August 21, 1903.] 



SCIENCE. 



231 



a part of this majority to become superior 

 craftsmen, rather than to feel that they 

 are superior to all crafts, and to be un- 

 willing to be put to any. 



Let us avoid the serious mistake of edu- 

 cating the majority as though they were 

 a privileged minority. Let us accept once 

 and for all the doctrine that any occupation 

 may be ennobled, enriched and dignified 

 by education, training, and skill ; that tliere 

 are a score of new professions requiring a 

 high order of intellect, and the close and 

 continued study of subjects as difficult and 

 as profound as are the branches which lead 

 up to the so-called learned professions. 



The educated and highly accomplished 

 architect or engineer is a learned man, and 

 he stands second to none in the forum and 

 in the arena of activitj^ to-day. There is 

 a great and an increasing demand for such 

 men in every city in the land. I have 

 been training engineers for nearly half a 

 century, and I know how inadequate the 

 supply is. In St. Louis we are quite un- 

 able to furnish graduates of our manual 

 training school as fast as they are wanted 

 in all kinds of industrial work. The other 

 day I was told that there were twelve hun- 

 dred educated engineers in Pittsburg, and 

 the demand was continually for more. The 

 number of students in the technical schools 

 — that is, the schools for applied science in 

 the various branches of engineering and 

 architecture — ought to be as numerous as 

 in colleges for letters and p.ure science, and 

 they will be as numerous when the sec- 

 ondary schools recognize the majority as 

 they now do the minority. The number 

 of students in colleges and higher technical 

 schools is increasing in this country at the 

 rate of five per cent, every year. 



What has been done in Philadelphia, 

 Kansas City and in some other cities, and 

 what is now doin? in St. Louis, ought to 



be done in every city that can nuiintain a 

 high school, viz., offer facilities for a sec- 

 ondary education looking towards indus- 

 trial occupations and teclinical professions 

 equal, at least, to those offered for students 

 looking forward to clerical or mercantile 

 occupations and the traditional professions. 



Are you doubtful about the intellectual, 

 moral and social standing of the graduates 

 of schools which incorporate a tliorough 

 course of manual training, including prac- 

 tical drafting with a modest academic 

 course ? If so, it will be of value if I give 

 you the record of the gi-aduates of a high 

 grade manual training school which has 

 been in existence twenty-three years and 

 has graduated twenty classes. I refer to 

 the school connected with "Washington Uni- 

 versit.y in St. Louis. 



Before I read the list please bear in mind 

 that the school does not aim to produce 

 mechanics. Not every boy is fit to be, or 

 has the ability to be, a good mechanic. 

 "When the whole boj' has been put to school 

 three or four years he finds out what his 

 strong points are, if he has any, and he 

 works into the occupation where he is most 

 likely to achieve success. In point of fact 

 the round plug gets into the round hole, 

 and the square plug gets into the square 

 hole, with an infinite sense of compatibility 

 pervading both plugs and holes. ]Many 

 graduates who started life as mechanics 

 have pushed along, and have been called 

 up higher, to greater responsibilities and 

 to larger rewards. We do not pretend to 

 know what a boy is by nature best fitted 

 for, nor what opportunities his environ- 

 ment will offer. We attach no value to 

 the whims and fancies of a thirteen-year- 

 old boy, and very little to the ambitious 

 hopes of parents. W^ien a boy stands four- 

 square on a broad foundation he is pretty 

 sure to build arisht. 



