Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 66.djvu/89

Rh, thoroughly trained theoretically without any so-called practical knowledge unless this knowledge has heen gained by employment in actual works.'

On the pay-roll of this English firm I find that five men receive salaries of more than $20,000. All these are graduates of technical departments of American universities. Seventeen receive from $6,000 to $20,000. Nine of these were trained in American universities, one in Australia and two in England, while five have risen from the ranks.

In the lower positions, most have been trained in Australia, a few in England, while in positions bearing a salary of less than $2,500, most have risen from the ranks.

"Given men of equal qualifications," says the director of this firm, "the man of technical training is bound to rise to the higher position because of his greater value to his employer. As a rule, also, men who have been technically trained are, by virtue of their education, men who are endowed with a professional feeling which does not to the same extent exist among those men who have risen from the rank and file. They are therefore more trustworthy and especially in mining work, where premium for dishonesty exists, for this qualification alone they are bound to have precedence. We do not by any means wish to disparage the qualifications of many men who have risen from the ranks to eminent positions, but our opinion may be concentrated in the statement that even these men would be better men had they received a thorough technical training."

The progress of chemical engineering is parallel with that in other departments of technology. Yet the appreciation of the value of theoretical training is somewhat less marked, and in this regard our manufacturers seem distinctly behind those of Germany.

"The development of chemical industries in the past history of the United States," says a correspondent, "was seriously delayed by the usually superficial and narrow training of the chemist in the colleges. Thus managers and proprietors came to undervalue the importance of chemical knowledge. The greatest need at present in the development of chemical industries is an adequate supply of chemists of thorough training to teach manufacturers the importance in their business of adequate chemical knowledge. Epoch-making advances in chemical industry will spring from the brain of great chemists, and to ensure the production of a few of these, the country must expect to seed lavishly and to fertilize generously the soil from which they spring. Germany has learned the lesson well: other nations can not long delay."

In the vast range of the applications of science to agriculture, the same general statements hold good. There is, however, no such general appreciation of the value of training as appears in relation to the various branches of training, and the men of scientific education are mostly absorbed in the many ramifications of the Department of Agriculture and in the state agricultural colleges and experiment stations.