Page:The Scientific Monthly vol. 3.djvu/129

 CHANGING CONDITIONS IN KENTUCKY 123

Ue walls, floors and seats were dirty. Two of the children were siiffer- ^%from trachoma. The equipment owned by the school consisted of ^^e wall map and three calendars. The only object on the desk was ^ soiall switch. The girl-teacher, who was a graduate of the institute ^^ Oneida, had charge of 69 pupils and, besides, was teaching, without ^^y, a '^ moonlight " school of evenings, to which people of all ages were '^iiig. She did not show any surprise or nervousness when our group fen nien in nailed boots filed in. Xor did the children pay much ^^*ion to the visitors. The third grade droned out its reading lesson, Th ^^ ^^^ second grade carried out its solemn program in spelling. . -.^ ^^as a solemnity about it all which the outsider does not under- thiz ^^^i^ ^^ becomes acquainted with the gravity of these people in ^^therings. Progress was being made, though it seemed a pity Y®X» \V\e children should have to learn the definition of some words v^uch probably they never will have occasion to use. The day of the '* shouting school" (in which the pupils indicate that they are study- ing; by reading aloud) has passed in the mountains. In a second school, a girl, younger than the first teacher, was in charge. She had had no training beyond the common school. There were a few modern desks, but also some rough hewn pews. When I tiptoed to the door and took a photograph of the interior she showed less surprise than an Indiana schoolmistress would have exhibited, but she smiled when some of her children awakened to the situation. In a third school a middle-aged man was in charge. He said that in some sections a holiday week is declBTed during the corn-haxvesting season. We visited also the mission and W. C. T. U. settlement schools, which are coming into the country ; as at Buckhorn, Hindman, Pine Mountain Postoffice, and Blackie. In these schools, conditions are much better. Many of the teachers are college graduates. I have in mind one of them, a young woman, who would be considered an excellent teacher in anv of our imiversities. One of the teachers had just returned from a vacation in New England, and another, from Paris. It was a privilege to meet these people of genuine culture among the hills. Their helpful and unselfish presence among the mountaineers is a good omen. An unfortunate feature of these insti- tutions is the extreme scarcity of men teachers.

Berea College, on the western margin of the region, serves as a uni- versity for the mountains, and is sending its extension department with wagon and camp into the remote sections. The reader is referred to the December, 1912, number of The American Magazine, for the story of the heroic foundation of Oneida Baptist Institute, and is reminded of Bulletin Number 530 of the TTnited States Bureau of Education, for the story of the opening of "moonlight" schools in the Kentucky moun- tains in 1911 for children, parents and grandparents. When the feud breaks out, mountain mothers from the section in which blood is shed,

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