Examples of 1890's Era
High School and College Classes
(First, The Introduction,
Then Some Depth!)

11th Grade (Oct 1896-June 1897) English History Burke's Speech on Conciliation with America * English Literature As You Like It Macauley's Life of Samuel Johnson German Schiller's Leid von der Glocke and Taucher Heine's Die Harzgeise Freytag's Fluch Der Schonheit Lessing's Minna von Barnhelm Goethe's Aus Meinen Leben Latin Arithmetic Latin Composition French Greek and Roman History [Context] 12th Grade (Oct 1897-June 1898) German Physics Algebra Geometry Astronomy Greek Latin College Freshman (Oct 1898-June 1899) French German Goethe Schiller History 476 AD - 1799 AD English Composition Milton's Poems and Areopagitica English Literature French Literature Corneille Moliére Racine Alfred de Musset Saine-Beuve Balzac Mérimée Victor Hugo College Sophomore (Oct 1899-June 1900) English Composition Bible as English Literature Odes of Horace Latin Comedy College Junior (Oct 1900-June 1901) Economics Elizabethan Literature Shakespeare History of Philosophy Reading List Little Lord Fauntleroy The Scarlet Letter (age 8) Greek Heroes LaFontaine, Fables (English, later, in French) Hawthorne, Wonder Book and Bible Stories Lamb, Tales from Shakespeare Dickens,  A Child's History of England The Arabian Nights The Swiss Family Robinson The Pilgrim's Progress Robinson Crusoe Little Women Heide (English, later, in German) The Jungle Book Wild Animals I Have Known Homer's Aeneid and Iliad Green, History of the English People Emerton, Middle Ages Goethe, Faust (in German) Le Medécin Malgré Lui The Chambered Nautilus In School Days Laus Deo (recited it) A Boy I Knew Birdie and Her Friends (pre-1879 book), containing story by Margaret Canby, The Frost Fairies (read aloud to child at age 8; followed by an accusation of the child plagiarising it nearly verbatim at age 12! when the truth was, the child had simply remembered it, internalized it, made it her own!) Author Reading List Carlyle Wordsworth Hood Herrick Whittier Mark Twain Scott Lowell Swedenborg's Heaven and Hell Drummond's Ascent of Man Washington Irving's Sleepy Hollow Miscellaneous Boat rowing and sailing A Sample Test Question: "Give an Account of Hus and His Work" How Diamonds Are Mined (1893) 1892, age 12, wrote an article for magazine publication, Youth's Companion *"Edmund Burke's On conciliation with the colonies, not the easiest work of thought and rhetoric for adolescents, was widely taught in high schools. And discussed and debated. Today it's seldom read even in 'universities,'" says Prof. Paul Fussell, Ph.D., Doing Battle: The Making of a Skeptic (Little, Brown, 1996), p 12. (Review; 2) (Chapter 1). The above data is from Helen Keller's, The Story of My Life (1902), particularly chapters 13-21. Wasn't that impressive, how much that student was assigned to study? It may help you put this in perspective, to know one more fact about that student. That student was Helen Keller (1880-1968). Due to disease, she had become blind and deaf at age 19 months. Yes, she did all that studying while she was blind and deaf. She did more, blind and deaf, than many do now, seeing and hearing. She had become deaf and blind at age 19 months. It was not until some years later before her parents were able to arrange some education for her, which began around age 7. So she had a late start, about two years late, on her education even beginning, later than most people now. Teachers trained to tutor the blind and deaf were retained when she was age 7. They began reading to her by signing on her hand and arm. She had to learn that first. That took some time. A significant reading program did not begin until she was about age 8. She still could not speak. It was not until she was age 10, March 1890, that she spoke her first sentence. That was, "It is warm." As the reading list above, shows, she made substantial progress thereafter!—more than many people nowadays, who don't have such a long delay before they can even start their learning process. Reading lists of this type were in the pre-homework era; schools existed to teach, to have students memorize VAST quantities in breadth and depth, and had the students read and study on-premises. At home, students did parental assignments, not school work. [Now in the dumbed-down era, anti-educators and anti-teachers have abolished the vast memorization concept, in favor of 'happy happy' concepts, and purporting to develop 'understanding.' Our more highly educated ancestors opposed this dumbed down approach, knew that providing, teaching, requiring learning of, vast quantities of data is best, with 'understanding' to come later, after the knowledge assimilation process and the practicalities and experiences of life.] At age 22, Helen Keller wrote her autobiography (1902). Have you written any books? Do you know anyone who has? Keller's autobiography of course did not list all that she had been taught and had learned in that short time. A textbook from that era is Sanders' Fifth Union Reader: Principles of Rhetorical Reading, by Charles M. Sanders, A.M. (New York and Chicago: Ivison, Blakeman, Taylor & Co, 1867) See uses of a classic education, as applied by Charles Sumner, in 1840's - 1860 anti-slavery and anti-war context. And see Lincoln's 1854 Peoria Speech for basic legal concepts that Northerners widely understood, and which we fought a war to defend against early anti-educationists (Confederates). Back then, 1830's - 1860's readers could easily comprehend classic references, and languages, how they are used, and their meaning-in-context. See references to “Xerxes scourging the Hellespont,” cited by Rev. Beriah Green, Chattel Principle (1837), p 33 the Roman girl “Virginia,” cited by Rev. John G. Fee, Sinfulness of Slaveholding (1851), p 29 “The Cid . . . Rui Diaz, the champion of Bivar,” cited by Charles Sumner, Barbarism of Slavery (Dedication, 4 July 1863), p 5 in Army recruiting literature for youths! (And note the rest of the book! and its difficult material now, easy then! That style wouldn't do much as recruiting literature now?, would it! Too over teenage readers' heads!) the many classic references, footnotes, including untranslated Latin quotations comprehensible to the average educated person of that era, in Sumner's 1845-1870 war history speeches distinguishing “book-law [from] the rule of actual practice,” cited by Abraham Lincoln, Peoria Speech (1854), p 221, referring to the "common law" and Blackstonian "Natural Law" concepts that everyone (including children) then understood in its fundamentals, and now is almost unknown, even ignored by judges from time to time! (Example: Then children could understand slavery unconstitutionality pre-Thirteenth Amendment, now an unknown fact! And think of the gross ignorance of the rights to pure air and put out fires!) Reader, do YOU know from your education, these classic references? and legal concepts?! In that same time period, Abraham Lincoln “probably the greatest writer among American Presidents [had studied] “the powerful beauty of the King James version of the Bible [and] as a youth . . . books on elecution, grammar, and rhetoric that were, in some important respects, superior to many of today's school books in teaching clear, eloquent and convincing language.”—Robert L. Polley, Lincoln: His Words and His World (Waukesha, Wis., Country Beautiful Foundation, for Hawthorn Books, New York: 1965), p 9. See also Lincoln's anti-aggression-war speech and his anti-slavery speech. Note the education of the child Elizabeth Tudor (1533-1603): “history, geography, astronomy, mathematics and music . . . translated Greek and Latin for recreation [no dumbed down TV for her!] . . . wrote poetry and composed prayers that were printed and sold for popular consumption . . . one of her earliest literary efforts, a long religious poem that she translated from the French. . . . Elizabeth explains that she worked at 'joining the sentences together as well as the capacity of my simple wit and small learning could extend themselves.' She was 11 at the time.” That volume too was printed in “a bound edition” now at “the Folger exhibition.” This data is cited by Doug Stewart, “Reign On!,” Smithsonian, pp 64-72 (June 2003). For more on Queen Elizabeth I's education, see Elizabeth Jenkins, Elizabeth the Great (New York: Coward-McCann, 1958): "Greek, Latin . . . history, geography, mathematics, the elements of architecture and astronomy and four modern languages: French, Italian, Spanish and Flemish" (p 19); "New Testament in Greek . . . Sophocles   . . . hours translating works from one foreign language into another and conversing with [teacher] on intellectual topics in all the languages in turn" (p 34). Reason: "It is an unerring rule and one of universal application, that a Prince [government official, or voter in self-governing societies] who is not wise [educated] himself cannot be well advised by others" (p 63). Note the love of reading of King Albert of Belgium, typically two books a day, says Barbara W. Tuchman, The Guns of August (New York: Dell Paperback, 1962). Note the education of the Scottish boys James Hutton (1726-1797) and David Hume (1711-1776) as reported by Jack Repcheck, M.A., The Man Who Found Time: James Hutton and the Discovery of the Earth's Antiquity (Perseus Pub, 2003), pp 59-60 and 63: "in November 1740 [Hutton] entered the University of Edinburgh . . . only fourteen, but that was the normal age to begin college at that time. David Hume . . . was only eleven when he started . . . ." Curriculum included Latin, Greek, logic, metaphysics, and natural philosophy (science). P 60: "Students paid the lecturer a fee . . . each course . . . . Thus, a professor had a strong incentive to develop a reputation as a fine speaker so that he could fill the lecture hall, and then his pockets." P 63: "Hutton graduated from the university in the spring of 1743 . . . appears [he] passed his years there rather uneventfully, which is what one would expect given his young age--even the precocious David Hume graduated from the University of Edinburgh at the age of fourteen without any of his professors noticing his presence among them." Note the education, "Scripture, Latin, Greek, French, German, Russian and Slavonic, mathematics, history, physics, and geography . . . logic," as tested c. May 1887 (result: 11 'A's and 1 'B') of the Russian boy Vladimir Ulrich Ulyanov (4/22/1870 - 1/21/1924), cited by Robert Payne, The Life and Death of Lenin (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1964), page 73 Note the education of the little German child Catherine the Great (1729-1796), recorded by Henri Troyat, Catherine la Grande (France: Flammarion, 1977; transl. by Joan Pinkham, New York: E. P. Dutton, 1980). At pages 4-5: Assignments to study Religion, Music, German and French (well-enough to write her later memoirs in French; could you write yours in a foreign language, or articulately at all in any language?!), Roman History (e.g., of Titus and Marcus Aurelius); to read authors Corneille, Racine, Molière, La Fontaine. Page 72: on own, self-motivated to learn, not just sitting there, watching TV, waiting to be told!, she read: "the works of La Calprenède and Mademoiselle de Scudéry, Astrée by Honoré d'Urfé, Clovis by Desmarets . . . the works of Brantôme . . . Madame de Sévigné . . . Father Basse's General History of Germany at the rate of one volume a week, and Father Préfixé's History of Henry the Great [Henri IV] . . . Voltaire . . . the four volumes of Bayle's Dictionary . . . precursor of the Encyclopedias." Page 91: "the Annals of Tacitus . . . Voltaire's Essay on the Manners and Spirit of Nations and Montesquieu's The Spirit of Laws." Does your child's so-called "school" teach near this level? !! :) As more data is obtained on education from this period, this website material will be expanded. Especially of concern is education from grades 1-10, which Keller omitted to cite except as implicit in her author and reading lists. (Suggestions welcome, by email below). It is evident how education has deteriorated. Keller's 1902 book, and the other cited references, gave author names or titles of readings, not necessarily both, as readers of that era were presumed educated and would know! Nowadays, this (for far too many people), is not the case at all: they don't know. That is why implementing the above suggestion for increasing graduation requirements is needful. For more on U.S. high school requirements of the 1890's era, see, e.g., (1) National Education Association, Report of the Committee of Ten on Secondary School Studies (New York: American Book Co, 1894), pp 46-47; (2) Edward A. Krug, of School of Education, University of Wisconsin, The Shaping of the American High School (New York: Harper & Row, 1964), pp 18-65; and (3) Lee C. Deighton, Editor-in-Chief, The Encyclopedia of Education (Macmillan Co & The Free Press, 1971), Vol. 7, pp 307-314 (by Edward A. Krug). Model High School Programmes: 1894† I. Classical II. Latin-Scientific III. Modern Languages IV. English I. Classical Three foreign languages (one modern). II. Latin-Scientific Two foreign languages (one modern). Year I (Grade 9) Year I (Grade 9) Latin 5 p. Latin 5 p. English 4 p. English 4 p. Algebra 4 p. Algebra 4 p. History 4 p. History 4 p. Physical Geography 3 p. Physical Geography 3 p. Total 20 p. Total 20 p. Classical Year I (Gr 10) Latin-Scientific Year I (Gr 10) Latin 5 p. Latin 5 p. English 2 p. English 2 p. *German [or French] begun 4 p. German [or French] begun 4 p. Geometry 3 p. Geometry 3 p. Physics 3 p. Physics 3 p. History 4 p. Botany or Zoology 4 p. Total 20 p. Total 20 p. Classical Year III (Gr 11) Latin-Scientific Year III (Gr 11) Latin 4 p. Latin 4 p. *Greek 5 p. English 3 p. English 3 p. German [or French] 4 p. German [or French] 4p Mathematics [Algebra 2; Geometry 2] 4 p. Mathematics [Algebra 2; Geometry 2] 4 p. Astronomy ½ yr. & Meteorology ½ year 3 p. History 2 p. Total 20 p. Total 20 p. Classical Year IV (Gr 12) Latin-Scientific Year IV (Gr 12) Latin 4 p. Latin 4 p. Greek 5 p. English [as in classical 2; additional 2] 4 p. English 2 p. German [or French] 3 p. German [or French] 3 p. Chemistry 3 p. Chemistry 3 p. Trigonometry & Higher Alegebra, or History 3 p. Trigonometry & Higher Algebra, or History 3 p. Geology or Physiography ½ yr, and Anatomy, Physiology, & Hygiene, ½ yr 3p Total 20 p. Total 20 p. *In any school in which Greek can be better taught than a modern language, or in which local public opinion or the history of the school makes it desirable to teach Greek in an ample way, Greek may be substituted for German or French in the second year of the Classical programme. Ed. Note: Information on Teaching Modern Languages in 2002 III. Modern Languages Two foreign languages (both modern). IV. English One foreign language (ancient or modern). Year I (Grade 9) Year I (Grade 9) French [or German] begun 5 p. Latin, or German, or French 5 p. English 4 p. English 4 p. Algebra 4 p. Algebra 4 p. History 4 p. History 4 p. Physical Geography 3 p. Physical Geography 3 p. Total 20 p Total 20 p. Modern Languages Year I (Gr 10) English Year I (Gr 10) French [or German] 4 p. Latin, or German, or French 5 or 4 p. English 2 p. English 3 or 4 p. German [or French] begun 5 p. Geometry 3 p. Geometry 4 p. Physics 3 p. Physics 4 p. History 3 p. Botany or Zoology 3 p. Botany or Zoology 3 p. Total 20 p Total 20 p. Modern Languages Year III (Gr 11) English Year III (Gr 11) French [or German] 4 p. Latin, or German, or French 4 p. English 3 p. English as in others 3; additional 2 5 p. German [or French] 4 p. Mathematics Algebra 2 Geometry 2 4 p. Mathematics Algebra 2 Geometry 2 4 p. Astronomy ½ yr. & Meterology ½ yr. 3 p. Astronomy ½. & Meterology ½ yr. 3 p. History 2 p. History as in the Latin-Scientific 2 additional 2 4 p. Total 20 p Total 20 p. Modern Languages Year IV (Gr 12) English Year IV (Gr 12) French [or German] 3 p. Latin, or German, or French 4 p. English, as in Classical 2, additional 2 4 p. English as in Classical 2; additional 2 4 p. German [or French] 4 p. Chemistry 2 p. Chemistry 3 p. Trigonometry & Higher Algebra 3 p. Trigonometry & Higher Algebra 3 or History 3 p. History 3 p. Geology or Physiography ½ yr and Anatomy, Physiology & Hygiene ½ yr 3 p. Geology or Physiography ½ yr., and Anatomy, Physiology, & Hygiene ½ yr 3 p. Total 20 p Total 20 p. †National Education Association, Report of the Committee of Ten on Secondary School Studies (New York: American Book Co, 1894), pp 46-47. Reprinted in Edward A. Krug, The Shaping of the American High School, supra, pp. 61-62. A modern analyst says “that [the past high school level] curriculum . . . is now about the level of a two-year college degree”—Linda Seebach (25 Feb 2002). (Context, "High School Graduates Fewer Than You Think" [16 Feb 2002]). As you learn here, she was far too kind! Even though you may not be able to rescue the schools of your district, you may be able to rescue your own child, or yourself, from the deteriorated education (each full year providing only 1/3 year of education, forcing the child more and more behind each year). Ways to escape the deterioration include (a) home schooling and/or (b) taking college-credit-level classes as soon as eligible and qualified to do so, and/or (c) obtaining a G.E.D. as soon as eligible and qualified, then forthwith entering college. Next, the 'some depth' on a bygone era's tobacco teaching promised above!

Examples from Students' and Medical Books
In That Era on Coverage of Tobacco Effects

"When we see a man whipping a good horse that is going fast enough, we feel angry. Now, the heart is like a willing horse. When it is making its seventy beats in a minute, it is going fast enough. "It is unnecessary and foolish to use any thing that will act as a whip does on a horse, and make it beat faster. That is just what [tobacco] does. "If it [the heart] is beating seventy times in a minute, a little [smoking] will often make it beat seventy-four or seventy-five times in a minute. Four or five beats in a minute make a great many extra beats in a day. Ed. Note: 4 extra beats per min. X 60 mins. X 24 hrs. = 5,760 extra beats per day 5 extra beats per min. X 60 mins. X 24 hrs. = 7,200 extra beats per day These extra beats are overworking the heart. See also Luther H. Higley and Theodore Frech, The Evils of Tobacco and Cigarettes (Butler, Indiana: The Higley Printing Co, 1916), p 30. "All these extra beats are labor lost. They are using the strength, without doing a particle of good," p 46. "The beats of a healthy heart are regular and steady, like the working of a steam-engine. When the heart is out of order, its beating is irregular and unsteady. One of the causes of such a condition is tobacco," p 47. "When a doctor says that Mr. A or Mr. B has a 48‘smoker's heart,' he means that he has got his heart into this unsteady state by smoking or chewing tobacco," pp 47-48. "Any bad smell in the air shows that there is something in it which ought not to be there. It is a sign of danger," p 104. "It is not good to breathe in a room full of . . . smoke," p 105. "The body is like a clock, with its wheels, and its spring, and its hands, and its ticking. If we take the clock to pieces, to see what it is made of, that is like the study of Anatomy. . . . If we set the clock a-going, and watch it to see how it ticks and strikes, and turns its hands, that is like the study of Physiology. . . . When we have learned these things about our bodies, we shall know how they should be taken care of in order to keep them in health. This knowledge is called Hygiene. Many grown people are very ignorant of these things. They abuse their bodies, and wear them out in various ways. . . . smoking or chewing tobacco, are among the most common ways," p 10. —William Thayer Smith, Ph.D., Prof of Physiology, Dartmouth Medical College, Primer of Physiology and Hygiene: A Textbook for Primary Classes (New York: Ivison, Blakeman & Co, 1885), pp 10, 46-48 and 104-105. In that era, "the laws state that all pupils must receive instruction in this subject . . . the younger pupils who can not yet read a text-book must be taught orally . . . the more advanced pupils must have a simple text-book . . . the higher grades must have a book which . . . shall also give a knowledge of the elements of physiology and hygiene," p 5. "In our study of Physiology and Hygiene, we need to learn how to take good care of the body so that it may grow to be well-formed and of full size. There are many ways in which we may injure the body and prevent its natural development . . . poor food . . . the use of injurious substances such as tobacco . . . . These substances are such powerful poisons that they injure every part of the body, especially the blood and nerves, and hinder the natural growth. Young persons are easily injured by chewing or smoking tobacco . . . .," p 21. "While these substances are poisonous and injurious, it is true that the person who uses them may become so accustomed to their effect that he does not know how much they are hurting him. Sooner or later, however, he will find out how evil they are, and it may then be too late to remedy their bad effects. . . . Young people need . . . good food instead of tobacco. . . . the habits that are fixed in youth are difficult to correct in later years. The appetite for tobacco . . . usually grows stronger with advancing life, so that the man who has formed such habits continues to be a slave to them. . . . Proper food and healthful exercise can do more than any thing else to promote our growth, while tobacco [is] to be shunned as evil, and only evil, to us," p 22. "The nervous system, like all other parts [of the body], is dependent upon the blood for repair. Hence, it follows that faulty nutrition and impurity of blood result in nervous weakness. Impure air, by its effects on the blood, deadens the energies of the nervous system. . . . The nervous system suffers through imperfect respiration . . . . [Some] substances . . . taken as food, drink, or medicine, affect the nerves by paralyzing them . . . substances such as tobacco, opium . . . chloroform, and other articles of the same kind. . . . The nervous system and the mind are so closely related, that whatever affects one also affects the other. When the system is healthful and vigorous, mental action is most forcible and reliable. Whatever weakens the nervous system, or disturbs it, produces corresponding disturbances in the mind. What is known as insanity, in which case the judgment and reason are dethroned, is the result. . . .," pp 122-123. "Intoxication is temporary insanity. It is not surprising that many repetitions of intoxication frequently lead to permanent forms of insanity. . . . Tobacco . . . is a poison. When chewed or smoked, its poisonous portion is absorbed by the blood and circulated through the system. Its effects are most fully shown in injury to the blood itself, and in paralysis of nervous force. Its influence on the nervous and muscular systems is so powerful that its use in medicine is regarded as too dangerous . . . Its use causes diseased conditions of the vital organs. The stomach, the liver, the heart, and the nervous centers suffer most from its use. The effects of tobacco blunt and degrade the mind. By its narcotic effects, its use fixes upon the system the most slavish conditions of the will. The person who permits himself to become addicted to its habitual use loses his power to stop the evil habit. No intelligent person who uses it, will advise another to begin the use of it," p 125. —Eli F. Brown, The Eclectic Physiology or Guide to Good Health (New York: American Book Co, 1886), pp 5, 21-22, 71, 122-123, and 125. "The use of tobacco is a pernicious habit in whatever form it is introduced into the system. Its active principle [ingredient], Nicotin, which is an energetic [strong] poison, exerts its specific effect on the nervous system . . . . the tone of the system is greatly impaired, and it responds more feebly to the influence of curative agents." "Tobacco itself, when its use becomes habitual and excessive, gives rise to the most unpleasant and dangerous pathological conditions. Oppressive torpor, weakness or loss of intellect, softening of the brain, paralysis, nervous debility, dyspepsia, functional derangement of the heart, and diseases of the liver and kidneys are not uncommon consequences . . . . A sense of faintness, nausea, giddiness, dryness of the throat, tremblings, feelings of fear, disquietude [paranoia], and general nervous prostration must frequently warn persons addicted to this habit that they are sapping the very foundation of health. . . . The opium habit . . . is open to the same objections." —Ray V. Pierce, M.D., The People's Common Sense Medical Adviser in Plain English; or, Medicine Simplified, 21st ed (Buffalo NY: World's Dispensary Printing Office and Bindery, 1889), pp 384-385. (Notice that opium is so far less a problem as to warrant only a one sentence reference! Yet post-gateway drugs are what politicians emphasize and fixate on—maliciously, with intent to harm society by focusing on post-gateway matters, on effects vs causation. They know that the "natural and probable consequences" of their fixating on effects, is to misdirect societal attention off causation, thus promote the very evils such politicans often profess to oppose. Such politicians are evil, vile, depraved. Notice that such politicians often oppose genuine prevention efforts. Examples: Supposedly anti-abortion / anti-drug politicians often SUPPORT tobacco, i.e., sabotage their professed goals. For parallel 1998 confirmatory data, see Theodore A. Slotkin, Dep't of Pharmacology and Cancer Biology, Duke University Medical Center, "Fetal Nicotine or Cocaine Exposure: Which One is Worse?", 285 J Pharmacol & Experimental Therapeutics (#3) 931-945 (24 March 1998) [summary at our birth defects information site]. "Tobacco contains a sharp-tasting liquid called nicotine, which is a quick-acting and deadly poison. Because of this poison, the juice of the tobacco is never purposely swallowed; but in chewing, the saliva dissolves the nicotine, and a part of it is absorbed into the system; while in smoking, the nicotine in the smoke and vapor is absorbed 72by the saliva and the moist membranes of the mouth and nose, where it exerts all of its harmful effects . . .," pp 71-72. "What has been said in the preceding lessons about the influence of alcohol upon the will power, applies with equal truth to such narcotics as tobacco and opium," p 73. ". . . heart action is increased when tobacco is being used . . . is due, not to stimulation of the heart, but to partial paralysis of the vagi nerves. From previous lessons you know that the vagi nerves hold the heart in check, causing it to reserve its power . . . if the vagi nerves are paralyzed, the heart beats rapidly, thus unnecessarily wearing itself out," p 161. "The greatest care should be taken by those who have buildings in charge to insure their absolute freedom from all . . . harmful, and sometimes fatal, impurities of the air. . . .When a room is properly ventilated, the air should seem odorless to one coming in from out of doors," p 187. "The free [repeated] use of either alcohol or tobacco may cause a very serious injury to the sight," p 235. "In boys addicted to this (tobacco) habit I find a nervous irritability, and inability to do the work that properly belongs to boys of their age," p 250. —Winfred S. Hall, Ph.D., M.D., Elementary Anatomy, Physiology and Hygiene for Higher Grammar Grades (New York: American Book Co, 1900). "The cells of the brain may become poisoned from tobacco. The ideas may lack clearness of outline. The will power may be weakened, and it may be an effort to do the routine duties of life. . . . The memory may also be impaired."—Dr. Albert F. Blaisdell, Our Bodies and How We Live (1904) (an elementary school textbook). "Nicotine is a rapidly acting poison resembling hydrocyanic acid in its fatal effects," p 931.   Page 1236 has this list entitled, "Some Good Reasons Why A Boy Should Not Smoke Tobacco": "1st. Cigarettes or tobacco in any form hinders the growth and injures the nerves and health." "2d. Cigarettes foster the tobacco habit, and may make any boy a slave to it." "3d. The cigarette habit does not help a boy in his life work, and may prevent him from obtaining a good position in business." "4th. Most all reliable business establishments refuse to employ boys who smoke cigarettes." "5th. The following are among the poisons and drugs used in the manufacture of cigarettes: Arsenic, Creosote, Nicotine, Opium, Saltpetre, Tonca flavoring and Rum, all of which are harmful." "6th. Cigarette smoking makes a boy dull and stupid, impairs his memory and prevents his advance in school." "7th. Smoking creates an unnatural thirst, which may lead to drinking intoxicating liquors." "8th. Smoking is a selfish habit which may cause [unlawful] annoyance, discomfort and distress to others." "9th. Tobacco affects the eye, ear and nose, or sight, hearing and smelling, and also the heart." —Joseph G. Richardson, M.D., Prof of Hygiene, Univ of Pennsylvania, Health and Longevity (New York: Home Health Society, 1909), pp 931 and 1236. "Tobacco . . . contains a very poisonous, volatile, oily liquid alkaloid, called nicotine. . . . Tobacco is a marked depressant nauseant, it produces emesis by irritation as well as by systemic action. Its continued use by smoking or chewing . . . produces granular inflammation of the mucous membrane of the mouth and pharynx, atrophy of the retina, dyspepsia, lowered sexual vitality, sudden faints, nervous depression, and cardiac irritability. Used by the young, it hinders the development of the brain, and interferes with metabolism in general . . . . It is claimed to produce cancer of the lips and tongue, blunting of the moral sense, mental aberration, and even insanity. The so-called ‘tobacco heart' induces many forms of nervous, painful, and oppressed cardiac action . . . ." "Nicotine is one of the most deadly poisons known. The author remembers poisoning a cat with this agent in the pharmacy school. The animal at once became greatly excited, then there was a wild stare, a deep sigh, and sudden death within three minutes after the ingestion of the drug." —John P. Buckley, Ph.G., D.D.S., Prof. of Pharmacology and Therapeutics, Chicago College of Dental Surgery, Modern Dental Materia Medica, Pharmacology and Therapeutics (Philadelphia: P. Blakiston's Son & Co, 1909-1911), p 153. "Tobacco is a rapidly acting poison resembling hydrocyanic acid in its fatal effects," p 1469. "There is no deadlier poison in nature than Nicotine. A drop or two of nicotine is sufficient to cause death. Like all poisons, it is highly stimulating for the instant, soon to be followed by its death-like effects. It is the peculiar poison which tobacco in any and all of its forms yields. The tobacco chewer, snuff taker, cigar smoker, and cigarette fiend . . . is simply administering poison to the vitals. . . . The boy or girl who uses tobacco before reaching maturity is sure to wreck the nervous system and take a long step toward idiocy or insanity. Perfect, clean, energetic and acceptable manhood or womanhood is impossible for a youthful tobacco poisoner. . . .," p 1485. "It is to be doubted whether any sane adult ever deliberately learned the tobacco habit. . . . it is to be doubted whether a sane man exists who does not deprecate the habit and wishes he were rid of it," p 1486. "No non-user of tobacco ever felt the worse or expressed regret over his abstention. No user of tobacco ever denied that the habit is— 1st. A filthy one, in that it begets frequent spitting of stained saliva by chewers, sickening smoke odors by smokers, and discharge of discolored mucous by snuffers. Add to this the disgustingly odorous smoke of the cigarette fiend, and then wonder what worse in the way of filth can be realized. "2d. No matter what the natural constitution or excuse, the habit is a dangerous one. It grows by what it feeds upon, and leads to gradual and insidious wreckage of the finer sensibilities and active nerve forces. "3d. It is an expensive habit, often entailing poverty, and always diminishing the recompense of labor. In the families of those who earn meagre support its expensiveness is almost the equivalent of robbery of wife and children. Destitution lies in the wake of tobacco . . . . "4th. It is an inconvenient habit and very often interferes with work . . . ," p 1486. "The most common narcotic in use is probably tobacco . . . its excessive use in the cigarette form, as also in the ordinary ways of chewing, smoking, and snuffing, has a tendency to foster in the young inclinations destructive of a high moral tone," p 1488. Pages 1487-1488 have this list entitled, "One Dozen Good Reasons Why A Boy Should Not Use Tobacco": "1st. Cigarettes or tobacco in any form hinder the growth and injure the nerves and health." "2d. Cigarettes foster the tobacco habit, and may make any boy a slave to it." "3d. The cigarette habit does not help a boy in his lifework, and may prevent him from obtaining a good position in business." "4th. Most all reliable business establishments refuse to employ boys who smoke cigarettes." "5th. The following are among the poisons and drugs used in the manufacture of cigarettes: Arsenic, Creosote, Nicotine, Opium, Saltpetre, Tonca flavoring and Rum, all of which are harmful." "6th. Cigarette smoking makes a boy dull and stupid, impairs his memory and prevents his advance in school." "7th. Smoking creates an unnatural thirst, which may lead to drinking intoxicating liquors." "8th. Smoking is a selfish habit which may cause annoyance, discomfort and distress to others." "9th. Tobacco affects the eye, ear and nose, or sight, hearing and smelling, and also the heart." "10th. It costs more than most boys can afford to pay to ahve their nerves and health ruined." "11th. Smoking is a useless and expensive habit, and always does harm to a greater or less degree." "12th. It is also a filthy habit and defiles the body, and anything 1488that defiles or injures the body is a sin against God, who created man in His own image." —B. Frank Scholl, Ph.G., M.D., ed., Library of Health: Complete Guide to Prevention and Cure of Disease (Philadelphia: Historical Publishing Co, 1916), pp 1469 and 1485-1488. Instructions to Fifth Grade Teachers: "Assign a lesson on the effects of . . . tobacco to be studied from a hygiene textbook. Develop these points in class: Effects on growth: 1. Nervous system 2. Will power 3. Ability to do one's best," p 273. References: Michael V. O'Shea, Ph.D., and John H. Kellogg, M.D., Making the Most of Life (New York: Macmillan Co, 1915), pp 166-172 Charles-Edward Winslow, and Pauline B. Williamson, Laws of Health and How to Teach Them (New York: Charles E. Merrill Co, 1926), pp 97-98 Henry Ford's anti-tobacco literature (Ford widely circulated The Little White Slaver (1914), of which Edison's letter above was one item), p 276. Note that Ford's book then, taught children about the tobacco-insanity link, p 53 and the tobacco-crime link, p 28! Nowadays, adults, even adults with so-called doctorates, typically don't know these then simple basics-for-children! And even deny them!! No wonder the asylums and prisons are overflowing. And costs are soaring. And politicians' only remedy is more prison-building!! Thus "Michigan's prisons are bursting at the seams, sucking up precious state dollars at an alarming rate and could close to new inmates by fall," says the article "Prisons full by fall; now what?" (Detroit News, 19 Feb 2007). "The state is paying more for corrections ($1.94 billion) than it does for its 15 public universities ($1.78 billion)." —Charlotte T. Whitcomb (Supervisor of Nurses and Health Educ, Omaha Pub Schools) and John H. Beveridge (Superintendent of Schools, Omaha, Neb), Our Health Habits: A Complete Course in Child Hygiene for the Grades (Chicago: Rand McNally & Co, 1926), pp 273 and 276. Ed. Note: Wherefore children then, could know more practical science than adults now. For a sample 5th level reader of that era, click here. Quiz: "Are you smarter than a 5th grader?" "While the toxic action of tobacco-smoke was thought to be due chiefly to nicotine, certain oxidation products, as collidine, pyridine, picoline, and other bases of the same series, besides ammonia and traces of ethylamine, must be considered in that connection. . . . The principal interest of tobacco to the physician centers in its poisonous effects." Nicotine impacts "the spinal cord, medullary centers, and, in particular, the ganglia of the sympathetic and vagosacral autonomic systems . . . It produces nausea and vomiting, quick, deep, and then labored respiration, great muscular relaxation, giddiness, mental confusion, restlessness, feeble circulation, general depression, and, occasionally, clonic convulsions (apparently of spinal origin), followed by complete loss of reflexes, and death from respiratory paralysis. . . ." A long-continued heavy use of tobacco produces chronic inflammation of the upper air passages (nasopharyngitis), indigestion, anorexia, cardiac irregularity, and palpitation (tobacco-heart), deafness, headache, giddiness, tremors, and other nervous symptoms due to congestion of the brain, spinal cord, and peripheral nerves. Ed. Note: More on anorexia by: Laycock, 1846 Favarger, 1906 "The eye loses its vision for colors, and complete blindness may result from degeneration of the optic nerve. "The testicles atrophy and become discolored, and the ovary of the female habitué shrivels into a small kernel, hard and yellow (fibrous degeneration). Libido and virility are markedly diminished." —Charles E. de M. Sajous, M.D., LL.D., Sc.D., and Louis T. de M. Sajous, B.S., M.D. Sajous's Analytic Cyclopedia of Practical Medicine, 10th rev ed (Philadelphia: F. A. Davis Co, 1927-1929), Vol 8, pp 563-64. This is a book for “the upper elementary grades.” “Have you ever seen the inside of a watch, or clock? If you have, you know that it takes a lot of delicate wheels with teeth that fit carefully into each other to make it go. If you threw sand into these wheels, you can easily guess that it would soon interfere seriously with their work. Your body is also a delicate machine. You want it to work smoothly and properly for you. Therefore you should not take things into the body or do thing that disturb its work. [Substances such as] tobacco have certain harmful effects upon the body. Their use can be likened somewhat to the throwing of sand into the wheels of a delicate machine. The parts are kept from working smoothly and well,” pp 16-17. “Tobacco contains a poison called nicotine. The use of tobacco during the years of growth is also very much like throwing sand into the gears of a delicate machine. . . . In childhood and youth, when the different parts of the body are growing and becoming used to working together in the proper ways, all disturbing things should be avoided,” p 20. “Tobacco contains a poison called nicotine. Even in small amounts it interferes with the normal working of the heart. Immoderate use of tobacco, especially in young people, excites the heart, and causes it to beat rapidly. The heart becomes fatigued, or tired. This is a dangerous condition, and should be avoided. Young persons should never smoke,” p 305. “Tobacco is a plant which was unknown to the civilized world before the middle of the 16th century. . . . Tobacco contains a powerful poison called nicotine. A large part of the harm from smoking comes for the absorption of some of this nicotine into the body. . . . Tobacco smoke . . . contains some carbon monoxide gas and other substances in addition to nicotine. Tobacco smoking is irritating to the delicate lining of the air passages,” p 388. “Tobacco makes the heart beat faster. . . . During the growing period of life, the use of tobacco is especially harmful. Tobacco disturbs the nervous system. It may cause headaches, trembling, and nervousness. Its effects upon the nervous system extend to the control of muscles [ataxia] and make smoking very harmful. . . . Smoking lessens strength and endurance. The shortness of breath that results from the use of tobacco is a big handicap . . . . The control of muscles by the nervous system is disturbed. As a result the persons are not so alert or quick as before, and they cannot do things with as much skill. Tobacco handicaps its users . . .,” p 389. “Tobacco Interferes With Mental Work: Many experiments have been made to find out the effects of tobacco on mental work such as learning and memorizing things and following directions. They have shown that tobacco affects both the speed and accuracy of mental work. Persons using tobacco were found to make more mistakes in adding figures [acalculia] than persons who did not use it. The users of tobacco also learned new things less easily and tired more quickly at their work than those who did not use it. School marks show that smoking and successful school work do not go well together,” p 390. An “employer knows that loafing too often goes with smoking and that the poisonous nicotine will keep him [the employee] from doing his best work. Smoking is annoying to many people. The smoker carries the unpleasant tobacco smell about with him on his skin and in his clothes. Then there is also the danger of fire from the careless handling of matches, cigarette stumps, and the hot ashes of tobacco. All these things are very likely to turn a careful employer away from the user of tobacco in favor of the one who does not use it,” p 391. Concerning “the use of tobacco. Its harm to the body, its interference with good school work, and its effects upon the character of the user are . . . too great,” p 392. “There is a form of slavery in the world today which might be considered as terrible or even worse than the slavery of old. It is the slavery to narcotic drugs. . . . The person who begins their use soon finds that more and more must be sued. . . . As a result, the user is a slave to drugs and will commit crimes . . . to keep supplied. . . . he will steal, lie, or even kill . . . You can easily see that it is about impossible for drug users to have much ambition, or even the ability, for doing worth-while things,” p 393. —William E. Burkard, Ph.D. (Principal, Philadelphia Public Schools), Raymond L. Chambers, Ph.D. (Principal, Philadelphia Public Schools), and Frederick W. Maroney, M.D. (Teachers College, Columbia University), Building for Health and Body and Health (Chicago: Lyons & Carnahan, 1936), pp 16-17, 20, 305, 388-391, and 393. Ed. Note: Wherefore children then, could know more practical science than adults now. "Tobacco was unknown to the civilized world up to the time of the discovery of America," p 122. "There are a number of harmful drugs in tobacco, but the principal one is nicotine. . . . Sometime a doctor orders a person not to smoke . . . because the heart or the nerves have been injured by the drugs in tobacco. . . . Athletes are not allowed to smoke because of possible injury to the heart or to the breathing muscles. Many employers do not allow their employees to smoke while on duty." p 123. "Suppose eyes, hearts, arms, and legs were for sale. What are some of the things you would look for in a heart if you were choosing one? . . . Do things last longer and give better service when they are given good care? What are some of the things to do to take care of a watch or a camera or a bicycle or any other of your belongings which you would find very difficult to replace? What are some of the things you can do to take care of your heart so that it will wear well?" p 126. —James M. Andress, Ph.D. (Editor, School and Health Section, Hygeia), Isidore H. Goldberger, M.D. (Ass't Dir, Health Educ, N Y City Public Schools), and Grace T. Hallock (Dir, Welfare Publication Bureau, Metropolitan Life Insurance Co), Safe and Healthy Living, vol 7 in Building Good Health (Boston: Ginn and Company, 1939-1945)

For a list of educational materials on teaching youth in this era, see the Bibliography in Botany Professor Bruce Fink's Tobacco (Cincinnati: The Abingdon Press, 1915), pp 111-123. See books of the era, 1798, 1833, 1836, 1845, 1859, 1860, 1862, and 1868. See the "Founding Father's Library" by Prof. Forrest McDonald (23 February 2004) ("The Americans were a remarkably literate people, and they were even more remarkable in the voracity of their appetites for things to read.") See the erudite nature of magazine contents from the 1787-1878 era. See an eighth grade test of 1895. Compare with 1998 and 2006. See cases of the era, 1855, 1866, 1874, 1878, 1890, and 1898. For an example of what children of 1889 knew, see the Michigan House of Representatives Report of that year. For background on current high school graduation rates, see manhattan-institute.org. For overview of the statistical research process, click here. For example of Civil War recruiting literature, click here. For the current citizenship test for applicants, click here.

Examples of Authors / Writings Familiar
to Educated People of That Era

Adams, John (1735-1826), American lawyer, statesman Addison, Joseph (1672-1719) English essayist, poet Aeneid (by Virgil, 70 B.C. - 19 B.C.) Aeschylus (525-456 B.C.), Greek dramatist Aesop (620 - 560 B.C.), Greek fabulist Andersen, Hans Christian (1805-1875), Danish writer Aristophanes (448 - 380 B.C.), Athenian dramatist St. Augustine, Aurelius (354 - 430 A.D.), professor, Bishop Aurelius, Marcus (121 - 180 A.D.), philosopher, emperor Bacon, Sir Francis (1561-1626), English essayist, philospher, statesman Beowulf (Old English sage of Geatish warrior) Berkeley, George (1685-1753), Irish bishop, philosopher Brontë, Charlotte (1816-1854), Emily (1818-1848), Anne (1820-1849), novelists, poets Browne, Sir Thomas (1605-1672), English physician and author Browning, Elizabeth (1806-1861), English poet Browning, Robert (1812-1889), English poet Bryant, William Cullen (1794-1878), American poet, journalist Burke, Edmund, On the Sublime, French Revolution Burns, Robert (1659-1696), Scottish poet Byron, Lord George (1788-1824), English poet Calderón de la Barca, Pedro (1600-1681), Spanish dramatist and poet Carlyle, Thomas (1795-1881) Scottish historian, essayist Cellini, Benvenuto (1500-1571), Italian sculptor, goldsmith Cervantes, Miguel (1547 - 1616), Spanish humorist, Don Quixote, (1605) Chaucer, Geoffrey (1340 - 1400), English poet, Canterbury Tales Cicero, Marcus T. (106 - 43 B.C.), Roman philosopher, lawyer, orator Confucius (551-479 B.C.), Chinese philosopher Corneille, Pierre (1606-1684), French dramatist Cowley, Abraham (1618-1667), English poet Dana, Two Years Before the Mast Dante, Alighieri (1265 - 1321), poet, Divine Comedy Darwin, Charles (1809-1882), naturalist, Voyage of the Beagle Descartes, René (1596-1650), French mathematician, philosopher Dickens, Charles (1812-1870), English novelist Donne, John (1572-1631), English divine, poet Dryden, John (1631-1700), English dramatist, poet laureate, All for Love Egmont, Comte Lamoral d' (1522-1568), Flemish general and statesman Emerson, Rev. Ralph Waldo (1803-1882), American essayist, poet Epictetus (50 - 130 A.D.), Greek Stoic philosopher Euripides (480 - 406 B.C.), Greek dramatist Faraday, Michael (1791-1867), English chemist, physicist Faust Doctor Faustus Franklin, Benjamin (1706-1790), American printer, inventor, displomat Froissart, Jean (1333-1400), French chronicler Goethe, Johann W. von (1749-1832), lawyer, statesman, dramatist, science & art writer Goldsmith, Oliver (1728-1774), British writer, She Stoops to Conquer Grant, Ulysses (1822-1885), American soldier, statesman Grimm, Fairy Tales Hamilton, Alexander (1757-1804), American soldier, lawyer, statesman Harvey Helmholtz Herbert Herodotus (485-428), Greek "Father of History" Hobbes, Thomas (1588-1679), English philosopher Holinshed Homer, Greek poet, The Odyssey Hugo, Victor (1802-1885), dramatist, poet, novelist Les Misérables Hume, David (1711-1776), Scottish philosopher Huxley Kant, Immanuel (1724-1804), physics, professor, philosopher Keats, John (1795-1821), English poet Kelvin Kempis, Thomas à (1380-1471), ecclesiastic, Imitation of Christ Jefferson, Thomas (1743-1826), American statesman Jenner Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784), poet, lexicographer, critic Jonson Lee, Robert E. (1807-1870), Southern soldier, educator, "Farewell" Lessing Lincoln, Abraham (1809-1865), lawyer, statesman, "First Inaugural," Peoria Speech Lister Locke, John (1632-1704), English philosopher Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth (1807-1882), American poet Luther Machiavelli Macaulay Major Religions (Chinese, Hebrew, Christian, Buddhist, Hindu, Islam) Malory Manzoni, I Promessi Sposi Marlowe Mayflower Compact Mill, John Stuart (1806-1873), English economist, philosopher Milton, John (1608-1674), English poet Molière: Poquelin, Jean B. (1622-1673), French dramatist Montaigne, Michel (1533-1592), French philosopher, moralist, Essays More Newcomb Newman Newton, Sir Isaac (1642-1727), English mathematician, astronomer the Niblungs Pascal, Blaise (1623 - 1662), mathematician, philosopher, scientist Pasteur Penn, William Pericles Pilgrim's Progress Plato (427 - 347 B.C.), philosopher and educator [Gaius] Pliny [Secundus (23 - 79 B.C.)] Plutarch (46 - 120 A.D.), Greek biographer, lecturer, moralist Poe, Edgar Allen (1809-1849), American poet, story-writer Racine Renan Rousseau, Jean J. (1712-1778), French philosopher Sainte-Beuve Sidney Schiller Scott, Sir Walter (1771-1832), Scottist poet, novelist Shakespeare, William (1564-1616), English dramatist, poet, actor Shelley, Percy Bysshe (1792-1822), English poet Sheridan, School for Scandal Smith, Adam "Song of Roland" Stevenson, Robert Louis Balfour (1850-1894), Scottish novelist, essayist, poet Swift, Jonathan (1667-1745), English satirst, Gulliver's Travels Tacitus, Cornelius (55-117 A.D.), Roman historian Tennyson, Alfred (1809-1892), English poet Thackeray, William M. (1811-1863), English novelist The Thousand and One Nights Virgil (70 - 19 B.C.), Roman poet Voltaire: Arouet, François-Marie (1694-1778), French historiographer, dramatist Walton Washington, George (1732-1799), American soldier, statesman Whitman, Walt (1819-1892), American poet, "Leaves of Grass" Woolman, John More at anova.org/gb Book List Test yourself; how many of the above could you identify, without the explanatory notes there? Do you wish this site were not under construction, and all the notes were there? "If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be."—Thomas Jefferson. Note the nature and quality of classic education in Greece: "Primary schools had been known in the Greek world since at least the sixth century B.C., and the sophists [teachers] had done much to make more advanced education a conscious subject. Now [three centuries later] an integrated system of education became [in the third and fourth centuries B.C.] widespread, for schooling had two vital functions: to ensure that the young learned the Greek culture of their forebears and to meet the cultural needs of a more fluid, individualistic world. Literacy seems to have been [become] more common among rich and poor Greeks alike than ever before . . . . children learned to read, to write, and to 416count; physical education . . . was a very important element." says Prof. Chester G. Starr, A History of the Ancient World, 3rd ed (Oxford Univ Press, 1983), pp 415-416. "Those students who could afford to go beyond primary level instruction . . . read and memorized Homer, Euripides, Menander, and other authors; learned grammar and composed moral essays; and studied geometry, the theory of music, and kindred subjects . . . . Greeks [living outside Greece were concerned to provide same quality education for their children, so they provided education] for the maintenance of ancestral moral values," says Starr, supra p 416. "Hellenistic education was clearly designed to inculcate the fundamental virtues and skills of a governing class. . . . Vocational skills as such played no part; ethical training was, on the other hand, heavily emphasized. Above all this educational system was designed to produce deep acquaintance with inherited standards rather than to lead the young twoard questioning experiment," says Starr, supra p 416. Note the Ancient Greeks' emphasis on ethical and academic subject matter education in contrast with the modern 'dumbed-down' or 'trade-school' style of "education."

For an example of recruiting literature addressed to young men in the Civil War, to inspire them to sign up, see the book, Barbarism of Slavery (1860). Test yourself; young men of military age, of that era, were expected to comprehend the material and references. Ask yourself, can you? If not, you have an example of deterioration in education.

For overviews of the deterioration of educators and education, and even at doctoral degree (Ph.D. etc.) level, see, e.g., Smashing the Looking-Glass (1916), by William H. Allen, Ph.D., in The Survey, pp 602-605 (19 Feb 1916) (declining standards including on foreign language proficiency) (since then, deterioration includes issues of professor inability to speak English, favoritism, testing outside scope of material taught, testing beyond specified time limits, administration unresponsiveness to these issues, etc.); “The Rout of the Classical Tradition,” 3 Horizon (#2) 17-24 (Nov 1960), by Hugh MacLennan, Ph.D. [1907-1990], Prof. of Engl. Lit., McGill Univ., Montreal; and Barbara W. Tuchman, The Proud Tower: A Portrait of the World Before the War 1890-1914 (London: Macmillan, 1966 reprinted 1971 and 1980), Chapter 7, “Transfer of Power,” in turn citing James Bryce, “Hindrances to Good Citizenship” (Lectures at Yale, 1909); and Leonard T. Hobhouse [1864-1929], Democracy and Reaction (London, T. F. Unwin, 1904; reprinted, New York: Putnam, 1905), etc. Bryce [1838-1922] noted that while adult literacy had improved 20-fold in the preceding 70 years, “the percentage of whose who reflect [think] before they vote has not kept pace . . . .” Hobhouse [1864-1929] noted a prevalence among the ill-educated, “not [having] the time to think and will not take the trouble to do so if he has the time,” result: popular views reflect NOT educated fact-based concepts, but rather “the popular sheet [media] and shouting newsboy [journalist, commentator, newspaper editor] . . . To this new public . . . it is useless to appeal to reason.” "Americans Held Herd-Minded, by Protestor Snedden. Columbia Sociologist Tells Summer Student Many Have Chronic Infantilism. Affects So-Called Thinkers." ("New York Herald-Tribune," July 25, 1929. [Context]). You cannot hope to bribe or twist, thank God! the British journalist. But, seeing what the man will do unbribed, there's no occasion to.   —Humbert Wolfe (1930)         (1886-1940) Tuchman summarized this as concern about “man's curious refusal to behave rationally in what seemed his own best interest. The low level on which the populace reacted politically, the appeal of the sensationalist press, and the new phenomeon of mass interest in spectator sports were disturbing.” See U.S. slavery examples and war explanation examples. The media further deteriorate public awareness by having a perverse definition of the word “news.” The media defines “news” as sensational events constituting “deviations from . . . norms” instead of “events of importance to sizeable numbers of viewers [readers/listeners].”—Byron Shafer and Richard Larson, "Did TV Create the 'Social Issue'?," Columbia Journalism Review (September/October 1972), p. 11 at 16. Prof. Howard Zinn, A People's History of the United States (New York: Harper and Row, 1980, reprinted, HarperPerennial, 1990), p 257, cites education being altered pre-Civil War to create people “to keep the system going, to be loyal buffers . . . learn obedience to authority [via] 'a factory-like system’ [with] school officials—not teachers—[being] given control over textbooks.” See also "The Educational System Was Designed to Keep Us Uneducated and Docile" (17 July 2003). "Abolitionists were seen as enemies [who] sought to educate large segments of society . . . distributed free newspapers, and even children's primers" educating on "the Constitution, the church, and the Union," says Gerald Sorin, Abolitionism: A New Perspective (New York: Praeger, 1972), p 127. (Sorin's book has background on abolitionist idealism and "religious conviction" "impelled by the vision of a better society"). Slavers and their accessories were enraged at such education! In essence, "the lords of the lash and lords of the loom" (Bible-Belt/Religious Right Southerners, clergy, slavers, allied with Northern big business) combined at that time, in opposition to having an educated citizenry. People who become educated learn their rights, refuse to tolerate and put up with abuses. Those two groups (Bible-Belt / Religious Right + Big Business) hated education. They constituted or were aiding and abetting the tobacco lobby then known as slavers. They did not want people to know the facts and their rights, e.g., that slavery was unconstitutional that people have a right to pure air that the Bible-Belt is causing evils, via tobacco, such as abortion and divorce, that the Bible Belt professes to oppose. (The Bible Belt also hated science, as science had debunked so many of their myths). If people were to know about the tobacco role in such evils, so many evils, they'd foreseeably not be scammed by Bible-Belt claims professing opposition to what they were and are in fact causing, by their regular and recurring pro-tobacco actions. At "the time of the Dayton evolution trial . . . the brisker conservative clergymen saw that their influence and oratory and incomes were threatened by any authentic learning. A few of them were so intelligent as to know that not only was biology dangerous to their positions, but also history--which gave no very sanctified reputation to the Christian church; astronomy--which found no convenient Heaven in the skies and snickered politely at the notion of making the sun stand still in order to win a Jewish border skirmish; psychology--which doubted the superiority of a Baptist preacher fresh from the farm to trained laboratory researchers; and all the other sciences of the modern university. They saw that a proper school should teach nothing but bookkeeping, agriculture, geometry. . . . This perception the clergy [called 'fundamentalists'] and their most admired laymen expressed in quick action. They organized half a dozen competent and well-financed organizations to threaten rustic state legislators with political failure and bribe them with unctuous clerical praise, so that these back-street and backwoods Solons would forbid the teaadching in all state-supported schools and colleges of anything which was not approved by the evangelists," says Sinclair Lewis, Elmer Gantry (1927), Chapter XXIX, Section 9, paragraphs 1-2, p 374-375. The Religious Right / Bible Belt scam is carefully designed for distraction purposes. “. . . you don't have to be pious with us. Ma and I are a couple of old dragoons. We like religion; like the good old hymns—takes us back to the hick town we came from; and we believe religion is a fine thing to keep people in order—they think of higher things instead of all these strikes and big wages and the kind of hell-raising that's throwing the industrial system all out of kilter. And I like a fine upstanding preacher that can give a good show. . . . But we ain't pious. And any time you want to let down—and I reckon there must be times when a big cuss like you must get pretty sick of listening to the snivelling sisterhood!—you just come to us, and if you want to smoke or even throw in a little jolt of liquor, as I've been known to do, why we'll understand.” Quoted from Sinclair Lewis, Elmer Gantry (1927), Chapter XXIII, Section 2, paragraph 12, p 302. Reason: "the church is in bondage to Big Business and doctrines as laid down by millionaires," Chapter XXVII, last paragraph, p 364. Now a century later we see the horrific results of the Bible-Belt/Big Business alliance and its ruthless, relentless war on education, their "dumbing it down." People do not know these subjects our ancestors knew, and are often scammed by the alliance's claims and political message. For background on the lying, see, e.g., Chris Rodda, Liars For Jesus: The Religious Rights' Alternate Version Of American History (debunks the falsified version of American history of David Barton and other historians on the "Christian right"). See also Frederick Clarkson, "History is Powerful: Why the Christian Right Distorts History and Why it Matters" (21 Public Eye Magazine (#2) Spring 2007) Brooke Allen, Moral Minority: Our Skeptical Founding Fathers (Review 1,   2,   3) Prof. David L. Holmes, The Faiths of the Founding Fathers (Oxford Univ Press, March 2006) (Review 1,   2,   3,   4) Upton B. Sinclair, The Profits Of Religion (1917), § 2.12 and § 3.10. “Fitche laid it down that education should aim at destroying free will, so that, after pupils have left school, they shall be incapable, throughout the rest of their lives, of thinking or acting otherwise than as their schoolmasters would have wished. . . .”—Bertrand Russell, The Impact of Science on Society (1953), pg 49-50. The 1850's were still an era when people were still educated, e.g., knew their constitutional rights, knew tobacco dangers. In 1836, a blunt fact had been widely circulated to Americans: the fact that doctors deemed it already well-established "that thousands and tens of thousands die of diseases of the lungs generally brought on by tobacco smoking. . . . How is it possible to be otherwise? Tobacco is a poison. A man will die of an infusion of tobacco as of a shot through the head."—Samuel Green, New England Almanack and Farmer's Friend (1836). Americans took heed. Result: Declining U.S. tobacco use, reported by Dr. J. B. Neil, 1 The Lancet (#1740) p 23 (3 Jan 1857). Prior to mass media advertising, non-smoking was "common" in the U.S.—Prof. John Hinds, The Use of Tobacco (Nashville, Tenn: Cumberland Presbyterian Publishing House, 1882), p. 10. And, in that still educated era, instead of election campaign "sound bites," multi-hour scholarly level analyses, e.g., Lincon's Peoria-Speech-1854, were conducted. A high public knowledgeability level on rights is a threat to rights' violators, motivating destroying that educational foundation of the people-at-large, as anti-educators have accomplished. Manuel Valenzuela, "The Dumbing Down of America" (2 January 2007), cites "the dumbing down of America, the methodical destruction and purposeful elimination of the means by which a society educates and enlightens itself." Paul Craig Roberts, Ph.D., "Polls Show Many Americans are Simply Dumber Than Bush" (29 January 2006), says "Half of the US population is incapable of acquiring, processing and understanding information. . . . half of the American population is unable to draw a rational conclusion from unambiguous facts. . . . the inability of half of the US population to acquire and understand information are far larger threats to Americans than terrorism." "Special Report: American Schools in Crisis" (7 April 2006) ("Most Americans have no idea how bad things really are—we are in a state of emergency.") Note that the U.S. "educational system was twisted into a test taking industry that is careful, above all, not to teach children how to think," says Prof. David Michael Green, in "One day you’re gonna wake up, America" (4 May 2007) (Green is Professor of Political Science at Hofstra University, New York). Note "the huge gap between funding for military ventures and US public education," says Emily Spence, "We Can't Get No Educashion: A Critique Of US Public Schools" (26 August 2007). "Why People Believe Americans Are Stupid" (November 2007) Benjamin Grabow, "Reading's two-minute drill" (28 November 2007) ("Americans are reading less than ever . . . the average adult is reading for pleasure far less than a generation before. With so many other forms of entertainment available, literature is losing its luster. . . . a proper education is necessary to enjoy a work of literature. But two other key ingredients to prose appreciation are often overlooked: time and quiet. . . Reading must happen in two minute increments or it doesn't happen at all.") See the issue of a recent textbook that "presents a skewed view of topics from global warming to separation of church and state," reported in the article, "Student sees political bias in high school text: Publisher now says it will review the book, as will College Board" (AP, MSNBC, 8 April 2008). "Roughly a third of all American high school students drop out. Another third graduate but are not prepared for the next stage of life — either productive work or some form of post-secondary education. When two-thirds of all teenagers old enough to graduate from high school are incapable of mastering college-level work, the nation is doing something awfully wrong," says Bob Herbert, "Clueless in America" (New York Times, 22 April 2008) A teacher is being punished for daring to teach children: “I teach them critical thinking.” See Juan Gonzalez, "New York 8th-Graders Boycott Practice Exam But Teacher May Get Ax" (22 May 2008). This is an example of punishing good teachers who do not indoctrinate children with robot-like drills. A lament of the mis-education process lacking critical thinking, in political context, is given by Jacques Hardy (June 2008). Prof. James Mulhern, A History of Education (New York: Ronald Press Co, 1946) (647 pages), summarizes the “course [on past, present, and future] of education [and its having changed, and why] for students at the University of Pennsylvania for the past twenty years [meaning, 1926-1946].” For information on education officials “during the past forty or fifty years [having deliberately] removed from the curriculum [classic teaching on] the Western culture which produced the modern democratic state,” and replaced that curriculum with an “egoist, careerist, specialist [trade-school] and asocial” curriculum, see Walter Lippmann, B.A. (Harvard, 1910), “Education vs. Western Civilization,” 10 The American Scholar (#2) 184-193, especially pp 184 and 190 (Spring 1941). Ask yourself about so-called "high school education" nowadays, is it what our ancestors deemed mere "trade school"? leaving people unprepared to serve as citizens, e.g., to vote intelligently? “[H. G. Wells] feared that the average citizen could never be educated or aware enough to decide the major issues of the world. Therefore he favored the vote be limited to scientists, organizers, engineers, and others of merit.”—Herbert George (H. G.) Wells (1866-1946). For more on deteriorated education and myth, see J. Carleton Bell and David F. McCollum, in Journal of Educational Psychology (May 1917) (finding only a 16-49% knowledge rate) Upton Sinclair, The Goose-step: A Study of American Education (1923), (“a bandit crew have got hold of it [the U.S. education system] and have set it to work, not for your benefit, nor the benefit of your sons and daughters, but for ends very far from these? [thus the youth] are being taught, deliberately and of set purpose, not wisdom but folly, not justice but greed, not freedom but slavery, not love but hate?”) (Excerpt, Chapters XLIV-XLV.) Upton Sinclair, The Goslings: A Study of the American Schools (1924) (“The aim of public education is not to spread enlightenment at all; it is simply to reduce as many individuals as possible to the same safe level, to breed and train a standardized citizenry, to down dissent and originality. That is its aim in the United States, whatever pretensions of politicians, pedagogues other such mountebanks, and that is its aim everywhere else. . . . The public schools, which originated in Prussia . . . have the . . . aim [purpose] of putting down political and economic heresy. Their purpose, in brief, is to make docile . . . citizens.”—H. L. Mencken.) "Ignorance of U.S. History Shown by College Freshmen," New York Times (4 April 1943) (finding only a 6-25% knowledge rate) Prof. Bernard Bailyn (Harvard U historian), New York Times (1976) (50% knowledge rate found) Prof. Allan Bloom, The Closing of the American Mind (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1987) ("our students have lost the practice of and the taste for reading. They have not learned how to read, nor do they have the expectation of delight or improvement from reading," p 62. "Teachers of writing . . . have told me that they cannot teach writing to students who do not read, and that it is practically impossible to get them to read, let alone like it. This is where high schools have failed most," p 65. And "most high school graduates nowadays have difficulty reading and writing," p 341. Having to teach remedial reading "is merely a high [grade] school function that our sad state of educational affaris has thrust upon" colleges, p 341. John Taylor Gatto, Dumbing Us Down: The Hidden Curriculum of Compulsory Schooling (Philadelphia: New Society Pub, 1992) Charles J. Sykes, Dumbing Down Our Kids: Why America's Children Feel Good About Themselves But Can't Read, Write, or Add (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1995) Prof. James W. Loewen (History Prof, Univ of Vermont), Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong (NY: The New Press, 1995) David P. Levine, Robert Lowe, and Robert Peterson, Rethinking Schools: An Agenda for Change (1995) Katharine Washburn and John F. Thornton, eds., Dumbing Down: Essays on the Strip Mining of American Culture (New York: W.W. Norton, 1996) "Third International Mathematics and Science Study" (Fall 1998) (cites "precipitous decline in U.S. student performance between the fourth and eighth grades" . . . "right in that middle third of their pre-university training [grades 5-7, U.S. schools] drop the ball and stop challenging them intellectually" . . . "In mathematics, American students could outperform only two nations—Cyprus and South Africa") Maureen Sout, The Feel-Good Curriculum: The Dumbing-Down of America's Kids in the Name of Self-Esteem (Cambridge, Mass.: Perseus Books, 2000) National Assessment of Educational Progress Tests (1987, 1994, 2001) (50% ignorance-of-basics rate) Prof. Harvey C. Mansfield, "Grade Inflation: It's Time to Face the Facts" (The Chronicle Review, 6 April 2001) (Harvard professor essay on the subject) U.S. Dept of Education Report (2001) (nearly 60% of high school seniors lacking even basic knowledge of U.S. history) "Testing Our Schools," Interview with Prof. William Schmidt (PBS, 26 April 2001) Richard Paxton (U of Wis Prof., Educational Foundations Dept), Phi Beta Kappan (Dec 2003) Sam Wineburg (U. of Stanford Prof of Educ), Journal of American History (2004) Jay Mathews, "Most students struggle with U.S. history," Washington Post, cited in The Detroit News (14 March 2004), p 13A. Report of the Program for International Student Assessment (2005) (shows U.S. tied for 27th place, with Latvia, re student mathematics performance, vs Hong Kong in 1st place; tied for 22nd place, with Austria, re science, vs Finland and Japan tied for 1st place). Stephen Bitsoli, "Can U.S. Students Make Gains in Math, Science?," Macomb Daily (26 March 2006), p 2C (citing Prof. William Schmidt on poor US education quality) Kurt Nimmo, "Dumbed Down Americans: Chattel for Global Tyranny" (3 May 2006) (many Americans ignorant of geography, map-reading, directions. "According to the Connecticut census of 1840, only one citizen out of every 579 was illiterate and you probably don’t want to know, not really, what people in those days considered literate; it’s too embarrassing. Popular novels of the period give a clue: Last of the Mohicans, published in 1826, sold so well that a contemporary equivalent would have to move 10 million copies to match it. If you pick up an uncut version you find yourself in a dense thicket of philosophy, history, culture, manners, politics, geography, analysis of human motives and actions, all conveyed in data-rich periodic sentences so formidable only a determined and well-educated reader can handle it nowadays.") For information on results of the deteriorated educational system, exacerbated by the sensationalist media, e.g., that many in the public are unable to articulate reasons for picking a specific political party or candidate, beyond perhaps one specific point, if they remember the in-process election at all, see Prof. Herbert Asher, Presidential Elections and American Politics: Voters, Candidates and Campaigns Since 1952 (Homewood, Ill.: Dorsey Press, 1976), pp 93-94. Law school has markedly deteriorated. It used to be, to become an attorney, a minimum of 16 years for civil practice; and to be an apprentice, 7 years. Reference: Baron J. Campbell and Richard Hildreth, Lives of Judges 1300's - 1600's (1849, 1856), pp 21-22. Now you can be a 'lawyer' (with a so-called law “doctorate” no less!) in a mere three years! Note NAS Report on College Deterioration 1955 vs 2002. College now is at 1955 high school level, meaning a four grade deterioration, with 12th grade at old 8th grade level. Hint: for “truth in education,” rename your area's alleged “high school,” as a “trade school.” The American South has been behind much of the anti-education effort; it has even alleged the Bible as reason for being anti-education! This anti-education bias denies that "It costs less money to build schools than jails." [The real truth is, educated people smoke less, commit fewer crimes.] For example, note this anti-education quote: "But what if it turns out that the State's involvement in schools is one of the things which necessitates the expenditure in jails?" (Robert L. Dabney, Discussions, 1876, Vol 4, p 195). Dabney's view is nonsense, the oppposite is true. But that viewpoint has wholly taken over America, politicians would rather vote for cops-punishments-prisons than education!, hence education's severe deterioration. For other anti-education sites, see http://amprpress.com/public_schools.htm http://www.geocities.com/mosouthron/education3.html For background on the anti-education mentality, see also, e.g., Upton Sinclair, The Goose-step: A Study of American Education (1923), (“a bandit crew have got hold of it [the U.S. education system] and have set it to work, not for your benefit, nor the benefit of your sons and daughters, but for ends very far from these? [thus the youth] are being taught, deliberately and of set purpose, not wisdom but folly, not justice but greed, not freedom but slavery, not love but hate?”) (Excerpt, Chapters XLIV-XLV) Upton Sinclair, The Goslings: A Study of the American Schools (1924). And note an example of media censorship of news, traceable back a century. Lacking proper education, people become easy prey for propaganda (disinformation, distortion, half-truths, etc., as distinct from legitimate data presented in appropriate context). Note examples by historians. Danish analyst Dr. Georg Brandes (1842-1927), The World at War (New York: The Macmillan Co., 1917), p 170, said: “The sound sense of the masses and their intuitive conception of right have never been anything but a democratic legend. For the masses believe, as a rule, every lie that is cleverly presented to them.”—Later cited with approval by Historian Clinton H. Grattan (1902-1980), Why We Fought (New York: Vanguard Press, 1929, 1957), 71, adding, “. . . propagandists counted heavily on the naiveté of the civil populations of all countries and of the American public in particular. It can hardly be said that their [propagandists'] confidence [in public gullibility, inability to identify propaganda as such] was misplaced.” (See details). Education is now so deteriorated that for communication with leaders such as politicians, content is a mere 10%!! Non-verbal communication is 60%! with vocal tonality, pitch, and pauses 30%. Recall is a mere 25%. Reference: Stanley Zareff, "Literally Speaking," 14 Worth (#1) 46-48 (January 2005). Parallel to this fact, even if education were not deteriorated, politicians are typically not scholars, but “good ole boys” who prefer drinking, schmoozing, BS-ing to honest scholarly research into actual research-based and professional truths. Politicians often act on “whims, fancy, and sudden childish notions.” Awareness is at ignorant level, typically “does not know about” key factors. They listen with “little attention,” react with “remarkable irrelevancy” to reality due to “ignorance.” There is “a special failure of communication in dealing with heads of state.” “It is a feature of government that the more important the problem, the further [up the political structure] it tends to be removed from handling from anyone well acquainted with the subject.”—Barbara W. Tuchman, Stilwell and the American Experience in China (New York: Macmillan Co, 1970), pp 241, 404, 405, 464, respectively. [For more on politicians, click here.] For an example of how this widespread politician trait harms, note that Michigan politicians (professing to aid the economy!), dealt it a devastating permanent blow as noted at our Wendling site. In 1971, the Royal College of Physicians of London, in its book Smoking and Health Now (London: Pitman Medical and Scientific Publishing Co, 1971), p 9, found the smoking-caused death toll a "holocaust" due to the then "annual death toll of some 27,500." Instead of wanting to end this Holocaust then, politicians too often, Reichstag enabling-act style, wanted not to end it, but to prolong and intensify it. Readers, it is your life that is at stake. Seek protection, as the Constitution already mandates in your favor.

Education Sites

The Tutors-Online Site. Subjects include Math, English, Geography, History and Science; Languages, Music, Arts and Special Needs; Sociology and Therapies; Skills, Sports and Pastimes. The International Educational Services Website. Has English teaching resources for age 11 to 17. Waldo's Maths Pages. This is a secondary level math site. The Earth Teacher Science Site. This is an interactive site featuring lesson plans, educational downloads, free stuff, product links, and more.