To wipe illiteracy out of the county was the goal set for the following
year. First, the school trustees were induced to take a census of the
illiterates. When this was completed, an investigation was made of
each individual case. Soon we had on record, not only the name and
age of every illiterate in the county, but his history as well, his
ancestry, his home environment, his family ties, his religious faith,
his political belief, his weaknesses, tastes and peculiarities, and
the influence or combination of influences through which he might be
reached in case the teacher failed with him.
Each teacher was given the list of illiterates in her district and
told to go out and cultivate these people, like a good politician,
before the moonlight schools began. The citizens of the county were
enlisted. The slogan “Each one teach one,” was adopted and most of the
people were glad to obey. Doctors were soon teaching their convalescent
patients, ministers were teaching members of their flocks, children
were teaching their parents, stenographers were teaching waitresses in
the small town hotels, and the person in the county without a pupil
was considered a very useless sort of individual. The district with an
illiterate in it was a district in disrepute, while the child with an
illiterate parent felt that he was a child disgraced. A man redeemed
from illiteracy became at once a source of pride and admiration to
his neighbors, as well as to himself and family, and, like most new
converts to a cause, he exceeded the old adherents in loyalty and zeal.
[Illustration: A class of Moonlight School pupils all past 50 years of
age.]
Some of those who had learned were not only walking evangelists
preaching the gospel of “No illiteracy in the county,” but became
itinerant teachers, going from district to district giving lessons.
Those fresh from their first contact with the printed page imparted
what they had learned, meager though it was, with an enthusiasm, that
was possible only to the newly-learned. They were successful teachers.
They attempted to give lessons in reading and writing only and to
create that self-confidence, which, with adult illiterates, was the
first battle to be won. They had the advantage, too, of presenting
themselves as examples, as living proof that illiterates could learn.
Their visits to illiterate homes started the process of learning in
most cases, and cleared the way for the teacher who was to follow with
more complete and thorough knowledge.
Each and every district was striving to be the first to wipe out
illiteracy. One school trustee, who had been campaigning strenuously
all week against illiteracy, came in on Saturday and said with
determination, “I’ll bet I have illiteracy out of my district before
Monday morning. There’s only one illiterate over there, and he’s a
tenant on my place; I’m going to run him out over into Fleming County.”
“Oh, no,” I protested, “That’s not the way to get rid of illiteracy.
You must teach him before he goes.”
A young teacher who felt somewhat discouraged, came in for some advice.
“You gave me a list of sixteen illiterates in my district,” said he,
“and I’ve taught fifteen of them to read and write; but there’s one
stubborn old woman out there who absolutely refuses to learn. I’ve
exhausted my resources with her.”
He deserved commendation and he needed encouragement, so I said,
“A young man who has made a success as you have done in that most
difficult of all places, his home district, who has enrolled one
hundred and eleven men and women in his moonlight school and has taught
fifteen out of sixteen illiterates to read and write will get the other
one. I have no fear but that you will succeed.”
We got the illiteracy record and looked up this old woman’s history.
We found that she thought she was a physician, and felt flattered when
anyone sought her services as such.
The young man went back to his district and there developed an eruption
on his wrist. He went over and consulted this old woman. She diagnosed
his case as erysipelas and proceeded to treat him. She concluded
that one who possessed such excellent judgment in the selection of a
physician, knew enough to teach her something; so while she treated
him for erysipelas, he treated her for illiteracy, and she learned to
read and write. He sent in her first letter, enclosed in his own, and
wrote in great glee, “Tabor Hill district is freer from illiteracy
than Boston; come at once and bring the Bibles.” It was the plan at
that time to give a Bible to each one who learned to read and write.
It was an offer that was made when our vision was small and we could
not anticipate the large numbers that would take advantage of it. When
hundreds began to claim it, we tried to keep the faith, and some of us
have not yet recovered from the strain on our pocketbooks.
I drove out to Tabor Hill one bright moonlit evening to witness the
celebration which marked the banishment of illiteracy from the
district. The scene was one good for the eyes of those who delight
in a real community center, although at that time such a thing as
a community center was known in few rural districts in the United
States. But here was the highest ideal of a community center being
realized. Every person in the district was at the school-house. The
men and women, who had been in their seats bright and early, were
gaily chatting; the young people stood around the organ, singing their
gladsome songs, and around the house, peering in at the windows, was a
cordon of spectators six rows deep.
The newly learned gave an exhibition of their recently acquired
knowledge. They read and wrote, quoted history and ciphered proudly in
the presence of their world. They did it with more pride than ever high
school, college or university graduates displayed on their commencement
day.
They were next presented with Bibles, and as they came up one by one,
some young and stalwart, some bent and gray, to receive their Bibles
with gracious words of thanks, it was an impressive scene--and when
the Jezebel of the community came forward and accepted her Bible and
pledged herself to lead a new life forevermore, there was hardly a dry
eye in the house.
Lemonade was a thing rarely seen in those parts, a treat indeed, so it
was served as the final reward, not from a punch bowl, as it is served
in most places, but from the most available thing to be found on Tabor
Hill--a lard can. As they passed in line around the receptacle to be
served, an old man rose in the back part of the house and said in a
loud voice, “Things certainly have changed in this district. It used
to be that you couldn’t hold meeting or Sunday school in this house
without the boys shooting through the windows. It used to be moonshine
and bullets; but now it’s lemonade and Bibles.”
Some teachers found obstacles in their way, such as the prolonged
absence of the illiterates from home, but they watched for their
return, and even if they came back and tarried but a short time, they
put them for the moment to the book and pen. One teacher said to me,
“I have a father and three grown sons in my district who are employed
twelve miles from home and are only at home on the Sabbath day. Do
you think there would be any harm in my going over there on Sunday
and teaching them to read and write?” Remembering those words of the
Master when he was asked in regard to healing the withered hand of a
man on the Sabbath day--and certainly these were withered hands--and
His answer, “Is it lawful to do good on the Sabbath day?” I said, “It
is a holy day and I think it would be a holy deed.” The young man went
Sunday after Sunday and taught the father and sons to read and write.
There are masterpieces of art that one would travel many miles to
see, but to me there is no picture more beautiful than the one my
imagination conjures up of that young teacher, with those four grown
men grouped about him learning to read and write on the Sabbath day.
We tried by every means, to wipe illiteracy out of the county to the
last individual. Every one was offered the opportunity and some were
offered it repeatedly. The overwhelming majority accepted it with joy
and gratitude--a few had to be coaxed. Some few, in their ignorance had
a misconception of our motives and stubbornly refused to learn.
When the campaign closed, of the 1,152 illiterates in the county,
only 23 were left, and these were classified; six were blind or had
defective sight; five were invalids languishing on beds of pain; six
were imbeciles and epileptics, two had moved in as the session closed
and four could not be induced to learn.
One of the teachers who had taught fifty-six people in her own and
other districts to read and write, went into the home of one of these
stubborn four after the campaign closed and paid her an exorbitant
price for board. She induced this old woman to teach her to knit, and
one day when they were sitting and knitting together and had become
fast and familiar friends and the time was ripe, she said to her,
“Now you’ve taught me something valuable, something, in fact, that
I’ve always wanted to know. I’m going to return the favor, I’m going
to teach you to read and write, so that you can write to your son in
Washington, and the one in Indiana and the one in Illinois. I know how
glad they’ll be to have letters from their mother’s own hand, and how
glad you’ll be to read letters from them.”
While she was speaking, she was placing the material in the old woman’s
hands, and, almost before she knew it she was copying “E” the first
letter in her name.
One morning shortly afterward, that little teacher knocked at my door;
I opened and she entered. Without a word, but with shining eyes, she
laid that old woman’s first letter on my desk.