this for the following reasons: The United States have the right to feel proud of their Public Schools and Institutions to produce enlightened and educated men for the honour and prosperity of their Republic...... Have our people thought of letting our teachers derive some profit from this unique occasion to study everything the United States have done for Education in the way of school organization, methods of instruction, educational apparatus hygienic regulations, etc." The leading American Educationists quite understood what was expected of them by foreign nations. This, Mr. Wickersham, as their mouthpiece, expressed in an address on the subject, delivered in August, 1875, he said: "Thousands of distinguished citizens from abroad will visit Philadelphia next year (1876), for the sole purpose of studying our systems of public education. These systems are everywhere recognized as the only salt that can save institutions like ours. They are the centre of our national life. In them is found the chief source of the strength of the Republic. The political philosopher who understands them will find no difficulty in understanding all that we have to show-all we are. "With a view to make the American Educational Exhibition a credit to the Republic, it was originally designed to place it in the main building, within an area of 2000 feet long and of a reasonable width, so as to allow for counter and floor space, no State to occupy more than 100 feet of wall. Delays and other causes prevented this desirable plan from being carried out; so that instead of one grand combined exhibit of the whole educational resources of the United States, the whole extensive and valuable collection with one exception (Pennsylvania), was scattered and hid away in a very small and inconvenient gallery." The consequence of this delay in preparing for a full educational exhibit of the various States, was, as Mr. Wickersham says in his late annual report, " that no State made a full representation of educational interests, and many States were not represented at all. The exhibit as made was broken up into fragments, and located, some in one place and some in another, in the different buildings about the grounds. Pennsylvania erected a building of her own; Massachussetts occupied a gallery over the east entrance of the main building, while those of others, with that of the National Bureau of Education, occupied space in the Government building; and fragments of what ought to have been one united, well-organized whole, were scattered about the floor of the Main Building, the Women's Pavilion, and some of the annexes. This disorganized mass of material, excellent as it was in parts, distracted, if it did not disgust, the hundreds of learned foreigners who came to the Exposition expressly to study American systems of education, and lost to us an opportunity that may never occur again of doing justice to the great efforts our people in all sections of the country have made to educate themselves." The failure early in 1876 to carry out the original plan of grouping the educational exhibits of the several States together in the Main Building, stimulated the Hon. Mr. Wickersham to proceed at once with the erection of a very handsome "Educational Hall" for the State of Pennsylvania, at a cost of $12,000. So urgent was the case, that, as Mr. Wickersham states, "the Hall was under roof before any money was obtained with which to pay for it." I mention these facts to show the great difficulties experienced by the Americans themselves in giving their educational exhibit that prominence at the "Centennial " which they so justly and eminently deserved; and also to show how unselfish they were in giving so admirable a position in the Main Building to our own and other foreign school exhibits. From this necessary digression I shall now proceed to point out some of the more interesting features of the Pennsylvanian Exhibit. The Pennsylvania Educational Hall provided 20,000 square feet of wall surface for exhibitors. It was octagonal in shape (as shown in the engraving.) Not including the wings, it was 100 by 100 feet, the wings were 40 by 24 feet. The centre contained an octagonal room 48 by 48 feet. In the wings there were apartments for the State Superintendent's office, conference and sitting-rooms, etc. The main aisle was ten feet wide, with alcoves on either side eight feet deep. In these alcoves were admirably arranged articles, or other illustrations, relating to Kindergarten; Common School appliances of 1776 and 1876; School Ornamentation; Orphan Schools; Schools for the Blind; for the Feeble-minded; Schools of Design for Women; Sunday Schools; Academics; Seminaries; Colleges; Universities; Normal Schools; the Education Department, etc., etc. In addition to these departments of the Pennsylvanian Exhibit, there were very admirable collections of School furniture, School apparatus,* maps, charts, text-books, and other appliances for Schools. I shall now refer to the specialties of the Exhibit as they presented themselves to me. 1. The admirable and systematic arrangement of the whole exhibit, its extent and variety. If it had any defect it was that of being too miscellaneous. 2. The Pennsylvanian ideal Common School. This consisted of a complete collection of furniture, maps, apparatus, stationery (70 articles), and text-books suitable for a Common Country or Village School. 3. Elaborate models and photographs of School-houses and Grounds.-These models were admirably prepared, and the photographs were, on the whole, excellent. 4. Illustrations, books, charts, diagrams made by apparatus, and decorations for Sunday Schools. This unique exhibit was very extensive and complete. It was contributed by the Protestant Episcopal, Presbyterian, Lutheran, Baptist, Quaker and Jewish Churches of the State, as well as by the American Sunday School Union. 5. School Ornamentation, including a fountain with fish, twining vines, hanging baskets, flower pots and vases, statues and statuettes, mottoes and engravings.-This collection was one of the most interesting and suggestive, as well as the most philosophical in the exhibit. the pleasing features of "school life" the Americans excel all other nations.t 6. Matters of Historical Interest.-This exhibit consisted of a "condensed " model of the interior of a School of ""76," and by way of contrast, one of 1876; also, valuable historical portraits of persons identified with the cause of education in the State from its earliest history. 7. Students and Pupils' Work.-This Department, although not peculiar to the Pennsylvania Exhibit, was yet here in almost exhaustless variety. The elegance and finish of much of this work, especially from the Colleges and higher Seminaries (and many Public Schools), were subjects of frequent remark and commendation. *From the collection exhibited by Mr. N. H. Edgerton, I selected, with the aid of Dr. May, a number of very excellent articles for our Depository and Normal Schools. +So deeply impressed have I been of the softening and elevating influence of refinement in the ornamentation of School premises, both within and without, that I have devoted two whole chapters to the subject in a second edition of a recent work which I have published on "THE SCHOOL HOUSE: ITS ARCHITECTURE, EXTERNAL AND INTERNAL ARRANGEMENTS." I have treated this subject under the following heads :-The Influence of an Attractive School House-School Houses should be Pleasant Way Marks-School House Influence on the Morality of its Frequenters-Children's Ineffaceable Memories of the School House (Examples)— Ornament your School, as well as your Home, Grounds-Reasons why we should Provide Rural RefinementSchool Flower Show:-How to Arrange Flowers about School Premises, etc. As a general rule, examples of pupils' work-most of it very excellent, and exccuted with skill and accuracy-was the great staple of the Educational Exhibits of the various American States. Indeed, to my mind, its profusion was rather a defect than a special excellence. It was an elaborate exhibition of "results" rather than an illustration of "processes," or "modes" of instruction, with corresponding examples of the appliances of education. shall, however, refer to this subject in another place. BRIEF SKETCH OF EDUCATION IN PENNSYLVANIA. From the descriptive Catalogue of the State Exhibit, prepared by Mr. Wickersham, extract the following statistics and explanations : I Extent of Territory-square miles 46,000 Population in 1870 3,521,791 Number of persons in the State in 1870 between the ages of five and eighteen 1,076,000 Estimated number in 1876 between six and twenty-one (the school age)..... 1,200,000 Number of Pupils enrolled in the Public Schools in 1875 890,073 Average number 551,848 Estimated number in other than Public Schools...... 60,000 Cther appropriations and expenses in 1875. 272,411 10 Cost of Soldiers' Orphan Schools, paid directly by the State, 423,693 76 The figures below show the growth of the Public School system in the past ten years, from 1865 to 1875: .24,260,787 00 |