The news in this publica
tion is released for the press on
the date indicated below.
THE UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA
NEWS
LETTER
. Published weekly by the
Univecsity of North Carolina
for its Bureau of Extension.
DECEMBER 8,1915
CHAPEL HILL, N. C
VOL. II, NO. 4
Branson. J. Q. deR, Hamilton, L. B. Wilson, L. A. WiUiftlnB, R. H. Thornton
.. ,h. OW. HU,. ».0.. ^
NORTH CAROLINA CLUB STUDIES
flOMORS FOR UNIVERSITY
MEN
Theotlierday LafayetteCollej^e, Easton,
Pa., conferred the honorary degree of
Doctor of Laws upon President Edward
Kidder Graham.
j-rwident Graham. j)r. Charles H.
Herty and Dr. Charles Lee Raider have
been invited to address the second Pan-
American Scientiljc Congress in Waph-
ington City, Christma.s weeiv.
BIG SCALE EDUCATION
'I'he Wisconsin I/ejjislatiire has jtwt
voted $7,080,000 for popular education
and enlightenment; for public scliofds,
normal st^Iioohs, technical schools, pub
lic libraries, and the Univereity.
it is nearly a three-foJd increast*, in ten
yearn. It is more than the state expen
ditures hi North Carolina for all purpostsi
whateoftver, although the two atate.s have
almost the saino population.
The (Jnivej-sity get-s $2,800,000; Lhe
,st«nogra4>hers alone I'eceive 187,000 a
year. In the University of North Caro- i
Jioa they rec,eive less chan $1,800.
Libct’al ii)vestn)ent of public monev in
public ‘du’ation puts a community on
the safe aide of the deadline. Wisconsin
really tt^ie.ves in public education.
UNIVERSITY ALUMNI HELP
The November number of the Alumni
Keview directs the attention of the alum-
»,ni to (he I!jiiversity Xew.s Letter, for
fwo reaHons:
■ 1. They can give it their liearty sup
port a*i H inediiun through which the
University i.s most effectively reac;hing
rhe |>eopk^ of i^forth Carolina. "
Our publishing fund at pre.stuu limits
the weekly edition to 7.000. It could
easily be 20,000 a week. One alumnus
■Hentls i'lOO; another writes t-o know if
-’.ontribiiti-_*iis iin* iii orle.j‘. It goes"free
of charge to those who write for it, so
Jar as we are able to meet the demand.
“2. They can aid the University by
placing it locally throughout the state
where it will render the greatest service.”
The thoughtful people who read aud lead
in every coiimiunity ought to be on our
mailing list. The Alumni can tell us
who they are. Write us about them.
ENTRANCE CREDITS IN VOCA
TIONAL SUBJECTS
The fa!ulty of the University ofj A'orth
■Carolina after careful consideration, ex-
iiending over stweral months of investi
gation aud discussion, ha.s adopted the
following regulations concerning entrance
credits in vocational subjects:.;
The Committee on Entrance certilicates
J-eoommends that the University accept,
as elective units, for entrance credit, work
in the vocational subje^ts as indicated
5)e.low.
We recommend that not more than two
sinits from this list 1k' accepted for en
trance to the Collegt* of Libera! Arts,
and no! more than three units for en-
j'trance to the ScIichjI of Applied Science.
' The acceptance of thwse units shall be
contingent upon a special investigation
of each case by the Entrance Committee
to the merits? of the w'ork done.
Vocational subjects for entrance: Geu-
;ral Agriculture, .5 or 1 unit; Commer
cial tieography, .5 or 1 unit; Manual
Training, 1 or 2 units; Bookkeeping, 1
t^*i"’fi'«rcial Arithmetic, 1 luiit;
|i|P>Stenogr,i|ihy and Typewriting, 1 unit.
I poultry nor eggs equal to the demands of
I home consumption in Nortli Carolina.
! PorK Production
2. hi pork production we again have
everything in our favor — .short, mild
winters, abundant watf^'r everywhere,
winter pa.xtures. peanuts, j>o1«t(}es and
corn. Pork can l>e prxlu(*d in North
Carolina at any time ai a third leas per
I pound than in the Middle West. Oiir
I brool sows have more litters in a year,
' larger litters as a rule, aud a smaller j>er
I cent of pigs lost. Nevertheless in 1910 we
I had only 39 pigs per 1,000 acres; while
I Iowa had 212, We had barely more than
j half a swine ;>pr person; and Iowa more
I than three porkers per person. We had
; 70,000,000 pounds of pork to buy abroad ;
, they had nearly a billion potmda to .sell,
j In 1910 only 26 counties were raising
I enough pork for home con.‘?mnption.
Cattle Possibilities
I 3. B»ef proiuction imder frontier con-
I ditiona on free ranges is ended, and the
I nation’s meat aupply nuist now be pro
duced on the farms of tiie country. North
Carolina with her twenty-two miUion
wilderness acres is ready for the new era;
and the South with two himdn-d jnillion
acres of uncultivated laud ought now to
take the lead in beef, milk, and butter
production. Our soils and .soaj^>U8 offer
mild winters, well watered grazing an^aa,
ptuTJianent pastures, winter covor crops,
silage crops, feed and forage crops in
abundance—all these actually, or pos.si-
bly with proj)er skill and attention.
We need big beef sires, more and tx^t-
ter breeds of dairy cows, and riddam* of
the cattle ti;k. We need cash livestock
markets within pos.sibIe re^ujh of our far
mers ; and railroad arrangements, ccui-
veniences, facilities and rates that will
tempt our farmers into livestf>ck fanning
and reward them for the venture. Local
but5h_aring, packing and refrigerating]
plants, and well managed city markets ;
are also indispensable. Our beef supply j
will be locally raised when the farmers
have an assured profit in the bu.siness; i
and not before. ' |
At present we have otdv 31 cattle of all'
sorts per 1,000 acres. Korty-five counties s
have only 20 or fewer; and six counties ^
have fewer than 10 each. We could eas- i
ily have 61 per 1,000 acres—the average
for the country-at-iarge. But the change
will come slowly. Successful livestock
farming is bred into a people only by
generations of education and ejcperi-
ence.
NORTH CAROLINA
Dr. Clarence Poe
I believe in ^J'ortli Carolina, in her
coming awakening, in the gloryof her
ileutiny; I believe that whatever of
good or beauty or nobleness men in
any other land or. era have wrought,
we men and women of North Carolina
today and tomorrow, in the provi-
dente of Oo^t, may here and now
achieve.
1 am persuaded that with a stock so
sturdy and capable, and with natural
and social con>iit.ions so auspicious,
such an ultimate flowering of the gen
ius of our people is inevitable; that
not only Shall we develop a ci\Hliza-
tion whose average level will be high,
but that even a;j one g*>neration in
Virginia produced a Wa,shingtoi, a
•leflerson, a Marshall, a Madison, a
Henry, ami a Monroe, so there will
arise from s>me generation of otir own
T>eople a group of North Carolinians
who will greatly and yet more various
ly enrich the annals of our race. -
UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF EDUCATION
LETTER SERIES NO 54
OUR LIVESTOCK POSSIBILI
TIES
At the la.it fortnightly mw'ting of The
'orth Carolina Club, Mr. D. N. J5d-
vards, of Wilkes county, discussed The
dvantages of Livestock Farming in
orth Carolina.
Poultry and E^gs
1. Speaking of |X)ultry, he said that
n 1910 we had 5,000,000 fowls, Wiacon-
in, 9,000,000 and Iowa 23,000,000; but
ur hens showed an egg-producing pow-
r equal to that of these w'estern fowds,
•vhile in poultry production we ran far
head. Wi.scon.sin, for in.stance, pro
duced during the year 10,0(X),000 fowls,
vhile North Carolina produced 15,000,-
*00. A little more attention to the breed
nd care of fowls would make North Caro
lina the greatest poultry state in the
L'nion. As it is, we produce neither
Colt Raising
4. As for colts, said he, we rai.se few
er and few’er of them year bv year in
North Carolina—only 13,778 in the cen-j
sus ye.ar. Our annual need fornew work j
animals is around 45,000—due to old age, I
sendee, exposure, and disease. At the j
lowest estiuiate w^e must import around
30,000 horses and mules per year, and
i«ud out of the state some six million dol
lars of cash for work animals.
Colts C4in be raised at a prolit. 'The
farmers in Tennessee, Kentucky, and
Missotiri do it. Our need is j>ermftuent
pastures, hay and forage, interest, atten
tion and skill far iTiore than we have at
present.
North Carolina is still on tlie lowest
rung of the ladder a-s an agricultural
state, that is to say, her farm income is
from crop sales merely or mainly. When I
we ri.se into livestock farming and our ^
farm income is mainly from the sale of'
livestock and livestock products, we wdl)
bi> worth from $3,000 to $3,.300 apiece in '
the coimtry regions, a« in the westeni !
states, and not 1322 apiece; or even leas
a.s in Florida, Missia^iippi, Alabama, and
IvOuisiana.
THE PROFESSOR SAYS
1 have often wondered why children
are always so eager to attend school,—
until they have been going for two or
three years! Can it be possible that the
system and the teachers are to blame?
I wonder!
How shall we provide equal opportun
ity for all the children of all the people
in education so long as counties report
that only from 50 to 70 per cent of the
children of school age are enrolled in
school?
The school without a daily plan of work
is like a railroad system without a time
table.
HOMICIDES IN NORTH
.CAROLINA
Homicides in the 24 si;ates of the regis
tration ai'Ka ot the United Statea were
exhibited by Mr. .1, H. Lassiter of
Northamptf)n county iu the University
News Letter, numbtsr 50, vol. 1. (Nov.
23). These rates were based on the 1913
volume of morality statistics of the Fed
eral Census Bureau.
-North Carolina stood (irst, with an. ur
ban rate of 274 homicides per million of
population, and ii rural rate of 173;
againstr an average ijomicide rate of 72 in
the registration area.
Our sad pre-eminence in the tirst table
was so distressing that Mr. Lassiter has
spent another month in a .study of this
difficult subject, tefore presenting ftirther
figures upon homicides in North (’aro
lina.
Excessive Homicide Rates
Duringfour years beginning with the fall
term of the 1910 courts and ending with
the spring t«rm.s of 1914, the homicide
eases that came to trial in North Caro
lina we«‘ S89, oj' an average of 222 per
year; as shown by the ro|x>rt« of the At
torney-General of the State, Our popu
lation of 1914 as estimated by the Onsua
Bureau was 2,339,452; aufi supposing
that all homicide reached the
couits, our average annual rate would be
95 jK^r million of population. The rate is
closer to the average in the registration
states, l)ul it is still excessive and hu
miliating.
In the Urst .Animal Report of the .State
Bureau of Vital Statistics, pp. 47, 133,
the deaths by homicide in 1914 were 215;
on which basis onr homicide rtite is 91.5
per million.
City Homicide Rates Highest
Eighty-eight of these homicide deatlis
occurred in 63 towns ot the State having
11,000 or more inhabitants; which means
tfiat the tow'n rate of homicides in North
Carolina wa« 248 again.st a country rate
of 68.
The figures of Dr, ,1. K. (Gordon, depu
ty registrar of vital statistics for the State,
show that the homicide problem in N.
C. concerns the town population in
largest part. Bart^ly more than a fifth,
21 per cent, of our people live in in(*or-
porated towns of any size whatsc«'ver;
but they commit two-fiftlis of all the
homicides. Seventy-.seven of the 88 town
homicides were committed with firearms;
and 63 of the killed w'ere negroes.
No Homicides in Three
Counties
Three counties, Hyde, Pamlico, and
Randolph, had no homicide. c.ases in
court during these four years.
Six countie-s had between 20 and 30
cases—Guilford, Bmicoml*. Union, For-
syth, Pitt, Hayw'ood; and three counties
had 30 or more—Robeson, 30, Wake, 36,
and Mecklenburg 45. More than a
fourth, 28 per cent, of all the homicides
of the State during this j)eriod occurred
in these nine counties.
During the last two years, 13 people
have been tried for homicide in Hay-
THE WORK OF THE HIGH
SCHOOL
1 he High School has a most difficult
work to perform. It not only has to give
instruction in all of the advanced sub
jects in tlie rapidly lengthening course of
study but it also has to make every effort
To Hold Its Pupils
who iiave come to it from the lower
schools. There are two courses of action
open to the teacher in the High School,
He may imitate what he regards as the
method of the instructor in whose le5ture
room he pursued his college studies, and
in this way unconsciotisly so toughen the
course that many of his sttidcnta will
■soon become disc^ouraged and drop out;
or he may endeavor to teach so that his
Students Will LiKe Every Sub
ject I
iu file courae and hence heartily and j
diligently apply tiiemselves to the work '
m hand. It is sometimes claimed that
a teacher has done the best work only
when a goodly numbe,r of Iris
Students Fail to Pass.
E>ut is tJiis true? Has a teacher taught
sucw,^fully when a .student of average
capacity and average appIic.ation fails to
pas,^? What is the trouble when a boy
or .1 girl of average capacity and apphca-
tion becomes discouraged and asks to be i
Allowed To Drop A Study?
A girl who wore a bunch of violets at
her throat asked to be permitted to stop
studying botany. She gave as her reason
t«at the botany was so
Hard And Uninterestinii
that she hated it; and that, too, in
spite, of the fact, that she did like violetg
and was making fine p.rogre8s in her
other studies. What was the trouble in
her case? Do you think her teacher
could have found the trouble and cured
it.? Why is it that sometimes a boy or a
girl in a few weeks after the term opens
says, 1 am getting along well in every
thing except Latin, or (irreek, or French,
or (^rman, or algebra, or geometry, or
some otiier subject?
A Lack of Process
is sometimes attributed to the pupil’s
inability to do the work, sometimes it is
attributed to tJie difficulty of the subject,
and sometimejj it may be attributed to the
teaclier’s
Method Of Teaching
The first grea,t question the High School
teacher, or any other teacher, should aak
himself when a pupil fails to keep up
with rhe class is, “Is there anything that
migiit he the cause of my pupil’s fail
ure?" Our State Jiigh Schools are im
proving every day and doing work of
which we all are proud. One great thing
for them to do is to
Find Out The Cause
for the falling off in numbers from the
Freshman to the Senior year. This fall
ing off ui common to all .schools, but it ia
telieved that a remetly can be found.
wood county alone, thus presenting the '
worst, record in North Carolina, says the '
Wayiies\-i!le (Courier in a recent issue. I
Forty Counties MaKe a Good
Showing
But when homicide rates, not totals
arc rnusidered, 38 counties in the State
make a better showing than the average
for the registration area of the United
States. 72 per cent. These are the first
3S coimtiej; in the table that follows.
Fifteen counties at the bottom of the
list have homicide rates more than twice
the average for the registration area; 8 of
them, mon> than thrw times, 6 of them
I more than four times, and Robeson more
than five times this average!
Ten of the counties making a showing
worse than the State average are in the
mountain regions; twelve are in the pied
mont region ; and 22 are in the coastal
plain and tide w'ater country where negro
populations are largest.
One hundred and seventy-seven or four-
fifths of the homicides in North Carolina
W'ere committed with firearms. This
single fact provokes earnest tiunking.
HOMICIDES IN NORTH CAR0LINaTT913-1914
■!. H. LASSITER, Northampton County. North Carolina Club
Aveiage Annual Rates per million inhabitants; and four-year homicide totals.
Rank County Rates
1 Hyde
1 Pamlico
1 Randolph 1
4 Hertford
5 Brunswick
6 ('atawba
7 I’?rquimans
8 Bladen
9 .lone.-i
9 I red^ll
9 Pereon
12 Yadkin
13 A laniance
14 Carteret
15 Davidson
16 Macon
17 Durham
18 Chatham
18 Chowan
18 Lw>
21 VVashington
21 Duplin
23 Gate.*?
24 Wilkfts
25 .'Vshe
26 Halifax
26 (!leveland
26 .lohnston
26 Lincoln
30 Stokes
30 Mgecombe
32 .A.lleghany
32 Clay
34 Caswell
34 Montgomery
36 Burke
36 Transylvania
38 Onslow
39 Caldwell
39 Mitchell
41 McDowell
42 Rockingham
42 Pasquotank
44 Cabarrus
45 .lackson
46 Surry
47 Warren
48 Sampson
49 OautoQ
4-year totals I Rank County Rates
0
0
' 50 Beaufort
89
0
0
j SI Northampton
90
0
0
: 51 V'ance
90
16
1
} 53 Watauga
92
17
1
I 54 Greene
96
18
2
j 54 Tyrrell
96
28
1
j 56 Rutherford
97
28
2
j 57 Eiertie
98
29
1
' 58 Stanly v
100
29
4
j 59 Dare
103
29
2
1 60 Cumlverland
^06
32
2
j 61 Rowan
107
35
4
j 62 [jenoir
110
36
2
j 63 Granville
111
37
4
64 Guilford
112
41
2
165 Pender
113
43
6
65 Harnett
113
44
4
67 Buncombe
115
44
2
68 Wilson
115
44
2
69 Orange
116
45
1
70 Cherokee
123
45
5
71 Yancey
124
48
2
72 Columbus
125
49
6
73 Wayne
126
52
4
74 Union
128
60
9
75 Currituck
110
60
7
75 Forsyth
130
60
10
77 Davie
131
60
4
78 Camden
113
62
5
79 Craven
137
62
8
80 Martin
140
64
2
80 New Hanover
140
64
1
82 Nash
141
67
4
83 Wake
142
67
4
84 Moore
147
70
6
85 Franklin
152
70
2
86 Mecklenburg
168
71
4
87 Madison
174
72
6
88 Pitt
183
72
5
89 Polk
196
74
4
90 Kichanond
204
75
11
91 Henderson
215
75
5
92 Swain
217
76
8
93 Anson
235
80
4
94 Alexander
237
84
10
95 Haywood
238
86
7
96 Graham
242
87
10
97 Scotland
277
13
98 Robeaos
4«6
4-year totala
11
8
7
5
5
2
11
9
8
2
15
16
10
12
27
7
10
23
13
7
7
6
18
21
4
25
7 '
3
14
10
18
19
36
10
15
45
14
27 ;
6
16 ;
14
9
6
11
20
5
ir
30