The news in this publica
tion is released (or the press on
iceipt.
UARY 12, 1921
Bdiiorial Board i O. Branson, L. R, Wilson, E, W, Knight, D. D. Carroll, J. B. Bullitt.
OUR POVERTY STRICKEN COLLEGES
THE UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA
NEWS LETTER
CHAPEL HHX, N. C.
Published weekly by the
University of North Carolina
for its Bureau of Extension.
VOL VII, NO. 8
IS CAROLINA BANKRUPT?
The arresting facts that show the
collapse of college education in North
, Carolina in this year of our Lord and
I the'Legislature are: First, 2,308 appli
cants turned away for lack of room
last fall by the colleges of their choice
—one rejected for every four receiv
ed.' Second, a four-fold ^crease of
' high school, graduates during the last
five years, and the clear necessity for
doubling the college facilities of the
,st^e at once. Third, only fourteen
million dollars invested in thirty-one
coljeges, junior colleges, technical train
ing schools, and the University, in two
hundred arid fifty years. Fourth, a total
annual working income of only two and
a half million dollars in 1920-21..
Here are the bare facts reported to
the Rural Social Science department of
the University by responsible officials
themselves in October, 1920. They in
dicate the poverty-stricken estate of
college education in North Carolina.
Is it a cheerless, hopeless poverty?
Are we really bankrupt in purse? As a
matter of fact, are we too poor to pro
vide our sons and daughters with col
lege advantages equal to those of any
state In the Union? .
Are we rich in purse and bankrupt in
courage? Are we poor in spirit or pov
erty-stricken in spirit? Are we poor
and unable, or rich and reluctant, or
nch and unafraid? Whatever the facts
are, we ought to know them competent-
lyJand face them unflinchingly.
We Once Were Poor
^Itooking back at our poverty' in by
gone days—a pinching poverty unmis
takable and undisputed— the present
.'college situation is understandable. For
two and a half centuries North Caro
lina reckoned with destiny in terms of
% deficit-economy, and out of hard, un-
rollna—voters all—are asking. Who is
to blame for the present unsavory col
lege situation in this state? And why,
with all the wealth of North Carolina,
this unreadiness cannot be brought to a
summary end? And if it is unduly pro
longed, who ds responsible for the de
lay?
The ans_wers we make to these in
quiries today will echo throughout North
Carolina tomorrow and for long years
to come.
For courageous response to just such
challenges as these, the state will long
remember Archibald D. Murphy, Charles
B. Aycock, and Charles D. Mclver.
The men who today stand head high
with these Great Commoners of the
past are never likely to be forgotten in
North Carolina.
We Now Are Rich
It is the roundabout look that dis
closes the poverty-stricken condition of
college education in North Carolina.
We have' suddenly grown rich and we
have been innocently unaware of it.
During the last five years our farms
and forests and factories have been
producing brand-new wealth, at the
average rate of a billion dpllars a year
—five billions of brand-new wealth, all
told, since 1915. And the gain is not
in values alone but in quantities as well
—in greatly increased crops of wheat
and corn, tobacco and cotton; in the
doubled and quadrupled output of our
cotton mills, tobacco factories, and fur
niture establishments; in trade and
bank resources; in material good things
in multiplied abundance in and around
our town and country homes. Despite
the momentary collapse of market
prices, our farmers are less in debt
and have more money in the banks to
day than ever before in two and a half
centuries. We have two hundred and
fifty million dollars laid safely away in
toward circumstances wrought wonders j iii)erty bonds, war stamps, and bank
jf achievemenL And, next to the Civil account savings, and we are this year
War, the hardest of these circumstan
ces has been wide-spread illiteracy. In
1850 our illiterate adult whites were
nearly one in every eight, and sixty
years later this ratio stood practically
unchanged.
Illiteracy and poverty are twin-born
^ial ills; they have always been so
Inlevery land under heaven. Poverty
keds illiteracy, illiteracy breeds pov-
By, and ‘the destruction of the poor is
pheir poverty’.
■ flOf course we were poor—how could
It^ave been otherwise? It Was two
deicades after the war between the
states before North Carolina found an
assured footing for manufacture and
was safely started toward industrial
prpmiership in the South. It was forty-
fi^^ years before our bank account sav-
Ms reached a total of twenty-one mil
lion dollars. And it was a full half cen-
"tury before our per caffita taxables re
gained the level of 1860.
^uring this period of struggle for
bare existence there were very few
people in North Carolina who had any
left-over cash when a year was ended
and a balance sheet was struck. Most
of us can still remember when making-
buckle-and-tongue-meet was the cheer
less effort of almost an entire people.
Inlvery truth. North Carolina was a
poverty-stricken state for more th&n
hundred years. And out of our
Jle we really gave much to our col
lejes. They have grown in number
from three to thirty-one during the last
seventy years. And until the Great
War began they had room at least for
all the students who applied for en
trance. During this period of poverty
the colleges were calling for our sons
and daughters; now our sons and daugh
ters are calling for colleges—and calling
in vain, twenty-three hundred of them.
North Carolina is at last rich. A con
vincing evidence of it is the thirteen
thousand college applicants last fall.
Hich and unready. A convincing
pifoof of it lies in the fact that the col
lie applicants she rejected in,1920 are
fourteen times the number she received
in 1850.
''■_^thelred the Unready has long been
^familiar acquaintance to high-school
^dents. They have sudderjly discov-
eijed another—Carolina the Ijinready.
^And even now the mothers of men
^d the men of tomorrow in\ North Ca-
twp
U4le
« second-class matter November U, 1914, at the Postotflce at (Ihapel Hill. N, C., under the act of August
EDUCATION PAYS
D. A. Tompkins
Whatever else the legislature does
or does not do, it ought to plant the
flag of education through the state.
We are not here regarding'education
as a burden upon the resource/ of
the state, but rather as a means of
bringing the state’s resources to
profitable fruition.
Better education will not only con
duce to more tax money, ■ but will
conduce also to better observance of
the rule^ of the Christian religion,
to better morals, to better thrift
and economy, to better industry, to
the betterment of the children and
youth of the state, and to the gen
eral prosperity of the state in all fu
ture time.
We earnestly recommend to the
legislature that it make sure, first,
of an increase of the school term,
and then raise the money the best
we can, if we »go in debt a little
more.
The schools and the education of
the youth of the country will pull us
through in the matter gf the debt;
but if we let things drift into the al
ternative of ignorance, ignorance
will never improve the state in any
particular.—George Tayloe Win
ston’s Life of Tompkins.
enjoying an interest income of ten mil
lion dollars from this one source alone.
There has never before been anything
like this situation in North Carolina in
her whole history.
True we shall have two hundred mil
lion dollars less of farm wealth this
year, and it is a cruel calamity for
merchants and bankers as well as
farmers. But it is childish to conclude
that the state is therefore facing bank
ruptcy. Two hundred 'millions of loss
against more than five billions of gain
is the fundamental fact. The state is
solvent by a comfortable margin of
many billions of dollars.
What has happened is the passing of
North Carolina out of a long period of
deficit-economy into a new period of
surplus-economy, and what we need to
learn is to spell at present problems
and future necessities in terms of wealth
instead of poverty. North Carolina is
rich—rich beyopd question or debate,
and she can no longer afford to think in
small-scale ways about the big-scale
concerns of the commonwealth.
But Our Colleges Are Poor
Fourteen million dollars in round num
bers is the ^ull total of what l^orth Ca
rolina has been able or willing to invest
in college properties in two and a half
centuries. Th^ exact figure is $14,008,-
071. And set against the poverty of
bygone years it is a colossal sum. But
set against the wealth of today in North
Carolina it is a bagatelle. Expressed
as an average, it is five dollars and
fifty cents per inhabitant. And five
dollars and a half will barely pay for a
pair of good shoes, a hat or a bonnet,-
three bushels of wheat, a dozen pounds,
of Cheap candy, ten pounds of butter, ‘
or the gasoline for Christmas joy-rid
ing. But it represents the average per
son’s investment in college properties
in North Carolina after two hundred
and fifty years of history.
If the colleges of North Carolina were
burned to the. ground tonight, our sweet
potato or our peanut crop would rebuild
them all tomorrow. What-we spend for
automobiles and aucomobile parts in a
single year would replace our college
buildings and equipments nearly four
times over.
In ten years we' have invested one
hundred and forty million dollars in au
tomobiles, but in two hundred and fifty
years we have invested only fourteen
million dollars in college properties, de
nominational and state. And further
more, we are buying automobiles fast
er than any state in the Union—at the
rate, indeed, of forty-seven million dol
lars a year, or one hundred and thirty
thousand dollars a day, counting Sun
days.
California has invested in her state
university alone two and a half million
dollars more than North Carolina has
invested in all her thirty-one college
properties. And the same startling
contrast will be presented by Michigan
when her nine million dollar program of
university building is completed. When
Minnesota finishes her three and a
quarter million program of building, she
will be the third state whose university
property is worth more than the com
bined value of the thirty-one college
properties of North Carolina.
Our fourteen millions in college prop
erties of every kind mean that North
Carolina is poverty-stricken in college
education. Once upon a time, as has
been said, there was a reasonable ex
planation for the college-poverty of this
state, hut that day has passed, and we
are now face to face with a situation
that is disgraceful when set against our
vast stores of new wealth and our vast
expenditures for almost every other
purpose under the sun.
A Shabby Worhing Income
The exact total of the working income
of our colleges is $2,434,646.. Here is
what it cost the people of North Caro
lina to keep their 31 colleges going in
1920. It is an average of only ninety-
five cents per inhabitant. And ninety-
five cents is right around the cost of a
single circus ticket, or a half bushel of
wheat, or a plug or two of low-grade
chewing tobacco, and it nis a good deal,
less than the cost of a pound of smok
ing tobacco ef any grade whatsoever.
Illinois spends upon' her state univer
sity alone just about what the people of
North Carolina spend upon all her thir
ty-one colleges put together. And the
University of Texas is asking for a
maintenance appropriation that is half
a million dollars more than the com
bined ingomes of all the colleges of
North Carolina at present. The work
ing fund of our colleges needs to be
doubled at once. It can be done at a
cost of less than two dollars a year per
inhabitant.
We spend six million dollars a year
to keep our churches in commission,
and less than half that amount to keep
our colleges in commission. Education
has always been called in North Caro
lina ‘the. hand-maid of religion’; what
we seem to mean is, ‘poor relation, on
half rations’.
It is distinctly not creditable for
North Carolina to spend twenty millions
a year for gas and oil to keep her mo
tor cars going, and only two and a half
millions a year to keep her colleges go-
; ing. It is brain-power that determines
; the quality of a civilization, not gas-
I engine power—the diffusion of culture,
; not the consumption of gasoline. Greece
I was great twenty-five centuries before
motor cars and airplanes were invented.
Rich Enough to Educate
The emergency the state faces today
is the necessity for quadrupling the
buildings and equipments of her colleges
and doubling their teaching forces with
in the next five years. It calls for at
least fifteen million dollars for state
colleges alone, and perhaps another five
millions for state institutions of benevo
lence, or twenty millions all told, or
four millions a year during the next
five years. We do not happen to know
just what these various state institu
tions have called for in their budgets,
but our opinion is that the crisis we face
cannot be met with much less than the
total we have named. '
It is a large total. If our eyes are
turned backward upon the ancient pov
erty of the state, we are likely to flinch.
If we row like John Bunyan’s water
man, with faces' set to the rear, if we
look one way and row another, we shall
move ahead at a pitiful pace. But if we
look about us at the substantial wealth
the stftte has accumulated in amazing
abundance during the last five years,
we are likely to take counsel of courage
and not of fear. The simple fact is,
the state has accumulated greater ma
terial wealth during this five-year period
than during all the preceding two hun
dred and fifty years of her history. Our
farm crops alone last year brought six
hundred and eighty-three million dollars
reckoned at farm prices, and the output
of our mills and factories sold for six-
hundred and fifty-eight million dollars.
All told, the brand-new wealth we cre
ated in 1919 amounted to more than one
and a haIfj,billion dollars. We are at
last a billionaire state—not merely in
the wealth we have accumulated, but
in the wealth w'e annually create.
In view of facts like these, it is pert
inent to ask whether or not we are rich
enough to give our sons and daughters
a liberal college education equal to that
offered by any gther state in the Union.
The answer is, yes. And there is no
other answer.—E. C. Branson.
of themselves better farmers.
A goodly number of farmers from all
sections of the State no doubt will make
it a point this year to take this Course.
In order that our farmers may be better
prepared for better and more profitable
farming next year and in subsequent
years, than they have been doing in the
past, it would appear to be the part of
wisdom for theip to take a few days off
in January and to go to the State Col
lege for this work. People in other
lines are attending and profiting by sim
ilar short courses; will not a large num
ber of our farmers do the same?
It is announced that the Course this
year will include practical matter' per
taining to field crops, commercial ferti
lizers and farm manures, pruning,
spraying, insect and diseasd enemies of
crops and orchards, and the most effec
tive method of their prevention and
control; farm dairying, poultry raising,
livestock feeding, handling and judg
ing, soil management, fruit and vegeta
ble growing, diseases of farm livestock
and poultry, and their prevention and
control; and gas engines and farm trac
tors.
Those attending the Course will be
supplied free tuition, and rooms may be
secured in private homes in close prox
imity to the College. Meals may be
had in the College mess hall at the rate
of $19.00 per month. Those wishing
further information with reference to
the Course, cost, etc., may secure it
from Dean of Agriculture, West Ral
eigh, N. C.
THE LAWRENCE HOLT FUND
The University has received from
Lawrence S. Holt, Jr., ’04, of Burling
ton, a gift of $10,000 to be used in help
ing provide a college education for stu
dents who do not otherwise have the
money to go to the University.
The principal of the $10,000 will be es
tablished as a loan fund for worthy and
needy students, and the income from
these loans will be used for four schol
arships which will be awarded annually
to that member, man or woman, of
each of the freshman, [sophomore, jun
ior, and senior classes who shall be
judged the most needy, deserving, and
worthy.
It is my wish, said Mr. Hplt, in mak
ing the gift to President Chase, that
no person shall receive one of these
scholarships who would otherwise be
able to. attend the University of North
Carolina.
President Chase points out, also, the
double efectiveness of the gift which
establis’hes a loan fund and provides
scholarships at the same time. It is a
generously conceived and finely planned
gift, said he, and, so far as I know, is
unique in the multiplied results it will
achieve.
Lawrence Holt has been in close con
tact with the University for many
years. He has been prominently con
nected with cotton manufacturing in
terests in Alamance county and now
lives at Burlington.—Alumni Review.
A UNIQUE SCHOOL SURVEY
The Report of the Educational Com
mission of North Carolina, appointed
by the Legislature of 1917 and contin
ued by the Legislature of 1919, has just
come from the press. It was the cen
tral theme for discussion at the recent
session of the North Carolina Teachers
Assembly in Asheville. Every citizen
of North Carolina interested in the wel
fare and prosperity of the state should
read this report not only in bulk but
paragraph by paragraph and. sentence
by sentence.
This study of our public school system
is one of the best reports on state sur
veys of public schools that has come to
our attention. It is unique in ;form, ar
rangement, and style. While recogniz
ing that we are making long strides in
educational progress in the state and
while acknowledging that conditions in
our public schools are much better than
they have been even in the recent past,
the report clearly, specifically, and force
fully points out that we are not doing
in this state .all that we can do. It is
searching, but thoroughly sympathetic.
There is nothing in the report of carp
ing criticism but all the way through
the study one finds a most understand
ing portrayal of our state public school
attitude.
It is not to be expected that there
will be entirely universal agreement
with all the recommendations and sug
gestions for improvement. This .was
shown clearly in the discussions during
the sessions of the Teachers Assembly.
That there will be practically univer
sal agreement upon' the general princi
ples involved in the recommendations
and suggestions was shown with almost
equal clearness in the discussions at
Asheville. We may differ in our opin
ions about the details, but we undoubt
edly will agree in the main with the
points made in this report.
Copies of this report may be secured
from Dr. E. C. Brooks, State Superin
tendent of Public Instruction, Raleigh,
N. C."
FARMERS SHORT COURSES
At the State College of Agriculture
and Engineering at West Raleigh, there
will begin on January 20 a Two Weeks
Short Course in Agriculture. This
course has been arranged by the College
to come at a slack time of the year with
farmers and is to embrace only subjects
of direct practical value to the busy
farmers of our State who wish to make
The University started in its career
in 1793. Eighty-eight years later, in
1881, the State of North Carolina made
its first direct appropriation for support
or maintenance of this institution. For
eighty-eight years the^young men of
this state were receivu^ education at
our University when the only funds the
University received for all purposes
were provided by alumni and friends,
and a very insignificant revenue from
escheated lands. Not until 1905 did the
state erect a building at the University.
At the present time alumni and friends
have provided funds from which the
salaries of the twelve highest paid pro
fessors ait the University are being met.
Four-fifths of the loan funds for the
benefit of needy students are provided
by alumni. More than 1200 students
have been enabled by loans from these
funds to receive education at the Uni
versity.—R. 0. Huffman in Charity and
Children.
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