Education: A School on a Farm
In the December number of Maxwell's Talisman, a monthly paper published in Chicago, there appeared an article with the title “Education. A school on a Farm. Emmanuel Missionary College, Berrien Springs, Mich.” This article was “by E. A. Sutherland,” and was accompanied by a group of views of the various buildings of the institution, occupying a full page. In this contribution Professor Sutherland gives a brief account of the removal of Battle Creek College from Battle Creek, Mich., to Berrien Springs, stating the reasons which led to this change, and then presents the principles upon which the institution was re-established under its new name, and their practical working in erecting the buildings and conducting the actual work. The closing paragraphs run as follows:— “It is natural that after such a training young people should go from the college as teachers of the children, for Emmanuel Missionary College is a training-school having many affiliated schools for the youth, in which the fundamental principles are country life for the young, and ‘learning by doing.’ “The land for Emmanuel Missionary College cost something over $19,000. The school started with $12,000 in cash. The farm, with buildings and improvements, has cost nearly $75,000. During three years $60,000 has been accumulated as the result of the interest of the students and their friends in this system of industrial training. The experience proves the possibility of starting schools on a self-supporting basis when the principles of industrial education are adhered to. “Recently a farm of four hundred acres has been purchased nine miles from the city of Nashville, Tenn., and there, under still freer management, the founders of the Emmanuel Missionary College are establishing another college, to be known as the Nashville Agricultural and Normal School. This new institution will in its start have the benefit of the experience gained at Emmanuel Missionary College. Its workers are those who have grown into the principles of industrial education, and in that favorable location on the banks of the Cumberland River, the principles of hand, head, and heart education will be still further developed.” We are informed that “there were forty thousand of the Talisman distributed to all the principal educators in the land.” Thus the attention of the public has again been called to one of our educational institutions, and to the principles of education for which it stands.