There is one social affair which used to belong to country life, that
I would like to see come back again. That is the old-fashioned Friday
night literary at the schoolhouse.
You older people who used to attend them,
did you ever enjoy yourselves better anywhere?
Image courtesy/Internet Archive
At early candle light, parents and pupils from all over the district gathered
at the schoolhouse, bringing lanterns and candles and sometimes a glass lamp
to give an added touch of dignity to the teacher's desk. The lighting was good
enough, for eyes were stronger in the days before brilliant lights were so common.
Do you remember how the schoolchildren spoke their pieces and dialogs?
It gave one a touch of distinction to speak a part in a dialog.
Then came the debate. Sometimes the older pupils of the school, sometimes a few
of the pupils and some of the grownups, or again just the grownups took part in
the debate. The questions debated were certainly threshed out to a conclusion.
I have been thinking lately what a forum for discussing the questions of the day,
political and otherwise, the old-fashioned debate would be.
I think farmers do not discuss these things enough among themselves these days.
They are more likely to talk them over with their banker or their merchant
when they go to town; and their minds on the questions of the day
take their color from town opinion.
We farmers are very slow to realize that we are a class by ourselves. The bankers
are organized, even internationally as a class; merchants, both wholesale and retail,
are organized and working in a body for the interests of the merchants; labor,
except that of the farmer, are still contending, single-handed, as individuals
against these huge organizations. We are so slow to organize and to work
together for our mutual interests.
The old-fashioned debates at the country schoolhouse would be a place and
time where farmers could discuss these things among themselves. An understanding
among farmers, of themselves and how their interests are affected by the questions
of the hour, is seriously needed. We cannot take our opinions from our fathers nor
keep the opinions we formed for ourselves a few years ago.
Times and things move too fast. We must learn to look at things, even politics,
from a farmer's standpoint. The price of hogs is more important to us than whether
one political party wins an election simply as a political party.
I would like to hear such timely questions discussed in an old-time debate; and I really
think that training in public speaking and understanding of public questions would be
worth more to pupils of the schools than games of basketball, because by exercising
their brains they might just grow into intelligent, wide-awake citizens.
Well, the debate is finished, and it is time for the spelling-down match. How
earnestly we used to line up for the struggle and valiantly contest for the honor
of remaining longest on the floor, and how we used to laugh when some
small schoolchild spelled down an outsider who had forgotten
the lessons in the old spelling book.
"The Friday Night Literary"
(January 1919)
Laura Ingalls Wilder
(1867-1957)
Prolific American writer and author of
the "Little House" series of books.
Excerpts taken from the book, "Little House In The Ozarks
A Laura Ingalls Wilder Sampler The Rediscovered Writings"
Laura Ingalls Wilder
Edited by Stephen W. Hines
(1991) Guideposts Edition
