Chapter VII: Part I: A Mother’s Desire Realized (4)

There must have been an inborn instinct to try for an education, because no forms of business or other like inducements ever claimed any part of his mind. He remained on the farm till he was seventeen years of age, going three months to school in the summer and doing what he could with his books himself at odd times. Finally his brother gave him a cotton patch. The cotton, when sold, netted him $85. With this money he went away to a boarding high school where he came in contact, for the first time, with teachers of some influence and moral strength. He remained at this school five months and had to return to the farm because of no more money.

From the farm he went to work in a general store, thinking perhaps this was a quicker and shorter way, but found this a difficult task, too, to save any money ahead because of such small wages. All this time there was an ever increasing desire to go away to school, “money or no money,” but lack of experience made him afraid. From the store he went out from town to town as a picture agent and it was here perhaps that a bit of self-confidence was first gained. All this time the one purpose and desire was to save money for college, but sales were not successful enough to warrant his going into what seemed impossible to the inexperienced mind. Finally, one day he came in tired out and discouraged feeling that to be a picture man was to be of little force in the world. He clearly saw that, first of all, one must be educated. Acting upon this conclusion he boarded a train for the State University of Louisiana, which was to open in ten days. He first set about finding out whether boys without money could earn their way by work. He told the President that all the money he had was $65, but that he had come there determined to enter school. This determined spirit made the President offer some encouragement by advising the young student to register and try. He did far more than this by saying he would give the boy the name of a newspaper editor who wanted some boy to assist in managing the circulation of his paper.

With this small spark of hope, the young student settled down to study and to try to meet the entrance examination, which he himself thought he could not pass. The necessary “mark” was made to enter the subfreshman department, however, and he was finally enrolled and became one of the boys.

He worked every afternoon in this newspaper office, seeing that the papers were delivered promptly, collected for the paper and solicited new subscriptions. Thus he made his expenses for the entire year. This did a great deal to encourage him. After spending the following summer looking after the horticultural gardens, he returned the next session and carried papers as an ordinary newsboy, and passed his freshman year.

After this year a scholarship was granted him by the University, which made his expenses possible during his sophomore year. During his junior and senior years he assisted in the zoölogical laboratories at the University and taught the sciences at the city high school, which more than paid his expenses to graduation.

During his summers he worked as “tick agent” for the Bureau of Animal Industry, Washington, D. C., and in this way saved sufficient money to begin a medical course, which he saw no chance of completing at the time. Luck came his way, however, and he met every obstacle for two years and finally borrowed money from a friend to finish his medical course.

One finds a course in medicine somewhat more difficult to work through than a college course, but after one has gone through college these difficulties are easily met.

Finally, allow him to say that all any boy needs to obtain an education is money enough to pay his railroad fare to the school he wishes to attend; after he reaches there, if he is in earnest, someone will show him a way.

The writer does not wish to disclose his name for personal reasons, but anyone interested can get his address from the author of “College Men without Money,” and letters written to him concerning how to work through school will be answered with pleasure.

_Mississippi._

DIFFICULTY AND WILLINGNESS ARE ENEMIES

REV. C. H. ROWLAND, A.B., M.A., D.D.

On the 10th day of September, 1895, I arrived at Elon College to do five years’ work in order to receive a diploma from that institution. It seemed like an impossible task. A well-worn trunk held my belongings, which consisted of a preacher’s coat of long standing. My purse contained the whole amount of six dollars and seventy-five cents. It might be of interest to say that I was nearing my twenty-seventh birthday, and had been a licensed preacher for four years. There is no need to tell why I was at college without money, for I have already said, that I was a preacher, and the Scriptures say, “Not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble are called.”

It was Dr. Smith Baker, of Maine, who said, “In the ministerial profession, four-fifths of the ministers worked their own way by doing all kinds of work from sawing wood to teaching school.” I was not one of the class who sawed wood, neither did I teach school, but I preached, just simply preached. I have not asked those who heard me what _they_ called it, but _I_ called it “preaching.” I always believed that if a young man had brains and energy he could obtain an education without much help from anyone but God. My trouble was, I wanted enough money before I went to college to “put me through.” I suppose, if I had been so favored with money, I would not have been worth “putting through.”

That was a ride never to be forgotten on that September morning, when I left my home to drive thirteen miles to Raleigh, N. C., to take the train for Elon College. A widowed mother at home--practically no money in my pocket, and five years’ work to be done in college. My little bark was on a stormy sea, but I had decided to use the oars with all my might, and if I went down I would be breasting the storm. If it had not been for the prayers and sacrifices of a Christian mother, and the encouragement of a devoted cousin, who lived with us, I should have failed. That same mother is helping her boy to-day by her prayers, although she has passed her four score years, and has been an invalid for many years. When I arrived in Raleigh, I was met on the street by an uncle, and he asked, “Where are you going?” I said, “I am going to Elon College.” He turned and walked with me down the street until he came to a drug store, and then he said, “Come in here for I want to give you something.” We went in, and he asked for a box of soap, and he purchased a box containing three bars of soap. He had it wrapped nicely, and we walked out, and then he said, “I want to give you this for service and a symbol; keep yourself clean.” I do not know which he thought I needed the most, the soap or the advice, but I know that both were timely, and I feel sure I profited by the incident.

My first day at college left me almost penniless, for I paid five dollars as a matriculation fee, and the remaining one dollar and seventy-five cents was invested in second-hand books, except a few cents retained to pay postage in writing to my mother and my girl. That first week at college was a long one, but at last Saturday came, and I dressed and went to the depot to go to my Sunday appointment fifty miles away. I met one of the professors on my way to the station, and he asked me, “Where are you going?” My heart sank within me, for I did not have a dime in my pocket, but I said, “I am going to fill my appointment.” Just before I got to the depot, for I “walked and was sad,” I met a preacher. He looked kind, but preachers are generally poor men to borrow money from, but I said right out, “Brother ----, loan me one dollar until Monday.” That preacher had the real money, and it might have been his last dollar, but he handed it to me. It took almost every cent to pay my railroad fare, and nothing with which to return. That was one time I acted on faith. The church which I was serving at that time held a conference on that Saturday afternoon, and one of the brethren asked that they pay up just a little better, as “their pastor was in college.” They paid me a little more than a dozen dollars that day, and I am sure that I preached better than usual on the following day. I received one hundred dollars from that church that year, and paid twenty-five of that to the railroad for transportation.

That college year was not far spent, when another church called me to become pastor at a salary of fifty dollars for the year. I had resigned two churches before I left home, as they were so far from the College that they took more of my time than I could give, and the expenses were more than the salary paid. My brother gave me most of my clothes, and all the help he could, and my churches paid other bills. The vacation was spent in evangelistic work for which I received a small amount. The second year was even more gloomy than the first, for the hired man at home had failed to make good. Someone had to be found to take his place, and it seemed for some time that I would have to be the man. After arrangement was made for home I began my second year at college with one more church, and that one was much nearer and it was to pay one hundred and twenty-five dollars as a salary.

It may seem like a small matter to preach three Sundays in each month, and attend school, but it is hard on all--the professors, the student, and the people. With three churches I began the third year, but in ten days after I returned to the College I had the misfortune to shoot one of my feet, and a part of the foot had to be taken off, and one-half of the year was lost from college. It seemed that the way was now blocked entirely, and that my college days were at an end; but mother, my faithful cousin, and I put our heads together, and we decided to move to the College. When we arrived at Elon College, Christmas of 1897, I was still pastor of three churches, but my expenses were so much increased that I took the fourth appointment at a salary of seventy-five dollars for the year, making my salary in all three hundred and fifty dollars. The remainder of my time at the College I preached every Sunday, with few exceptions.

It does look like a reflection on those churches to tell of the small amount paid for preaching, but the thing that startles me is, how they were ever able to pay what they did for such preaching. I hope they feel that they were giving themselves to save a poor preacher in college. The amount received for preaching did not meet our family expenses, but we took a few boarders, and received a little from the farm, and the rest I borrowed. The last year was a test of faith also, for my strength was hardly equal to the task of keeping up with my classes, and looking after home duties, and preaching every Sunday, and trying to make up some work missed while lame from my accident. Work was piling up, churches were paying poorly, grades were poor, and the breaking-point almost reached, and it was my senior year. I would not let myself think about failing to receive my diploma, but the way was dark. The commencement time was coming, and money was getting more scarce, and bills more frequent. One day a real friend came to me and said, “A man trying as hard as you are needs help,” and she handed me a sum of money. I wept, and she wept with me, but I saw through those tears light that I had not seen before.

The day of graduation came on the 14th day of June, 1900. It was a glad day, and a sad day, for I felt that I had almost reached the goal, but I knew that I had not gotten all that I ought to have gotten out of my college course. I thought people would ask me about my grades, but not one has asked me about them yet. I find that folks are not interested in what my grades were, but what I can do.

One thing I learned by being at college without money, and that was that money is not essential to character. Money cannot cover up badness, neither can poverty hide goodness. It is not a matter of how little money you have to get through college, for the money is the smallest part of a college life. The less money the better in some cases. It is not so much money as it is great Faith, and a Determination.

_Franklin, Virginia._

FAITHFUL IN LITTLE THINGS

HON. C. G. SAUNDERS, A.B., LL.D.

My father, George W. Saunders, was born in England, June 3, 1837. His parents emigrated with their children and settled in Oneida County, New York, in the spring of 1852. My mother, Mary E. Walker, was also born in England and came with her people in the forties to the same county in America, and I presume they should properly be placed in that large class of people who were “poor but honest”; my maternal grandfather, Thomas Walker, became a prosperous farmer, and lived to a very old age. Shortly after his coming to America, my grandfather, William Saunders, became an invalid and my father, being the oldest of a large family, was compelled to assist in earning a livelihood for the family and so was deprived of early educational advantages. He was a man of strong natural talents, of strict integrity, and was commonly known as a “hard-headed old Englishman.” He became a very successful farmer before his death and “passed over the grade” financially just as I became of age. My sainted mother was a plain, home woman who loved her family and her God, and who devoted her life to her family of eight children and her husband. I was the oldest child, and was born on the 10th day of April, 1861, in Oneida County, New York. In 1868 my father removed to Iowa City, Iowa, where he was a railroad foreman for five years, and during those years I attended the graded school when I was not sick. In the spring of 1873 my father concluded he did not desire to rear his boys about a railroad, and so settled upon an eighty-acre farm, near Stuart, Iowa. At this early age, when I was puny and weak, I was forced by the financial condition of the family to enter upon the active duties of the farm. Many a day have I plowed, when I did not possess sufficient strength to pull the plow around the corners, and lifted it around by getting the handles upon my shoulder. In the spring of 1876, my father saw that he could make only a bare living upon his small farm, so he sold it and removed to Vail, Iowa, and settled in the rich and fertile valley of the Boyer River. At this time he had about two thousand dollars, a weak body, and an ambition to achieve success. An injury sustained while in the railroad employment incapacitated him from doing the heavy work of the farm, but it did not impair either his ambition or his energy. I worked from seven in the morning until sundown on the long summer days behind a heavy team. Mother sympathized with me, but father never realized that the toil was beyond my strength. He was a firm believer in the doctrine of “hard work” and that “Satan finds mischief still for idle hands to do,” and governed himself accordingly. He loved his family and did the best for them that his means permitted.

The county was new and people were all poor, but the land owners characterized the others as “poor renters.” For four years we were in the latter class. I completed the country school, in the spring of 1877, and then desired to enter the Vail school, the course of which did not extend beyond what would now be classed as the eighth grade. We lived three miles from town, and as my people could not afford to pay my board in the village, I was necessarily compelled to live at home and go horseback to school. When I was about sixteen, I determined to become a lawyer and so informed my people. They treated the announcement as a boyish whim, and later discouraged me from entering upon such a course. Father urged that I might become one of those “educated fools” and mother, who was a devoted member of the Methodist Church, quoted to me that passage of Scripture, “Woe unto ye lawyers.”

Books to the amount of about seven dollars were required if I should enter the Vail school and that was a large sum of money in our large family. The turning point in my life came on a cold December day in 1877. I had taken a load of hay to Denison about eight miles away. All the way there and back I was pondering over the question of an education. When I drove into the yard after returning from town, father came to assist in putting away the team. I was stiff with cold, but I said, “Father, I am going to Vail to school after New Year’s.” He retorted, “Where is the money to come from for the books?” I said, “Father, you spend six dollars per year for chewing tobacco” (his only bad habit), “and you can afford that much to send your boy to school.”

I went to school two and a half months that winter and likewise the next two winters. I then secured a second-grade certificate and taught a county school the two winters preceding my twenty-first birthday. Each winter I taught a four months’ term--wages $30 per month the first winter, and $35 the second. The first winter I walked three miles across the prairie, cared for a team at home and acted as my own janitor at the schoolhouse. This was the awful winter of 1880-81, when the snow was four feet deep on the level. There were no roads that were available to me, and I made my own path. I saved one hundred dollars that winter and a like sum the following winter, so when I attained my majority in April, 1882, I had two hundred dollars. I had never had an overcoat and I did not possess even a trunk. I owned a colt that I sold for fifty dollars. That summer I worked on my father’s farm at a wage of twenty dollars per month for five months, and on September 15, 1882, I started for Drake University with $350, a suit of clothes and a trunk. I had thought by day and dreamed by night of a college education, and now the dream was to become a reality. As the train whistled at the station, father grasped me by the hand and, with tears streaming down his face, said, “Boy, I have opposed this all the time, but I guess you are doing the right thing.” That was the first word of encouragement I had ever received from my parents to proceed with my education.

My room, partially furnished, cost me four dollars per month when I shared it with another, and board was $1.75 per week in the “club.” We did not fare sumptuously, but we had sufficient wholesome food to keep us in good health. I did not earn any money during the first fall and winter, but in the spring I seized an opportunity to earn three dollars per week by sweeping six rooms, carrying the coal for the same, and ringing the bells for all the classes and the college bells from 6 A. M. to 9 P. M. A watch was necessary for my work, so I took part of my hard-earned wages and bought a watch which is now a treasured possession. The following summer I worked upon the home farm and returned to Drake in the fall. I did janitor work during my second year at the same scale of wages. I also spent many of my Saturdays grubbing stumps out of a lawn near the University. In the spring of my second year I worked Saturdays on the streets with a shovel, receiving $1.50 for eight hours’ work. In the spring term of my second year, some of my college chums found that my return was doubtful: hence they elected me steward of the boarding club for the succeeding year. This paid my board and room rent during the third year. In the summer following my second year, I assumed the role of book agent. This experience was not very successful, netting me only about seventy-five dollars for my summer’s work.

When I entered Drake University, I had two years of preparatory work to do. I carried five studies for three years, reciting daily in each. This was possible because we had eight class hours of forty-five minutes each. As I approached the end of my third year, some of my teachers urged me to return for another year. I found that by carrying six studies all the year I could graduate classical, and on the last Sunday night before commencement I determined to return, notwithstanding the fact that my purse was empty. I worked again on the home farm in the summer vacation, and returned in the fall with sixty dollars and an assurance of a loan of one hundred dollars from my father. The University had agreed to take my notes for the tuition of my senior year, so I returned in the fall of 1885 not knowing how I should get through the year, but confident that in some way I would earn some money and complete the course. The evening I returned to the University, the secretary of the faculty offered me the editorship of the college paper. Frank Morgan, of blessed memory, assumed the business management, and we divided two hundred and forty dollars between us as the profits of the venture. A personal friend, who was as poor as I, with me rented a furnished room in which we kept “bach.” I shall not state the amount it cost us for fuel, coal oil and food, but it was much less than the expense of boarding in the club. I edited the paper, carried six studies, and broke down about two weeks before commencement. I did not take my final examinations, but was awarded my degree upon my class standing. I had borrowed the promised one hundred dollars from my father, had given my notes for my tuition, and when we made our final division of profits arising from the paper, I had sixty dollars in my pocket and my college degree.

Between the winter and spring terms of my senior year, I applied for the principalship of the high school at Manning, Iowa. For six weeks the board was in a deadlock and then it elected the other applicant. It was a bitter disappointment, as such positions were not numerous and most of them were then filled. I planned to teach two years and then pursue the study of law. About two weeks before commencement, I was offered the principalship of a two-room school just outside the corporate limits of the city of Des Moines. But I saw, however, that I could immediately take up the law, and so about July 1, 1886, I entered the law office of C. C. Nourse and in the next fourteen months I read the junior year of the law course laid down by the State University. In the fall I took charge of my school, but I read law nights, mornings and Saturdays. I was fortunate in securing board at a very reasonable price. By close economy I paid all my debts and had about one hundred and fifty dollars left when the fall of 1887 came. I then entered the State University of Iowa, passed the examinations of the junior year, became a member of the senior class, and graduated in June, 1888.

Such in brief is the story of my struggle for an education. I have written it with the hope that it may encourage other young men and young women of limited means to make the effort that I made to open the gates of opportunity. While the expenses have increased, the opportunities for employment have multiplied in a much greater ratio, and I am fully convinced that any young man or young woman, with fair health, may secure a higher education if he has it in him and is but willing to pay the price of toil and sacrifice.

Some may inquire, Did it pay? Within one hundred feet of where I performed janitor work, Drake University in 1900 conferred upon me the LL.D. degree; three times have I been elected to the State Senate. The State Bar Association has honored me with its presidency.

_Council Bluffs, Iowa._

FROM JANITOR TO COLLEGE PRESIDENT

REV. W. W. STALEY, A.B., A.M., D.D., LL.D., EX-PRESIDENT OF ELON COLLEGE

I have been asked to tell _why_ and _how_ I worked my way through college. Because there was no other way to get through college, but to work through, gives the reason _why_.

My father, John Tilmon Staley, was a school teacher. He died of typhoid fever at twenty-eight, when I was five.

My mother married Archibald M. Cook three years after my father’s death, and was the mother of eight children: three Staleys and five Cooks.

At the close of the Civil War, emancipation left us nothing but land.

In 1866 my uncle, Lieutenant J. N. H. Clendenin, proposed that if I would work with him on his farm he would send me to Dr. W. S. Long’s school in Graham the next winter. My stepfather said he was not able to send me to school, but he would give me my time. I worked on the farm that summer and entered school January 17, 1867, and walked three miles to school that term.

At the end of that term, Dr. W. S. Long proposed to furnish me board, clothes and tuition, if I would live with him and provide wood, keep rooms in order, build fires, cultivate the garden, milk cows, feed horses, and cultivate a small crop in summer vacation. I accepted and entered his service in September, 1867. I hauled wood two miles, cut and placed same in place for fourteen fires, swept schoolrooms and built fires; attended to horses, cows, and garden; went to the country for feed, flour, meat, and live beef and butchered it; cultivated vegetables, potatoes, and corn in summer; did sundry errands for Dr. Long; and recited lessons when other duties did not prevent, and kept up with my classes.

In 1869 I taught the Graham Public School and in the spring I entered the store of Col. A. C. McAlister in Company Shops (now Burlington) as clerk. In addition to my store duties, and with the consent of my employer, I attended to the morning express train and sale of tickets at four o’clock. My pay as clerk was board, laundry, and $10.00 per month; and I received $10.00 per month for attending to the early morning express train. At the end of the year Col. McAlister paid me $5.00 per month more than he had promised.

In the spring of 1871, I spent four months more in the Graham School, and entered the sophomore class in Trinity College, N. C., in September, 1871. I graduated from Trinity in June, 1874, in a class of thirteen.

The first half year in Trinity I boarded myself by renting a room from a minister whose wife prepared meals for me and another young man, who is a distinguished judge. The son of the good woman who prepared our meals worked his way through college by sweeping rooms and building fires. He became a fine judge.

Two years and a half I boarded on credit with W. S. Bradshaw and his good wife. At the end of the spring term of 1872, Mr. Bradshaw asked me if I was coming back in the fall. I told him I would have to stop and make some money and would come again. He replied: “I will board you till you get through, and wait with you for the money.” I said, “I have no security to give you.” He replied, “I will trust you and take the risk.”

After I finished I paid for my board with interest, paid my tuition in full (though the college did not charge ministerial students), and made a donation of $100 to the college. In addition to this, I secured a $100 subscription from each of the other twelve members of our class to be paid in four equal annual instalments after graduation.

Friends and churches aided me in the sum of two hundred and forty-nine dollars. Since then I have paid to the church in cash more than twice as many _thousands_ as I received _hundreds_.

After leaving College seven hundred dollars in debt, I taught with Rev. D. A. Long and Judge B. F. Long in Graham, and preached as assistant pastor of New Providence Church till 1877, when I entered the University of Virginia. That was the only institution where I accepted _free tuition_; but I paid all other fees.

About the easiest task of my life was to work through college; and, if I may make one remark, it would be that the danger of schools is to make education too easy. The armor used by Roman soldiers in camp exercises was twice the weight of that which they used in battle. This made battle easy as compared with drill. It seems to me that college life ought to develop human powers by double strain so as to prepare for life’s big task. Hot-house methods cannot make men of greatest endurance and usefulness. That is why so many men drop out suddenly in the prime of life. They cannot stand the strain of great public service.

_Suffolk, Va._

STARTING WITH FIVE DOLLARS

I graduated from high school in 1907 with less than $5 left from my previous summer’s earnings. Although, when younger, school attendance had been distasteful to me, I was now fully determined to get a college education, and that without asking financial aid from my parents. I had been reared on a farm and was used to hard work; but I felt that my education should now count for something, and that I should be able to get something better than manual labor. I made a complete canvass of the town and obtained offers of two very lucrative positions. The first on a local paper (I had already made some progress in learning the printer’s trade) at the enormous salary of $2.50 per week, and the other as assistant bill clerk in a wholesale house at $3 per week. I decided to accept the latter, as it offered the better chance of a quick rise, but the offer was rescinded before I could accept it. I then returned to the paper, but found that they no longer needed a “devil.” I saw then that it was the overalls for me.

My first position was in a lumber camp in the Smoky Mountains at $1.40 per day of eleven hours. Next I took work with a gang engaged in grading at $1.25 per day. It was in July and slightly “warm around the edges,” but I was getting along fairly well when I was offered the position of “devil” on the other local paper at $4 per week. I accepted.

I worked for this paper for over two years and my wages were steadily raised. Our week consisted of fifty-four hours, but I frequently worked from ten to twenty hours a week overtime, in addition to walking back and forth from my country home and doing the chores night and morning. I frequently spent only my pay for overtime, and deposited all of my regular salary in the bank.

I well remember the fall of 1908, when, in a big rush the other two printers got on a big drunk and quit, thus leaving the whole burden on me. The strain was heavy, but I stood it and as a result got the foreman’s place long before I had served a four years’ apprenticeship. By the summer of 1909 I had saved $575. I had never commanded a large salary, as I quit just when I was becoming efficient enough to hold down a position in a bigger office. I was offered a chance to learn the linotype, but refused and entered college in September.

I did no outside work until the following spring when I started to working in a local printing office at odd times. I picked up $25 in this way. During my sophomore year I made $50, and started with the same work in my junior year, but was offered work correcting English papers and made $60 in this way during the year. The first summer out of college I worked at my trade and saved about $100. The next summer I took an agency with the Aluminum Cooking Utensil Co., which has, I suppose, helped more boys through college than any other one company. I was absolutely inexperienced as a salesman, but worked hard and cleared $200. The next summer I took the same work, but as I had secured an instructorship which would pay the expenses of my senior year, I “loafed on the job” and saved only $75. I have since sincerely regretted this wasted summer.

By these financial means, without any assistance whatsoever, I completed my college course, and on the day of graduation I could have paid all of my debts and railway fare home, and still have had $25 to my credit, or $20 more than I had when I finished high school.

When I landed in my college town I knew absolutely no one and, although I had very little money to spend and the college has the reputation of being somewhat aristocratic, I haven’t made such a bad record. In my freshman year I won the English scholarship; in my sophomore year the history scholarship; and in my junior year the endowed scholarship, under which I took the instructorship. I have served as president of the literary society and have twice represented it on public celebrations. I have been on the intercollegiate debate, and was elected to the position of valedictorian by the senior class. I was also elected to membership in Phi Beta Kappa and Delta Sigma Rho (both honorary). I mention these facts merely to show that a fellow without money need not be denied an active part in college life and activities.

In looking back over the past six years I attribute my ability to do what I have done to perseverance and good health. Too much emphasis cannot be laid upon the latter. Any young American with determination, good health and reasonably good sense, who has no one else dependent upon him, can get a college education to-day.--“_ZANK REIN._”

_Lexington, Va._

FROM GOOD TO BETTER

REV. W. E. SWAIN, D.D.

I was born and reared on a little farm in Washington County, N. C., near the present site of Creswell. My father was poor. Four years of service and suffering in the Confederate army so wrecked his health that he was able to do but little after it was all over.

There were no schools of any consequences near, and had there been, they were barred to me, for my father was not able to pay tuition, and there were no public schools in that section.

When I was nearly fifteen years old a gentleman living near by employed me to grub new ground. This work had to be done at night after my day’s work at home. By piling the brush and firing them two hours’ work could be done before the light was entirely gone. It took about eight nights to do a “task” which was a piece of ground sixty feet square. After having finished three tasks, the gentleman paid me. With the money so earned a bottle of ink, six pen points, half quire of paper, a pen staff and a “blue-back speller” were purchased. The speller was necessary that the script letters might be learned. Having made a small rough table in which a drawer was placed to hold writing material, the task of learning to write was begun. To me this was much more difficult than grubbing. Even after I had learned to make the script letters I did not know how to spell. As a substitute for this lack more than half the speller was copied. By the time this was done some of the simpler words had been learned and so I began to write. About the same time I undertook to work “sums” in Greenlief’s Arithmetic. This was painfully slow. Ben. Spruill, now Capt. Spruill, of Creswell, N. C., taught me to reduce a fraction to a common denominator. This was done with the sharp point of a cotton burr, the figures being made in the sand between the rows of cotton.

On August 12, 1880, I arrived at Yadkin College, now Yadkin College Institute, engaged board, matriculated and began to cast about for some work. Mr. James Benson, long since dead, was a large merchant of the place and employed me to make drawers to place under the shelves in the store. I made the first one the best I could and tried to make every drawer better than the preceding one. This work was done on Saturdays, and when it was finished he employed me to stay in the store on Saturdays and paid me really more than I was worth. Soon his health failed and I was out of a job. On March 24, 1881, I began work at house carpentry and tried to keep up my studies by sitting up late at night preparing the lessons for the next day. At commencement I had my speech prepared and stood my examinations, passing on all but one study. During the vacation of 1881 taught school and saved a few dollars to begin the next term.

When school opened this was soon gone and something had to be done. A small unused room was secured, a pair of scissors, two razors, a comb and brush and a barber shop was opened. The boys were kind and long suffering, so the business prospered. Thus another term was finished,--and no debt. Again during the vacation of 1882 I taught. At the close of this vacation I was elected town constable. This was by no means to my liking, but something had to be done, or quit. This business frequently broke into my school work and made it hard to keep abreast of the class. However, in this way I managed to pay expenses for the term and saved a few dollars besides. During the vacation of 1883 I taught school near Denver, N. C., and in the meantime served as pastor of Fairfeld Church. Both together made it possible for me to have more money than I ever had at one time before.

On returning to college at the close of vacation I was elected a tutor. In this way I earned ten dollars a month and kept up my own studies. This work was more in keeping with my general taste than anything I had hitherto tried. It was a fine opportunity to review what I had done and was perfectly agreeable to me. The amount thus earned was ample for all my real needs, and so the difficulties began to give way. Hope that had been groping amid the shadows began to mount up, and resolution grew strong. Thus, sustained by a kind Providence and encouraged by friends, my college course was finished.

I feel that this would be incomplete were I to omit to speak of Rev. John Parris, D.D., who gave me so much encouragement and help. When I was yet a boy, never having been to school a day, he, somehow, learned that I was anxious to read. Knowing I had no books he would borrow them from Capt. T. J. Norman, becoming personally responsible for their safe return, and bring them to me. When bringing them he would say, “Now, young sir, if you damage this book I may not bring you another.” He not only brought the books, but would question me on the contents when he returned. He was a man who seemed stern and repulsive to the young, but when better known was as gentle and sweet spirited, loving and tender and patient as a mother.

_Mebane, N. C._

A TASK WITH A MORAL

HON. FRED J. TRAYNOR, A.B., LL.B.

There is nothing remarkable about my experience in working my way through college. I do not deem it worth the telling, except that it may help to encourage the boy who thinks that it is more than he dares undertake to obtain an education without means to back him.

I was born in Ontario, Canada. I was fortunate in being able to get an excellent common school training and three years of high school work before having to get out and dig for myself. Since the age of fifteen, when my father died, I have been at all times self-supporting, and, before coming to North Dakota at the age of twenty, I had taken such employment as was obtainable. In the summer of 1898 I had saved enough money to make the trip to North Dakota, looking for opportunities. Teaching seemed to be the most feasible stepping-stone, so that fall, after having spent three months as a farm laborer in this State, and having saved what I had earned, which, together with a little I had left of what I had brought from Ontario, made about $90, I entered the preparatory department then in existence at the University of North Dakota.

It was a month after the opening of the school year when I entered school that year with the idea of taking a winter course for teachers in order that I might take the state examinations for a teacher’s certificate in the spring. Instead of taking the course intended, however, I fitted in as nearly as I could to the regular course of study for the last year of the preparatory department and used what spare time I could obtain to study the common branches upon which I would have to take examination for a teacher’s certificate. By close application to business I was able to carry along the regular course of study and also to secure the coveted teacher’s certificate in the spring.

I left the University that spring at the end of the winter term, March 22, or thereabouts, and taught school from then until about the last week in October. I left the University on Friday and commenced the term of school on the following Monday and had no vacation during the summer; and, in addition to that, I succeeded in obtaining the permission of the school board that had employed me to teach six days a week during the last five weeks in order that I might get back to the University a week earlier than otherwise. My salary was $40 per month. I had barely scraped through from November 1 until March 22 on that ninety dollars, and had to make a loan of twenty dollars from a friend to tide me over until I got a month’s salary. At the end of the term of school I had paid back the $20 and saved about $110.

During the spring term of the University, while I was teaching, I continued my studies as if I had been at the University, endeavoring to do the same work that my class-mates at school were doing and reporting from time to time to the professors. I burned midnight oil many nights, but North Dakota spring weather is healthful and invigorating, and I gained flesh on it and was able to take the examination with my classmates in June to get better than a pass mark in all subjects. Then I commenced on the subjects. I expected to begin on in the fall, as I knew I would be about a month late entering college.

The story of my life for the next twelve months is much a repetition of the previous year, except that I did not have the extra work of preparing for teacher’s examination. I had to borrow about $36 to tide me over until I got my first month’s salary, but I paid this back during the summer and returned to school late in the fall as usual with about $120. The following spring, in fact, before the winter term had ended, I was “broke,” as each year seemed a little more costly than the previous. President Webster Merrifield, then and for many years previous at the head of our University, was the good angel who came to my rescue. Every boy was his friend and he was the friend of every boy in the institution. Always looking for an opportunity to help those he thought worthy, he divined my need and offered to help me with a loan that would tide me over the spring term. At first I declined the tender of aid, but later thought better of it and accepted a loan of $60 and gave my note, payable one year after the expected date of my graduation. That summer I took a position as timekeeper for an extra gang doing surfacing work on the line of the Great Northern Railway in Minnesota and returned to school at the opening of the school year that fall with about $75 ahead.

The University of North Dakota, at that time, had about two hundred and fifty students, including those in the preparatory department. A little book store and postoffice was conducted by students in one of the University buildings. President Merrifield controlled the appointment of the postmaster and manager of the book store, but the students getting the positions had to finance the book store themselves. I applied for and received appointment in the book store and postoffice, and retained an interest in it during the three years following. I had to do some skirmishing to borrow $100 to add to my $75 to provide my share of the capital necessary to make advance payments on our stock of books, and was denied a loan from friends I thought knew me well enough to trust me. Again a generous professor in the person of the dean of the college of arts came to my aid and made me the loan. I shall not soon forget his kindness.

During those last three years of my college days while completing the courses of arts and law I was able, writing life insurance among the students as a side line in addition to doing my share of the business in the book store and postoffice, to make my entire expenses and leave school free from debt.

_Devil’s Lake, N. D._

FROM THE UNIVERSITY OF DENVER BULLETIN

Benjamin Eitelgeorge arrived at University Park the 6th of September, 1905, With $45.00 on hand. He took the severely plain quarters in the basement of University Hall and worked for his room rent and tuition. He did his work well. He went from house to house in search of work for Saturdays and afternoons. At first no one seemed to need him. Later on, however, there was all the work offered which he could do, in house-cleaning and other work, at twenty cents an hour. He won a prize in that first year and was made head janitor at the college. In the second and third terms he had the care of a cow and a furnace. So the first year closed with a new sense of self-reliance.

In the summer he went to summer school, working for his tuition, and had the care of a cow, pony and lawn for his room and $15.00 per month.

In the fall he was made head janitor at $15.00 per month, with room rent and tuition added. Saturdays he had all the outside work he could do. This brought him through the year in comfort and with a still deeper sense of self-reliance.

Now he was given charge of the church at Black Hawk, on request of the people there who had heard him preach, and he has kept that service for four years. Indeed, the people at Black Hawk desire to have him appointed as their pastor for life. He now preaches at three places each Sunday. Of course, this left Mr. Eitelgeorge no opportunity to get into all sorts of college sports. He took part in all inter-class games, however, where the object in view is the pure fun of the game. He was active in the debating club, and made the honorary debating fraternity, Tau Kappa Alpha. He was conspicuous in all the Christian activities of the college. Mr. Eitelgeorge says he enjoyed college life as much as any student who ever went to college, and that he would not take anything for the experience and satisfaction of having worked his way through college. He was graduated with the A.B. degree in 1911.

This sort of discipline creates men who can do things. If Benjamin Eitelgeorge were shipwrecked on an island which was peopled by rude savages he would know what to do at once. With a prayer in his heart, and that everlasting smile on his face, he would begin at once at the task of creating a Christian nation out of the raw material. And in twenty-five years he would have trade relations with other countries, an ambassador of his government at Washington, and a Christian college, with the whole faculty from the class of 1911 in the University of Denver.

John F. Sinclair’s story reads like a romance. In February last he made an address at the Denver Y. M. C. A. to the high school and working boys on “How to Work One’s Way Through College.” From that speech the following facts are taken: Mr. Sinclair came to University Park with Mr. Eitelgeorge from New Mexico in September of 1905. He had $20 in his pocket and plenty of pluck, but with no certain ideas about how he could make a living. He went with Eitelgeorge in that first canvass for work, but no one seemed to want them. There were plenty of discouragements at the start, but presently he had more work offered than he could do. He roomed in the basement of University Hall and did honest work to earn his tuition and room rent. At that time we had a boys’ club where the fellows kept in prime condition on two dollars a week. For two years he made his way with odd jobs. He “waited on tables, washed dishes, cooked meals, scrubbed floors, washed windows, cleaned furnaces, built fires, chopped wood, beat rugs (the most despised job in the curriculum), cut out weeds, mowed lawns, spaded gardens, painted, calcimined, solicited, sold peanuts and pop-corn, ran errands, etc.”