On the Firing Line in Education

by Adoniram Judson Ladd

It is no longer necessary to offer an extended plea for a recognition of the value of physical training. The human race, in its upward climbing, long ago passed the stage where the body was looked upon as a hindrance to the soul in its aspirations. We have likewise gone beyond that higher stage in which the attitude toward the physical being was merely negative, and have clearly reached an altitude upon which we recognize a well-defined relationship between the physical man and the mental and spiritual man. We know now that only as each is healthy and thus in a condition to do its own work well, is the other able to act normally. As the great English philosopher, Locke, said, "A sound mind in a sound body is a brief but full description of a happy state in this world." This is a well-recognized article of our educational creed, not only, but even the conservative religious workers have accepted the principle, and we find inscribed over the entrances to our Christian Association buildings the word "body" as well as the word more commonly found in such connection, "spirit."

But to go back just a moment: let us consider it from the standpoint of mere physical betterment. We know that a muscle unused means a muscle undeveloped, and that, on the contrary, intelligent, systematic use, with a definite purpose in view, will accomplish wonders in physical development. We know something as to what a physical trainer can do with a bunch of raw foot-ball material. We know how the gymnasium can metamorphose a loose-jointed, lop-sided, stoop-shouldered, shamble-gaited young fellow. We know what the brisk recruiting officer can do with the "awkward squad." In the one case as in the other, the physical training stands him upon his feet; it takes the kinks out of his back; it throws his head up; it unties the knots in his legs; it puts fire into his eye. The good red blood courses thru his veins, and even shows itself in his cheeks. He walks with an elastic step. Every organ of his body is doing its duty. He no longer needs liver pills, digestive tablets or wizard oil.

I said "mere physical betterment," didn't I? Well, you can not have "mere" physical betterment. In every case suggested above, there is something better than physical improvement. Without knowing why, or how, the young fellow, after the training suggested, in addition to being a more perfectly functioning animal, a better working flesh-and-blood machine, is several rounds higher up on the ladder of manhood. He looks you in the eye. He gives your hand a regular Stearns grip. He dares to say that his soul is his own. And why? Because the life-giving oxygen is getting down into the long-neglected corners of his lungs. Because his heart is forcing this purified blood thru his veins building up his system and incidentally throwing off the waste and poisonous matter, so that, relieved of the dregs, the bodily organs can really function. And if that is true of the "gizzard" it is likewise true of the brain. He can feel more keenly, think more wisely. But all this can be done by physical exercise alone. Some of the best of these results can be obtained by the use of the mere punching bag; by running around the house, if you run often enough and fast enough; all alone with the dumb bells or Indian clubs, if you keep at it long enough, or even by walking out to the University on the railroad tracks and saving your street car nickels. But taken thus, these exercises constitute a mere medicine. And people don't take medicine until they have to. And for some strange reason they won't take this kind even then unless some doctor prescribes it in consideration of the payment of a good sized fee. Why is it? Simply because we prize things in proportion to their cost?

Now, we want these results and even better ones. And we don't want to pay the doctor's fees for this or any other kind of medicine in order to get them. What are we going to do about it? Isn't there some sugar coating that we can put on to these physical exercise pills to make them a little more palatable? Can't we in some way make ourselves believe that we are eating candy instead of taking quinine? For you know that we grown-ups have not lost all our powers of imagination. How often we play make believe, even yet! I'll tell you what we can do. Let's have this same physical exercise idea but introduce into it the element of sport which Webster defines as "that which diverts and makes mirth." Let's do these stunts "for the fun of it" instead of as a medicine. We'll get the results, just the same, and thus get double pay for our pains. I fancy that the skiing and the skating, the snow-shoeing and the curling of which we are to hear, all have that element tucked away somewhere in their anatomy.

But you may ask me what more there is than the results already mentioned to be gotten from these physical exercises, if we succeed in covering up the quinine with Mr. Webster's molasses. I've used Indian clubs and dumb bells by the hour; I've walked to the University in season and out of season; I've even run around the house—and as a result have experienced the exhilaration that comes from such vigorous discipline. I've been better for it, physically, and therefore, of course, mentally. More oxygen, better blood, firmer bodily tissue including better nourished brain cells, have done their beneficent work. But yet, as I look back and see myself going thru these various maneuvers, I am fully confident of the fact that all this time I was also doing something else—that my poor brain cells, which really needed recuperation more than any other part of my body, that these brain cells were still at work, that I was all the time carrying on a more or less strenuous train of thought as exhaustive as tho I were seated in my study chair, or standing before my class in the recitation room. More than one lecture, or address, have I worked out while walking to and from the University.

Now, one of the most important things for us to do is occasionally to stop thinking, or at least to stop thinking along our accustomed lines. We should give those few brain cells that are being made to work over-time a chance to rest once in a while. We are living too fast. Our lives are too intense. We are running our machines under high pressure, and some of them are already showing the results altho they are almost new. Unless there is a change, new ones will have to take their places ere long. The rate of speed of the life of the modern American business and professional man, the rate of speed of the life of the modern American society woman, is something terrific. We are wearing ourselves out before our time. Modern life is so complex, so exacting, so wearing, that we are losing all the joy of living. We are at our own firesides so seldom and for such short periods that we scarcely know our own little ones. Longfellow's "Children's Hour" that came "as a pause in the day's occupation," is almost wholly unknown in most American homes. There is no "pause" in the day's occupation. The occupation goes right on till after these "children" are soundly asleep in their beds and begins again before they are awake in the morning. And all this is true even of us, right here in this select circle, the "favored ones," many would call us.

But I am not giving a diatribe on American life, so will not pursue the matter farther. All that I am trying to do is simply this: to call attention to the fact that we are living fast—faster than our physical and mental make-up can long stand; that we have already reached the danger point. And what are we going to do about it? Well, we shall have to do many things before the problems are all solved, the difficulties all met. As a slight relief, and to answer a question raised a little earlier in the paper, I am suggesting the sports—those activities that both rejuvenate the physical man and also "divert and make mirth." Into these we can not carry our teaching and our preaching and our making of social calls. The goods of the merchant, the notes of the banker, the briefs of the lawyer, the annoyances of the teacher, and the cares of the housewife, alike, would all have to be left behind. The mind could rest while the body and the spirit are being recreated. An hour a day, in the open air, with fears and anxieties and schemes all cast aside, in companionship with kindred spirits similarly divested of that which troubles and makes afraid, all engaged in recreative sports, would do more to make us physically well, morally strong, and civilly decent than all the pills of the doctors, all the texts of the preachers, and all the keys of the jailers!

In keeping with the world-wide movement in this direction our own people, in their civic capacity, have already acted and have thus become the possessor of splendid park facilities which offer ample opportunities, when fully developed, for a sane out-of-door life of a population many times as large as ours at the present time. And as we all know, the Park Board has entered intelligently and systematically upon this matter of development and improvement. Much has already been done. Very much more is fully outlined in the minds of the Park Board. I think it is their purpose—and I fully believe that they will carry it out—to proceed in this matter of development just as rapidly as the people show, by their use of the facilities progressively offered, an appreciation.

Nearly all the work done thus far, such as clearing away the rubbish, making the shady retreats usable, fitting up picnic grounds, caring for the tennis courts, golf links, and other game reserves, as well as erecting pavilions and other conveniences, has looked toward putting the grounds into condition for summer use. And the response on the part of the people has been gratifying. As rapidly as the parks have been put into shape, they have been generously used by an appreciative people. It has done my heart good, many times, especially on Sundays in the hot summer months, to see the numbers of people, and the people, who were really using the parks. They have been the people, in a large mesure, who can not easily get elsewhere the best things that the parks give.

Thus far, as said, the plans for development have looked mainly toward summer use, But I am especially glad to note a recent improvement that shows that the Park Board has the winter use of the parks also definitely in mind. I refer to the new skating rink in Riverside Park. It is a most commendable institution. I very much hope that it will be extensively used, not only by the people living in that part of the city, but by those of all sections. It belongs to all of us. Here is an opportunity for a most delightful winter sport freely offered. If appreciated, as shown by its use, I have no doubt that it will be duplicated next winter, and on a larger scale, in Lincoln Park. And if we show that we appreciate this, other features will be added.