DR. JOHN D. RUNKLE, THE FOUNDER OF MANUAL TRAINING IN THE UNITED STATES.
“Resolved, That the Corporation of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology takes this opportunity to cordially congratulate his Imperial Highness, Prince Pierre d’Oldenbourg, that, at the Imperial Technical School of Moscow, education in the Mechanic Arts has been for the first time based upon philosophical and purely educational grounds, fully justifying for it the title of the ‘Russian system.’
“Resolved, That this Corporation hereby tenders its grateful thanks to his Imperial Highness for his most valuable gift, with the assurance that these models will be of the greatest aid in promoting Mechanic Art education not only in the School of this Institute, but in all similar schools throughout the United States.”
Appreciating the value of the services rendered to the cause of the new education by Dr. Runkle, in introducing to the schools of the United States tool practice by laboratory methods, and desiring to inform the public of the course of thought which led to results so important, the author addressed him on the subject. His reply, under date of May 22, 1884, is in substance as follows:
“From the first the course in Mechanical Engineering has been an important one in the Institute of Technology. A few students came with a knowledge of shop-work, and had a clear field open to them on graduation, but the larger number found it difficult to enter upon their professional work without first taking one or two years of apprenticeship. This always seemed to me a fault in the education, and yet I did not see the way to remedy it without building up manufacturing works in connection with the school—a step which I knew to be an inversion of a true educational method.
“At Philadelphia, in 1876, almost the first thing I saw was a small case containing three series of models—one of chipping and filing, one of forging, and one of machine-tool work. I saw at once that they were not parts of machines, but simply graded models for teaching the manipulations in those arts. In an instant the problem I had been seeking to solve was clear to my mind; a plain distinction between a Mechanic Art and its application in some special trade became apparent.
“My first work was to build up at the Institute a series of Mechanic Art shops, or laboratories, to teach these arts, just as we teach chemistry and physics by the same means. At the same time I believed that this discipline could be made a part of general education, just as we make the sciences available for the same end through laboratory instruction.
“All teaching has in an important sense a double purpose: first, the cultivation of the powers of the individual, and second, the pursuit of similar subjects, by substantially the same means, as a professional end. Now we use our shops [laboratories] both for educational and professional ends.... In brief, we teach the mechanic arts by laboratory methods, and the student applies the special skill and knowledge acquired, or not, as circumstances or his inclinations dictate.”