CHAPTER VIII
THE MOVEMENT EXTENDS TO THE WHOLE STATE OF KENTUCKY
Twenty-five other counties in the State were, by this time, having moonlight schools, and whether it was in a Bluegrass County among the tenant class, in the Purchase among the farmers, in the coal regions among the miners or in mill or distillery sections, there was the same response; men and women thronged to the schools, strove to make up for the time they had lost, and pleaded for a longer term when the session closed. It seemed that the State should extend its aid to these unfortunate men and women and should support the volunteer teachers in their patriotic efforts. So I opened up a correspondence with the Governor on the subject of an Illiteracy Commission. The first letter read as follows:
Morehead, Ky.
Dec. 16, 1913.
Governor James B. McCreary,
Frankfort, Ky.
My dear Governor McCreary:—
I am taking the liberty of addressing you upon the subject of having an Illiteracy Commission formed by legislative act to study the condition of adult illiterates in our State and to give men and women their freedom from this bondage; also, to place our State in a better light before the world. For years there has been a constant cry about Kentucky’s appalling percentage of illiteracy. It has been repeatedly declared that we are near the bottom of the literacy scale.
The purpose of forming such a commission would be to promote voluntary effort on the part of the teachers and others and to co-operate with those who are already making an effort. Many teachers have already volunteered, but they need guidance and inspiration and other teachers need to be called upon to volunteer.
We have taught over a thousand men and women in Rowan County during the past three years, and now some twenty-five counties are putting forth an effort along this line. I have hundreds of letters which demonstrate the fact that men and women can learn to read and write in a very short time after their interest is quickened.
I have letters from octogenarians besides many middle-aged and younger men and women. What has been done in Rowan County in three years in reducing and almost wiping out her illiteracy, can be done in Kentucky during the next six years—by the time the Federal census is taken.