Faulk County, SD History .....Chapter I Educational Advantages 1909
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EDUCATIONAL ADVANTAGES.



    South Dakota is the best equipped state in the Union for educational

purposes. She is proud of her common schools. Where there are children to go to

school, teachers are provided and school houses built: The school law

contemplates that every child in the state shall receive the benefit of a common

school education and makes liberal provisions to attain that end. It provides

for the transportation to school of all children living at an unreasonable

distance from schools. Free school books are furnished, and libraries are also

provided. Two sections of land in each township were set apart for school

purposes by the general government, which assures a very low rate of taxation

for the common schools. With four normal schools, one at Aberdeen, one at

Madison, one at Spearfish and one at Springfield, and a school of Mines at Rapid

City, a State University at Vermillion, and an Agricultural College at

Brookings, the supply of teachers should be equal to all demands.



    Denominational schools are as follows, viz: Methodist colleges at Mitchell

and Hot Springs, Congregational colleges at Yankton and Redfield, Presbyterian

at Huron, the Baptist at Sioux Falls, the Scandinavian Lutherans at Sioux Falls

and Canton, and the Episcopalians at Sioux Falls. The Roman Catholics have well

equipped academies at Aberdeen, Sturgis, Elkton, Marion, Vermillion and other

points, and the Mennonites at Freeman.



    The population is cosmopolitan, being composed, as reported by the census of

1905, of 33,473 Scandinavians, 17,873 Prussian Germans, 12,365 Russian Germans,

22,144 Canadians, 5,564 settlers from England, Scotland and Wales, 3,298 Irish,

1,566 Hollanders and the balance of the population, Americans.



    By occupation the people are engaged as follows: Eighty-two thousand eight

hundred and fifty-seven are farmers, of which 57,288 own their own homes; 16,821

are engaged in domestic and personal service, 15,247 are in trade and

transportation: 14,327 follow mechanical pursuits, and 7,877 are in professions.

There are over 150,000 school children enrolled in the public schools of the

state. Three fourths of the farmers own the land they till, a most gratifying

and satisfactory fact from a financial standpoint. Seventy-eight per cent of the

population are native born.



    The state of South Dakota has provided liberally for her most unfortunate

class, the insane, as well as to guard society from the most vicious element of

the population. The hospital at Yankton has large, well constructed buildings

where these unfortunates are well cared for. The Northern Hospital for the

insane and feeble-minded has been erected at Redfield, where a certain class of

the insane are cared for. The penitentiary at Sioux Falls is a modern structure,

well suited for the purpose for which it was built and is under the best

possible regulations. The state reform school is located at Plankinton. Its

equipment consists of several large buildings, suitably furnished, and a 640

acre farm. The deaf mute school at Sioux Falls and the asylum for the blind at

Gary are also well equipped institutions. The Soldier's Home at Hot Springa,

with its well constructed buildings, is an institution of which the state can

well be proud.



    The people of South Dakota are congenial and hospitable, and as a class,

morally, socially and intellectually, worthy and reliable. South Dakota as a

state in the American Union, stands in the front rank and is one to which every

citizen of Faulk county may well feel proud to own allegiance.



Additional Comments:
From:



HISTORY OF

FAULK COUNTY

SOUTH DAKOTA

CAPTAIN C. H. ELLIS



TOGETHER WITH BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES OF PIONEERS AND PROMINENT CITIZENS



ILLUSTRATED

19O9





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