Moonlight Schools for the Emancipation of Adult IlliteratesStewart, Cora Wilson
History
Moonlight Schools for the Emancipation of Adult Illiterates
Stewart, Cora Wilson
Education -- Kentucky; Literacy -- Kentucky
The women of America must regard themselves as thoroughly
militarized. They must consider themselves as real soldiers and take
orders from their officers here and obey them without question. Any
woman who has a husband, brother, sweetheart, or relative in foreign
service should write, write, write long, cheerful letters telling
everything that happens in the old home town. The men are hungry for
news and the things which seem like trivial happenings at home will
be of the greatest interest to the men.
The order which I would send to the women of America is to work and
write.
All who returned from the War Zone, lecturers, propagandists and
others, brought the same message--“The boys need letters, letters;
write, write, write.” The sad news came of boys dying of homesickness
in the army overseas. It was not indifference or negligence on the part
of the soldiers’ families that caused them to withhold letters, but in
many cases it was the inability to write.
Here was a work for the moonlight schools scarcely less urgent than
that of teaching the boys themselves, so sessions were begun for the
wives, mothers, sisters and sweethearts of soldiers, and for the men
over thirty-one who were subject to the next draft. The main purpose
of these sessions was to teach those who enrolled to write to the boys
in France, so they came with that expectation and all the training
was to that end. Not only were they taught as quickly as possible to
write letters, but they were instructed as to the kind to write and the
sort to withhold. Letters such as “Mrs. Wiggs” and “Pollyanna” would
write--radiating enthusiasm and cheer, were placed, for comparison,
on the blackboard beside one of exaggerated woes, which rendered the
latter so absurd that none would care to even faintly imitate it.
Boys in France wrote joyfully on receipt of these letters. The fact
that they were written by those who were illiterate when they left home
gave them a happy surprise. One boy wrote, and his was a typical letter.
You couldn’t imagine how pleased I was to get a letter from my dear
mother. Ma I wouldn’t take the world for that letter. You certainly
did well. I could read your letter a whole lot better than I could
Pa’s.
A war course of study was prepared and issued for use in these
sessions. The drills of peace time gave way to the more pressing ones
of food conservation, the Red Cross, Liberty Loans and lessons on the
history of the War and the geography of the warring countries, all of
which were designed to bring isolated people into co-operation with the
agencies that were striving to win the War.
The _Soldier’s First Book_ was revised and elaborated and contributed
to the Y. M. C. A., the educational arm of the Government, for
publication by their press and for use in the camps. It was turned over
to them on the one condition that it be provided to every illiterate
soldier free, as had been done in Kentucky, in the early days of the
War.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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