Kentucky in a few years time taught 130,000 to read and write. This record of the number taught is based on letters of pupils, who stated that they had learned, together with the reports of teachers and county superintendents. The names of the illiterates had been obtained from the United States Census Bureau early in the campaign to be used in locating them and checking off their names as they were taught. Though assured by the United States Commissioner of Education that these were records that would not be divulged, we had invaded the Census Bureau and secured the names of Rowan County’s illiterates. It was only a step that led to the divulging of the names of all the illiterates in Kentucky, though some pressure had to be put on before the complete record was obtained. It was the first time in history that the Census Bureau had ever been approached with such a request. The names of illiterates formed a record hitherto unavailable to the states. This Bureau has since been flooded with demands and some states have paid thousands of dollars to have the names of their illiterates copied. Kentucky had secured this information, not easily, but free of cost to the state and in so doing was carrying out the mandate of the Legislature which had charged the Commission “to make research, collect data and statistics and procure surveys of any and all communities, districts or vicinities of the state, looking to the obtaining of a more detailed, definite and particular knowledge as to the true conditions of the state with regard to its adult illiteracy.” Kentucky through an effective attendance officer law, one of the fruits of her illiteracy crusade, has secured herself against a recurrence of illiteracy in future. The thousands of illiterates she has redeemed have demonstrated both their ability and their desire to learn. There lies before her the task of redeeming the others and of providing opportunities for the newly-learned to advance through, at least, the elementary grades. This will be done in time by following her crusade with the establishment of an extensive system of evening schools, with teachers paid and a State school for adults where those younger men and women who can leave home may complete their education quickly and enter upon intelligent and useful careers. CHAPTER XII THE ILLITERACY CRUSADE SPREADS FROM STATE TO STATE The crusade against illiteracy had extended rapidly to other states. Moonlight schools were organized in the fall of 1913 in Bradley County, Tennessee, to teach the mountaineers; in Spartanburg County, South Carolina, to teach the people in mill villages, and in Grant County, Washington, to teach some German farmers to read and write the English language. Alabama was the second state to wage a state-wide crusade against illiteracy. In 1914, Honorable William F. Feagin, State Superintendent of Education of Alabama, sent out this call: