Mr. Roncovieri conducted very pleasant “institutes” for the teachers, and was profuse in flowery compliments, telling them that they were “the finest teachers in the world.” (They had been appointed by the grafters, and had tenure for life, and a majority of them were Catholics.) He selected lists of speakers, and the Catholic brothers and fathers were prominent thereon. He cultivated his reputation as “the best hand-shaker in San Francisco”; also he saw to it that the incidental music at the institutes was of the finest quality—as an expert trombone player, that was in his line. How good care he took of the schools you may judge from the fact that in one of the largest and most crowded high schools more than one hundred windows were found to be broken and not repaired! San Francisco kept on growing, and the schools kept on falling to pieces, and public agitation grew louder and louder. Various public bodies took the matter up, and finally a survey was ordered, and a committee was appointed by the United States Commissioner of Education. This committee visited 106 schools, and made 1818 visits to classes. They issued an exhaustive report of 649 pages, which you can get from the United States Bureau of Education. They criticized the schools of San Francisco very sternly, and called for a complete reorganization, amendments to the charter, new departments, and other radical changes. Superintendent Roncovieri, needless to say, took offense at this report, and before the Teachers’ Institute he delivered a violent attack upon it. The report was defended by Mr. Addicott, of the Polytechnic High School, and so resulted several years of controversy. Roncovieri’s outpourings were featured in the San Francisco “Chronicle,” organ of Mike de Young, whom Ambrose Bierce pictured hanging on all the gibbets of the world. (See “The Brass Check.”) In the “Chronicle” of October 19, 1920, Superintendent Roncovieri described Mr. Addicott as “a clown,” “an idiot,” and “a boob.” These highly educational statements were followed by charges on the part of Mr. Gallagher, Catholic president of the board of education, to the effect that there was gambling going on at Polytechnic High School. Also it was charged that Mr. Addicott had suspended some pupils—though nobody could explain how the principal of a school was to keep the pupils from gambling if he were not allowed to suspend any of them. It must be especially hard for a principal to keep the pupils from gambling when the principal knows, and all the pupils know, that the big business men of the city are doing little else.