One final suggestion finds here its logical place. Before the reading
work of elementary or high schools can be modernized, the city must
purchase the books used in the work. Leaving the supplying of books
to private purchase is the largest single obstacle in the way of
progress. Men in the business world will have no difficulty in seeing
the logic of this. When shoes, for example, were made by hand, each
workman could easily supply his own tools; but now that elaborate
machinery has been devised for their manufacture, it has become so
expensive that a machine factory must supply the tools. It is so in
almost every field of labor where efficiency has been introduced. Now
the books to be read are the tools in the teaching of reading. In a
former day when a mastery of the mechanics of reading was all that
seemed to be needed, the privately purchased textbook could suffice.
In our day when other ends are set up beyond and above those of former
days, a far more elaborate and expensive equipment is required. The
city must now supply the educational tools. It is well to face this
issue candidly and to state the facts plainly. Relative failure can be
the only possible lot of reluctant communities. They can count on
it with the same assurance as that of a manufacturer of shoes who
attempts to employ the methods of former days in competition with
modern methods.
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