ONLY?? An eighth grade education?

[iddee]

 What it took to get an 8th grade education in 1895...
Remember when grandparents and great-grandparents stated that they only
had an 8th grade education? Could any of us have passed the 8th grade in 1895?
This is the eighth-grade final exam from 1895 in Salina, Kansas, USA
It was taken from the original document on file at the
Smokey Valley Genealogical Society and Library in Salina, and reprinted by the Salina Journal..

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8th Grade Final Exam:
Salina , KS - 1895
Grammar (Time, one hour)
1. Give nine rules for the use of capital letters.
2. Name the parts of speech and define those that have no modifications
3. Define verse, stanza and paragraph.
4. What are the principal parts of a verb? Give principal parts of 'lie,' 'play,' and 'run'.
5. Define case; illustrate each case.
6 What is punctuation? Give rules for principal marks of punctuation.
7 - 10. Write a composition of about 150 words and show therein that you understand the practical use of the rules of grammar.
Arithmetic (Time,1 hour 15 minutes)
1. Name and define the Fundamental Rules of Arithmetic.
2. A wagon box is 2 ft. Deep, 10 feet Long, and 3 ft. Wide. How many bushels of wheat will it hold?
3. If a load of wheat weighs 3,942 lbs, what is it worth at 50cts/bushel, deducting 1,050 lbs for tare?
4. District No 33 has a valuation of $35,000. What is the necessary levy to carry on a school seven months at $50 per month, and have $104 for incidentals?
5. Find the cost of 6,720 lbs. Coal at $6.00 per ton.
6. Find the interest of $512.60 for 8 months and 18 days at 7 percent per annum.
7. What is the cost of 40 boards 12 inches wide and 16 ft long at $20 per meter?
8... Find bank discount on $300 for 90 days (no grace) at 10 percent.
9. What is the cost of a square farm at $15 per acre, the distance of which is 640 rods?
10. Write a Bank Check, a Promissory Note, and a Receipt.

U.S. History (Time, 45 minutes)
1. Give the epochs into which U.S. History is divided
2. Give an account of the discovery of America by Columbus .
3. Relate the causes and results of the Revolutionary War.
4. Show the territorial growth of the United States .
5. Tell what you can of the history of Kansas .
6. Describe three of the most prominent battles of the Rebellion.
7. Who were the following: Morse, Whitney, Fulton , Bell , Lincoln , Penn, and Howe?
8. Name events connected with the following dates: 1607, 1620, 1800, 1849, 1865.
Orthography (Time, one hour)
[Do we even know what this is??]
1. What is meant by the following: alphabet, phonetic, orthography, etymology, syllabication?
2. What are elementary sounds? How classified?
3. What are the following, and give examples of each: trigraph, subvocals, diphthong, cognate letters, linguals?
4. Give four substitutes for caret 'u'.
5. Give two rules for spelling words with final 'e.' Name two exceptions under each rule.
6. Give two uses of silent letters in spelling. Illustrate each.
7. Define the following prefixes and use in connection with a word: bi, dis, pre, semi, post, non, inter, mono, sup.
8. Mark diacritically and divide into syllables the following, and name the sign that indicates the sound: card, ball, mercy, sir, odd, cell, rise, blood, fare, last.
9.. Use the following correctly in sentences: cite, site, sight, fane, fain, feign, vane , vain, vein, raze, raise, rays.
10. Write 10 words frequently mispronounced and indicate pronunciation by use of diacritical marks and by syllabication.
Geography (Time, one hour)
1 What is climate? Upon what does climate depend?
2. How do you account for the extremes of climate in Kansas ?
3. Of what use are rivers? Of what use is the ocean?
4. Describe the mountains of North America .
5. Name and describe the following: Monrovia , Odessa , Denver , Manitoba , Hecla , Yukon , St. Helena, Juan Fernandez, Aspinwall and Orinoco .
6. Name and locate the principal trade centers of the U.S. Name all the republics of Europe and give the capital of each.
8. Why is the Atlantic Coast colder than the Pacific in the same latitude?
9.. Describe the process by which the water of the ocean returns to the sources of rivers.
10. Describe the movements of the earth. Give the inclination of the earth.

Notice that the exam took FIVE HOURS to complete.
Gives the saying 'he only had an 8th grade education' a whole new meaning, doesn't it?!
Also shows you how different our education system has become
and,
NO, I don't have the answers!

[Lburou]

Impressive.  I guess all the smart people do not reside in the population centers after all... ;-)

[brooksbeefarm]

My grandpa only had a 3rd grade education and he could read wright and was a wiz at math? How you figure? Jack

[Mikey N.C.]

Principal of lie,play& run

[Mikey N.C.]

Have known some that have lied,played&ran 

[rober]

one thing that's obvious on the internet is that there's a whole lot of people who cannot spell.

[kebee]

 And I am one of them.

Ken

[apisbees]

one thing that's obvious on the internet is that there's a whole lot of people who cannot spell.

That is why they made spell check. Suffering with a bit of dyslexia myself  I find spell check indispensable. To get a lot of the beekeeping words in to spell check I copy the Beekeeping Glossary into a post then right click on all the underlined words and select add to dictionary. The exit the post with out saving it. Just a trick that works for me.
In Firefox spell check is active in explorer you may need to turn it on and select a dictionary. I know you had to do this on earlier versions.

[Gypsi]

By the 1970's things had deteriorated Some.  But compared to what my children learned (and didn't learn)

The education I had by the end of first quarter of my Junior year was enough to test at 2nd year college level on my GED's, to break into the computer world without any college courses necessary, and to make a skilled living anywhere a degree was not required. I could not quite bring myself to attend college for a career that I really wasn't interested in. I will probably retire to free-lance writing in a few years.

[Ray]

I have the form my Grandmother was supposed to fill out and send in to get financial aid to help pay for education past the 8th Grade.

[lazy shooter]

We have two different high school diplomas in Texas.  One diploma states that you have completed the bare minimum requirements for graduation.  The other diploma states that you are college ready.  Some of our high school graduates have 30 or more college hours upon graduation.  I am most impressed with our mathematics programs in secondary school.  We have lots of graduates that have two courses of calculus upon high school graduation.  I didn't have any calculus course until my sophomore year of college. 

The students that apply themselves graduate with enough math, physics and chemistry to enter college or any number of specialized training courses for electronics or other physical sciences, such as environmental technology or medical imagery fields.

I agree that the eight grade test above is quite daunting, but our current education is pretty good for the students that care and apply themselves.  We need different skills now than then.

[Retroguy]

I have a very similar set of tests from around 1926 for the State of Minnesota.  Questions are equally as daunting.  I had one uncle on my mother's side who had some high school and his younger brother got his H.S. Diploma.  Otherwise everyone else had an 8th grade diploma.  Everything was geared more or less toward a farming career but estimating the amount of cubic feet in a silo is no different than figuring the volume of any cylinder, be it a water tank or an air or hydraulic cylinder.  Only the scale is different.  My Dad was actually appalled when he found out we weren't being taught how to estimate the tonnage of silage in a silo but was satisfied when I asked him to show me and then I showed him how we were doing the same thing with other types of material stored in various shaped containers.

I've known plenty of folks from that earlier generation who did just fine with "just" an 8th grade education.  Keep in mind that in those 1-room school houses you had more than 1 teacher.  The older kids helped the younger ones learn thus reinforcing throughout the grades whatever the teacher had taught at each level.

[neillsayers]

When I moved to this area 33 years ago, I spent as much time as I could visiting with the old timers. I was trying to learn the old lore before it was lost. Most of those folks had to get by with an 8th grade one-room schoolhouse education as this part of the country was very isolated. They managed to run farms and raise children and were some of the sharpest,wisest and healthiest folk I have ever met. Most lived well into their nineties. The next generation, their kids, started dropping in their 50s and 60s. One of the advantages of "modern living".

[apisbees]

neillsayers
Most lived well into their nineties. The next generation, their kids, started dropping in their 50s and 60s. One of the advantages of "modern living".

This is very true If they managed to get to 30 the future looked bright.

[neillsayers]

So right, childhood mortality was dreadful. Instead of the common expression, "This one will be _______ when he/she grows up." They often said,  "If this one lives......" Kind of sad

[efmesch]

Iddee says:"Remember when grandparents and great-grandparents stated that they only had an 8th grade education? "

Efmesch wonders:  In the 1890s, what percentage of the population had great grandparents.  I was in 8th grade in the early 1950's and I don't recall any of my acqaintences having even one great grandparent.  Then again, maybe it's just my memory that's at fault.  Maybe the "country folk" were dying in their 90's, but I don't think the city folk were doing any near that well as to longevity.

[iddee]

Same here, Ef. All my g-grandparents were gone when I was born, along with both maternal grandparents. My paternal grandfather died when I was 5. My paternal grandmother was the only one I knew well. She lived until I was in the military.

Three brothers died at 37, 42, and 52. Father at 60.

[Gypsi]

I had no living great grandparents

[tedh]

Me neither.  That's kind of spooky now that I'm one.  Hope I get to know my great grandchild as more than someone crawling around on the floor.  And that he gets to know me as more than that freaky old guy with hair growing out his ears!

[lazy shooter]

I too, had no living grandparents.  I love Apis like a brother, but I think he is wrong on the ninety bit.  Those old people didn't have heart disease and cancer at the rate that we do today, because they had a more active life style and weren't exposed to the chemicals that we are.  However, their bodies literally wore out from hard work.  There were many infant deaths and child deaths, and the chronic diseases like diabetes and other blood sugar  illnesses just killed people.  I'm sure some of them lived into their nineties, but I think they were rare in the total population.