Another way to put it, "The BIS - not all discipline, paddling or work." YES, there were times when the teenage boys pushed the limits and had to be reminded why they were at the BIS (or FSB) and that reminder came in various forms. For years there was a leather strap (with a wooden handle) that was used as an application of "the board of education" and sometimes simple removal of the good things or times was punishment enough. The following comments have been gleaned from our correspondence with former BIS boys during the past two years up to the Summer of 2010.

One former resident wrote, "I could never honestly, say that I recall being on the Hill, like some boys recall, going on a "Scouting" retreat. It was far from camp fire songs  and dunking apples. Nevertheless, in my particular case, it did the trick, so to speak."

Another former resident regarded his stay at the BIS with these words: "I was at the hill around 1953.. No sooner than I got there I ran off, only to be caught soon after. Then they beat my ass with a long strap fixed to a wood handle. Through the years I repeated this. Once leaving the hill I ended up in Mansfield, left [the BIS] when I turned 21. In and out of prison for many years. I now live in Alabama. I've been out of prison for 30 yrs. I became self employed as a painter. Did very well."

Another boy, now 67 years old, from the current days and looking back at his days at the BIS. "I am a retired captain and pilot on the Great Lakes. Some of the boys I tried to keep in contact with were doing good, others not quite as good. They had forgotten what we were taught while on the hill."

THESE PICTURES SHOW A VARIETY OF ACTIVITIES

Three boys all "dressed up in Sunday clothes" or visitation day.

Two residents of the Fairfield School for Boys who were WINNERS at the popular Derby Downs July 24, 1975.

DERBY DOWNS was just down the road where kids from all over got to see how good they could build a soap box derby. Soap boxes they did not resemble---that was a hang-over from the long-gone days when orange crates were transformed into the predecessor of skate boards. Old roller skates were fastened to a discarded wooden crate (in which oranges were shipped to stores). The brick streets at the BIS didn't make very smooth running for skates or skate scooters and when the official Derby Downs season came along it was common to find several boys involved.

SPIT & POLISH --- Yes, there was plenty of that. Discipline, the military style, was also common. Boys lined up, marched (sometimes with a vocal cadence) to the cafeteria or work.

Here is a cadence recalled by Larry Berens, a former employee of the BIS; he said he'd heard this called out thousands of times by the boys marching to their dinner or work details.

Nothing really beats the military way to teach a boy how to "stand up and pay attention" like being dressed up, yes as that old song says, "There's something about a soldier..." Even the "plain clothes" dude looked like he had to stand tall too.

The Boys Industrial School was called the "BIS" for 80 years, until 1964, when it was renamed The Fairfield School for Boys from 1965 till it closed in 1979, was not a Sunday school picnic nor was it always fun but whenever an atmosphere of casual fun could be created, the institution did not short change their wards. Many of the young men who were at the FSB might never have a chance to build a soap box derby car or join the Boy Scouts or get involved in sports but the institution recognized the importance of such activities and as a state organization they got the boys outfitted as good as the common community boys in town. Uniforms and sport [game] clothes were probably better than a lot of outfits the boys in town could afford (remember, the state was paying the bill--with taxes, of course).

In reality, there were high school graduation diplomas awarded to any boy who were there during grade school or high school years. During the years of 1969, 1970 and 1971 FSB students actually got to publish a school annual just like any other high school Regretfully such a publication simply involved a lot of time and effort that was difficult to continue. They even had "school dances" --

yes, they invited the girls from the reform school for girls! You can imagine what kind of chaperoning that required but the boys and girls had fun (just like their counterparts) in any city in Ohio.

Here are some comments from David Shiltz, a former teacher at the FSB. These words may sound staid or even sterile to some but they do set forth some principles and precepts the boys often either did not accept, chose not to recognize or hopefully would get the drift and make sufficient progress to graduate from the FSB school.

"Our existential philosophy of education requires us to encourage the student to a commitment to himself, to the ideal within him, or to the ideal from beyond him. The individual defines himself or. chooses what he becomes. If the student is to discover himself, then he has to understand the influences that have played upon him directly and indirectly. He must understand choices and commitments of others that have impinged upon him. He must become aware of choices that he has made, and he must become aware of possibilities for becoming through new commitments. The teacher as an integrated person is committed to ideals. He is a living witness to this commitment as he works with the students placed in his care."

These principles apply to both the student (boys in this case) and the teachers hired by the State of Ohio. As witnessed in the comments from former residents, some learned how to stay within boundaries and some simply failed to grasp "the message" and they often went back to FSB and even unfortunately graduated to higher levels of crime. You could only do so much, as a teacher, and one of the real concerns of some teachers was "Will we have the boy long enough to do him some good?"

The BIS - Not all spit & polish
Copyrighted 2010, Bill & Jean Venrick
Lancaster, Ohio

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Another article will be forthcoming about the regular school system with two elementary grade schools as well as a high school. THE WORDWRIGHT

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WHAT'S IT ALL ABOUT, ALFIE?
Copyrighted 2010 by Bill & Jean Venrick, Lancaster, Ohio

What young man or woman hasn't had this thought pass through their minds? What are the real purposes and goals in life? What is right or true? Those familiar with the Scriptures find similar questions in the Book of Ecclesiastes. It was refreshing to me to read such questions (with commentary) in the lyrics of a hit song of almost fifty years ago, "What's It All About, Alfie?" Honest questions are not always answered honestly with proper perspective and life experiences in the BIS (or FSB) are no different. Consider the questions asked Alfie:

The photos accompanying this essay show "boys on the hill" seventeen years before "What's It All About, Alfie" was to fill a giant screen and supply some philosophical meaning to life, and perhaps more simply remember the first line instead of the lessons taught in the movie. Who remembers more anyway? Hopefully lessons are learned--even in the movies.

What mother wouldn't be glad to know her son could take a pair of scissors, follow a pattern and cut up the material, choose the various kinds of cloth necessary to make a jacket or a pair of trousers? Only the mother whose son carelessly wore his best clothes to play in or take a hike through the woods. Boys at the BIS learned first hand what it took to make clothes - and not just make them, but how to keep them clean and look nice!

Making garments, sewing articles or items together to make pillow cases, hand towels or utilitarian clothes was just one part of the training boys on the hill were given. Another photo shows a room full of boys being taught how to iron clothing (they also worked in a laundry where they used large commercial machines to iron sheets). When you have had to iron the clothes you wore, it just might be you also learned to respect the work involved to iron and mend the clothes you wear.

From head to toe the boys were taught about the clothes they wore. Years before these pictures were taken (these photographs are of classroom work in 1949) boys on the hills also made their own shoes! In the years the trade of shoe making and repair was taught at the BIS the boys worked with professional, commercial "state of the art" equipment (see photo below) comparable to the kind of equipment found in the shoe factories in downtown Lancaster, Ohio. Perhaps some of those boys who learned how to make shoes left the hill and got a job at Irving Drew Shoe or Godman Shoe in town, or at shoe factories in nearby Columbus, or other larger Ohio cities. Shoe repair shops were quite abundant in the days of the BIS existence. Manufacturing philosophies today are much different in our casual "throw-away society" and shoe manufacturing is just one more industry that has gone "offshore"..

In the sheet metal shop (above) boys were taught to make items that would be used in the farm work: scoops to measure out grain or buckets to use for water or milk, or kitchen pans; etc., this was again, what a boy who became a man could use as a skill or trade. Weaving was also one of many vocational curricula. The photo below shows boys working at various stages of making small throw rugs.

"WHAT'S IT ALL ABOUT, ALFIE?" Purpose in life. Meaningful existence. Giving more than we take. Learning threads and yarn "hold things together". "Learning there's something more to believe in--something much more, something even non-believers can believe in."

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Copyrighted 2010 by Bill & Jean Venrick

The pictures accompanying this essay show a BIS boy plowing with horses and a BIS boy driving a tractor pulling a hay bailer! A few weeks prior to writing this article found this writer driving through a rural setting and taken back a hundred years or more - there came an Amish young man driving a team of horses pulling some kind of agricultural "distributor" of fertilizer. He was standing up, holding rein on those horses just like farmers did all over our country decades ago, and you could tell by the smile on his face he couldn't have been happier had he been sitting atop a modern John Deere combine. One fact has to be recognized: he knew who he was. This was not the young man trying to "find himself" who in reflection years later laments, "been there, done that".

Some principles and precepts governed the BIS (and FSB) that might be foreign or no less than a light year or two different from our current culture. Is that (all) bad? No, and it should not be all that surprising either. In one of the photographs above it is obvious farm work at the BIS was done just like the rest of farmers at that time--they used horses (or mules). The other photo shows a farm scene where horse-power was supplied by a tractor. But "work" was work in either case, the methods simply coincided with the times. The Amish boy, in the first paragraph, was simply exercising his privilege to work with horses instead of a gasoline-powered tractor.

The following copy from the September issue (Page 14) of The Industrial School Journal, dated 1930 expresses the basic guidelines of the BIS during its 125 year history. Of course, in any organization, whether then or now, all kinds of personalities and individuals are involved and it is a given admission that no supervisor or any other employee claimed perfection but these words sum up the institution's basic purpose and principles:

"Training the boy who has broken the laws of our land in a useful occupation so that he may become a self-reliant, self-sustaining, producing citizen is the objective for which the Boys Industrial School was established by the State of Ohio. To supply a [temporary] home, giving the youngster a [surrogate] father and mother in place of the ones from which he was taken, that he may have parental advice, counsel and care. We are only meeting our obligation to the great state employing us in so far as we faithfully strive to attain that objective in spirit and in deed, failing in that the school should be closed."

No one is so naive to believe that every boy who was sent to the BIS would give an A+ to the facts testifying to the accuracy or fulfillment of this objective but those who often wrote back to the school or to this author, conceded what they received at the BIS (or the FSB) was what they needed. Some were even convinced that the BIS saved their lives! Perspective and introspection can result in truth when given time.

The photos depicting work and education at the BIS may be repulsive to some social groups who believe a child should not be forced to work. Yet within the biblical principles that enabled our nation to grow through faith in our Creator God, it is noted in words and principles: "If a man will not work, he shall not eat." (2nd Thessalonians 3:10) But some in our society have taken the stance that it was wrong to make the children raised in orphanages work during previous years. It was common to require the children to work in the fields or the barnyards. Unfortunately, for the most part, those otherwise successful orphanages and children's homes and institutions like the BIS have been forced to close their doors in compliance to these unsettling theories. Work is no disgrace to anyone and to those familiar with the Bible know the Scripture teaches a strong work ethic To those in rural areas of the 19th century (and earlier) there was no alternative - you worked because the milk would not magically appear in bottles on your breakfast table, you worked at shearing sheep because your wool did not magically appear in bundles in your barn, you worked at getting the crops in or they remained useless in the fields. Meat, milk, vegetables and eggs were food on the tables because someone worked. Work, whether it involved adults or children, boys or girls, was a part of life, and continues to this day.

We live in a very casual world and work has been denigrated and our throw-away society has corrupted good things of life. In less than six decades we have seen torn clothes, in need of patches, glorified and made a sign of fashion. Less than fifty years ago if fabrics wore out, mothers patched torn garments. In fact, some mothers were so proficient their patches were nearly invisible. And even patches became a rite of passage for some clothes -- a neat leather patch at the elbows of coats and sweaters was even fashionable. Today clothes that have been tumbled in some kind of "stone washing" are sought out by those who "have to be in style". Some even buy perfectly good jeans and tediously separate the fabric making "designs", regardless how erratic they appear, giving a pretense that their clothes are worn threadbare. Rather, if the truth were known, it is more likely those who intentionally tear the knees out of brand new jeans would have never known what it was to work hard enough to wear holes in their clothes.

True, this is a battle of fads and fancies and a glorification of tattered clothes, but it is also subtle evidence that people are pretenders of the first degree. People just fifty years ago would have been ashamed to go to school or appear in public places with torn clothes. Another reality: many modern moms apparently are clue-less as to how to patch clothes.

Early on, the BIS made it a point that no boy at the BIS (or FSB) would ever have to wear torn clothes. In the Officer's Manual, dated 1924, reads: "Untidy dress induces carelessness and slovenliness in other things." "It is not only necessary that boys be provided with comfortable, tidy and good fitting wearing apparel, but it must be given proper care and situation and kept neat and clean." Rules were rigidly followed and enforced. Appearance was a virtue in the annals of the institution. A barber shop was one of the early additions to the institution and later, as was noted in a previous article, barbering was offered as a career class making it possible for a boy to obtain a license to be a barber when he left the BIS. Within the last dozen years of the institution's existence a move was made to let the boys set some rules much comparable to the "modern" ideas of rearing children was tried. However there was sufficient concern by those in charge of checks and balances that such an idea was too risky when you are dealing with personalities already primed to challenge authority. The last superintendent was brought in to thwart that attempt to change the successful philosophies for over a hundred years. Codification of rules and regulations is inherent to maintaining the necessary discipline, otherwise chaos would reign.

Yes, we are talking about a cultural crisis. And, ultimately, as in any culture throughout history we find confrontations of philosophies have either made or broke those societies. It is a credit to the BIS that for years it upheld respect, honor and responsibility as qualities every boy should attain. And, until the day that the institution was closed in 1979, such virtues were often challenged but steadfast principles were a part of every day life at the BIS, from the soles of their shoes to the top of their heads. One aside case of acquired virtues is about one boy during the last ten years of the school's existence. This boy went with a group to an outing in a nearby city, and as usual all boys came back, "Present and accounted for." The next day that boy "ran away". When the authorities found him he was asked, "If you knew you were going to run away, why did you not run away when you were with the group?" His answer was classic: "I didn't want to give the program (and the school) a bad name."

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I NEVER KNEW THAT - Part One, Tunnels at the BIS
Copyrighted 2010, Bill & Jean Venrick
Lancaster, Ohio

While we were researching the history of the Boys Industrial School (aka Fairfield School for Boys), we often found occasions to tell about unique pieces of that history. The usual response was truthfully, "I never knew that."; and in all honesty this writer often made the statement during our interviews. It quickly became obvious there was a lot to learn about the BIS and what went on through the years. The Boys Industrial School had been around since 1858, when it was known as The State Farm, and at any time of its existence such a reaction would be nothing less than normal even to natives in Lancaster, Ohio. Unless you were personally involved or knew someone who worked at the BIS throughout those 125 years much of what went on at the BIS was simply not common knowledge.

The farther back our historical digs went, the less familiar experiences in life and trades would surface, like blacksmithing, making hames (part of the harness for horses), broom-making, making brushes and shoe-making. Some trades like woodworking and sheet metal continued on through the later years and current trades were offered and taught at the BIS. The significant fact is whatever a boy could use once he left the BIS, that is what the institution wanted to be sure the boys could "take home with them"--a trade or occupation. The following story tells about the unique tunnel system at the BIS.

Miles of tunnels at the BIS provided lessons or work experience common in years gone by. In 1881 steam heat was installed in the buildings. The pipes were laid in a series of long wooden boxes or chases. Sixteen years later the long wooden boxes were rotting with age and exposure. It could be imagined that as they stood there looking at those rotting long wooden boxes -- "Eureka!" as the ancient sage exclaimed, "Why not build an underground tunnel!" According to printed reports by the State of Ohio, several stages of this project were involved, starting as early as 1897, and 31 years later new tunnels were dug and still more work was in progress in the late 1940's. Remember, there was a constant labor force available--the residents or inmates of the BIS. The following appeared in the Seventh Annual Report of the State (The Dept. of Public Welfare) 1928:

"During the past year the project of the new power plant and its connecting tunnels has been completed and put into operation. The construction of the power plant and the tunnels is the largest single operation ever attempted at the institution and considerable pride is taken in the fact that the work was carried out as per specifications and on schedule[ed] time. A very large part of the work was done by the boys of the institution under the supervision of the institutions own employees. ... The success in the construction of the tunnels is remarkable, as engineers had considered the project for years and some of the estimates had placed the cost at as high as $135,000 and only a few were favorable to the plan of letting the institution construct the tunnels [skilled workmen were thought to be needed]. But the institution, with no outside help except the services of two experienced miners for several months, has completed the tunnels totaling 3,300 feet, about 1500 of which were driven through solid rock and yet the construction cost alone is below $20,000."

A map of the tunnels, dated July 8, 1948, shows the location of the tunnels and how they exited at each building, typically in the basement. When inmates found the tunnels were useful in runaway attempts extra security measures were used but the tunnels still were an ingenious method of getting electric, water and steam heat all over the campus. Quite an improvement over electric and telephone poles as used in "regular" communities of that day. Exactly how many miles the tunnels takes up is either not known or is classified but it is no exaggeration to simply say, "miles of tunnels" were in that system originating at the power house which was at the lowest geographical point of the campus and everything goes up from that point. The photo below shows a tunnel with an interior of bricks and stone construction.

Originally the tunnels were constructed like a coal mine with wooden beam construction and early on it was changed to stone construction and actual drilling and blasting through solid stone. Later, brick and masonry was used in construction as well as still later poured concrete was used with forms familiar with modern concrete construction. The size of the tunnel (4.5 feet wide by 6 feet high) never became larger than sufficient space to walk in or through and enable pipes for steam heat, water and later telephone cables. It can never be overstated that this was probably the most professional system for such an institution. A more brilliant idea would have been hard to imagine.

The map shows a comparable short length to a Y in the system forking off into two directions and as the tunnel system continues; only rarely does a curve or slight turn exist. Wherever there was a building on the campus there was a tunnel entrance-exit. Today those entrance-exit places are heavily locked and identified in bright yellow paint for obvious reasons--the facility is now known as Southeastern Correctional Institution, whose residents are offenders with felony convictions.

MORE STORIES TO FOLLOW....THE WORDWRIGHT

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FSB, aka B.I.S.

RALPH C. STARKEY, Last Superintendent of Ohio's Fairfield School for Boys, died January 24, 2010.

September 26, 2007 I had the privilege to sit in the home of Ralph C. Starkey as he sat reminiscing about the years he spent at the Fairfield School for Boys in the hills and ravines six miles south of Lancaster, Ohio. If anyone ever talked to Ralph Starkey and did not catch his excitement about trying to get boys back on track, they were not paying attention. January 24, 2010, Ralph Starkey passed away and his passing presented an opportunity to write "one more chapter" about the most successful Boys Industrial School in the United States, bar none. The B.I.S. Started in 1856 under the name, Ohio Reform School (Reform School & Farm); 1884 was renamed the Boys Industrial School; 1964 it became Fairfield School for Boys. The school closed in 1979 with Mr. Starkey being the last superintendent. The various name changes were merely semantics in action involving nuances about the principles and purposes of the school as viewed by various administrations and societal input.

Ralph Starkey was born in Circleville, Ohio, in the same town he was living when I interviewed him in the early days of our preparation and research to write a history of the Boys Industrial School (later known as Fairfield School for Boys, and most recently known as Southern Correctional Institution).

The small town of Circleville, nestled in the fields of Pickaway County, has some claims to fame but Ralph C. Starkey's name might just glow a tad brighter than entertainer Ted Lewis who, while holding his clarinet, would ask, "Is Everybody Happy?" Strange as it may seem this could have easily been one of Starkey's queries to those delinquent boys of the State of Ohio when they were sent to The Hill in a genuine detainment from the streets of crime.

After leaving Circleville, Ralph C. Starkey became known as #74, Tackle, with the New York Giants -- unique with his abilities, he was recruited to come to Lancaster and tackle major problems at FSB. "Something was going on" at FSB in Lancaster and it needed fixed. Ralph did not come right from the locker room or football field because he had been working with the State of Ohio Youth Commission for several years and was in Zanesville when he was asked to come to Lancaster.

There were many icons who sat in the chair of superintendency of that state institution that began in the 19th century by Charles Gustave Reemelin and a few others who saw the need to make a place where delinquent or truant boys could be rehabilitated and sent back home with new goals in life. Ralph Starkey may not have really asked the boys, "Is Everybody Happy?" but many feel he came to that school to try to make every boy leave there with a better outlook on life. Happiness may have been a by-product after all.

Ralph Starkey told me about being involved with Rotary and other organizations, and knowing some very influential people and when it was announced that the school was being shut down the whole town was up in arms. They were ready to take this to the governor. Representative Don Maddux even got involved. Central Office (of the state's machinery) called Starkey into the office and informed him that this was a done deal and to back off. Only a short time later it was made public the future of FSB would become history and The Hill would no longer vibrate with youthful boys but become a prison for hardened criminals. (A long way from its founder's dreams or hopes.)

Supt. Starkey had twenty vocational programs going on as well as a full academic high school. No one had time to "lay around on their bunks" as prisoners do in the SCI - they were programmed for those boys. All the kids were involved in either a vocational program or an academic program. The BIS was turning out sixteen hundred and we put almost two thousand kids through the program a year which was half of what the other eight institutions in Ohio did in a year. Mohican Youth Center, Cuyahoga school for boys, and other related "schools".The BIS, and later, FSB, had an outstanding work ethic.

There were five unions on the campus of Fairfield School for Boys. Each major labor force was represented and the teachers had a union. Starkey did not have any problems with unions--he was always willing to listen to them. All the vocational trades people for carpentry, masonry and horticulture, etc., were unionized as well.

The livestock program had ceased when he got there. Superintendent Starkey knew that if he kept the kids sharp looking, gave them three good meals and a snack at night he had 75% of his problems covered. He was in his office every morning at 6:00. He knew that former superintendents were never in their office until 9:00 in the morning. He would eat with the staff or the kids instead of living in the official superintendent's mansion (which had not be used as such for some time). Former superintendents seemed reluctant to go out where the students were and he got to know the students as well as the staff. On one occasion Superintendent Starkey went to a dormitory one night around 2:00 a.m.. He wanted to get in touch with the staff and become acquainted - it was the first time they had seen a superintendent in the middle of the night.

Every Friday morning at 8:00 he had an appointment with all the new kids in FSB. There would be as high as 50-60 new boys come in every Friday. He told them what he would tolerate: "no hands on anyone, don't even think about putting your hands on anyone or starting a fight". He expected them to keep themselves absolutely neat and clean at all times and he said, "We will provide clean clothes for you to make sure this happens.". Then he told them, "If you want to go home then this is what you will have to do." He wanted them to know FSB was going to do everything they could to make it possible for them to go home as soon as they could, and said, "I don't want to see you again." He would then approach each and every boy asking him if they would make the same commitment to him. He even assured them that he would not allow any parole officer to interfere with any boy's schedule to go home as soon as he could. Starkey even had a recording made of these meetings and it was given to the staff so they would know what he had told the boys. Every staff member knew exactly what the Superintendent had told these boys.

As a professional who had worked with delinquent boys, Mr. Starkey knew that most of these kids had never been a winner. The power of positive thinking has always worked and these boys needed to feel good about themselves. The Fairfield School for Boys had a program with four levels. Starkey worked up a system of cards that were punched to keep track of the individual boys - the conduct, cooperation, or whatever and the boys turned in their punched cards regularly. The cards became a part of the permanent record. If the kids got to certain levels they got to wear a different shirt with colored borders signifying what level they were on. The boys were proud of those shirts and would holler across the yard telling Mr. Starkey about their new shirts. The boys had "TIGER TOUGH" buckles, in the background of that logo was the level color they had achieved. "How you boys doing?" Starkey would ask, and they replied, "Mr. Starkey, we're Tiger Tough."

He gave the boys something to work for. If the kids felt good about themselves it would help them behave with one another. In our interview Starkey told about the boys' involvement with the city, the police and the county. He had boys he sent to work at the police department. The cops would even take the boys out to lunch with them. When the Hall of Justice was built, Starkey took the boys into town and they moved all the furniture into the new Hall of Justice.

They used the Olympic swimming pool so they could find out what level of proficiency the boys could swim. They had several skill levels from "tadpoles" on up classifying their level of proficiency. They held special swimming training to prepare boys to become lifeguards. They would then offer these boys services to Miller Park Swimming Pool to be life guards at no charge. Miller Pool said they were better lifeguards than the ones they had to pay.

Former tackle #74 for the New York Giants has ambled off the field of service to his state and fellow citizens. Those who worked with Ralph C. Starkey admired him and he will be missed. More stories are in the works about this institution that was a model for the entire United States.

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Historical Sketches of the B.I.S.
by Bill & Jean Venrick
Lancaster, Ohio - Copyrighted 2009

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ECHOES FROM THE HILLS
By Bill & Jean Venrick
Copyrighted 2008

THE BARBER SCHOOL at Fairfield School for Boys
(Throughout the text, Fairfield School for Boys may be referred to as "FSB" or the "BIS" which are acronyms for the official name of the school through the years.)

Having a bad hair day does not just apply to the feminine gender. Ever since 1907* the BIS has made it a point to be sure their boys "look good". "Looking good" makes a person "feel good about themselves", at least this is the opinion of the popular TV personality, Carol Burnett. Carol Burnett tells the story about trying to interest her daughters in dressing up and going some place. The reaction she received was less than cordial and she temporarily gave up the idea (probably waiting for an inspiration that was yet to come). Sometime later Carol knocked on one of her daughter's door and suggested they play dress up. This little game went on for sometime until one of the girls said, "Let's go someplace!" Light bulb comes ON! The daughter, who only minutes before had no interest in going someplace, now that she looked nice, wanted to go someplace. So, embedded deep into the minds of the supervisors of the Boys Industrial School (BIS) was the need to provide a means, be it ever so small as a haircut, errant boys could "feel good" or "look good. Albert Einstein could have had these principles in mind when he said, "Weakness of attitude becomes weakness of character." *Before 1907 the Family Officer was the official barber for the boys.

The Barber School was the only educational program that the teachers and instructors could be guaranteed they would have a dependable group of boys they could teach. You see, the average stay (or term) of boys assigned to the institution was about 7 months. During this time the educational needs of each boy were trying to be addressed and a state of flux was always present. Vocational programs for approximately twenty fields were in constant and continual class sessions as well as regular educational requirements such as elementary and high school. If a boy attempted to run-away, that would extend his stay (or term) and thus interrupt whatever educational program in which he was involved. A boy in the metal shop, for example, might be there only a few months, and before whatever he was in class was officially finished, he might be pardoned and "go back home" whether or not he was finished with the shop class in which he was enrolled. This scenario of change, multiplied by whatever the population was, became the only constant. Once, in a dinner meeting of some of the former employees, the teachers admitted this was the biggest disappointment they had to deal with - how many of the boys would finish their class.

The Barber School had an answer to this dilemma. Barbering is an occupation that is a bit more involved than learning how to tuck a bunch of hair into one hand and delicately clip extended hair away so the continued work would end as a good hair cut. Students of barbering, for years, would study for a year to learn much more than how to cut hair. They had to study anatomy of the head so they could determine where a specific drop of blood came from - a knowledge of the arteries, veins and nerves was a vital part of the barber's education. Classroom assignments helped the boys learn the psychological nuances of the trade as well. Mike Tharp, and his fellow instructors knew you could not train a boy to become a barber unless they could convince the boy to sign a contract that he would be willing to stay however long it would take to finish a 9-1/2 month program. In short, if a boy was only sentenced for 7 months, that means he would be signing a contract guaranteeing he would stay no less than two additional months. Any 16 year old boy with an 8th grade eduction could apply for the barber school. Immediately this developed a different breed of boys and one of the features or perks for students of the Barber Shop School would be they were classified as Honor Boys and they got to stay in the Dixon Honor Dorm. Remember the story about Carol Burnett? Give a boy or girl a reason to dress up and dressing up becomes natural.

Sure this sounds simple, and it was good for most, but occasionally one of the boys could just not stand the discipline and he would become a run-away but usually even such run-aways "came back" and honored his contract. So the concept of a guaranteed appearance in a classroom became the key to at least one of the vocational educational programs.

It almost seems strange that if this is all it took, why could it not work in the other trades, such as masonry, sheet metal, machine shop or carpentry. The answer to that problem was to work up some kind of guarantee that the boy would finish what he started. In itself, that very principle was already lacking in many of the boys - they had not finished their education, let alone finish maturing into men with character. At the beginning of a boy's decision to choose barbering as a trade, there was a 30-day Trial Program and if, at the end of this trial, he could either continue or drop out of the program. The goal of becoming a Certified Barber in the State of Ohio clearly created a different kind of academic program for some boys at the institution.

Education has become a stumbling block in our nation for years and it usually becomes a political football that boards of education kick around whenever a bond issue or levy runs out. Usually their main ploy is to use the phrase "our children". Well, truth involves the children, but how education is wrought is an entirely different matter. The concept of how to educate, unfortunately, is a consistently reoccurring issue - no doubt, for centuries. The sad fact is, for example, whenever any "new way" is developed, e.g, the "new math" popular for a while (1956-60), if a student could not grasp the concept, he grew to hate math. We have to ask, "What is so wrong with working with proven methods instead of continually dreaming up new ideas and abandoning the tested and tried methods?"

The field of education and its foibles created a virtual pathological study (of the boys) who came to the Fairfield School for Boys, regardless of the criminal reason they were there. Education in our society has been played with, adjusted, re-programmed, put in committees, you name it and it is a description of education as our academic society is seen today. T. J. Ray, a former and now retired professor of the University of Mississippi put it this way:

"Teachers are very important people. Not because they have degrees, appointments and publications lists. Not even because they know more about their subjects than their students do. Their lives are significant because they are trusted with the sacred duty of helping others, usually younger and less experienced, to prepare for a complex adult world. Teachers are variously cantankerous, snobbish, erudite, obtuse, cynical, Socratic, or superfluous. Students are often rebellious, dense, naive, eager, and innocent. And jointly and separately they fail each other. But the primary hope for mankind rests with teachers--not with family, church, or government--with the teacher and his students. There can be no more precious moment in human existence than when a teacher leads a student to know a truth.

"Some aspects of education have gotten worse. Standardized tests have almost eliminated the need of teacher evaluation of students, and teachers spend far too much time under the shadow of those tests. Dropout rates are higher, and strange experiments are being trotted out in an effort to keep kids in school. While [this] essay was more about public education, its essence was and is applicable to the college level, where things are as bleak as in lower grade levels. In a craze to have large and larger student bodies in order to get more and more money from the State, colleges have very steadily and readily admitted people who would have been turned away not many decades ago. Now a major state university has gone so far as to admit a student who cannot read or write. That might be surprising
were it not so patently clear that the tail (athletics) has come to wag the dog (academics)."

The above comments from T. J. RAY, Professor of English at the University of Mississippi, were written in an essay he first wrote in 1975 and later revised in 2006; hence the problems and principles covered in his comments and the issues in the historical environment at the FSB Barber School are evidence that essentially, the problems that confronted Mike Tharp and the other instructors (by theory teachers at the Ohio State University). The boys at FSB were already products of a faulty educational system (in some ways). Obviously not every educator will see this issue the same way because there have always been "smart kids" and then "the rest of the kids". The real smart kids, the college bound students, have a built in drive that will not allow anything to stand in their way -- they're self-starters. But it is the average students who are affected by such educational faux pas and the average kids will struggle for years because of flawed theories. Unfortunately the aggregate of incriminating flaws in our system unmistakably points towards issues some leaders of education have simply failed to acknowledge. (Anyone needing further proof of these summations could read "The End of Education" by Neil Postman. Postman's book has a demonstrative sub-title: "Redefining the value of school". Perhaps there is some wisdom in the criticism leveled against teachers by George Bernard Shaw: "He who can, does. He who cannot, teaches." Postman further cites another caustic thought against professional educators when quoting Lewis Perelman, who argued that "modern information technologies have rendered schools entirely irrelevant, since there's now much more information available outside the classroom than inside.")

In 1964, Mike Tharp started his career at the Fairfield School for Boys (FSB); being just under 21 himself, Mike was pushing the envelope a bit but by the time he was really an apprentice-barber-instructor he was 21. (Some old-timers in Lancaster, Ohio, just might remember a red-haired barber at the Fountain Square Barber Shop [behind Kresge's] as that is where Mike was working when recruited for the FSB Barber Shop School.) There were only nine chairs in the FSB Barber Shop when Mike started but a new 15 chair barber shop was just being finished as a part of a new vocational barbering program. Union qualifications for State Barber Schools required instructors to go through an apprentice program and Mike was one of two Vocational Instructors who had to complete a four week and an eight-hour In Service Training program at the new FSB Barber Shop for two years themselves. Upon fulfilling those requirements Mr. Tharp became a certified Barber School Teacher, moving up from Vocational Instructor to Vocational Teacher. When the vocational educational program for the FSB Barber School was being updated, in classes for the instructors at Ohio State University, whose professors were using their education prowess as a lever and were insisting their principles as used in "regular" classrooms were necessary but Tharp and fellow instructors, taking the class, were able to prove the concepts by the university professor were simply not applicable in the classrooms at the FSB. These boys already had two strikes against them and the system needed to do everything in its power to teach these boys something, and that something was a viable trade in which they could officially become a part when they left the institution. Furthermore, even the principles and methods used in regular public schools were certainly not applicable when dealing with students in an institution like a reform school.

The Fairfield School for Boys had a fifteen (15) chair barber shop. Their class work was basically two hours of text book and six hours of shop work and this plan was worked out to last twelve months. The boys learned how to cut hair the same way one learns anything else - by doing it! But to become a certified barber, a specific educational program had to be followed. In the 15 years Mike Tharp and his fellow instructor Alfred Sanders were there, they worked 150 boys through the Barber School and when those 150 boys went to Columbus to take their Barber School certification test, not one failed. Ethics and integrity were being taught and yet the words themselves were not, per se, in the lesson plans of the instructors. But those boys knew by nature and life itself, that the only way they could become a barber was to do what they had to do. Unfortunately, although it served as a specific lesson in integrity, there was an incident at the FSB, when one of the instructors became involved in a plot of escape for one of the boys. This incident alone served as a certain object lesson that rules were meant for everyone--instructors as well as "the boys". This was "education in progress" and consummately that employee was fired.

At an institution where hundreds of boys were regularly shuffled through there was plenty of work for the barber students. The schedule was simple: Every three weeks, boys from each of the fifteen cottages were in the shop for a hair cut--the barber shop was busy cutting hair five days a week - employees of FSB could also get their hair cut at the shop.

Other incentives were apparent when the boys cut hair for employees of the institution. Each boy of the FSB had an account for any financial benefits they earned. The Barber Shop boys, once they became proficient in cutting hair, routinely cut employees hair and and they received tips. The pricing of a haircut had levels of financial expense tallies and whatever was left would be credited to the financial records of each boy. Any tips given to the boy were turned into the office to go into that boy's account. When the Barber Shop School boy graduated, those collective amounts were usually more than sufficient to pay for a complete Barbering Kit that was his to keep (Clippers, six combs, hair brush, two razors [straight] and a leather strop, shaving mug and brush, and a haircloth.) Some boys had enough in their special cash fund to purchase two clippers, the one basic clipper was a vibrator type and a motor-driven clipper was a bit better for some work, and all the tools of the trade were carried in a nice attache case which was their personal property when they left the institution.

It needs to be mentioned that those boys learned more than how to cut hair - they were introduced to a level of loyalty and integrity many of the boys never had a chance to learn. An incident was related about a boy not wanting his hair cut and the instructor was called over by the student barber. The instructor immediately took charge by taking the clippers from the student barber, ran them through the unkept hair and said, "He needs one now." As the instructor turned away, the boy jumped out of the chair and attempted to strike the instructor from behind and the student barber simply bopped the "customer" on the head with his clippers! Naturally there was talk and and a "write up" for the student barber but the instructor straightened out the matter. The student barber obviously was also learning structures of loyalty, and conformity to rules and regulations. No lessons had been taught for such infractions. The barber school curriculum did not include this kind of infraction so the student's reaction was totally in line with the old-fashioned "respect for authority", which, for the most part, has been totally replaced with "casual concern for discipline" in most classrooms as well as lack of respect for teachers.

After nine and one-half months (or 1500 hours) in Barber School, those boys had a jump on their peers at the FSB--they had an Ohio State Certificate as proof they were barbers and could have a job in any barber shop in Ohio. Unfortunately some changes were made in the system later to extend the class time to 1800 hours and issues surfaced causing enrollment in the Barber School to fall.

Unique examples and levels of education were uncovered as we researched for this book. Interviewing the person who was Chief Cook in the last few years of FSB, he made a point of fact that in the kitchen, the work could not be set up in classes like the Barber School. The boys who worked in the kitchen were not there to learn how to become a cook. If they learned this lesson it was something they learned on their own, which of course, was possible but the reason for such a confined view was the kitchen crew had a regular job to do and it took many different but related fields of labor. The kitchen crew had to start at 4:00 a.m., and at approximately 6:00 that morning there would be several hundred walking through those doors to eat and everything better be ready. Certainly different from a schedule that ran all day with the Barber School where there was a regular routine to "cut hair" at a specific time throughout the day justs like a commercial barber shop has appointments. (More details about the boys who worked in the kitchen will be found in another part of the book.)

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The research and writing of of the book, "ECHOES FROM THE HILLS", by Bill & Jean Venrick, continues. Additional chapters are planned to be released as soon as they are finalized.
THE WORDWRIGHT

Posted by Bill Venrick at 6:24 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)