.     I Lived During The Good Old Days

                    Back when Reading, Writing, and Arithmetic

                             were guests in every home.

                         Kenneth Shelby Armstrong, Ed.D., Th.D.

                         When I was a boy, Sundays were for going to church and Saturdays were for going to the library. My mother saw to it that I participated (religiously) in both activities. I cannot ascertain all the distinct values that I received from either experience, but I do remember reading all those books written by Horatio Alger, Mark Twain, Edna Ferber, and the Apostle Paul.

                 These days, I spend my time writing. I am in hope that what I place on paper, will provide those who read it a love of ideas, beauty, and contemplation. Attaching the past to the present is a difficult and risky venture. But, never forget the old proverbs.

For want of a nail the shoe was lost.
For want of a shoe the horse was lost.

For want of a horse the rider was lost.

For want of a rider the battle was lost.

  For want of a battle the kingdom was lost.

   And all for the want of a horseshoe nail.

But I am not concerned about horses so much. I am concerned about the spirit of the average person. In these days we are forgetting what it takes to keep man's spirit firm and pure. Feeding our minds with television tripe simply will not do the job.

            Eddie Cantor once said that if we continue watching television in our spare times, we will soon breed a generation with eyes the size of saucers and brains the size of peas. He is being proven correct.         We need readers to build great souls, and if readers are needed then writers are a necessity. Being a writer is not a lofty position among the roster of professions, but without the writer, no profession, nor culture, nor advancement, can thrive. Erroneously, in a mad panic to get to the important subjects of science, business, and practical arts, our educational system has strayed too far and too soon from READING, WRITING, and ARITHMETIC.

          To be sure, our culture needs teachers and preachers, scientists and seers, executives and MacDonald clerks, but we need that thin thread that binds us all together. That thread is the ability to read the accumulated wisdom of the ages, and the art of expressing current experience and ideas in a lucid and contemporary form.     Writing is the concrete and permanent extension of thought and ideas. Oral facility can soon fade or be corrupted, but the written word goes on and on.     China can provide us with toys and trinkets, utensils and wrenches, clothes and crafts, but it cannot provide us with tools of thought, time for reflection, and appreciation of culture and beauty.     Only our own writers, up from our own villages can do that. It is our duty to provide to future generations, good writers with sane values and enduring concepts.      This nation can build armies starting with eighteen- year-old-citizens, but creating readers and writers must start from the beginning years of each citizen. Only then will we be a moral and strong nation.      The National Endowment for the Arts recently issued a report entitled To Read or Not to Read. This report reveals that, “38 percent of employers rate employees deficient in reading, while a shocking 72 percent of employers rate such graduates as deficient in writing skills.”      Young people tend to read less and less each year, and writing is nearly reserved to filling out forms for more credit cards. So sad!