Education's Role in Rhetoric, Class, and Privilege
As an industrial center, Pittsburg had plenty of opportunity for students to train in the art of emerging technology and its use. However, this is truer nowhere else but in the mining industry. Mining had been going on for quite some time in our area of the state, but new techniques were expanding it more than ever. The university was located near the largest coal field in KS, providing up close and personal experience when students were allowed to visit the mines. A historical PSU bulletin also stated that, “The Lead and Zinc mines of our state are also located near the institution, and are connected by trolley with the city of Pittsburg.”
One other point about our area was a reflection of just how important the coal industry was to people’s livelihoods. To this end, the local newspaper was actually called “The Pittsburg Daily Headlight” long before the Morning Sun or the Girard Press were to see publication.
Manual labor was in such high demand in the early twentieth century that an estimated 1,000,000 new workers were added every year. In the thick and densely settle areas of Pittsburg, we shared a big responsibility for these additions. Pittsburg was a boom town and the creation of PSU was only one more addition to the areas advancements as an industrialized city. In any city, history has shown, that the common man will ask for his due from those above him. This can be seen in the local struggles that President Lewis, Alexander Howat, and Hearl Maxwell were engaged in during this time period.
These types of sentiments were increasing around the world, but in our corner of Kansas with the evolving coal mining unions, captured the nation’s attention. To this extent, The University bulletin had an interesting message from the Reconstruction Program of the American Federation of Labor in regards to how it viewed the future of a growing industrialized society. It stated that:
It is important that the industrial education which is being fostered and developed should have for its purpose not so much training for efficiency in industry as opposed to training for life in an industrial society. A full understanding must be had of those principles and activities, as they are the foundation of all productive efforts. Children should not only become familiar with tools and materials, but they should also receive a thorough knowledge of the principles of human control, of force and matter underlying our industrial relations and sciences.
