Educational Exhibits and Conventions at the World's Industrial and Cotton Centennial Exposition, New Orleans, 1884-85

Abstract

THE extensive collection of everything connected with education which was to be made at the Exhibition held at New Orleans, and also the remarkable success of the United States Bureau in obtaining and dispersing educational information, have been referred to more than once in this journal. The Hon. John Eaton, Commissioner of Education, accepted the post of Superintendent, and the Government encouraged him to do everything in his power for the success of the undertaking; and this not unwisely, for the excellence or otherwise of the education exhibits of any locality is regarded as an attraction or warning by the most valued class of emigrants. Accordingly he made use of a visit to France, Belgium, and England to gain exhibitors, and in France he was very successful. At the Exposition he addressed large assemblies of teachers, and to himself as well as to the Bureau which he represented were awarded “Grand Diplomas of Honour” for valuable contributions. An illustrated catalogue of apparatus lent by the Bureau for experiments in the leading departments of physics is given in the Report. Among these the electrical instruments, as also a solar microscope, were particularly attractive at the Exhibition. Each State was urged to send specimens of the work, as also any objects which illustrated the growth and present condition, of its University; of its normal schools; of its schools of each grade; the work, on uniform paper, of children in every subject and standard; photographs and ground-plans of its best schools; school literature published in the State; technical work also, and both the methods and the performances of special schools, as for the blind, &c. Though not many States responded fully to this wide invitation, yet the fact that over nine thousand specimens (many of them volumes of school-work) were exhibited by Ohio alone, with regrets that a more complete set from all cities could not be got together, shows that a worthy response was made in some cases.

Educational Exhibits and Conventions at the World's Industrial and Cotton Centennial Exposition, New Orleans, 1884–85.

Special Report by the Bureau of Education. Part I. Catalogue of Exhibits. (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1886.)