Day #341 A Humbling Experience

This is a very long post -- much longer than usual, but I think it's worth reading. This is the exam given to all 8^th-grade students in Washington State in 1910. I cut and pasted it from this website: http://www.eagleforum.org/educate/2004/july04/1910.html
 
I had to think twice about some of the answers to the very first question, to say nothing of a LOT of the rest of them. See how you do . . .

The following 8th-grade exit exam materials for Washington state in 1910 were supplied to the Education Reporter by Vincent J. Doran of Anchorage, AK. OFFICE OF SUPERINTENDENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION, STATE OF WASHINGTON, OLYMPIA, WASHINGTON MY DEAR SUPERINTENDENT AND TEACHERS: Herewith are sent lists of questions to be used by pupils of the Eighth Grade, who are candidates for certificates of graduation. The aim of these questions is to give the pupils of the Eighth Grade a test in both the technical and general knowledge which they should possess in order to be ready for the higher work. The following facts have been kept in view in the preparation of the questions: The advancement of the pupils. The general knowledge that they should possess. The supplementary work that is now expected of teachers in our schools. The requirements of the preparatory courses in higher schools. If a pupil succeeds in passing successfully this test, he will receive a certificate of graduation, and will be entitled to enter upon a high school course. Permit the suggestion that no teacher have charge of his pupils while they are writing upon the questions, and to this end the Superintendent or some one appointed by him should have charge of the following examination. The papers are to be graded by the county Board of Education. The standard is uniform for the state, and is as follows: Minimum 60% Minimum in grammar and arithmetic 80% Average 80% The rules and program for teachers’ examinations are to be followed so far as they are applicable. Very truly, HENRY B. DEWEY, Superintendent of Public Instruction EIGHTH GRADE EXAMINATION QUESTIONS AUGUST 18 AND 19, 1910 READING CIRCLE WORK Write a brief review of one reading circle book. GRAMMAR Write the plural of the following words: daisy, leaf, tooth, penny, die, me, tongs, valley, Miss Jones, Mr. Brown. Name the four kinds of sentences as to use, and the three kinds of sentences as to structure. Give sentences containing noun, adjective, and adverbial clauses. Name four kinds of pronouns and give examples of each kind. In what must a pronoun agree with its antecedent? Illustrate. He felt the damp of the river fog, that rises after the sun goes down. Diagram or analyze. Compare: little, much, near, old, up, honest, elegant, famous, neat, merciful. Write a sentence containing a verb in the active voice, change it to the passive, and explain how this is done. Name three different ways in which a noun may be used in the nominative case, and three ways in which a noun may be used in the objective case. Write a letter to a friend describing briefly the country surrounding your home. ORTHOGRAPHY (spelling) 1-6. 1. soldier 16. sustenance 2. grandeur 17. obedience 3. numeral 18. cancellation 4. cuticle 19. declension 5. buffalo 20. military 6. decrepit 21. irregular 7. meridian 22. accurate 8. phrasing 23. pernicious 9. prairie 24. laudanum 10. reservoir 25. beneficent 11. Manhattan 26. senator 12. biography 27. registrar 13. emblematic 28. January 14. genuine 29. soliloquy 15. Siberia 30. Tuesday Write sentences showing the correct use of the following words: beat, beet; great, grate; lain, lane; seam, seem; the, thee. Mark diacritically the vowels in the following: banana, admire, golden, ticket, lunch. Form words using the following affixes and tell of the meaning of the words thus formed: ary, less, er, ous, dom. Define the following words and give examples: primitive word, compound word, vowel, accent, prefix. UNITED STATES HISTORY AND CIVICS What were the three objective points of the Federal forces in the Civil War? Name the last three presidents in order, and name an important event in each administration. How did the Colonies of the North and South differ as to social life, education, industries, and customs, prior to the Revolution? (a) State briefly the causes of the War of 1812. (b) Name two engagements. (c) Two prominent American Commanders. Give a short sketch of the life and work of one of the following great men: Thomas Jefferson, Henry Clay, William McKinley. (a) When and where was slavery introduced into America? (b) How was it abolished? What has made the names of each of the following historical? Alexander Hamilton, U.S. Grant, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Cyrus W. Field, Clara Barton. (a) State the qualifications of a United States Senator. (b) Name the Senators from the State of Washington. How do you distinguish between the terms Puritans, Pilgrims, and Separatists? Give an account of the framing and adoption of the Declaration of Independence. GEOGRAPHY What causes the difference in climate between Eastern and Western Washington? Name ten wild animals of Africa. Tell some reasons why the people of Washington are interested in the Orient. Name the five chief nations of Europe, and give their capitals. Name five important cities and five products of Canada. Sketch a map of South America, locating three rivers, five capital cities. What and where are the following? Liverpool, Panama, Suez, Ural, Liberia, Quebec, Pikes Peak, Yosemite, Danube, San Diego. Name five of the principal crops of the United States, and tell the section where each is raised. Describe the Nile and the country through which it flows. Name the largest country of Asia, three important cities, and three important products. ARITHMETIC Divide 304487 by 931. Find the sum of 5/9, 5/6, 3/4, 11/36. A gardener sells his celery for 8 1/3 cents per bunch. How many bunches should he give for $5.00? How many board feet in a piece of timber 14 inches square, and 12 feet long? What number diminished by 33 1/3 percent of itself, equals 38? By selling my horse for $156 I gained 8 1/3 %. How much did the horse cost me? A note for $200 was given January 1, 1909, rate of interest to be 8%. How much was due April 1, 1910? Find the square root of 95.6484. What is the cost of enough lumber to floor a room 24 feet long and 16 feet wide, at $32 per thousand feet? How much will it cost me to pave a street 42 feet wide, and 625 feet long, at $11.65 per square yard? READING 1-5. One selection in prose and one in poetry from eighth grade reading book. (50 credits) (not included) Name five American poets, and give a quotation from each. Who wrote the following? The Village Blacksmith. Rip Van Winkle. The First Snowfall. The Great Stone Face. The Raven. Quote two stanzas of "America." Quote a stanza from one of the poems mentioned in question 7. Give in your own words the meaning of the following: "To him who, in the love of Nature, holds Communion with her visible forms, she speaks A various language: for his gayer hours She has a voice of gladness, and a smile Into his darker musings with a mild And healing sympathy, that steals away Their sharpness ere he is aware." PHYSIOLOGY Describe the structure of the skin. Locate the thoracic duct. Trace a drop of blood from the time it enters the left ventricle, until it returns to its starting point, and name the different valves and principal arteries and veins through which it passes. Describe the composition of the blood. Why are the arteries more protected than the veins? Name five special senses. Explain why health depends largely upon habit. Explain the effect of alcohol and tobacco upon the action of the heart. Give some good reasons why boys should not smoke cigarettes. What do you understand about the germ theory of disease? GENERAL QUESTIONS (Note—Examiners will grade penmanship of pupils from their answers to the following questions) Write your name in full. What is your age? Write your post office address, number of your school district, and name of your teacher. To what grade of the school do you belong? Have you completed the grade? Is this your first eighth grade examination? If you succeed in obtaining an eighth grade diploma, do you expect to attend school next term? Where?

I have to admit it – I’m truly humbled by the breadth and depth of this exam.

BEEattitude for Day # 341:
       Blessed are those who expand their minds, for they shall find new worlds in there.

_______________________________

There’s still time

to get your dog in my next book!

From now through the end of September, anyone who donates $10 to WAG, also known as the Walton Animal Guild, will be automatically entered in a drawing.

If you win, your dog will be in my next Biscuit McKee mystery!

http://www.wagwalton.com/News.php

The donate button is right on their home page

Every $10 donation is automatically entered in the drawing

See Blog #324 for the details.

Day #340 WAG

If you missed the open house at WAG’s new office yesterday evening, you missed a good time indeed.

Lots of people showed up to see the little house, to eat yummy food, and to hear a reading from Violet as an Amethyst. I read the scene where Glaze and Biscuit see the lost dog for the first time and talked about how I could change it depending on which dog won the drawing.

Of course, people were showing me pictures of their dogs right and left. “This dog would be the best, don’t you think?” I had to spread my hands in an “it’s not up to me” gesture. Naturally, I’d like it all the dogs could win.

WAG (Walton Animal Guild) rescues animals from the county shelter and finds homes for them, primarily through showing them at the Logansville PetSmart. It was a day without too much bee activity in my life. I was centered on dogs and my books.

Here’s the page on their website where they talk about the drawing – and you can donate there, too.

http://www.wagwalton.com/News.php

BUT – before I drove all the way top Loganville, I had to be sure my bees had food, so I dressed up in my Michelin Man outfit – four heavy layers everywhere, including the toaster cover over my head under the bee veil. I took this picture of my reflection in the sliding glass door. You can just see the toaster cover behind the screen of the bee veil.

 

Quit laughing. Oh, what the heck, go ahead. I’m laughing right along with you.

BEEattitude for Day # 341:

       Blessed are those who don't mind looking foolish, for they shall find themselves in all sorts of adventures. 

__________________________

Green as a Garden Hose, the 3^rd Biscuit McKee Mystery,

is now available in mass market paperback

from World Wide Mystery, a division of Harlequin.

(Go to www.eHarlequin.com and search for Fran Stewart)

All the Biscuit McKee mysteries are available as eBooks, too!

_______________________________

There’s still time

to get your dog in my next book!

From now through the end of September, anyone who donates $10 to WAG, also known as the Walton Animal Guild, will be automatically entered in a drawing.

If you win, your dog will be in my next Biscuit McKee mystery!

http://www.wagwalton.com/News.php

The donate button is right on their home page

Every $10 donation is automatically entered in the drawing

See Blog #324 for the details.

Beekeeping at the Fair

The Gwinnett County Fair started Thursday, and a whole slew of folks from our beekeepers club were there to talk to folks about the value of bees. We sold some honey, and I had great fun explaining why the honey came in three different shades. The lightest in color came from the sourwood trees. Then we had a medium-toned wildflower honey. The one I’ll be buying when I work there next week is the dark, luscious sumac honey.

Then there were the booths just down the aisle from us. Tempting! Geri and I each bought a hat at one booth and a purse at another one. But then we went right back to talk about the bees.

It was fun watching children try to find the queen bee in the two observation hives. Sure, the queens each had a white dot of paint on their backs, but even more than that, you could see the circle of “attendant bees” cleaning them, feeding them, massaging their long backs. The women who were watching invariably said, "I wish I were a queen bee,” UNTIL I told them that the queen never leaves the hive and has to lay up to 2,500 eggs every day all spring and summer.

So, come on over and see us at the fair!

By the way, if you’re in the Loganville GA area, head down to the open house for Walton Animal Guild www.wagwalton.com. I’ll be there from 4 to 8 today (Friday).

3890 Oak Grove Road

Loganville, GA 30052

BEEattitude for Day # 340:

       Blessed are those who explore new options, for they shall be endlessly entertained.

_______________________________

Get Your Dog in My Next Book!

From now through the end of September, anyone who donates $10 to WAG, also known as the Walton Animal Guild, will be automatically entered in a drawing.

If you win, your dog will be in my next Biscuit McKee mystery!

http://www.wagwalton.com/News.php

Every $10 donation is automatically entered in the drawing

See Blog #324 for the details.

Day #338 It was a Dark and Stormy Night...

This is so much fun! The dog stuff, I mean.

In two more days the Walton Animal Guild is having an open house to show off their new facility, and I’ll be there to talk about my Violet as an Amethyst, my upcoming book that’s going to star one lucky dog.

Would you like a sneak preview? Shh! Don’t tell anybody... but here are the first few paragraphs:

--a brief excerpt from CHAPTER 1 of

Violet as an Amethyst © 2011 Fran Stewart

It was a dark and stormy night, dammit, and I was stuck, gasping for air, desperate for warmth, wedged between two branches of a drowning pine tree as the rain-swollen Metoochie River tried its river-like best to uproot the nearly-submerged tree and drown me. If it didn’t freeze me first.

I had no idea who had pushed me from the dock, but I knew I hadn’t simply slipped. A moment after I’d sensed I wasn’t the only one standing there watching the surge of the storm-water, two big hands hit the middle of my back.

What on earth had I been thinking, to take a walk at 2 a.m. when I could have stayed curled up next to Bob? Obviously I’d lost my mind, and now I was paying for it.

I prayed for a convenient lightning bolt to strike the man who’d pushed me, whoever he was. I prayed for dawn. I prayed for a friendly boater or a sudden river-drying drought. My only chance was to hang on and hope for rescue. I screamed for help again and again, but heard no answer above the roar of the river. Visions of Snoopy, pounding away at his typewriter on top of his red-roofed cartoon doghouse, careened around inside my muddled head. It was a dark and stormy night; it was a dark and stormy night. I couldn’t get beyond that first stupid sentence.

 Doesn’t that sound like fun? I couldn’t resist starting the book with a cliché, but tweaking it slightly, with the “dammit,” so it wasn’t totally a cliché. Wait’ll you read the end! … um … and the middle, too.

 What does this have to do with bees? Well, Biscuit’s husband, Bob, the town cop, gets talked into taking over some hives that belonged to a newly-deceased town member. But then, there’s this dead body that … Shh, Frannie! Don’t give that away.

BEEattitude for Day # 338:

       Blessed are those who anticipate good things, for they shall be eternally hopeful.
  

__________________________

Green as a Garden Hose, the 3^rd Biscuit McKee Mystery,

is now available in mass market paperback

from World Wide Mystery, a division of Harlequin.

(Go to www.eHarlequin.com and search for Fran Stewart)

 _______________________________

Get Your Dog in My Next Book!

From now through the end of September, anyone who donates $10 to WAG, also known as the Walton Animal Guild, will be automatically entered in a drawing.

If you win, your dog will be in my next Biscuit McKee mystery!

http://www.wagwalton.com

The donate button is right on their home page

Every $10 donation is automatically entered in the drawing

See Blog #324 for the details.

Day #337

Tuesday evening at the meeting for the Beekeepers Club of Gwinnett County, I sold off some of my equipment, and was happy to see it go to people who were enthusiastic about getting it.

The speaker at the meeting, Virginia Webb of http://www.mtnhoney.com/ told us about her honey business, and encouraged those of us who would actually be getting honey to be proud to market it.

One thing she pointed out is that local honey is – right from the very start – made in America. Every single product used in beekeeping comes from this country. From the special clothing to the hive components to the bottling equipment to the labels on the jars – all of it is made in the USA.

Honey sold on supermarket shelves (unless it’s in a special rack of local honey) is often bottled from “syrup” shipped in from China that is made of 50% processed, heated, pesticide-laden honey and 50% corn syrup.

Not our local honey! Good stuff. Absolutely dependable. Made in the USA.

Be patriotic – buy local honey.

p.s. At the end of the meeting, I taught everyone there how to use an epi pen. You already know how, since you read my blog a few days ago.

BEEattitude for Day # 337:

       Blessed are those who appreciate us bees for the work we do, for they shall taste only the best.

_______________________________

Only 16 More Days to Get Your Dog in My Next Book!

From now through the end of September, anyone who donates $10 to WAG, also known as the Walton Animal Guild, will be automatically entered in a drawing.

If you win, your dog will be in my next Biscuit McKee mystery!

http://www.wagwalton.com

The donate button is right on their home page

Every $10 donation is automatically entered in the drawing

See Blog #324 for the details.

Day #336 Looking on the Bright Side

Thank you to those of you who emailed me (or posted a comment here) about my decision to give up the bees. Your encouragement and understanding have meant a great deal to me.

I’m going to be offering the bees, the hives, and all my equipment (and there’s a LOT of it) for sale. I’m thinking of having a “silent auction” sort of affair, where I’ll list the stuff and let people jot down how much they’ll pay for it.

I guess I hadn’t realized how much money I’d plowed into this so far. Well, I did know, because I’m pretty good about budgeting, and I spaced the purchases out so they didn’t put a big dent in the checkbook. But I hadn’t considered the grand total.

If you’re thinking of getting into beekeeping yourself, this is something to keep in mind.

5-frame hives (2) with bees  (2 deep bodies each)	$   349
bee brush	$        4
frame perch	$      20
hive net	$      20
hive tool	$        4
smoker (used)	$      15
Book: Complete Idiot's Guide to Beekeeping	$      15
Book: Honey & Your Health	$        6
Book: Honey/Gourmet Medicine	$      10
Book: Natural Beekeeping	$      35
Education Cards for school programs	$      35
Online beginner's class CD from Brushy Mountain	$      15
extra veils (used - from Rob)	$      10
Inspector's Jacket w/ zip-on veil/from Brushy Mountain	$      76
comb cutter	$      12
extra honey pail w/ lid	$        7
gamma lid	$      10
glass jars	$      18
honey filtering system	$      35
pail holder	$      25
security-tab honey labels	$      20
5-frame supers (7)	$      70
empty frames	$      40
plastic frames	$      35

            Grand Total:          $886             

The last 10 items I never really used at all – they all have to do with large harvests of honey but when I look this over I realize I’ve had more than a thousand dollars worth of fun, and I’ve had a couple of thousand dollars worth of irreplaceable hands-on experience, plus hundreds of dollars of book-learning, to say nothing of the new friends I've met through the beekeeping community.

So, all in all, I guess I win!

BEEattitude for Day # 336:

      Blessed are those who see the bright side, for their shadows shall always fall behind them.
 

__________________________

Green as a Garden Hose, the 3^rd Biscuit McKee Mystery,

is now available in mass market paperback

from World Wide Mystery, a division of Harlequin.

(Go to www.eHarlequin.com and search for Fran Stewart)

 _______________________________

Get Your Dog in My Next Book!

From now through the end of September, anyone who donates $10 to WAG, also known as the Walton Animal Guild, will be automatically entered in a drawing.

If you win, your dog will be in my next Biscuit McKee mystery!

http://www.wagwalton.com

The donate button is right on their home page

Every $10 donation is automatically entered in the drawing

See Blog #324 for the details.

Day #334 Sad News

As you may know, I usually schedule these daily posts to show up at a minute or so after midnight, Eastern time.

I didn’t make it today, simply because I couldn’t write this last night.

I have to give up my bees, and I feel so very sad about this.

The reactions I’ve had to the bee stings I’ve received over the past few months have—as I’m sure you can see if you read this blog regularly—become more and more severe.

I can’t risk it.

The most recent sting pretty much immobilized my hand—and the swelling made it ¾ of the way up to my elbow. The picture I posted a few days ago was BEFORE it got to the worst point. I realize this doesn’t sound very appetizing. I hope you’re not eating breakfast while you read this. The swelling was so severe my knuckles are bruised from what little movement I had to make.

Beekeepers get stung. That’s just the way it is. I’ve heard from a lot of my beekeeping colleagues that they get some fairly uncomfortable localized swelling, but they put up with it because, all in all, beekeeping is fun and enjoyable, and the honey it great!

I looked out at my beehives this morning and realized that I’m afraid of those little girls now. As much as I’ve come to love and respect them (yes, it is possible to love a bee!), I feel that I’m putting my life at risk by continuing this journey.

As I decide how to end this … this experiment … this journey, I’ll keep you informed. You’ve come this far with me, and I’ll feel better knowing I can share the end of it with you.

BEEattitude for Day # 335:

       Blessed are those who cry when they need to, for they shall find comfort in their tears.