{"id":23314,"date":"2023-02-03T14:47:08","date_gmt":"2023-02-03T19:47:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/?p=23314"},"modified":"2023-02-03T15:01:33","modified_gmt":"2023-02-03T20:01:33","slug":"fwd-episode-730-i-wrote-a-book-would-you-read-it-dealt-with-machine-design-in-19th-century-1850-1891-memorize-sentence-8-ok","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/?p=23314","title":{"rendered":"Fwd: EPISODE 730 I wrote a book! Would you read it? Dealt with machine design in 19th century, 1850-1891, (memorize sentence 8. OK?)"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Fwd: EPISODE 730      I wrote a book!  Would you read it?   Dealt with machine design in 19th century, 1850-1891, (memorize sentence 8. OK?)
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alan skeoch<\/div>\n
Feb. 3, 2023
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Pride! Arrogance!  Both are a part of all of us.  Best kept in check.   <\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n
But who would know if the small candle is hidden under a bushel?<\/div>\n

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So let me get this bit of pride and arrogance off my chest and into<\/div>\n
the digital world.<\/div>\n

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Around 1980 I applied for sabbatical leave from my job teaching history<\/div>\n
at Parkdale Collegiate Institute.  For decades we had been watching the<\/div>\n
Ontario rural landscape changing as small 100 acre farms were disappearing<\/div>\n
several of which were Skeoch farms in the vicinity of Fergus where our ancestors<\/div>\n
arrived in 1846.  <\/div>\n

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Wth the disappearance of these farms\u2026hundreds of the them\u2026the machines of<\/div>\n
19th century agriculture were going to scrap yards across the province.  Some of them<\/div>\n
we rescued and trucked to our small farm, 25 acres, in Wellington County.  Others<\/div>\n
we bought and donated to various museums\u2026Ontario Agricultural Museum, City of<\/div>\n
Toronto Riverdale Farm, Doon Pioneer Village, and others.<\/div>\n

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There were precious few records of these machines.  So I decided to apply for the MA<\/div>\n
program at the University of Toronto and as accepted.  This was not an easy decision as<\/div>\n
we had already decided that raising children was best done by one parent staying in the<\/div>\n
home.  Other families made different decisions\u2026.or were forced to make different decisions.<\/div>\n
Our decision meant that one salary would be ours and living could be tight.  We could live with<\/div>\n
that.<\/div>\n

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But to take a year off was another matter.  I will forever be in debt to the Toronto Board of<\/div>\n
Education which had instituted a sabbatical leave program for oddballs like me..  My salary<\/div>\n
would be reduced to 80% and I would be committed to return to teaching in Toronto.<\/div>\n
In other words we now had a green light to pursue our MA program.  Our?   Did I say<\/div>\n
\u2018our\u2019?  Indeed I did.  Marjorie was in full agreement.<\/div>\n

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So I joined three departments at the U. of T.  The history graduate program under Dr.<\/div>\n
J.M.S. Careless, (who only had one arm),  The Fine Arts program under Dr. Webster,<\/div>\n
and the School of Practical Science (S.P.S.) under several professors.  The engineering<\/div>\n
profs were so helpful .  Three departments<\/div>\n
was strange but my desire was strange.  I hoped to consider the changes in agriculture<\/div>\n
which swept through the 19 th century and resulted in the fact that we only needed 4 or 5<\/div>\n
percent active farmers to feed 100% of our population.<\/div>\n

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The inventions of the 19th century were revolutionary.  From sicles and cradle scythes to<\/div>\n
hore drawn binders to early threshing machines and combine harvesters pulled by<\/div>\n
steam and fossil fuelled tractors.   No facet of agriculture was untouched by these changes.<\/div>\n

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IN the end I wrote a 300 page paper titled Technology and Change in 19th century agriculture<\/div>\n
between 1850 and 1891.   Research involved a couple of trips to the Ford Museum in Dearborn<\/div>\n
(Detroit), the New York State Historical Society in Cooperstown, Black Creek Pioneer Village, and others.<\/div>\n

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What a grand time we had doing this book.  Each machine had a history\u2026a human history.<\/div>\n

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At the same time I was writing this thesis (If I can call it that) I got an extra job teaching at <\/div>\n
the Faculty of Education, Type A students, helping them become teachers. That job was exciting.  <\/div>\n
I owe thanks to John Ricker, Dean of the faculty and Evan Cruickshank who had been my high<\/div>\n
school history teacher at Humberside Collegiate and became head of history at the<\/div>\n
Facultyof Education.   When the year ended I was offered a job at the Faculty but I was<\/div>\n
duty bound to return to teach at Parkdale Collegiate.  Glad to do so.  Loved teaching young<\/div>\n
people and loved my fellow teachers at Parkdale.  Absolutely no regrets.<\/div>\n

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Many of my friends and my brother took different tracks.  I had one amusing job as a Vice Principal<\/div>\n
at a summer program at Monarch Park Collegiate.  Walter C., the principal, told me this was the<\/div>\n
way to be upwardly mobile,  To do so he gave me a yard stick and told me:<\/div>\n

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\u201cAlan, I want you to stand outside the summer school and measure the length<\/div>\n
of the girls dresses\u201d<\/div>\n
\u201cWhat then?\u201d<\/div>\n
\u201cIf they are too short send them home to get changed.\u201d<\/div>\n

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My immediate thought was \u201cAre you kidding?\u201d Walter was not kidding.  I am proud to <\/div>\n
say I never sent a girl home to change her shorts  for a dress.  I did stand out<\/div>\n
In front of the school with the yard stick though.  That was humiliation enough.<\/div>\n

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\u201cAlan, I want you to check the boys\u2019 washrooms\u201d<\/div>\n
\u201cWhy?\u201d<\/div>\n
\u201cJust in case some wiseacre is smoking?<\/div>\n
What if a smoker is in the toilet stall with the door closed?\u201d<\/div>\n
\u201cKick it open.\u201d<\/div>\n

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That was a learning curve for me.  Other principals were not as right wing as Walter.  Many were terrific<\/div>\n
people.  Duncan Green, for instance, when I asked him about a newspaper interview regarding history<\/div>\n
teaching in secondary schools.  \u201cWhat should I say?\u201d<\/div>\n

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\u201cSay what you believe\u2026and say it in as few words as possible.\u201d<\/div>\n

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Which takes me back to the 300 page book I wrote on my wonderful sabbatical.<\/div>\n
I can still see the face of Dr. Carelss when I handed him my bound copy of the book.<\/div>\n
I knew at that moment he was unlikely to read the whole thing.  He would not have time.<\/div>\n
What would I do if some kid handed me a 300 page essay?  Point made.<\/div>\n

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There were so many funny things that happened on that sabbatical.  And some challenges.<\/div>\n
The big challenge was the French compulsory requirement.  Each grad student was expected to<\/div>\n
be fluent in a second language.  Holy Samoley!   So at the same  time I was doing all this research<\/div>\n
in three departments I had to be studying French to see if I could pass the compulsory language<\/div>\n
rule.  <\/div>\n

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I wrote the French test  twice.  Failed the first time and got  zero.  Zero!  Zero was a mid mark between<\/div>\n
+7 and -7.  I don\u2019t know how this was arrived at.  But I would have to get a +2 or +3 to get my MA.<\/div>\n
So I rewrote the test again one spring day along with a bunch of other grad students who accepted me<\/div>\n
as a peer even though there was a gap in our ages\u2026a big gap.  <\/div>\n

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One of the most flattering things happened in that second attempt at French.<\/div>\n

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\u201cAl, you are number 8, remember that\u201d, said one my fellow students.  I did not know<\/div>\n
what the designation 8 meant until we all went for a beer after the test.  The organizer had<\/div>\n
a pen and paper to record each sentence in the test.  We were not expected to pass the test.<\/div>\n
We were expected to memorize a sentence each.  Sentences translated would be provided<\/div>\n
for the next test.  We were expected to cheat.  (Not sure the same test would be presented)<\/div>\n

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What a great feeling i had that day.  My fellow students accepted me.  I was one of them.<\/div>\n
Even though I let them down with sentence number 8.  <\/div>\n

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Walter C., my former principal would expect me to see him right away to report the cheating.<\/div>\n
Are you kidding?   That\u2019s a laugh.   I do not rat on friends.<\/div>\n

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I passed the second test\u2026got a +2 I think.  None of my friends did that I know about.  How could<\/div>\n
they?  French was no longer compulsory in high school.  Those kids did not have snowballs chance<\/div>\n
in hell to get their MA as long as the French requirement was in place.   <\/div>\n

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The requirement was quietly dropped a year of so later I was told.   I was still basking in the<\/div>\n
reflected glory of being Number 8.   Immediately sent a note of thanks to Maida Schroeder,<\/div>\n
my high school French teacher who kept me in the front seat and during the final exam<\/div>\n
slipped me a cartoon that said it takes skill to invent words that do not exist.  She knew.<\/div>\n

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My friends at Parkdale held a party for me when I got the zero.  It was good party complete with<\/div>\n
a big poster and my mark emblazoned in red as I remember.<\/div>\n

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The thesis had an impact.  Copies were made and are on file at the New Yorks State<\/div>\n
Historical Museum, the Ontario Agricultural Museum, Black Creek Pioneer Village.  Parts have<\/div>\n
been quoted here and there.  <\/div>\n

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I returned to Parkdale C.I. for the  rest of my career.  Never regretted one moment.  Just loved<\/div>\n
sharing history with younger generations. <\/div>\n

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The yardstick?   The girls skirts and shorts?  What a humbug.  But I suppose standards have <\/div>\n
to be set in life.  We can\u2019t have students coming to class nearly nude? That might be too distracting<\/div>\n
for anyone  wanting to do an MA program.  Hard to memorize sentence 8 in that case.<\/div>\n

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Now here is a test.<\/div>\n

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If I handed you my thesis\u2026all 300 pages nicely bound.  Would you read it?  AHAH!  Thought so,<\/div>\n
Would you read sentence 8 for the test?  Now that\u2019s more like it.<\/div>\n

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alan skeoch<\/div>\n
Feb. 3, 2023<\/div>\n

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P>S>  NICE things do happen in life.  One of the nicest that year was when my Type A Class<\/div>\n
at the Faculty of Education gave Marjorie and me a gift\u2026an overnight stay at the Moffat Inn<\/div>\n
at Niagara on the Lake.  We went there the  following winter with the kids.  We had a fireplace<\/div>\n
in the room   That is how we celebrated my Master of Arts.<\/div>\n

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PPS   And after it was all over a gang of my fellow teachers spent several memorable<\/div>\n
weekends at the Henry Ford Museum in  between the consumption of beer. Henry Ford<\/div>\n
was an oddball collector of old machines.  I think a copy of my thesis resides there although<\/div>\n
I am not sure.   I was asked by the Mellon bank to rebuild a McCormick 1831 reaper and<\/div>\n
ship it to the Northern Ireland Pioneer Village.  That was another result.  <\/div>\n

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So there you have it.  Pride and Arrogance.<\/div>\n

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alan<\/div>\n

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Fwd: EPISODE 730      I wrote a book!  Would you read it?   Dealt with machine design in 19th century, 1850-1891, (memorize sentence 8. OK?) alan skeoch Feb. 3, 2023 Pride! Arrogance!  Both are a part of all of us.  Best kept in check.    But who would know if the small candle is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23314","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23314","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=23314"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23314\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=23314"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=23314"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=23314"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}