High School Legislation In Oregon 205 of the situation under existing conditions. The early state superintendents seemed to feel helpless in the face of the situation and went about the state evangelizing instead of doing something definite to improve condi- tions. A course of study would undoubtedly have provided a basis for improvement but none was drafted for the state until 1900. 8 Previous to that date the regulations of the State Board of Education specified the subjects that might be taught but no effort was made to grade the work. 9 State Superintendent McElroy felt the need of a graded course of study but it seems not to have occured to him to draft one. In his report of 1891 he recommend- ed, "That each county superintendent be required to pre- pare and establish a graded course of study for county schools, and that each board of directors be required to adopt such a course of study." 10 There is no evidence that this added burden was ever placed upon these poorly paid servants of the people. Added to the fact that the country was sparsely set- tled and without educational leadership is the further consideration that the educational ideals of the rank and file of the early settlers were not high. These pioneers came largely from the raw states of the Middle West where high educational standards had not yet become es- tablished and where public schools were little known. Missouri, Kentucky and Tennessee were so largely repre- sented among the early immigrants as to shape the form of local government and to color the educational outlook. 11 There were, to be sure, a few among them who recognized the value of higher education. Such men were Jason Lee, fourteenth Biennial Report of the Superintendent of Public Instruc- tion of Oregon. 1900. p. 199. 9 Twelfth Biennial Report of the Superintendent of Public Instruction of Oregon. 1897. p. 132. Rule xxxlx. This rule appears unchanged in each biennial report from 1876 to 1897. 10 E. B. McElroy — Ninth Biennial Report of the Superintendent of Pub- lic Instruction of Oregon. 1891. p. 272. xl Strong (Frank) and S chafer (Joseph) — The Government of the American People, p. 29.
