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I NEW VO«K PUBLIC SCHOOLS, WHERE HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF PUPILS WIIX RESUME THEIR S ] THE ORNATE ENTRANCE TO THE DE WITT CLINTON HIGH SCHOOL BUILDING. The decoration of the entrances is one cf the ways in which distinctive architectural characteristics are given to New York sc .00l bu.ldmgs. STRIDES IX EDUCATION. New York's First Public School Had One Teacher and 500 Pupils. L,ast week children were thronging to the New York public school houses in a polyglot stream to register. To-morrow the streets will be alive with hundreds of thousands of them on their way lo th< tirst session of the school year. For the occupancy <>f this mighty army of future rul<rs df New York City the school authorities have put in condition approximately 520 school buildings and completed, in addition, an even score ( ,f new on.>s. The buildings and the equip ment Which will be used by these children, ex clusive <>f tli. new buildings added within the last oar. represent a < apital investment of $98,975,332 22. Notwithstanding the great number of school bouses and the immense investment in educa tional plant, which has been ungrudgingly given, there are children in New York City who can attend public schools for only part of the time. Btf.ir. long the committee on elementary schools and the Board of Superintendents are to make a report which, if adopted, may "in augurate a new school policy, which will make for nailer classes, for full time for all the pupils, for a modified eq^irsr- of study, fnr more , !i -"is. for increased salaries, and for a businesslike and economical management, all of which can be accomplished on approved educa tional lines and with a decreased budget." It is a far cry from the two story brick school gilding erected less than one hundred years ago the soil which is now being excavated at Tryon and Park rows for the new subway to the mammoth and attractive schoolhouses going up to-day throughout the city, equipped with al most every essential modern convenience that imagination has pictured. With what pride the "first i itizens," in all the dignity of their place In the community, visited that early structure, the first free public school house, and examined the quarters. The firs! floor was to be occupied by a teacher who would not worry then about equalization of pay. being the only one in their employ The "spacious" room on the second floor was to be the one in which the five hun dred pupils were to learn what they could of the essentials if at least a successful defence In the struggle for supremacy in a bargain with a shrewd neighbor — in ot'ier words, 'he "three It's." If one of those tally city fathers could rise up to-day in his body of flesh and see the changes which have been wrought in education and its temples in this city, he would undoubt edly be inclined to ask a number of questions. On-i;:h hardly imagine what the "distinguished citi; .< n"' of a century ago would say if he were Bet down in the centre of Seward Park before the French Renaissance front of Public School 62, almost palatial in its expansiveness, and among dignified, gray bearded patriarchs of the Jewish faith sunning themselves on the park benches, or selling "silk" candy from an ancient baby carriage to the bright eyed school children. Fie certainly would not recognize the school- Uouse. One can imagine him endeavoring to do NEW-YORK DAILY TIJIUI.NE, SUNDAY. SEPTEMBER 13. IWS. THE FOYER OF THE DE WITT CLINTON HIGH SCHOOL. A decorative stone wainscoting is not without its value as a support to neighborhood morality. justice to the wonders exhibited, in such ejacu lations as -Wonderful:" and "Incomprehensi ble!" There rould be no better barometer of the change of conditions than this great school set beside the first free public school of 1809. This last building and its site cost approximately $1,300,000. or about one hundred times the amount sp< nt on the first structure, a sun-, which would have paid the annual expenses of the gov< rnmeni of the city a century ago. Where one teacher, rod in hand, ruled over half a thousand children in the single room of the old structure, in the new one more than fourscore instructors by moral suasion guide nine times that number, seated in one hundr- ■: classrooms, into realms of knowledge never areaa rca , f in the old days as possible for the ,; titude. instead of the li.^ r iron stove, around hildren in the old schoolhouse gath . ,-. ,i . n a cold morning, and the series of "gym nasty-sticks" through which they were sorne tin s put for the sake of warmth, the rooms of the modern building arc heated by a current of air drawn directly from the exterior of the build ing through a box filled with steam pipes and fanned into the t lassrooms. No one to-day has an excuse for making a cold day a half holiday because the rooms cannot be kept warm. Instead of the night of wooden steps up which NO. 62, AN EAST SIDE SCHOOLHOUSE. It represents an expenditure of $1,300,000, and accommodates 4.5C0 children A BUILDING CHANGED FROM » URE BY THE ADC" The tower and the terra cotta d««n brick building «ft, the children tramped are fireproof stairway elevators. Electric light 3 have taken the nt the sputtering oil lamps. The sand a around which the children used to take tar standing -while they practised forming '« in the sand with sticks, have been replac^ blackboards. In this modern schooßioGs ,', some things of whose Invention the go« Knickerbocker could never have dreamt they are not even modern improv- :I old devices. Such Is the telephone tobm ill of the schoolrooms. Why there anong gymnasiums, cooking imns) workshops a bathrooms in this building he would haw:, culty in understanding. And what would It r feelings on viewing the children of the M of the earth, not only learning the "thm E but studying geography, history, physio!, science, music, nature, drawing, cord and r\ work, sewing, cooking and carpentry? 0 work of the first school "redeemed" the cftigj from "the power and domination of igmnqjj as De Witt Clinton, its first president, pa: it.., present schools must indeed be the temjlM Minerva, from whose shades come forth j, men. : It is hardly necessary to t*ll a New la* that the school; . bein^ built to-day 3?. a tally unlike those which the city erectelar of years ago. Looking down the front i block containing one of the old red brick ads houses, one can hardly locate it because i \ close resemblance in color to the houses .", either side. Not so the new buildings. I may not know a French Renaissance front r £ a Tudor tower, but one can pick out one o^ new schoolhouses as far as one can see it t