Samuel Townsend was the first editor of Carlisle’s School News, a monthly, which ran from June 1880 until May 1883. Charles Kihega (Iowa) took over as editor in 1881. Kihega was assisted by Ellis Buffington Childers, a member of the Creek Nation.
The School News was the only student-edited newspaper printed at Carlisle. In his first editorial Townsend introduces the student-run School News to readers by distinguishing it from the white-edited newspapers at Carlisle: “We put everything in this paper that the Indian boys write for us. Not any white man’s writing, but all the Indian boys’ writing.” Townsend’s first editorial suggests that from the beginning, students were aware that the School News was fulfilling a unique role for its readers. Although it was written primarily for current and prospective students, Townsend envisioned a broader audience for the newspaper: “We print this paper for the boys and girls at this school, and for any body else who would like to read about what we are doing.” (School News Editorial, June 1880; Littlefield and Parins, American Indian, 335–37)
We know that this is a small paper. It is the smallest that we ever saw. We are going to try to make it good. We put every thing in this paper that the Indian boys write for us. Not any white man’s writing but all the Indian boys’ writing.
Some speeches and some letters.
They gave us the paper they write and then we take it to the printing office and print it. We want to show the people how they can do. Some have been going to school but a few months and some have been going to school for several years and they can do most everything now. This little paper we print everybody thinks is so funny and sometimes they laugh at it. We do sometimes laugh at it because it is so small.
We will try to make it good, so everybody will want to read it and will give us twenty-five cents a year for it. We will print it every month.
Some white folks say that the Indians do not know anything and can’t learn anything, but the Indians are learning something. Great many of the white folks never read about the Indians and they do not know anything about us, but sometimes they talk bad about us and they say that the Indians have no brains to think with and they can’t learn anything. Sometimes they say Indians can not be civilized. Maybe those white folks don’t know anything. Great many white people are willing to help the Indians and to make them civilized so that they can make their own living. If those other people would only come here to Carlisle school they would find something here that the Indians have done and see all the fields that they have cultivated, and if they would go out to Indian Territory and visit some of the Indians there who are like the white people—Cherokees, Chickasaws and Choctaws, who have their own houses and their own farms, who can do most anything, they would soon change their minds and never say anymore that the Indians are not worth anything. If every Indian boy and girl were in school it would not take long to civilize all the Indians. The reason it takes so long is because Washington does not give enough money to put all the Indian children in school. White people put their children to school when they are young. We know the white children learn very fast because they go to school every day and that is the reason they know much, and when they grow up to be men they know all about everything. If Washington would only give enough to put all the Indian children in school, Indians would soon be civilized. That is so what John Downing says on our first page: “Indians have more friends among the white people who are willing to help the Indians now than ever before.” Now if Washington would tell all the Indian boys and girls to go to school and if they would stay in school until they know something, until they know how to work and read and write, in thirty years the Indians would not be much like they are now they would know about the white man’s road and they would make their own houses. When all the Indians are civilized why they can make cars and do most anything.
It is better for the Indians to send all their children to school for if they don’t send their children to school they will not know anything. Now the Indians don’t know how to make wagons, plows, hoes, and harness; they don’t know how to make anything. They have to buy these things from the white people. That is the reason the white people like to make wagons and plows and everything because they think they can get lots of money. If the Indians knew how to make wagons and plows and all these things they would get lots of money from the whites and would keep all their own money saved. The Indians don’t know how to make anything, that is the way they spend all their money. Long time ago the Indians used to go to hunt buffalo. When they found some buffalo they killed them and take the skins off and take it to some town and sell it and get money for it but now almost all the buffalo are gone. What will the Indians do? Why they have to work hard; plow the ground and do something, for if they don’t they will starve to death and their children too. It is better they should send their children to school and learn to read and write, and not only read and write but learn how to work at a trade. That is the way the white boys do; they learn a trade and when they grow up to be a man, they can go on working and make some money of it. If the Indians do the same way they would not be poor. The men who make the wagons and plows and clothes and everything get much money from the Indians, because the Indians must buy these things from the men who make them. If the people of the United States will help the Indians they will soon find the way. From all over the parts of the country Washington sends teachers to Carlisle and Hampton and to the agencies to educate the Indians, but there are not enough schools like this one, where the boys and girls learn to work at everything. We learn from books and we learn about God too.
Some Indians don’t want to be ignorant they want to know something. They want to know about the things that the white men do. Indians can’t learn anything without some wise people teaching them so the people of the United States must give the Indians more help and give them more education. They can’t do the things like the white people because the white people have more knowledge but the Indians have not this kind of knowledge. The Indians are ignorant. Some of them are trying to know something. They put themselves among the white people. Some of them have thrown away the things they used to wear and wear now the white people’s things. Only a few tribes are using paints and wearing blankets and other things but some other tribes have thrown away the Indian things and have caught hold of the things like the people of the United States and are glad to have them. Some white people like to have the things that the Indians wear because they think Indian things are a curiosity to look at. Uncivilized Indians ought to go to school and learn something. They don’t know how to travel. If they were traveling in the cars they would not know which way to go they would be lost, if no white man was with them.
Some bad people teach the Indians how to drink whiskey. Indians never drank whiskey but they have learned it from the bad people.
The children want to hurry to learn how to read and write, so they can read all the hard words in the books and they can read every book, and so they can write letters home to their parents. They try hard to learn all they can how to spell long words. That is the reason they try hard because they want to show their parents how they can read and write and speak the English language. They won’t have to try so hard to learn English when they are with their tribe because they talk the Indian language all the time but now these boys and girls if they want to talk to their parents they must write English letters. So you see that is good for them. They feel that they must try hard to write but then they go to school in their tribe they have nobody to write to. Only a few white friends sometimes, but now these children write to their homes very often. Some boys and girls who have been to this school about one year can write very good English letters. We hope our parents will not forget to write to us, and we hope some of the boys and girls at the agency school will write to the boys and girls at this school. When these children write a letter to their home they can tell them a great many things about the east that these children never saw. It is a good thing for the Indian boys and girls to go to school but we think it is the best thing to come east to school because we can not see out at our tribe and we learn much faster.
Sometime the Indians will become entirely civilized people just as good white people. If the boys and girls want to be the rulers among their people they must get the best education and learn how to work too. We don’t think these children at this school or at any other school either will ever rule their parents and the old Indians only if they do their best, when these children go back to their homes far west if they act right and show the Indians about the way they learned at school the old Indians will see that is the best way to do. If there were many big schools like this and Hampton school we think the Indians would get along very nicely. When all the Indians become educated there would be no more wild Indians but all civilized and educated people. Great many white people think that it is best for the Indian boys to learn to be minister. It is good to be a minister but the best thing for most of the Indian boys to learn is to work. Some of the boys get tired of too much work. White men never get tired of working. Some of them are just like the Indians lazy like to do nothing but the greatest white men that ever lived became great through hard work. We learn to be good while we are learning to work and if we can spend some time in school that is very good, but work and hard work is what makes men of the Indian boys. There will be no use for a lazy Indian in a few years, so learn to work and to be good, and honest and true. Let the boys who expect to be ministers learn to work, too.
The new President Mr. Garfield will take his place in Washington on the 4th of March and Mr. Hayes will go out because he has been President of the United States for four years. Mr. Hayes did the best he could to make the Indians civilized and he did the best he could to help the Indians, now we hope Mr. Garfield will put all the Indian children in school right away and not wait. Just a few children in school can’t do much good but EVERY Indian child who is old enough would be glad to go to school, and the ONLY way to civilize the Indians is to educate the children.4