Thank you to everyone who attended (83 registered) the “Back to School” event Saturday, Aug. 19 at the TB Ferguson Home Museum. Despite the 105 degrees (official airport reading), the band under Lincoln Spurlin sounded great with various percussion, brass and wind instruments. Janine Espy gave a talk about TB and Elva Ferguson’s involvement in teaching. A boy’s and girl’s bicycle were given to children so that they could to ride to school, if they so choose. Refreshments of various baked goods and ice cream followed. Many thanks to the Watonga High School band and parents for your participation.
And we do thank our teachers including Mr. Spurlin and assistant band director, Mrs. Miranda Spurlin for teaching our children.
As we have mentioned in this column, both TB and Elva were teachers. “TB Ferguson obtained his early education in grammar schools in southern Kansas and later attended Emporia State Normal College. He worked his way through this institution by teaching at grammar schools near Emporia. After graduating in 1884, he studied education at Fort Scott Normal College … and then completed his teacher preparation with four months of training at a normal school of Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Ferguson then taught school in Chautauqua County for several years, but by 1890 two other loves, religion and newspaper work, had begun to dominate his life. While teaching, Ferguson had studied religion under the direction of a Methodist minister and served as a supply pastor at several small Methodist churches Chautauqua County, including Peru, Sedan, Hartznill and Cedarville, Kan.
His growing love for newspaper work coincided with his love for Eva Shartel, whom he married in June 1885; when in 1890 he had the opportunity to take over his father-in-law’s newspaper in Sedan, Kansas, he quit teaching.” https:// gateway. okhistory. org/ark:/67531/metad c862901/m1/120/ However, his experience as a teacher led him, as governor, to promote and fund education at all levels.