78-01-A4

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American Farm School II

Transcript The Rev. John Henry House and his wife Susan started scratching at 53 barren acres in northern Greece in 1902. Their harvest? A beautifully landscaped campus and 400 acres of productive farm land with several hundred Greek boys and girls learning and working. They dry-farmed, dug wells, prayed to God and built a tiny school room. Their first students were a handful of orphans, refugees from the massacre of Macedonian peasants by the Turks. From that beginning the Thessaloniki Institute became the American Farm School and is one of the oldest educational landmarks in Macedonia. It has survived wars, pestilence, drought and malaria. Today it is a middle level technical school open to those who've had nine years of schooling. Rev. House never lived to see one part of his dream come true--the creation of a girls' school on the campus. It was his belief that, "when you educate a man you educate an individual. When you educate a woman, you educate a whole family." In 1917 his son Charles, a Princeton engineering graduate, returned to Greece where he had been brought up. His father was aging and Charles pitched in to help what had now become the American Farm School. When John House died in 1929 Charles took over. He understood and loved the Greek farmer. The school is not an American outpost on Greek soil. Of its graduates six out of 10 today farm in their native villages, others have gone on to get additional training and some have returned to teach and carry on the tradition of John and Susan House. In 1945 when a rural electrification program began in Greece, the Farm school graduates were the first to harness electricity for farm use. Charles died in 1961 but the school carries on, led by Bruce Lansdale, who is as dedicated to the founders' dream as was the founder himself. With the exception of years in college in America he has lived in Greece since 1925 and has known the American Farm School since childhood. The students get a total education -- an academic program plus homemaking skills and crafts for the girls and modern farming for the boys. They pay $350 a year which is one-half of the cost-per-student. All the work is done by the students, the housekeeping chores and the farming. They have a shop where the girls' handiwork is sold. This, and the produce raised by the boys, provides almost one-half of the school budget. A small percentage of help now comes from the Greek government which pays to send adult farmers to the school for special courses. Our own foreign aid program, A.I.D., helps with some construction needs which leaves 37 percent to be raised by private donations, both in Greece and the U.S. Talk about dropping a pebble in the water and watching the rings spread across the surface--the school now has a student exchange program with other countries and there are special summer courses in the ancient arts and crafts of Greece which makes for an interesting summer vacation for even a touring American. Time won't permit a listing of all the programs offered by the school, but you can get complete information or if you just want to keep a truly successful bit of American neighborliness going, write the American Farm School, 380 Madison Avenue, New York. Up around Thessaloniki no one says "Yankee go home." This is Ronald Reagan. Thanks for listening.		Details Batch Number 78-01-A4 Production Date 01/09/1978 Book/Page RPtV-250 Audio Youtube? No
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