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Education: The Great Trial

Scene. In the fastnesses of Tennessee, the quiet of dawn is split asunder by wailing screams from a steam siren. It is the Dayton sawmill, waking up villagers and farmers for miles around. From 5 until 6:30 the blasts continue. The hamlet and the fantastic cross between a circus and a holy war that is in progress there come slowly to life.

Along the main street of the village, where everyone in town sees everyone else within five minutes, peddlers, hucksters, hot-sausage men (they call their wares "hot monkeys" now), pamphleteers, itinerant evangelists,...

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