The exam that follows was taken from an original 1895 document on file at the Smoky Valley Genealogical Society & Library in Salina, Kan., and reprinted by the Salina Journal. 

From the Dec. 5, 1895, San Francisco Call (Library of Congress/Chronicling America) Illustration of the Whittier public school, drawn by a Call artist from a photograph.

Although the original reads, “Examination Graduation Questions of Saline County, Kansas,” there has been some debate about the exam’s authenticity and whom it was intended for — either eighth graders or potential teachers. The recent discovery of handwritten notes for the grammar section of the exam, found by a Saline County school superintendent’s grandchildren, support the legitimacy of the test.

The Salina Journal obtained a scan of the original and has a PDF version available on its website: Examination Graduation Questions.

The exam has six sections: grammar, arithmetic, U.S. history, orthography, geography and physiology. The last of which isn't consistently included on copies of the test floating around the Internet. Give it a try — then check your answers!

Grammar (Time, 1 hour)  

1. Give nine rules for the use of capital letters.

2. Name the parts of speech and define those that have no modifications.

3. Define verse, stanza and paragraph.

4. What are the principal parts of a verb? Give principal parts of “lie,” “play,” and “run.”

5. Define case; illustrate each case.

6. What is punctuation? Give rules for principal marks of punctuation.

7–10. Write a composition of about 150 words and show therein that you understand the practical use of the rules of grammar.

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Arithmetic (Time, 1 hour 15 minutes)  

1. Name and define the Fundamental Rules of Arithmetic.

2. A wagon box is 2 feet deep, 10 feet long, and 3 feet wide. How many bushels of wheat will it hold?

3. If a load of wheat weighs 3,942 lbs., what is it worth at 50 cents/bushel, deducting 1,050 lbs. for tare?

4. District No. 33 has a valuation of $35,000. What is the necessary levy to carry on a school seven months at $50 per month, and have $104 for incidentals?

5. Find the cost of 6,720 lbs. coal at $6 per ton.

6. Find the interest of $512.60 for 8 months and 18 days at 7 percent.

7. What is the cost of 40 boards 12 inches wide and 16 feet long at $20 per meter?

8. Find bank discount on $300 for 90 days (no grace) at 10 percent.

9. What is the cost of a square farm at $15 per acre, the distance of which is 640 rods?

10. Write a Bank Check, a Promissory Note, and a Receipt.

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U.S. History (Time, 45 minutes)  

1. Give the epochs into which U.S. History is divided.

2. Give an account of the discovery of America by Columbus.

3. Relate the causes and results of the Revolutionary War.

4. Show the territorial growth of the U.S.

5. Tell what you can of the history of Kansas.

6. Describe three of the most prominent battles of the Rebellion.

7. Who were the following: Morse, Whitney, Fulton, Bell, Lincoln, Penn and Howe?

8. Name events connected with the following dates: 1607, 1620, 1800, 1849, 1865.

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Orthography (Time, 1 hour)  

1. What is meant by the following: alphabet, phonetic, orthography, etymology, syllabication.

2. What are elementary sounds? How classified?

3. What are the following, and give examples of each: trigraph, subvocals, diphthong, cognate letters, linguals.

4. Give four substitutes for caret “u.”

5. Give two rules for spelling words with final “e.” Name two exceptions under each rule.

6. Give two uses of silent letters in spelling. Illustrate each.

7. Define the following prefixes and use in connection with a word: bi, dis-mis, pre, semi, post, non, inter, mono, sup.

8. Mark diacritically and divide into syllables the following, and name the sign that indicates the sound: card, ball, mercy, sir, odd, cell, rise, blood, fare, last.

9. Use the following correctly in sentences: cite, site, sight, fane, fain, feign, vane, vain, vein, raze, raise, rays.

10. Write 10 words frequently mispronounced and indicate pronunciation by use of diacritical marks and by syllabication.

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Geography (Time, 1 hour)  

1. What is climate? Upon what does climate depend?

2. How do you account for the extremes of climate in Kansas?

3. Of what use are rivers? Of what use is the ocean?

4. Describe the mountains of North America.

5. Name and describe the following: Monrovia, Odessa, Denver, Manitoba, Hecla, Yukon, St. Helena, Juan Fernandez, Aspinwall and Orinoco.

6. Name and locate the principal trade centers of the U.S.

7. Name all the republics of Europe and give the capital of each.

8. Why is the Atlantic Coast colder than the Pacific in the same latitude?

9. Describe the process by which the water of the ocean returns to the sources of rivers.

10. Describe the movements of the earth. Give the inclination of the earth.

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Physiology (Time, 45 minutes)  

1. Where are the saliva, gastric juice and bile secreted? What is the use of each in digestion?

2. How does the nutrition reach the circulation?

3. Wha tis the function of the liver? Of the kidneys?

4. How would you stop the flow of blood from an artery in case of laceration?

5. Give some general directions that you think would be beneficial to preserve the human body in a state of health.

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Done? Check yourself at one of these two websites I found that claim to have the answers: www.the-reality-check.com/1895_test_answers.html and www.critesclan.com/lee/editorials/eighth-grade-exam.html.

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Daylight saving time hits us every year, and 2009 is the third year where we'll spend more time "saving" than in standard time. 

Jack Delano Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe railroad conductor George E. Burton and engineer J.W. Edwards compare time before pulling out of Corwith railroad yard for Chillicothe, Ill., in March 1943.

Many technological advancements came about in the late 19th and early 20th centuries — barbed wire, the gas tractor, the automobile — and one that is easily overlooked: time standardization.

Railroads were the driving force in the U.S. (and Canada), establishing standard time zones in 1883 to ensure trains remained on schedule. On March 19, 1918, the "Standard Time Act" became U.S. law, which created daylight saving time as well as the nation's four time zones.

However, national daylight saving time was repealed the following year. Whether to participate in any sort of "daylight saving" returned to a local level for the next 20-plus years, until World War II. The U.S. government reinstated national daylight saving time, during certain months, from Feb. 9, 1942, to Sept. 30, 1945. Following WWII, once again the nation decided on a local level whether to conserve daylight.

More than two decades past until, under President Lyndon B. Johnson, daylight saving time become a national standard again. In 1966, the Uniform Time Act was passed, which established daylight saving time (with local exemptions) from the last Sunday in April to the last Sunday in October, with the change occurring at 2 a.m. local time.

During the energy crisis in the mid-1970s, Congress enacted earlier starts to daylight saving: Jan. 6 in '74 and Feb. 23 in '75. 1976 saw the return to the last Sunday in April.

Ten years later, in 1986, the starting date was moved to April's first Sunday, effective the following year.

Through all the changes to the start day, the end of daylight saving remained rather constant. That is until October 2005: Enter the Energy Policy Act. The act changed the start to the second Sunday in March and the end to the first Sunday in November, beginning in 2007.

So now, as a nation, we spend 34 weeks — 65 percent of the year — saving daylight. Check out U.S. Code, Title 15, Chapter 6, Subchapter IX for the specifics. (And remember to "fall back" Nov. 1, 2009!)

Red sky at night is the shepherd’s delight;

red sky in the morning is the shepherd’s warning.

Variations of this weather lore abound, involving both shepherds and sailors or a combination of the two, and even appear in the Bible and Shakespeare:

[Jesus] answered and said unto them, When it is evening, ye say,

It will be fair weather: for the sky is red.

And in the morning, It will be foul weather: for the sky is red.

—Matthew 16:2-3 (authorized 1903 translation)  

Like a red morn that ever yet betoken’d,

Wreck to the seaman, tempest to the field,

Sorrow to shepherds, woe unto the birds,

Gusts and foul flaws to herdmen and to herds.

—William Shakespeare’s “Venus and Adonis,” lines 453-456 (1593)  

Yet all heed the same – a red sky at night foretells calm weather the following day, whereas a red sky in the morning warns of storms.

Originating most likely in England sometime before the 14th century, the phrase incorporates the path of weather systems and the sun.

Weather fronts typically travel west to east across England (and the U.S., for that matter), in opposition to the rise and fall of the sun.

As the sun sets in a clear westerly sky, its light reflects off the clouds to the east – clouds that have already passed over the region. When the sun rises in a clear easterly sky, its light reflects off the clouds to the west – clouds that have yet to affect the region.

The “red sky” comes from the sunlight’s refraction through the atmosphere before reaching the clouds on the opposing horizon. The shorter wavelengths of the visible light spectrum (the blues and violets) are diverted, leaving the longer wavelengths (the reds and oranges) to reflect off the clouds.

Wavelengths aside, the phrase merely suggests you’ll experience clear weather when clouds have already passed and none appear to be incoming, and the opposite when clouds are fresh on the horizon.

In the mid-1920s, a curious conversion kit became available. 

From what I could find, Snow-Motors Inc., based out of Detroit, Mich., offered a kit that replaced the wheels and axles to a number of conveyances with “two revolving cylinders instead of wheels — something on the order of a steam roller,” as Time reported in January 1926.

The snow motor conversion enabled someone to travel from 6 to 8 mph across snow and ice with ease. “The machine has already proved its usefulness in deep snow previously unnavigable,” Time continued. “One such machine has done the work which formerly required three teams.”

In the promotional film below, courtesy of YouTuber LETHLSS, the Snow-Motors kit is demonstrated with a Fordson tractor and a Chevrolet automobile. Thanks to Bob Kuhns, of Arlington, Kan., who brought this intriguing contraption to our attention. He came across the video posted on the TreasureNet forum; that version of the film suggests it resides in the “Archives of Michigan.”

Watch the film on TreasureNet.com: “Fordson snow-motor.”

Read Time’s 1926 account of Snow-Motors Inc.: “Business & Finance: Snow Motors.”