He also told the story of some Massachusetts commissioners who invited the Indians to send a dozen of their youth to study free at Harvard. The Indians replied that they had sent some of their young braves to study there years earlier, but on their return “they were absolutely good for nothing, being neither acquainted with the true methods for killing deer, catching beaver, or surprising an enemy.” They offered instead to educate a dozen or so white children in the ways of the Indian “and make men of them.”
So writes Walter Isaacson on page 153 of the book Benjamin Franklin: An American Life.
(Thanks to investigator Klaus West for bringing this to our attention.)
Posted by Stephen Drew on
Saturday, December 1st, 2007 at 12:01 am
under Arts and science.
