To: AV Press
Date: 06/2002
Re: Value of Education
Comment: Sometimes you see odd things springing from the limited knowledge of newspaper 'reporters' and this relates to one of them....
Kym Roley's letter commenting on the AV Press article which reported that a young man wouldn't "move on to college right after high school" but instead would be going to the prestigious U.S. Military Academy at West Point reminded me of a story told by a graduate of Annapolis (Navy's version of West Point).
Seems the Annapolis grad bought a farm in New England after retirement and, drawing on the engineering training he had received, installed a very elaborate irrigation system replete with an impressive manifold valve control center. His neighbor, a taciturn New Englander, viewed the result and asked the man where he learned to do such work. "At the Naval Academy" the man replied proudly. "Think I might send my boy there" the New Englander opined. "We've need of good plumbers hereabouts."