Between the winter and spring terms of my senior year, I applied for the principalship of the high school at Manning, Iowa. For six weeks the board was in a deadlock and then it elected the other applicant. It was a bitter disappointment, as such positions were not numerous and most of them were then filled. I planned to teach two years and then pursue the study of law. About two weeks before commencement, I was offered the principalship of a two-room school just outside the corporate limits of the city of Des Moines. But I saw, however, that I could immediately take up the law, and so about July 1, 1886, I entered the law office of C. C. Nourse and in the next fourteen months I read the junior year of the law course laid down by the State University. In the fall I took charge of my school, but I read law nights, mornings and Saturdays. I was fortunate in securing board at a very reasonable price. By close economy I paid all my debts and had about one hundred and fifty dollars left when the fall of 1887 came. I then entered the State University of Iowa, passed the examinations of the junior year, became a member of the senior class, and graduated in June, 1888.
Such in brief is the story of my struggle for an education. I have written it with the hope that it may encourage other young men and young women of limited means to make the effort that I made to open the gates of opportunity. While the expenses have increased, the opportunities for employment have multiplied in a much greater ratio, and I am fully convinced that any young man or young woman, with fair health, may secure a higher education if he has it in him and is but willing to pay the price of toil and sacrifice.
Some may inquire, Did it pay? Within one hundred feet of where I performed janitor work, Drake University in 1900 conferred upon me the LL.D. degree; three times have I been elected to the State Senate. The State Bar Association has honored me with its presidency.
REV. W. W. STALEY, A.B., A.M., D.D., LL.D., EX-PRESIDENT OF ELON COLLEGE
I have been asked to tell _why_ and _how_ I worked my way through college. Because there was no other way to get through college, but to work through, gives the reason _why_.