Manual Training is a term used extensively by educators in defining a part of a system of general education. One would infer from the term "manual," meaning hand, that this branch of education is the training of the hand, but it is more than this. Not all that is done with the hand is manual training in the school sense of the term. In laboratory work in physics and chemistry the hand is trained to use apparatus in a skillful way, but this is not considered as manual training. Manual training is a general term which signifies the expressing of ideas in things by means of tools in working with such materials as paper, cardboard, clay, wood, iron, brass, copper, tin, etc. Manual training does not include work with apparatus, neither is its purpose to teach a trade.

Man is by nature a "tool-using animal" and has been so from remote periods of antiquity. Let us stop to consider briefly how much of the history of mankind is written in the tools that have come down to us. We look at the pens made of reeds which were used by the ancient Egyptians and a series of facts are revealed by means of those tools which were used by man more than four thousand years ago. Axes made of stone, copper, bronze, etc., are dug out of the earth, and each tells a different story of the life of savage peoples of antiquity. The story of man's development is written in his tools just as plainly as the history of our earth is written in the rocks.

It is almost impossible to conceive of man without tools, yet in the beginning of human existence he had no tools. He was naked and without food and fire, living in caves and hollow trees, searching for fallen nuts under the trees and for fish and game in the streams and mountains. He was ever hiding from stronger animals and always seeking an opportunity to attack weaker ones.

Some one has wisely said that human culture began with fire, but no one has said when fire was first used by man. Doubtless some rude tools were invented before fire was discovered, and these tools probably led to the discovery of fire. With fire came protection and comfort. It drove away the fierce animals, which were afraid of fire; it protected man from cold. The weaker members of the family were left by the fireside while the stronger ones went out in search of food.

But man needed more than fire for his protection, for he was one of the weakest of animals. In expressing the weakness of man in this early period, Katharine Elizabeth Doppl says: "He could not run as fast as the horse, swim as well as the fish, fly as the eagle, crawl as the serpent, or render himself inconspicuous by changing his color to correspond with the natural objects with which he habitually came in contact, or by maintaining such a control of his muscles as the wild calf and other animals do when they remain motionless in order to be unobserved. He was not protected with armor as the turtle is, with a thick skin as the rhinoceros, with a heavy coat as the mammoth, or with feathers and fur as the birds and beasts of prey. In his conflicts he could not strike as the cave bear, kick as the horse, crush as the rhinoceros, gore as the urus, or pierce and rend as the tiger. In the exercise of his senses and in muscular force he was surpassed by many of them." What man needed most in his weak condition was tools, and being endowed with intelligence he was able to construct them, although very crude ones, out of the materials at his command. At first his hands and teeth were substitutes for tools. His first constructed tool was the hammer. This he may have used in opening the shells of oysters, nuts, etc. In combat he fought at close range and therefore his blows were weak. Later he found that by using a club as a hammer he could strike a harder blow and thus slay even much stronger animals than himself. Still later it became necessary for man to fight at long range, and out of this necessity grew the need of, and therefore the invention of, the bow and arrow - tools of great utility among primitive people.

1 "The Place of Industries in Elementary Education," p. 19. The University of Chicago Press.

The development of the bow and arrow was a great step in man's advancement, for at long range he could kill large animals, which furnished materials for food and clothing. In making and operating the bow and arrow man developed physically and mentally. Many problems came up in the construction and use of these tools, the solution of which demanded the activity of reason. In making the bow there was the kind of wood to be considered, when it should be cut, the seasoning of the timber, the shape and length of the bow. In making the string for the bow and in making the arrows other problems arose, all of which were carefully worked out in the course of time.

Among some of the Indian tribes of to-day certain rules regarding the bow and arrow which were worked out centuries ago are still in use. Of course, a boy could not use a bow that was made for a man, and two men differing in physical strength could not well use the same bow; so a difference in the size and strength of the individual led to modifications of these tools so that they could meet the requirements of each individual. Each individual made his own bow and arrow, and in making them certain units of measurement were and are still employed. The Indian hunter in making his bow does not use a standard length; the bow must be exactly eight times the span from the thumb to the little finger of the hunter using it, and the length of the arrow must be exactly the distance from the armpit to the end of the thumb, measuring on the inside of the extended arm. Similar methods were employed in the making of all tools. In writing of the bow and arrow, Thomas Wilson1 says: "The bow and arrow was the greatest of all human inventions - greatest in that it marked man's first step in mechanics, greatest in adaptation of means to the end, and as an invented machine it manifested in the most practical and marked manner the intellectual and reasoning power of man, and his superiority over the brute creation. It, more than any other weapon, demonstrates the triumph of man over the brute, recognizing the limitations of human physical capacity in contests with his enemies and the capture of his game." His necessity demanded the bow and arrow, and this led to its construction and use. As man increased his variety of tools, he was gradually lifted to a higher plane of civilization.

1 Smithsonian Report, 1894, p. 980.