Smile For Today ~


In keeping with his ideas on the dignity of labour, John Ruskin encouraged his Oxford students to try their hand at manual work.  He hit on a scheme of building a road from the village of North Hinksey to Oxford to provide the villagers with a direct route.  Among the undergraduates he recruited was Oscar Wilde.  The charms of manual labor wore off after a while and the road was never completed.  The line of the road was still visible in the mid-1960s.  Perhaps even remnants today!


Source:  THE LITTLE, BROWN BOOK OF Anecdotes, 1985, Clifton Fadiman,
~ J. Ruskin (1819 - 1900) British critic & social reformer.  Professor of Fine Arts at Oxford.