Part 35

The “relief” which is poured out indiscriminately simply serves to check their efforts at self-support, and to turn all their energies to the pursuit of more “relief.” It is not that they are different from other people; no human being will put forth greater exertion to sustain himself in the way he likes than is required for that purpose. No man will devote more time or more labor than is necessary to maintain himself and his family at his own standard. If his standard is so low that what comes to him in “relief” is enough for him, why should he spend time and strength in getting more? But if his standard is so low, then the help he needs is that which will raise his standard, but not his standard of physical life only; far more important is it to raise his moral standard,—to raise his character, so that degrading surroundings cannot be endured, so that they cannot exist.

By the different kinds of “help” offered to those in want, they may be trampled down into the mire and left, body and soul degraded, a curse to themselves and others, or they may be lifted into the healthy, self-respecting life of the men and women who do the work of the world, of the mass of the people, who lead hard lives of struggle and self-sacrifice, but whose intellects are strengthened, whose characters are strengthened, whose souls are strengthened, by the daily and hourly trials they meet and overcome.

The account of the way in which American women have dealt with these suffering people, those upon whom most of the experiments of the benevolent are tried, is not, as I have already said, entirely discouraging. In all their dealings with them, they always seem to have had a latent consciousness at least that they had minds and souls, and not bodies only. I think women have seldom been responsible for the “charities” which were satisfied to give one meal to a hungry fellow-being and then turn from him with no further sense of responsibility for any subsequent meal. They have usually sought to enter into some sort of human relation with those they tried to help, to make material relief the vehicle for moral and spiritual relief, and even when the material relief was actually doing far more harm in undermining character and self-dependence than could be counteracted by all the teaching given, still this sad fact was not recognized, or at least not realized, and the intention was far better than the performance.

Within the past ten or fifteen years, all over the country, an awakening of conscience in regard to these subjects has been taking place, and in almost all the larger cities and in many of the towns of our country there are already formed associations whose object it is to cure and prevent pauperism. This movement is in this country due in a great degree to women, and in all the sixty or seventy societies which now exist men and women work together, and in many of them women take the lead. The “old charity” sought mainly to relieve physical suffering by physical relief; the “new charity” seeks to relieve physical suffering by raising the character of the sufferer and by discovering the underlying causes of the suffering both in himself and in his surroundings.

IV. The fourth class whom we can serve are the people who are generally thought to need no “charity” at all, and who indeed get but little of it, either by word or deed—the wage-earners of the world—those who dig and hammer, who sew and scrub, who toil and sweat, to feed and clothe themselves and all the world besides.

Fortunately, there has, within the past few years, grown up a strong conviction among those who seek to serve their kind, that to help these men and women, to strengthen them, to teach them, is the real means of lifting the race, and hence have been developed (especially by women, and for women and children) many plans for making their lives not only easier, but richer and nobler, and more what a human life should be.

In all such plans education is involved, and there are many inspiring instances of really great changes wrought by women in the system of education in our large cities, whose influence for good will never cease. The introduction of kindergarten teaching for little children, which many of those who study the dark problems of pauperism and crime believe will do more to destroy the misery of mankind than any other one educational agency, was due to Miss Elizabeth Peabody, herself a teacher in her youth, who in her middle age was filled with enthusiasm by the beautiful new teaching, and has lived to see it, in her old age, incorporated, mainly by the exertions of women, into the public school system of many of our large cities, where the need of the reform was greatest.

In St. Louis, the first city to adopt the kindergarten, it was a woman who proposed it. In Boston, one woman herself established and maintained for nearly ten years thirty-one kindergartens, and finally, having by this long experience proved their value, persuaded the Board of Education to accept them as part of the public school system.

In Philadelphia, another woman, inspired by the good she saw accomplished in Boston by the kindergartens established by her friend, in 1879 opened one in that city, and gradually, following her example and under her leadership, others were opened; and in 1881 the Sub-Primary School Society was incorporated for the purpose of establishing and maintaining kindergartens in Philadelphia, and continued its work until in December, 1886, this was consummated, when it presented to the Board of Education thirty-two kindergartens, to be in future carried on as part of the school system.

In California, the Golden Gate Association has founded, by the help of a few rich people who have given money, and of many devoted women who have watched over the enterprise and given time and thought to its success, a large number of free kindergartens, and the same is true of many other cities in the country.

In other ways, also, the public schools have been benefited by the volunteer work of women, not only as members of School Boards, which position they have accepted in Boston, New York, and Philadelphia, but especially in leading the way in demonstrating the possibilities and value of industrial education.

In New York, the Industrial Education Association was founded by men and women for the purpose of bringing this most important subject before the public, and of training teachers for all branches of manual education.

Industrial schools have been established and carried on by women in many different localities,[192] and all over the country church societies conduct sewing classes, and classes in domestic training for girls. In many of our cities, women have established vacation schools to save the children from the demoralization of the long summer idleness, and have, in some places, obtained the use of the public school buildings for this purpose. In Boston “The Emergency and Hygiene Association” (composed of men and women) has a “Committee on Playgrounds,” which, in the summer vacation of 1888, opened seven of the public school yards as play grounds for children, and three more as “sand-gardens.” In each a matron was present to oversee the games of the children, and in the playgrounds they were supplied with “sand-heaps and shovels, balls, tops, skipping ropes, sand bags, building blocks, flags to march under, and transparent slates to draw on,” while in the “sand-gardens” there was only the pleasure of digging in sand heaps. Thus for three hours a day, on four fair days of each week during the vacation, hundreds of children spent happy and healthful hours.

The “fresh air work,” the “country week,” the excursions of every kind, are chiefly carried on by the devotion of women, and all will undoubtedly accomplish a greater good than the temporary benefit to the health and spirits of city children, by implanting a love for country life in many of the little visitors, which may prove in the future an influence to counteract the strange taste which now leads so many people to prefer a crowded tenement to a farm-house and makes them “feel lonesome” within a stone’s throw of a dozen neighbors.

Nor have women, although devoting so much of their time to the training of children, neglected those past the age of schooling, those who have grown up without privilege or advantage, especially the young girls who have to work for their living and struggle with untrained hands and brains to support themselves and perhaps many others dependent on them. In almost all our cities women have formed associations especially to help self-supporting young women and girls, and the aim of all is to give happiness and added pleasure, besides the opportunity of development in every direction. The Women’s Christian Associations,[193] of which there are more than fifty in the country, open rooms for evening entertainment and study, give instruction in intellectual and manual branches, find situations for those who need them, help working girls in every way, and many are the women who have leisure and education who devote both to efforts to help and succor women who have neither. Most of these associations have Homes for working women, where the inmates are guarded and watched over with kindly care. In other cities the Young Women’s Christian Association have no Homes of their own, but select safe boarding places for young women, and direct them to them, and keep boarding registers.

One of the women who knows most of the condition of working women in our cities, says of the “Homes:” “The few hundreds sheltered are in most cases really friendless and deserving women to whom the chief boon is not the cheap board, but the respectable surroundings, which could not be had at all in ordinary lodgings.... The safeguards thrown about women in these Homes are most desirable.... My objections to them are that they are not radical enough in their reforms, and really bar the truly needy factory girl of the slums; and that by furnishing so many comforts and privileges at low rates they create false expectations and standards. Were the advantages made dependent on co-operative management, were the inmates themselves responsible for the adornment and conduct of the Homes, suffering for extravagance and bad judgment, profiting by foresight and experience, valuable educational training would be secured, and a far more home-like interest.”

The Boston Young Women’s Christian Association (founded in 1866) in its twenty-third annual report, after describing the employment department, gymnasium, library, entertainments, the travelers’ aid, the industrial training department, the evening classes for intellectual work, says:

“Another important work, which has been carried on for some years, is the training of girls for domestic service.... They remain three months.... They are instructed in the best possible way, practically, by doing all varieties of domestic work. As this educational work progressed, there opened out another need, and this was an opportunity for preparation on the part of women of intelligence and education, by which they could fit themselves for positions as matrons, housekeepers, teachers of domestic economy, etc. For this end a normal class has been organized, and they are now pursuing a course of instruction.”

The New York Young Women’s Christian Association, founded in 1872, offers to self-supporting women the following privileges:

I. The Bible class.

II. Free concerts, lectures, readings, etc.

III. Free classes for instruction in writing, commercial arithmetic, book-keeping, business training, phonography, type-writing, retouching photo-negatives, photo-color, mechanical and free-hand drawing, clay modeling, applied design, choir music, and physical culture.

IV. Free circulating library, reference library, and reading-rooms.

V. Employment bureau.

VI. Needlework department, salesroom, order department, free classes in machine and hand-sewing, classes in cutting and fitting.

VII. Free board directory.

In the year 1883 was incorporated the Baltimore Young Women’s Christian Association, “having in view the improvement of the condition of the working women of Baltimore by providing for them a reading-room, and such other departments as may be found necessary.”

I quote from a description, lately written, some account of the work of this association:

“The educating influences of the Young Women’s Christian Association has been chiefly social and practical.... Classes in reading, writing, book-keeping, and singing were early instituted.... English literature has been taught in simple and effective ways by reading aloud from good authors to appreciative groups of young women, and also by introducing the co-operative method of reading, one girl taking one book by a given author, another girl another, and all reporting on their individual readings to the assembled class....

“Another excellent branch of committee work is to see that girls who come to the lunch-rooms have proper boarding places. Ladies visit girls in their lodgings. A female physician has lent her services in caring for the sick, and has made herself very useful by keeping a careful watch upon the sanitary condition of shops where girls are employed....”

Several of the Women’s Christian Associations have under their care other branches of charitable work than those above enumerated, and as a rule their benefits seem to be confined more or less strictly to Protestants. There are other organizations for the befriending of young women and girls (helping hands, girls’ friendly societies, church societies in great numbers, etc., etc.) which have the same limitation, but there are still others intended to receive all who will join them.

The “Women’s Educational and Industrial Unions,” existing in thirteen cities of the United States, have for their objects “increasing fellowship among women, in order to promote the best practical methods for securing their educational, industrial, and social advancement.”[194]

The following are extracts from a circular issued by the original Union, founded in Boston, in 1877:

This institution may be regarded as a social centre, a place of welcome. Any woman, resident or stranger, by coming to the Union will find herself among friends. Its placards in railway stations often bring to us strangers from various parts of the country and from abroad. It invites all women to its reading-room and parlors. It provides lectures, classes, and entertainments. Some of the classes are industrial. It has “Mother’s Meetings” and “Talks with Young Girls” from women with high reputation. It affords opportunities for interchange of thought upon the vital questions of the day. It receives and preserves reports of women’s associations both near and distant. It is a centre of local information. It gathers in the best ideas and suggestions, and weaves them into plans for the benefit of humanity. It befriends the friendless. It is a tower of strength for the helpless. It secures dues unjustly withheld from working women. It investigates fraudulent advertisements, and publicly warns women against them. So far as practicable, it secures situations for the unemployed. In its salesrooms are found the products of women’s industries.... Wise thinkers have the opinion that for removing the ills of humanity primary work is better than after work. The methods of the latter are charities, reformatory crusades, and penal enactments. The evils contended with,—pauperism, drunkenness, vice, crime,—are simply inward conditions becoming apparent in conduct. These conditions are ignorance, selfishness, undeveloped faculties, false rating of values, lack of self-respect and of self-restraint. The effective work is to change such conditions by a kind of education that shall develop the highest and best, thus enabling the individual to stand upright of himself, instead of being held in position by charities, reforms, or penalties.

In New York, in 1879, was founded a Girls’ Club, which consisted of the founder, a woman of education and wealth, and ten or twelve factory and shop girls, who met in an upper room in a Tenth Avenue tenement house. During the past ten years, that club has increased to a membership of several hundred, and twenty-two kindred clubs have been formed in New York, eleven in Brooklyn, and eight in Boston and in other cities. These clubs are mainly self-supporting, and their work is the education and elevation of the members in every possible direction—physical, industrial, mental, and moral. They supply a common ground of meeting for young women who have had the privileges of education, money and leisure, with those who have had the privileges of self-denying, hard-working lives, and the benefits are mutual.[195]

Women have, in various cities, opened restaurants where good food is provided at moderate prices, for the purpose not only of saving money to those who patronize them, but to give decent and attractive surroundings and a freedom from temptation to drink. In some of these restaurants are rooms where working-girls may eat lunch which they bring from their own homes, and in some the decent toilet provision is spoken of as a great boon to these girls, who work in shops and factories where every requirement of decency is neglected or violated in that particular.

In New York City a small band of educated women have jointly hired a tenement house in the very worst district of the city, politically and morally, and there they intend to live, for the purpose of doing what they can to elevate the tone of the neighborhood. Most of them have their daily avocations, but in the evenings they will give their time to such efforts as they find best suited to attain their end.[196] Some of them have already taken part in the work of the “Neighborhood Guild,” the spirit of which is thus described in its last published circular:

We do not look upon our work as done by one class of society for another class of society; not as up-town residents, nor from the height of proud superiority to our fellow-men in any regard do we go down to labor in the tenement-house district. All sorts and conditions of men are brought into contact in the Neighborhood Guild. All both give and receive; all are both teachers and taught; and the lesson for all is the brotherhood of man. The Guild is not connected with any church or society, whatsoever. But persons of various beliefs are connected with the Guild, and the sense of the brotherhood of all men is their bond of union. The work of the Guild, except in the kindergarten, is done by faithful volunteers, several of whom have resided for many months in the tenement-house district. The spirit of the Guild is against unnecessary absenteeism in good works. It would bring all sorts of men together close enough to feel one another’s heart-throbs. It believes in a communism of mental and spiritual possessions.

A somewhat similar society, established both by men and women, in Philadelphia, gives the following account of itself:

The object of this unsectarian association is to establish, in localities most needing them, and chiefly for the benefit of workingmen and their families, convenient centers for social intercourse, amusement, reading, study, restaurant accommodation, etc., without the accompaniment of any demoralizing features.

Our first experiment was to open, on Saturday evenings, the hall on the corner of Twenty-third and Hamilton streets, which seats nearly three hundred people. This was furnished with tables for refreshments, and here we gave a series of light entertainments, sometimes for five cents, sometimes ten cents admission. The next step was to open the house at 2134 Vine street, and start a neighborhood society under the title of Family Guild, No. 1. In order to secure to the house at the start the character desired, we admitted to its privileges, under proper conditions, men, women, and children, and instead of separating families, offered special inducements to father, mother, and children to come together.

The advantages of membership are a library, reading-room (with magazines, weekly and daily papers), rooms for games, music classes, accommodations for business and social meetings, etc. The price is one dollar a year for adults, fifty cents for those under seventeen, while a family ticket including father, mother, and all children under seventeen, is one dollar and fifty cents. Class instruction is extra, five and ten cents a lesson, except the manual training, which is free, and the dancing, which is fifteen cents.

The most popular classes last year were cooking, singing, and dressmaking. The cooking class numbered sixteen, dressmaking ten, singing thirty. The number of members enrolled last winter was one hundred and fifty. This does not include all attending classes, some of whom were not members of the Guild.

The experiment of associating the sexes both in study and recreation has proved a success. The class in manual training, which now numbers forty, is composed about equally of young men and women, and the teachers say it is much easier with such a class to keep order and to secure attention to work.

Besides the regular social evenings devoted to plays, singing, dancing, etc., it is not unusual for the members of the evening classes which close at nine to adjourn to the play-room and take a little time for amusement. The managers have naturally kept an anxious watch over these occasions and have found nothing to complain of in the conduct of the young people....

There will be certain hours of each afternoon devoted to the children of the neighborhood, with the object of teaching them quieter and less brutal ways of playing than they learn on the streets. We also hope to establish a day nursery, which shall obviate the dreadful necessity among working women of locking their children alone in a room for the day....

In Illinois, women have organized associations for the protection of women and children which seem to be more far-reaching than any such in other States.

The second article of “The Protective Agency for Women and Children of Chicago” reads as follows:

Its objects are to secure protection from all offenses and crimes against the purity and virtue of women and children; protection against any injustice to women or children of a financial character, such as withholding of wages, exacting of exorbitant interest, violation of contract, or fraudulent advertisements of any kind; enforcement of existing laws, and efforts toward the enactment of better ones, for the protection of women and children against wrongs and abuses, of whatever nature; the extension of a wholesome moral support to women and children who have been wronged, discriminating wisely between misfortune and guilt.

For three years the agency has fulfilled its objects and has carried out the wish expressed in its first annual report in the following words: “Justice is better than charity, and we wish to be a terror to evil-doers as well as a good Samaritan to the unfortunate.”