TOWN IMPROVEMENT
I--OUR LOCAL CONDITIONS
1. _The Value of Public Sentiment and Cooperation_--Rise in values as a town improves; what an enthusiast can accomplish.
2. _Our Water-Supply_--Detailed description: water-system, wells, cisterns, etc.; quality of the supply; limitations, dangers, and possibility of improvement.
3. _Our Sanitation_--Detailed description: cesspools; garbage; disposal of sewage.
4. _Our Yards, Our Streets, Our Parks, Our Public Buildings_--Tree-planting; fences; city fountains.
BOOKS TO CONSULT--Patrick Geddes: City Development. C. M. Robinson: The Improvement of Towns and Cities. W. P. Mason: Water Supply (from the Sanitary Standpoint). Shade Trees: Their Care and Preservation (N. Y.
State Cornell Agricultural Experiment Station Bulletin 256).
The town water-supply has immense interest; study its relation to the disposal of sewage; the ice-supply, the use of filters, bottled water, and the like. Cleaning up and beautifying the back yards of a town, planting vines, removing unsightly buildings, making gardens and having window-boxes may be expanded into more than one paper. The village common, the drinking-fountains, the band-stand, the use of refuse-boxes in public places, may be discussed.
II--THE WORKING-PEOPLE"S HOMES
1. _Existing Conditions_--The various subjects of air, light, water-supply, sanitation and adequate fire-escapes may be brought up for careful consideration.
2. _The Model Tenement_--Plans, profit to the owner of tenement property, management, rules for tenants (cleanliness, promptness of payment), beautification of tenements (window-boxes, roof-gardens), playgrounds.
3. _Model Cottage Homes_--Possibility of acquiring ownership (building-and-loan a.s.sociations, thrift clubs). Improving laboring-men"s homes in villages. Yards for children.
4. _The Garden Cities of England_--Compare the Sage Foundation proposals in America. Model towns (Pullman in this country, Essen in Germany, etc.).
BOOKS TO CONSULT--Gould: Housing of the Working People (U. S. Labor Dept.). Manning: Villages for Working Men and Working-Men"s Homes. R. W.
DeForest and others: The Tenement-House Problem. F. C. Moore: How To Build a Home.
Discuss the subject of the model towns. How satisfactory do the tenants find the system of leases and regulations? Show pictures of the Garden Cities of England and the model tenements of Berlin. Take up the merits of building-and-loan a.s.sociations and buying homes on the instalment plan. Shall we employ an architect for the small home, or are published plans practical?
III--FACTORIES AND WORKSHOPS
1. _The Industrial Age_--The introduction of labor-saving machinery in England in the eighteenth century. Enormous development in the present day. General effect on the laboring cla.s.s.
2. _The Factory System and Human Life_--Overcrowding, and lack of air and light. Unprotected machinery. Danger of fire. Inadequate fire-escapes and exits. Bad sanitation. The sweat-shop. Monotony of tasks and overlong hours of work. The labor of women. Child labor.
3. _Model Conditions in Factory Life_--The building: air, light, sanitation, s.p.a.ce, protection. The eight-hour day: a living wage.
Insurance against accident, old age, and death. The lunch-room. The factory doctor.
4. _Local Ideals_--Conferences with employees. The cultivation of social sentiment in the employing cla.s.s. Beautifying the factory grounds.
a.s.sociations among employees: recreation, social, mutual benefit.
Holidays and Sundays. The children in factory homes.
BOOKS TO CONSULT--Clarke: Effects of the Factory System. Spahr: America"s Working People. Wright: The Factory System as an Element in Social Life.
At this meeting there should be a presentation of the fine conditions existing in certain great manufactories and publishing-plants where the employers and the employed are working for the same high ends; pictures may be shown of gardens, recreation-grounds, lunch-rooms and the like; abundant material may be found in various magazine articles. The question of old-age pensions should be discussed. A practical outcome of this meeting may be the appointing of a permanent committee to better local conditions.
IV--PUBLIC SCHOOLS
1. _The Place of the Public School in American Life_--Beginning of the public school in colonial days. Relation of the school to citizenship.
National sentiment. The flag and the school. The public school and the foreign child.
2. _The Modern Curriculum_--Multiplication of subjects (manual training, cooking, sewing, music, etc.). A discussion of the merits of the system: thoroughness versus variety.
3. _The Ideal Public School_--The model director. Women on school boards. The perfect school-house; light, air, sanitation, room.
Beautifying the school within and without; pictures, casts, flowers, etc. The school doctor; contagious diseases, oversight of eyes, ears, throat, and teeth. Social service of the school: night-schools, lectures, recreations.
4. _Parent and Teacher_--Mutual acquaintance. Conferences. Literary clubs. Is the public exhibition desirable?
5. _School Sentiment_--Interscholastic athletics and debates. The alumni a.s.sociation. The commencement exercises and annual banquet. The return of distinguished graduates.
BOOKS TO CONSULT--Dewey: The School and Society. Butler: The Meaning of Education. The International Educational Series. Reports of the United States Commissioner of Education.
A discussion may be planned on home work: How much shall be expected and arranged for by the parent? When is it best done? Emphasize the importance of having the parent closely in touch with the child"s work, familiar with his reports, and constantly in conference with the teacher. Notice the importance of the work of the truant officer. If there is no gymnasium provided by the school, can the parents combine and make one? In a large city, can there be a roof-garden for recreation?
V--AMUs.e.m.e.nTS OF THE TOWN
1. _Necessity of Recreation_--Change in our point of view: the old ideas contrasted with the new. Read from the chapter on Recreation in Adeney"s A Century"s Progress in Religious Life and Thought. Recreation and morals. Subst.i.tutes for the social life of the corner grocery and the saloon.
2. _Planning Recreations_--Organizing a local committee. The grange, the lyceum, the town band or orchestra, motion pictures.
Discuss the disadvantage of unregulated amus.e.m.e.nts, and their improvement through intelligent control.
3. _The Regular Program_--Ill.u.s.trated lectures, concerts, village-improvement meetings, athletic meets for men, the women"s club.
4. _Occasional Amus.e.m.e.nts_--Loan exhibitions of pictures, antiques, etc., organ recitals, flower fetes, amateur theatricals, excursions, neighborhood dances.
5. _Ideals in Recreation_--The ideal of democratic sociability. The ideal of culture. The ideal of healthful interest for young people. The ideal of clean amus.e.m.e.nt.
BOOKS TO CONSULT--Luther H. Gulick: Popular Recreation and Public Morality (Sage Foundation). Hartt: The People at Play. W. S. Jevons: Amus.e.m.e.nts of the People.
This is one of the most important programs of the year, and deserves special preparation and study.
The modern tendency is to plan everywhere for clean, wholesome amus.e.m.e.nts for old and young, and the woman"s club can cooperate with the mayor, school trustees, and intelligent men and women, to carry out their plans.
Discuss especially what has been done to provide a subst.i.tute for the attractions of the saloon; the dangers and the value of the moving-picture show, and how far there may be a public sentiment created for the regulation of these and other amus.e.m.e.nts.
VI--THE TOWN CHILDREN
1. _Town versus Country for Children_--Discussion of the advantages and the disadvantages of each. How to make the most of town life for children.