XVIIHEALTH AND RECREATION
The great majority of men and women, and even many children, have to work for a living. To keep healthy they need time and opportunity for wholesome recreation.
Recreation is as much a necessary part of normal life as food or drink; a fact that has been partially lost sight of in this economic age, but throughout the world’s history there have been frequent examples of governments which made careful provision to supply necessary amusements for their citizens. In Greece great stadiums were erected for games and contests; in medieval times the knights held tournaments, even the churches celebrated their saints’ days with gay street processions.
The need for recreation is particularly great to-day because the congestion of population of our cities has left few open spacesfor leisure time, and crowded living and small, dark rooms where all the work of the household must be done, preclude any social life in the homes of many families. Many young girls who crave companionship and social intercourse with friends have to go outside their homes to find it.
Crowded tenements without light or air, dirty streets with no provision for wholesome recreation, are proofs of poor government and inefficient democracy, no matter how prosperous and contented a city may look in its richer quarters.
People who are obliged to live in the crowded districts have a lowered vitality and a lessened value to the world; and the same natural impulses which, rightly directed, lead to an orderly, useful, contented life, may be the causes of delinquency if stunted or misdirected. The slum is an economic crime, condoned by a public which pays the penalty in contamination and contagion thrust back upon itself.
Housing: Air and sunshine are the first requisites of healthy life. The government recognizes a certain responsibility in insuring these necessities, and prescribes by law regulations for the construction and inspection of living accommodations. Many familiescannot choose their homes, but are obliged to live in the kind of buildings that are to be found near their work. Inside rooms without windows, rooms into which a ray of sunshine has never penetrated, are common in every city in the State. The law prohibits, in cities of the first class, the building of new tenements with inside rooms without windows, but many old ones are in existence, and two-family houses may still be built with inside rooms. In other cities there are practically no restrictions, except by occasional ineffectual city ordinances. Sanitary arrangements, and the water-supply in many tenement-houses, are insufficient for health or even decency.
Tenement-house inspection is a part of city government in which women are particularly fitted to serve. In New York City, there are 103,688 tenement-houses and 193 inspectors. Only eight of these are women.
The war has greatly intensified the housing problem. With the tremendous increase in certain industries which has brought thousands of people to work in new factories, there is a corresponding demand for living accommodations near their work. These factories may not be permanent, and so private capital hesitates to build houses near them.The result is a terrible crowding of people in unsanitary and unfit buildings. The consequences of such overcrowding is seen in the increase of child delinquency, immorality and disease, an increased death-rate, and the inevitable unrest from such unhappiness which results in strikes and labor troubles.
Recreation: The modern city so far has made little provision for the natural irresistible desire of youth for play.
This is all the more dangerous because young men and women are being drawn in great numbers from the protection of the home, for work in factories and shops. They have a freedom from restraint such as they have never had before. They have money which they have earned; they are eager for amusement. When they come to the end of a day of exhausting work their love of pleasure will not be denied. If they are not given the right kind of amusement, they will take the wrong kind.
Instead of recognizing this natural instinct for play, and providing safe channels for its expression, all provisions for recreation are usually left to commercial interests, to be used for their own gain, without supervision or control. Vice is often deliberately disguised as pleasure, and the most normal andhealthy impulses of young men and women, that, properly directed, lead to happy married life, are frequently used as a means to their downfall.
Loneliness also plays a part. Many a young man or girl comes to the city to find work. Where can they find the social intercourse and companionship necessary to normal life? The homeless boy often stands around the edge of the dance-hall, vainly hoping to make the acquaintance of some “nice girl.” The lonely girl, living in a cheerless hall bedroom, turns to the dance-hall as a place to find companionship. Proper provision for public recreation, well supervised, would help to bring this boy and girl together in decent, wholesome surroundings.
The Dance: In young girls, the social instinct, the desire to meet and know other people, and especially those of the opposite sex, becomes a dominant factor between the ages of fifteen and twenty.
The most natural expression of youthful spirits is the dance. To allow it to become a snare to spoil the lives of young people is one of the great deficiencies of city life. In every city dance-halls, ranging from the back room of a saloon to the casino or “gin-palace,” hold out temptations to young people.
In New York City there are over five hundred licensed dance-halls. This means, at a moderate estimate, one-quarter of a million young people every night in these public dance-halls, most of which are run in connection with the liquor trade.
The obligation to regulate places of public amusement, and to provide good amusement in place of bad, rests with the community.
The minute you begin to regulate the dance-hall you are interfering with many kinds of business; first and foremost the liquor trade and all the interests it involves; then, with the business of those whose livelihood depends upon the vile trade that is stimulated by the usual dance-hall; and behind these groups, an unknown number of perfectly respectable businesses whose trade is increased by the conditions which characterize a “wide open” town. All these manifold interests are rooted deep in the fabric of the government of most of our American cities, and, because their connections are in so many instances seemingly innocent, are all the more difficult to defeat and dislodge.
Playgrounds: The need of organized recreation facilities for children has become pressing, as congestion of population has leftno place, not even the streets, in which they can play.
There are many blocks in New York City where the population is greater than in any other place of like area in the world. Where can the great throng of children go to find innocent amusement? Where shall they go out of school hours?
In 1915 it was estimated that there were 734,000 children between five and fourteen years of age who had to play away from home. To provide for them, the city furnished school and park playgrounds for from 100,000 to 185,000, leaving at least half a million children with no provision of any kind for play, except the already crowded city streets.
Vacation Schools: Keeping the schools and playgrounds open during the summer months takes the children away from the hot, crowded streets, at least part of the time. Like public playgrounds, the number of vacation schools is always dependent on appropriations. The makers of the city budget find a greater pressure exerted from the multitude of business interests that want consideration, than they do in support of appropriations for public health and comfort. It will be necessary for women to be as alivein supporting such measures, as men are in demanding that their interests shall be considered. Also facts must be given to prove that the cost of such appropriations is saved in the increased productive powers of a healthier people. It has been stated that a healthy laborer increases the wealth of the country by some $30,000 during a normal lifetime. If this is true, it should be merely intelligent business on the part of the commonwealth to expend a reasonable pro rata of this sum, when necessary, to insure that a child when full grown is healthy.
Recreation Centershave been established in some of the Western cities. Chicago has a series of small parks in various parts of the city, with outdoor playgrounds, and in each one a large building where there is a gymnasium, swimming-pool, and assembly-rooms, large and small. On a Saturday or Sunday afternoon, these places show many happy pictures of thousands of families, with both the old and young spending their leisure in a way that increases their own happiness, and their value to the world.
Municipal Dance-hallshave also been tried. In the recreation centers of Chicago there are dance-halls under careful supervision. But whether the city provides municipaldance-halls or not, public dance-halls should be divorced from the liquor business, and there should be careful policing and supervision of private halls, and for this work women police officials are necessary.
Municipal Bathing Beachesare also possible for any community with a water-front. They are one of the great attractions of Chicago, where a large part of the lakefront draws hundreds of thousands of men, women, and children, who may easily reach these public beaches from any part of the city. The New York State law makes the construction of free baths obligatory in cities of 50,000 or more population.
The “Movies”: Millions of children attend moving-picture theaters every day of the year. In New York City alone, the daily attendance of children is estimated at 200,000. The pictures impress the minds of children like scenes in real life. For good or for evil, moving pictures are the great teachers of the youth of to-day.
Many of the lessons taught on the screen are not suitable for children. They give intimate views of the underworld, of assault and infidelity, and barroom brawls. They show fair heroines and gallant heroes committing crimes, and being pardoned andliving happily ever after. They show picture after picture that tends to destroy moral standards that home and school have tried to teach.
Causes for Juvenile Crime: The natural craving for excitement and love of adventure, with no provision for its legitimate expression, is responsible for much of the crime of our cities. Some years ago, it was estimated that of the 15,000 young people under twenty years of age who were arrested in Chicago during a year, most of them had broken the law in their blundering efforts to find adventure. It is said that the machinery of the grand juries and criminal courts is maintained, in a large measure, for the benefit of youths between the ages of thirteen and twenty-five. The so-called “gangs” of our cities are an expression of the recklessness and bravado, common to boys, which, well-directed, is of great service to the world, and, misdirected, is responsible for much misery.
The Use of School-buildings as Social Centersmeets a very real problem. Halls for dancing and for entertainments, lectures and debates, rooms for games, even gymnasiums, could easily be brought within the reach of most of the people. Grown-ups, aswell as young people, would find them of value. This use of the schools, outside of the regular school hours, has greatly increased in the West, and the school plant has become an increased factor for good in the life of the community.
Rural Needs: Some of our indifference in regard to proper provisions for recreation may be due to the fact that we were so long a rural nation. The boy who lived on a farm or in a village, who had the swimming-hole in summer, the farm with its hay-loft, and in winter sledding and skating, was able to satisfy his love of adventure. To-day, even rural conditions have changed, and there is as much need of decent and wholesome recreation in the country and small villages as in cities. Churches are open only on Sunday, schools are closed two days in the week, the only meeting-place is the corner store, or the saloons, and the streets. The use of the school-building and grounds when school is not in session and on Saturdays and Sundays, would take many boys off the streets.