Stoneham High School - Wildlife Yearbook (Stoneham, MA)

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Uh: Sinnzlyxm High ,School LAxdl-gexuii: He has the advantage of being able to experimentiin school, and does not in after life have to drift from job to job-forever seeking but never finding the Work for which he is 'best fitted. The different shops are not only self supporting, but are an annual source of income to the schools, for the boys learning the different trades do the entire repairing. The school grounds which are divided into two parts, one for the girls and the other for the boys, are kept immaculate by them. In each part are swimming pools, sand pits, tennis courts and, in fact, every con- ceivable kind of playground apparatus and equipment which has been almost entirely planned and built by the pupils. Woe to him who molests any shrubbery which they have planted in the rich, black soil. One remaining feature deserves brief mention. Mr. Herbert Roberts, who visited the schools, in a spirited report, says in part: One of the basement rooms in the Emerson school bears the legend-- Boyville Council Chamber K Mayor and C1erk'S Oilice. Inside is a semi-circle of aldermanic chairs with the mayor's siege d' honneur at the top. Here the representative council of Boyville, elected by the duly qualified voter, meets and passes its law. The other day, it passd ft law making the kids cut out going over people's vacant lots in the school neigh- borhood. Did it themselves. The boys called for more garbage cans for Gary and a stricter enforcement of the cigarette law. The fact of the busi- ness is that in live years' time, the kids of Boyville will be running that town of Gary and running it right. ln live years the Gary schools will own the whole works and everybody in it. Truly, the Gary Schools are an alma mater, a fostering parent in the good old Latin sense of the Word. . ' The Maman nf 'igesterhag zmh filnhag Sermtb Qinnur-Faiherhe BXTSEUU We are told by wtise men that we can know only by contrast. After we have tasted something bitter, we know by contrast what is sweet if we haveexperienced pain, we understand pleasure. Consequently, it is often well to contrast our lot with that of people who have lived under less for- tunate conditions. Girls, can you carry yourselves back in imagination about two hundred years? Imagine yourself strolling to school with your sister of yesterday- not to learn the three R's, reading, 'ritin.g, and 'rithmetic, as your ibrothers do : but to learn only the househld arts of cooking, knitting, weaving, gar- ment making, and the like. After completing this narrow system of education what future do you face? Splendid courses in universities, seminaries or business colleges? Oh, no! Your task is to win a husband. You must first flll a chest with

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Ulla Slnnehmn High ,School ,Authentic that a third of that time is spent in the jolliest and healthiest supervised play. Of the other two-thirds, one is given to academic work and one to the learning of some useful art or trade. In other words, the Gary idea is to substitute the supervised play in .the schools for the non-supervised play in the streets. ' - School is compulsory five days a week for ten months, but the building is kept open the year round. The pupils may take their long vacation any season of the year they please. It is both surprising and interesting to know that over one-half the scholars come back on Saturdays, evening and vacation quite as much for their studies as for their sports. The school plant is utilized evenings largely -by adults and older boys and girls, who work in the mills. Theatres, plays, and supervised dancing are also held in the school certain evenings of the week. This ideal school includes beside the academic equipment, a play- ground, garden, park, school farm, social center, library, and a work-snop in charge of trade-union masters where carpentry, cabinet making, plumb- ing, housepalnting and practically all the important trades are taught. The girls have classes in all branches of domestic science. The teachers are specialists, who teach one subject only. The old-fash- loned grade room, where the children recited all their lessons to the same worn out teacher, has been abolished. There is a room where arithmetic is taught, others are occupied exclusively with English, Latin and so on. The playground, workshop, and classrooms are always tilled. One third of the children are at play, one-third are in the shops, and one-third are in the classrooms all of the time. 'When the division which ls in the class- rooms has iinished its studies, it passes out to play: those in the shops, in turn, come in to till the classrooms, and those who were at play go into the shops. -School is thus a succession of work and play. As said before, economy is manifest, for just three times the number of pupils may be accommodated in a school of this kind as in the ordinary American school. , If a child is deficient in arithmetic, he may for a few days give up his play, remain in the same room for the next period and have the work over again with the incoming class. In Gary, the individual child is trained and the studies are -fitted to his needs, instead of the -child trying to adapt himself to studies perhaps wholly unsuited and distasteful to him. , Once in a while a lad presentshimselt at the principal's office announc- in-g that he is going to leave school. Why, John, what's the trouble? the principal asks. Are you tired of your studies? Yes, I am, replies John. What would you like to be, John? Well, sir, answers John, I think l'd like to be a plumber. That's a good trade, my boy, the principal agrees. Then he suggests John drop his studies and devote all his time'to learning the trade in the plumber's shop. Perhaps John finds out that he doesn't like plumbing. If so, he can test the Work in all the different shops until he Ends a trade suited to his tastes, 7

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mhz ,5lnuelyam Qliigh School Qxulhentl: clothing to be used in your future domestic lifeg not until this is done may you be married. It is then by no means a hard task to wln a husband- bachelors and old maids being objects of much contempt. At one time there was in Boston a very ancient old maid of twenty-five summers, who was looked at terribly askance. . Your husband won, your woman's task of home making is exceedingly dillicult. Not only must you feed your family, but also spin and weave the cloth wherewith to clothe them all, mould the candles, and compound Your own medicines, some of which seem very queer in comparison with our present scientific methods of treatment. For instance, a sure remedy for rickets I must impart to you. Take a -bushel of snails and boil them in fbeer, add to this a. quart of earthworms nicely cleaned and sliced, add also many herbs and boil the whole ln a gallon of ale. This remedy is fully approved by the learned doctor of your village. Your children brought up and mar- ried, your task is ended and so tired, so wearied, so worn out by life's bur- dens are you, that you can not enjoy the short rest remaining for you. This little glimpse into the lives of the women of yesterday surely makes us revel in the fact that we are women of the present. I need not point out the contrast-schooldays tllled with sports, soclals, and interesting. work: youth with its Elorius 0DD0Y1l1lI1iti9s ln every fleld of activity: domestic life with its tireless cooker, its wet wash, and its wo- man's club. K It is one of the glories of our age that the Woman of average powers can use these opportunities. But what of the woman of unusual ability? Must she hide her candle under a bushel just because she is a Woman? Ah, no! Witness Jane Addams. The thought of her brings with it inevitably the thought of Hull House. Before she was seven years old her father, a miller, had occasion to take the little girl with him to a. mill ln the poorest quarter of a, little city. 'W'hy, Jane inquired, do People live in such horrid little houses, so close together? After listening thoughtfully to his reply she an- nounced with much firmness: VVhen I grow up I shall of course, have a large house, but it shall not 'be built among other large houses, but among horrid little houses like these. Has Miss Addams succeeded. Let us ask a policeman of that district what Hull House, the great Chicago settelment, means to him. I have e very easy job of it, he replies. What does she mean to a lonely girl? She provides a place for enjoyment for reading and for entertainment. She is a big sister always ready with sympathy and advice. The little street urchin replies that he can enjoy at Hull House all the games dear to a boy's heart without interruption, and can even learn a trade there. Indeed. I-lull House ls of infinite value to every person in Chicago, and Jane Addams has made it what it is. Books could be fllled with the splendid service of such Women as Anna Howard Shaw, Albion Fellows Bacon, and Frances A, Keller-but gil'lS. lsn't it due to be living today? I am sorry to have to do this, said Johnny, as he spread jam on the cat's face, but I can't have suspicion pointing its finger at me, 5 A