TRAGIC OLD NEW YORKERS.

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 279, 24 November 1928, Page 7 (Supplement)

TRAGIC OLD NEW YORKERS.

NEARLY ONE-THIRD PENNILESS.

CRUEL CITY FOR THE ELDERLY.

(By CHARLES ESTCOURT, JUN.)

(Copywrlght.to "Star" and North American Newspaper Alliance.)

Visitors remark that they see few old people about the streets of New York. That's true, and the men and women of advanced years who are seen in public places look either extremely well-off, or rather poor.

A social worker says that more than 54,000 of the 185,000 New Yorkers beyond 65 have no property of any kind, and that the fate of possibly 30,000 rests with agencies organised for their relief.

These destitute ones are not necessarily inefficient, going by present standards, nor are they improvident. Fortune is reversed swiftly here. Since 1900 there have been in a certain home for the aged a former surrogate, a president for more than forty years of the Shakespeare Society, a baronet of Sweden, a member of Queen Victoria's household, a descendant of former Governor Clinton, and a retired army colonel.

The town's all right, people say, if you've got money. Yes, and it's a fine place for persons in moderate circumstances if only they know how to be comfortable in close quarters, and can find enjoyment in the books, art, music, various parks and museums that are free, or nearly so.

But there is an age limit. Without tho vigour and agility that usually depart in later years it is hard to cope with tho almost cruel speed of metropolitan transit and transportation, and with the inconsiderate crowds. _ Only the possession of money makes it possible to be independent of these things.