ADULT KINDERGARTEN CLASS

Evening Post, Volume LXXXII, Issue 25, 29 July 1911, Page 10

ADULT KINDERGARTEN CLASS

That there could be any connection between cutting out paper dolls and tilling the soil ptobably would not occur to that large majority of persons who see only the surface of things, but, the kindergarten training of Miss Emilie C • has revealed many things to hei -aafc are hidden from people otherwise wise and prudent, and Frederick Tow> send Martin is so much, interested in her plan that he wrote to her just before he sail* ed for Europe this spring to say that he tvanfced to give it some financial support when n© came back. Many Are the Ways devifeed by the philanthropic for reclaiming those hungry wastrels who petition nightly for food and lodging at the Bowery Mtesion, No. 227 Bowery, but probably the most original is that of Miss Curtis. When she appeared one day at the mission and. petitioned for the privilege of opening a kindergarten there the astonished superintendent answered: — "But, there are only grown-up men here. "I know," she answered; übutu but if you will let me have six of your most incom- 1 petent men and a room in which, to hold I the kindergarten I will pay them 10 cente an hour for two hours every day." This the superintendent knew would enable the men to bec&ffie self-support-ing, according to the Bowery standard, and as he saw no harm in the plan he consented. He also chose the sis men he knew had the least chance of getting positions, and the next day the kindergarten wae started. The men were somewhat surprised and a little bit ashamed at first when they learned that their work was to cut out paper dolls. "But it ain't fur de loikes of us to ax her wofc's de use of ifc ; we gets our pay, an' wot more do youse want?" the philosopher qf the group admonished those who had demurred. Out of the six men that had been asked only one had refused. cut out paper dolls? Nit!" ne said, contemptuously. Although he at first, with several other habitues of the mission, jeered in a mild way at the kindergarten— for lack of food isn't conducive to much wit- and bantering— -they Boon stopped when they saw that the others were in earnest. It was a good eight to see this roomful of human flotsam which bad been lelt so long to drift by itself blossom out under the gentle hand of the teacher. At first the great clumsy fingers could scarcely be forced to guide the scissors successfully around the delicate tracings without cutting ofl noses and other small items necessary to the making of a paper doll. They were more awkward than thto most awkward child Would have been. But no child ever took a greater pride in anything than the man who was the first to cut out a doll successfully. Tho praise that the teacher bestowed on him filled him with, the glee of a child and made the others redouble their efforts. So in the zest of competition they forgot the triviality of their employment, and they also forgot themselves. fThey lost themselves so completely in their work that theit minds, freed from brooding morbidly over their wretched lot, became more alert, and in a week or two they were different men. Encouraged by their teacher, they talked while they worked. One old man of sixty told of his boyhood days in New York City, of his long rides By etage coach out to the then distant Jamaica, and of his all-day excursions by boat to High Bridge. "How interesting!" Mis* Curtis exclaimed, encouragingly. "You have seen the evolution of the stage coach to the horse car, then the electric and trolley car, next the steam engine, then the wonderful tunnels under the river, and now, last and most wonderful of all, the airsbipfi. You must try to go up in an airship to make your experience complete." "Excuse me, lady,' he said, looking at her reproachfully, as if she had expressed d. wish for nis demise. "I don't hevet intend to go up in an airship. Wot fur? To be made a angel of No more do 1 intend to go under dem tmrn&ld and have de river come troo on me and kill m«>." He was an old man, out of work, with) no family, no permanent place of abode, and sleeping anywhere he could, yet the thought of all this misery suddenly terminating made him shudder apprehensively. And so it ts with the majority of these men. Each is. anxious to live. Thus, while they entertained one another with stories, the two hours would Slip by With incredible speed. They were so anxious to begin again the next day that they would collect outside the mission as early as 9 o'clock, although the doors did not open until 10. This alertnessi was a not.icea.ble contrast to the chronic elet-piheK* of the oilier frequenter? of the mission. Had the kindergarten pupils felt m inclined, thet could now have retaliated by jeer- j ing at the men who had jeered at them, for as wage earners they had this advantage over the other men— they no longer had to stay up tmttl J o'clock in the morning for tho bread line. They could now buy their otvn sandwiches and coffee and still have 10 cents left for a night's lodging, and so go to bed as early as they liked. Day after day they came to the missum and steadily improved. One man who had been so unskilful with his hands that it was an effort for him w> much as to salt his own food—and that not because of rheumatism or any of any other ailment, but simply becausp of inability to do things with his hands— improved to such an extent that at the end of two months the mission was able to send him out a* a waiter. And *? it was with the rest of these men. B,r the rtul of three months they all had positions, and a new- set of men took their places. This is the good that nuettted to the men from cutting out paper dolls, that slowly though laboriously they learned the art that had been losfc to Miem of being deft with their hands. The plan for helping them, which at first feemed EO foolish and eccentric, proved so successful that another kindergarten, on a larcer scale, is 10 be slatted next autumn, with a view to sending the men out on Farms aud teaching them airirmltiirft as wtoo ac they b«w>uie proficient <snou*h 1|) ibß tiki pi ihiif hsAii. Aad in toil

plan Mr. Martin, who visited the mission once last winter, is *o much interested that ho says he want* to help.— -New York Tribune,