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Title: New Homes for Old

Author: Sophonisba Preston Breckinridge

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Language: English

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NEW HOMES FOR OLD

Harper & Brothers Publishers

THE COMING OF NEW AMERICAN HOME MAKERS

AMERICANIZATION STUDIES

ALLEN T. BURNS, DIRECTOR

NEW HOMES FOR OLD

BY

S. P. BRECKINRIDGE

PROFESSOR OF SOCIAL ECONOMY
UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO

HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS
NEW YORK AND LONDON
1921

New Homes for Old

Copyright, 1921, by Harper & Brothers
Printed in the United States of America

[v]

PUBLISHER'S NOTE

The material in this volume was gathered by the Division of Adjustment of Homes and Family Life of Studies in Methods of Americanization.

Americanization in this study has been considered as the union of native and foreign born in all the most fundamental relationships and activities of our national life. For Americanization is the uniting of new with native-born Americans in fuller common understanding and appreciation to secure by means of self-government the highest welfare of all. Such Americanization should perpetuate no unchangeable political, domestic, and economic regime delivered once for all to the fathers, but a growing and broadening national life, inclusive of the best wherever found. With all our rich heritages, Americanism will develop best through a mutual giving and taking of contributions from both newer and older Americans in the interest of the commonweal. This study has followed such an understanding of Americanization.

[vi]

[vii]

FOREWORD

This volume is the result of studies in methods of Americanization prepared through funds furnished by the Carnegie Corporation of New York. It arose out of the fact that constant applications were being made to the Corporation for contributions to the work of numerous agencies engaged in various forms of social activity intended to extend among the people of the United States the knowledge of their government and the obligations to it. The trustees felt that a study which should set forth, not theories of social betterment, but a description of the methods of the various agencies engaged in such work, would be of distinct value to the cause itself and to the public.

The outcome of the study is contained in eleven volumes on the following subjects: Schooling of the Immigrant; The Press; Adjustment of Homes and Family Life; Legal Protection and Correction; Health Standards and Care; Naturalization and Political Life; Industrial and Economic Amalgamation; Treatment of Immigrant Heritages; Neighborhood Agencies and Organization; Rural Developments; and Summary. The entire study has been carried out under the[viii] general direction of Mr. Allen T. Burns. Each volume appears in the name of the author who had immediate charge of the particular field it is intended to cover.

Upon the invitation of the Carnegie Corporation a committee consisting of the late Theodore Roosevelt, Prof. John Graham Brooks, Dr. John M. Glenn, and Mr. John A. Voll has acted in an advisory capacity to the director. An editorial committee consisting of Dr. Talcott Williams, Dr. Raymond B. Fosdick, and Dr. Edwin F. Gay has read and criticized the manuscripts. To both of these committees the trustees of the Carnegie Corporation are much indebted.

The purpose of the report is to give as clear a notion as possible of the methods of the agencies actually at work in this field and not to propose theories for dealing with the complicated questions involved.

[ix]

TABLE OF CONTENTS

[xii]

[xiii]

LIST OF TABLES

[xiv]

[xv]

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

[xvi]

[xvii]

INTRODUCTION

The following study is the result of effort on the part of several persons. Miss Helen R. Wright, formerly research assistant of the Chicago School of Civics and member of the staff of the Massachusetts Immigration Commission of 1914, had much to do with the planning of the inquiry, the framing of such schedules as were used, and the organization of certain portions of the information gathered. Through Miss Laura Hood, long time a resident of the Chicago Commons, it proved to be possible to obtain many intimate views with reference to the more subtle questions of family adjustment in the groups that are of special interest in such an inquiry as this.

Certain questions of uniformity in method and style of presentation were determined by the editorial staff of the Study of Methods of Americanization. For the final drafting of a considerable portion of the study, especially in the earlier chapters, the members of this editorial staff are responsible, though the writer is glad to acknowledge full responsibility for all conclusions drawn or recommendations offered.

Sophonisba P. Breckinridge.

April 15, 1921.

[1]

NEW HOMES FOR OLD

I

FINDING THE NEW HOME

The great westward tide of immigration has again begun to rise. Annually to the ports of entry and to the great inland centers of distribution come thousands of immigrant families, strange men and women with young children, unattached girls, and vigorous, simple lads. With few exceptions no provision by native Americans has been made for their reception in their new places of residence. Communities of kindly-intentioned persons, because of their lack of imagination and their indifference, have allowed the old, the young, the mother, and infant to come in by back ways, at any hour of day or night. Frequently they have been received only by uncomprehending or indifferent railroad officials or oversolicitous exploiters.

THE FIRST ADJUSTMENTS

It is not strange that in most American communities there is no habit of community hospitality.[2] Communities are in themselves transitory and fluid. Many of the native born have as yet become only partially adjusted to their physical and social environment. At least the childhood of most of our older generation was spent under the influence of those who had either migrated or immigrated. "Nous marchons tous." We are all "pilgrims and strangers." Some have come sooner, and some have come later, and except for the colored people and those in territory acquired in 1848 and in 1898, all have a common memory of having come deliberately either from something worse or to something better. All have come from where they were into what was a far country.

While the earlier arrivals are making their own adjustments, there are knocking at their gates strangers from a more distant country speaking a foreign tongue, accustomed to totally different ways of living and working. Their reception, however, need not be an impossible task. On their arrival they are formally admitted, and information as to their origin and destination must be supplied. Methods could be devised for receiving them in such a way as to make them feel at ease, and for interpreting to them the changed surroundings in which they must find a home and a job in the shortest possible time.

If discomfort and confusion were the only distress into which the strange group fell, the situation[3] might be only humiliating to our generous and hospitable spirit and could be easily remedied. But the consequences of failure to exercise hospitality at the beginning endure in lack of understanding on the part of both groups. The immigrant fails to find natural and normal ways of sharing in the life of the community, and becomes skeptical as to the sincerity of perfectly well-meaning, but uninformed, professions on the part of the older residents. Spiritual barriers as definite, if not as easily perceived, as the geographical boundaries of the "colonies" formed in the different sections of our cities, develop.

This is often true in connection with the foreign-born men and tragically more true of the women. One Italian woman in Herrin, Illinois, for example, who had lived nineteen years in this country, told an investigator for this study that she had never received an American into her home as a guest, because no American had ever come in that spirit. A Russian woman had lived in Chicago for nine years and had, so far as she knew, not become acquainted with any Americans. Several instances were found in which efforts have been put forward to secure the united effort of the whole community, and yet large groups of immigrants have remained substantially unaware of these efforts and were entirely untouched by them.[4]

There are several other attitudes, too, that have perhaps blinded some to the need of provision for community hospitality. One attitude might be characterized as that of the "self-made man." Hardship may have either of two different effects. In one person it will develop sympathy, compassion, and a desire to safeguard others from similar suffering. In others it may lead to a certain callous disregard of other people—a belief that if one has been able to surmount the difficulties others should likewise be able. If not, so much the worse. This kind of harshness characterizes the attitude of some of those immigrants who have come at earlier dates toward those who have come later.

A RAILROAD CAMP FOR IMMIGRANT WORKERS IN A PROSPEROUS SUBURBAN COMMUNITY, 1920

AN IMMIGRANT RAILWAY WORKER LIVES IN THIS CAR WITH HIS WIFE, SIX CHILDREN, AND THREE DOGS

It is like the occasional successful woman who is indifferent to the general disadvantages of her sex, and to the negro who makes for himself a brilliant place and argues that color is no handicap. In talking to women about bringing up their children, it was a significant fact that some of the women who had had no trouble with their own children said that where there is trouble it is the fault of the parents. The following comment, for example, was on the schedule of Mrs. D., a Polish woman who has been in this country since 1894, and has three children, aged twenty-five, twelve, and six. "If a child is not good, Mrs. D. blames his mother, who does not[5] know how to take care of children. She thinks they are too ignorant."

There is also the sense of racial, national, or class superiorities. The virtue of the Anglo-Saxon civilization is assumed; the old, as against the new immigration, is valued. There are many who crave the satisfaction of "looking down" on some one, and it makes life simpler if whole groups—"Dagoes," "Hunkies," "Polacks," what you will—can be regarded as of a different race or group, so that neither one's heartstrings nor one's conscience need be affected by their needs. The difficulty is increased by a similar tendency of immigrants to assume the superiority of their people and culture and so hold aloof from the new life. This assumption of superiority on both sides tends to hinder rather than to further mutual understanding.

Clearly, if we are to build up a united and wholesome national life, such attitudes of aloofness as have persisted will have to be abandoned. If that life is to be enriched and varied—not monotonous and mechanical—the lowly and the simple, as well as the great and the mighty, must be able to make their contribution. This contribution can become possible, not as the result of any compulsory scheme, but of conditions favoring noble, generous, and sympathetic living. The family is an institution based on the affection of the parents and their self-sacrifice for the life[6] and future of their children. Of all institutions it exemplifies the power of co-operative effort, and demands sympathetic and patient understanding. This is perhaps especially true of the foreign-born family.

This discussion of the family problems of the foreign-born groups in relation to the development of a national consciousness and a national unity is based on the belief that no attempts at compulsory adjustment can in the nature of things be successful. Sometimes the interests of the common good and of the weaker groups demand for their own protection the temporary exercise of compulsion, but the real solution lies in policies grounded in social justice and guided by social intelligence.

HOMES STUDIED

The material in this study is of a qualitative sort. No attempt has been made to organize a statistical study. The problems of family life do not lend themselves to the statistical method except at great cost of time and money.

A large body of data with reference to conditions existing during the decade just prior to the Great War, exists in the reports of several special government investigations, especially the report of the United States Immigration Commission, that of the United States Bureau of Labor relating to conditions surrounding women[7] and child wage earners, and that of the British Board of Trade on the "Cost of Living in American Towns." The regular publications of certain government bureaus, especially the United States Children's Bureau, the Bureau of Home Economics in the United States Department of Agriculture, and the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics, were found useful. These publications have been studied so far as they discuss the problem of family life. Their contents are presented only in illustration or in confirmation of statements made.

The material collected is of two kinds. First, there are facts dealing with the different agencies organized to help in solving these problems. This information was gathered largely by correspondence. Questionnaires were sent to case-work agencies dealing with family problems, which are members of the American Association for Social Work with Families and Home Service Bureaus of various Red Cross Chapters, asking their methods for attacking these difficulties and their advice as to the best methods worked out. The supervisors of Home Economics under the Federal Board for Vocational Education were asked to what extent they had included foreign-born housewives in their program and the special plans that had been worked out for them; the International Institutes of the Young Women's[8] Christian Association were asked to describe their work with married women.

The methods of certain agencies in Chicago—the United Charities, the Immigrants' Protective League, some of the settlements—were studied more carefully through interviews with their workers and through a study of individual records. Officers of the national racial organizations were interviewed about their work on family problems. In addition to these a limited number of co-operative stores in Illinois were studied. Mining communities in Illinois, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia were visited, as well as certain of the newer housing projects, such as Yorkship Village in New Jersey, Hilton Village in Virginia, Bridgeport, Connecticut, Lowell and North Billerica, Massachusetts and several towns in New Mexico.

The government investigations already referred to had made certain needs of the foreign born very clear. It seemed unnecessary to go over that ground again, but it was necessary to know whether those needs still existed. An attempt was made to learn this through interviews with leaders of various national groups and by obtaining schedules from a limited number of selected families. A word should be said as to the information obtained from these sources. The leaders selected were, in the first instance, men and women whose leadership in their own[9] group had been recognized by election to important offices in their national organizations. These men and women then frequently suggested others whose position was not so well defined to an outsider, but whose opinion was valued by members of the group.

Most of the persons interviewed were able to speak English readily. They were people who were close enough to the great mass of immigrants to be familiar with their problems, their needs, their shortcomings, and their abilities, and at the same time were sufficiently removed from the problems to be able to view them objectively. Some were persons of more educational and cultural background than the majority of immigrants, some of them had been born in this country or had come when they were young children; but there were more who came to this country from the same Old-World conditions as the majority of their countrymen and had worked their way through the same hard conditions. They were probably exceptional in their native ability.

No attempt was made to fill out a questionnaire from these interviews. An outline was prepared of points to be covered, but frequently no attempt was made to adhere to the outline. Rather, these persons were encouraged to talk on the family problems in which they were most interested, and to which they had given most[10] thought—to enable us to see them as they saw them with their knowledge of the Old-World background from which their people had come. They were also asked to suggest possible ways of meeting the more pressing needs of their people.

Adequate expression can never be given to the obligation under which those busy men and women who gave so generously and graciously their time and their thoughts have placed us. Our very great indebtedness to them is acknowledged, as without their aid this study in the present form would have been impossible. The demand made upon them could be justified only by the hope that the contacts thus established may prove in some slight degree profitable to them if only in giving them assurance that there are those to whom their problems are of real interest.

The women from whom family schedules were obtained were slightly different, and the information sought from them was obtained in a different way. They were for the most part women who did not speak English well enough to carry on an extended conversation in it. While they were not very recent immigrants and hence were not going through the first difficulties of adjustment, most of them were women who had not yet worked their way through to the same place reached by the women with whom the more[11] general interviews were had. They were, in general, very simple people, too absorbed with working out their problems to have had much time for reflection. We asked them to tell us of their early experiences and difficulties as they recalled them, and of their present ways of treating some of the problems. This information was taken in schedule form.

Not enough schedules were obtained to be of statistical value—there were only ninety in all—but the families chosen are believed to be more or less typical. They were selected with the advice of leaders of their group or were known to our foreign-speaking investigators, who had a wide acquaintance in several groups. That is, we have tried so far as possible to see the problem with the persons, if not through the eyes of the persons whose fellow countrymen we wished to know.

We do not mean to suggest that other and very important groups might not have been studied, but we tried to learn of others; and sometimes because we could not find the clew, sometimes for lack of time, it proved impossible to go farther. We feel that we have obtained an insight into the situation among the Polish in Chicago and in Rolling Prairie, Indiana; the Lithuanians, Bohemians, Slovaks, Croatians, Slovenians, nonfamily Mexicans, Russians—both family and nonfamily—and Italians in Chicago;[12] Italians in Herrin and Freeman, Illinois, and Canonsburg and Washington, Pennsylvania; and the Ukrainians in Chicago and in Sun, West Virginia.

Besides the large body of evidence with reference to these groups, we have suggestions from many interested and kindly persons of other groups. The Magyars and the Rumanians, particularly, we should have liked to know better, and we have had most suggestive interviews with certain of their leaders. We were not able, however, to follow the leads they gave, and therefore do not claim to speak for them, except to express the feeling of the need for greater understanding and appreciation.

With reference to those groups discussed, it should be noted that some, such as the Polish, Bohemian, Lithuanian, Italian, are among the largest of the great foreign colonies in Chicago, the growth of a long-continued immigration. They live in the different sections of the city, in crowded tenement districts, or in more recently developed neighborhoods for whose growth they are responsible. The Croatian and Ukrainian groups are newer groups, and are therefore poorer. The Croatians are moving into houses which the Bohemians are vacating. In the Russian and Mexican groups we have the current evidence that the old problem of the nonfamily man is still with us.[13]

The Poles in Rolling Prairie, Indiana, are a prosperous farming community living in modern farmhouses with yards and orchards. There are women still alive who can tell of the earlier days, when just after their arrival they lived in one-room houses made of logs and plastered with mud. Then they helped their husbands to fell trees and clear the land. Like other pioneer women, these women have contributed to the "winning of the West." The grandmothers tell of these things. The mothers remember when, during the winter, the children went to school for a few months, they were laughed at because of their meager lunches, their queer homemade clothes, and their foreign speech. The young people now go to school at least as long as the law requires and sometimes through high school.

The mining towns in Illinois and Pennsylvania need not be described. Their general features are familiar. Although extended information with reference to the life of the various groups was not obtained, mention will be made of certain facts that are of importance to this study.

While the numbers are not great, it is hoped that certain methods may be worked out for approach to the problems of the groups studied, that will prove suggestive in attacking the problems of other groups not included here. No two groups are alike; but the experience with one or with several may develop the open-minded, humble,[14] objective attitude of mind and that democratic habit of approach that will unlock the doorway into the life of the others and exhibit both the points at which community action may be desirable and the direction such action should take.

DISSOLVING BARRIERS

The purpose of this book is to help in the adjustment of immigrant family life in this country. The immigrant will feel America to be his own land largely to the extent that he feels his American home to be as much his home as was his native hearth. To define what makes a home is harder even than to achieve one. Perhaps more than any other human institution the home is a development, the result and component of innumerable adjustments. This growth comes about largely spontaneously, without conscious effort on the part of its members, except that of living together as happily as possible.

There is among most housewives, whether native or foreign born, a certain complacency about housekeeping and bringing up children. Housekeeping is supposed to come by nature, and few women of any station in life are trained to be homemakers and mothers. The native born, in part consciously through their own choice and in part blindly moved by forces they do not understand, have been gradually moving away[15] from the old tradition of subordination on the part of the wife and of strict and unquestioning obedience of children. In the general American atmosphere there are suggestions of a different tradition.

In the old country the mother knew what standards she was to maintain and, moreover, had the backing of a homogeneous group to help her. In this country she is a stranger, neither certain of herself nor sure whether to try to maintain the standards of her home or those that seem to prevail here. As a matter of fact, these difficulties are usually surmounted, so that by the time the foreign-born housewife has lived here long enough to raise her family she has learned to care for her home as systematically and intelligently as most of her native-born neighbors, who have not had her difficulties. Sometimes they have learned from the members of the group who have been here longer; and sometimes they have learned by going into the more comfortable American homes as domestic servants.

In the American domestic evolution a scientific and deliberate factor has been introduced. Students of family life have conducted inquiries into domestic practices, needs, and resources, and applied the researches of physiologists, chemists, economists, and architects. The result has been the discovery of certain standards and requirements for wholesome family life. It must[16] be admitted that the attempt at formulation of standards for family life encounters difficulties not found in the field of education or of health, where the presence and service of the expert are fairly widely recognized. For many reasons the subject of the minima of sound family life has been more recently attacked and is, in the nature of things, more difficult of analysis and especially of formal study. The impossibility, for example, of applying to many aspects of the family problem the laboratory methods of study or of examining many of the questions in a dispassionate and objective manner, must retard the scientific treatment of the subject.

There are, however, some aspects of family life with reference to which there may be said to be fairly general agreement in theory if not in practice in the United States. The content of an adequate food allowance is generally agreed upon by the students of nutrition, and the cost and special features of an adequate diet for any group at any time and place can therefore be described and discussed. In the matter of laying the responsibility for support of the family on the husband and father, at least to the extent of enabling the children to enjoy seven years of school life and fourteen years free from wage-paid work and the resulting exploitation, there is wide agreement embodied in legislation.

Such standards are becoming gradually adopted[17] and incorporated into domestic life through the slow processes of suggestion, imitation, and neighborly talks already mentioned. While the slow establishment of social standards is required for a complete and adequate adjustment of family life on the basis of specialists' discoveries, many systematic and formal efforts can be made which will forward and accelerate the process. These efforts can help to remove the feeling of strangeness, perhaps the greatest obstacle in adjusting home life; they should seek to connect with the appreciations and sense of need already felt by the women who are to be influenced.

There is necessity for thorough inquiry into what are the points of contact in these problems for immigrant women; what are their present customs and standards in which the specialists' knowledge can be planted with the prospect of a promising combination of seed and soil. This study indicates how great is the need of search for the possibilities of just such organic connections. Pending such further studies, this report can do two things:

First, it can exhibit, so far as possible, the difficulties encountered by foreign-born families in attaining in their family relationships such satisfaction as would constitute a genuine feeling of hominess, and make the immigrant home an integral part of the domestic development in this country.[18]

Second, the report can suggest the deliberate and systematic methods which can be effective in introducing the immigrant family and specialists' standards to each other. The services of social agencies have been largely in this field, and it is hoped that they may find in this book lines for increased usefulness. Incidentally, evidence will be presented to show that, in allowing many of these difficulties to develop or to remain, the community suffers real loss, and it is hoped that in the following chapters suggestion will be found of ways by which some of these difficulties may be overcome and some of the waste resulting from their continued existence be eliminated.

[19]

II

FAMILY RELATIONSHIPS

It is impossible to discuss the problems of adjustment of the family life of the immigrant to life in this country without taking notice of several factors that complicate the problem. There is first the disorganization in family life that is incident to the migration itself. The members of most of the families that come to this country are peasants who are almost forced to emigrate by the fact that the land they own will not support the entire family as the children grow up and establish families of their own.

There was, for example, among the families visited for this study, a family from the Russian Ukraine. The man's father was a peasant farmer with six acres of land and a large family of children. The income from this small property was supplemented by hiring out as laborers on the large estates near by. As the boys grew up they left home. Two had already come to America when the father of this family left in 1910. At the time he left there were thirteen people trying to get their living from six acres of land.[20]

Another family from the same country were trying to live on the income from the farm of the man's father, who had four acres of land and five sons.

SEPARATED FAMILIES

In such families, and even in less extreme cases, it is evident that the cash needed for the emigration of the whole family is difficult to secure. It often happens, therefore, that the family does not emigrate as a group, but one member—usually the man—goes ahead, and sends for the rest as soon as he has earned enough to pay their passage. It is then some time, usually from two to four years and occasionally longer, before he is able to send for his family.

One Ukrainian man interviewed in this study came in 1906, leaving his wife and four children in the old country. He had difficulty in finding work he could do, wandered from place to place, never staying long in one place, and it was eight years before he had saved enough to send for his family. Another man, a Slovenian, came in 1904, and was here seven years before he sent his wife money enough so she could follow him.

Separations of this kind are often destructive of the old family relationships. What they mean in suffering to the wife left behind has been revealed by some of the letters of husbands and [21]wives in a collection of letters in The Polish Peasant,[1] especially in the Borkowski series. These are letters written by Teofila Borkowski in Warsaw, to her husband, Wladek Borkowski, in America, between the years 1893 and 1912. During the early years the letters usually thanked him for a gift of money and referred to the time when she should join him in America. "I shall now count the days and weeks. May our Lord God grant it to happen as soon as possible, for I am terribly worried," she wrote in 1894.

As time goes on the intervals between the gifts grew longer, and she writes imploring him to send money if he is able, as she is in desperate need of it. In 1896 she had been ill and in the hospital. "When I left the hospital I did not know what to do with myself, without money and almost without roof ... so I begged her and promised I would pay her when you send some money" (p. 353). And in 1897 she wrote:

For God's sake what does it mean that you don't answer?... For I don't think that you could have forgotten me totally.... Answer me as soon as possible, and send me anything you can. For if I were not in need I should never annoy you, but our Lord God is the best witness how terribly hard it is for me to live. Those few rubles which you sent me a few times are only enough to pay the rent for some months.... As to board, clothes, and shoes, they are earned with such a difficulty that you have surely no idea. And I must eat every day. There are mostly days in my present situation when I have one small roll and a pot of[22] tea for the whole day, and I must live so. And this has lasted almost five years since you left (p. 353).

She is pathetically grateful when money is sent. Thus in 1899 she writes:

I received your letter, with twenty rubles and three photographs, for which I send you a hearty "God reward!" I bear it always in my heart and thought and I always repeat it to everybody that you were good and generous, and you are so up to the present (p. 358).

Her sufferings are not confined to financial worries and lack of a place to eat and sleep. There is apparently a loss of social prestige and a falling off of friends. The letters also show what was evidently a real affection for her husband, and that at times his silence was even worse than his failure to send money. Thus in 1905, when the money and the letters were very irregular, she writes a letter (p. 362) in which no reference is made to her economic situation. After asking if he received her last letter, she continues:

It is true, dear Wladek, that you have not so much time, but my dear, write me sometimes a few words; you will cause me great comfort. For I read your letter like a prayer, because for me, dear Wladek, our Lord God is the first and you the second. Don't be angry if I bore you with my letters, but it is for me a great comfort to be able to speak with you at least through this paper.

Her financial situation grows steadily worse, and in 1912 she writes that she is "already barefooted[23] and naked." The series closes with a letter from a friend stating that she is ill and in the hospital, "not so dangerously sick, but suffering very much ... and very weak from bad nutrition and continuous sorrows." He closes: "And please write a little more affectionately. Only do it soon, for it will be the best medicine for your wife, at least for her heart" (p. 368).

KEEPING BOARDERS

The life of the man who has come ahead has been made the subject of special study from time to time,[2] especially with regard to the housing conditions in which he lives—as a lodger or a member of a nonfamily group of men. It has been shown in all these studies that whatever the plan worked out, he adapts himself either to a life of intimate familiarity with women and children not his own, or to a life in which children and women have little part.

In connection with the present study, the living conditions of some of the Mexicans and Russians in Chicago were studied. As in the past, the men were found living in one of the following ways: as a lodger in the family group, as a boarder paying a fixed sum for room and board, [24]or as a member of a group of men attempting to do their own housekeeping. The Mexicans studied included 207 men, of whom 197, or 95 per cent, are unmarried. The Russians included 112 men, of whom 65, or 58 per cent, had wives in Russia. It is interesting to note that 136 of the 207 Mexican men were boarding, usually with a Mexican family, 37 were lodgers, and 34 were doing co-operative housekeeping. Among the Russians, on the other hand, there were 25 doing co-operative housekeeping, and 85 living with family groups, of whom only a few paid a fixed sum for room and board, while the others paid a fixed rate for lodging and the food bill depended on the food that was consumed.

EVEN A BOARDING HOUSE OF EIGHTEEN BOARDERS IN FIVE ROOMS IS MORE CHEERFUL THAN A LABOR CAMP FOR MEN ALONE

Four variations were found in the method of paying for food: (1) The landlady buys all the food for the group and her family on one account. The total bill is divided by the number of boarders plus the head of the family, the wife and children getting their food as partial compensation for her services. (2) Each lodger has his own account book, in which is entered only the meat purchased for him. He pays this account himself. The other food purchased is entered in the landlady's book, and divided in the same manner as before. (3) Each lodger has his own account and buys what he wants. Instead of paying for what he has bought, he pays his share of the total food bought during the week. (4) Each[25] lodger has his own account, the family has its own, and each pays his own.

Whatever expedient is adopted as a substitute for normal family life, the result is unsatisfactory. The men studied almost without exception preferred living as boarders with a family group, if possible. This preference is easily understood, as it meant less work for the men, who, in co-operative groups, had to do women's work as well as their own, and it also seemed a closer approximation to normal living. For the sake of these advantages they were willing to put up with housing conditions that were worse than those of the men who tried co-operative housekeeping. Thus 56 per cent of the Russian men in co-operative groups had the four hundred cubic feet of air per man that is required by law, and only 35 per cent of those living with family groups had this requirement.

The presence of a lodger in the family, moreover, is attended with great discomfort to the family. He is given the best accommodations the house affords and the family crowds into what is left. Thus, in the family groups with whom the Russians were living, only 18 per cent of the adult members of the family had the four hundred cubic feet of air required by the city ordinance for a person over twelve, as compared with 35 per cent of the boarders or lodgers, and forty of the fifty-three children in the groups[26] were deprived of the two hundred cubic feet of air space that is prescribed for them.

The people with whom we have conferred in this study have said again and again that the lodger in a family meant restriction and deprivation for the family, and especially for the children. One Lithuanian woman who came to this country when she was two years old, says she well remembers the "utter misery" of her childhood, due to the lodgers. They were given all the beds and any other sleeping arrangements that could be contrived, and the children slept on the floor in any corner. Their sleep was often disturbed by people moving about. Sometimes they were wakened and sent to the saloon to get beer for a group of lodgers who sat up late playing cards and drinking. She remembers, too, the constant quarreling over the food bill, and thinks that is very common.

The complicated system by which the accounts are kept, to which attention has already been called, makes suspicion on the part of the lodger only too easy. Several people have spoken of the unsteady character of the lodger and the practice of staying up late, drinking. One of the women interviewed said that the family life was much easier, now that it was no longer necessary to keep lodgers, for when there were lodgers in the house they always had beer, and her husband would drink with them. Other people have[27] spoken of the women drinking with the lodgers, and it was said that anyone who read the foreign-language newspapers would see many such advertisements as: "I am left alone with my three children; my wife has gone off with a lodger. Anyone having information, please communicate with..."

THE MAN WITHOUT A FAMILY

Life in a men's co-operative housekeeping establishment is usually more difficult, for upon them falls the burden of maintaining cleanliness in the household, and in many cases preparing their own meals. Some of the Mexican men visited at nine o'clock in the evening were preparing food for the next day's lunch. An important consideration here is the high cost of living under such conditions. The immigrant woman may not be a skillful buyer, but the immigrant man is evidently a most extravagant one. Among the Mexicans, for example, it was found that the men living in co-operative groups paid practically as much for the food which they themselves prepared as the men living in boarding houses paid for board and room. Their food cost seven to eight dollars per man per week.

These studies showed the same lack of opportunities for wholesome recreation and for meeting nice girls, as well as the same restlessness of the men as did earlier studies. This was especially[28] noticeable among the Mexicans, who spoke with longing of their Mexican dances that lasted two days and were held almost every week-end, and of the band concerts to which they could often go. No matter how poor their furniture, most of them had one or two musical instruments which they played, and usually there was one phonograph for the group. They found these poor substitutes for group music, where they could have not only the music but the social time.

In brief, these studies of nonfamily men in 1919 show that the problem of adequate housing and some form of normal social life for the men who come ahead of their families is a recurring one. The nationality of the group changes as one immigration wave succeeds another. With the change in nationality come minor changes in the needs and desires of the group, but the main problem remains the same. It should never be forgotten that the impressions these men receive during their early life in the United States form the basis of their judgment concerning American life. Moreover, the life they lead during this period of separation from their families must inevitably affect their family relationships when family life is re-established, whether it be in this country or in the country from which they come.

The first national recognition of the needs of[29] the men was evident in the plans of the United States Housing Corporation.[3] These provided for separate lodging houses for men, where each man had a room of his own, with an adequate amount of air space, and where bathing and toilet facilities were provided. Recreational needs were met by having a smoking room, reading room, and billiard room in each house, and, unless provided elsewhere in the community, bowling alleys in the basement. It has been repeatedly emphasized to us that the men would not be satisfied unless a lodging house for them were run by some one who could speak their language, knew their national tastes, and could understand their problems. The availability of houses of this type to the immigrant men in nonfamily groups would depend to a great extent on their administration, but it is apparent that such a housing plan is not impossible of attainment.

THE SINGLE WOMAN

It is not always the man who comes alone to this country. Often the girl comes in advance of the others and sends money back to bring over her parents and younger brothers and sisters. Attention has been called again and again to the hazards for the girl thrown on her own resources in a strange country among people she does [30]not know, whose language she does not understand.[4]

She has, in fact, the same problem to solve as the man who has come alone, but she is further hampered both by economic and social handicaps. She is probably from a country where the life of a woman has been protected and circumscribed, and to find herself in a country where the conditions and status of women are freer, makes both for confusion and complications. A false step is of more serious consequence to her than to a man, and without guidance and assistance she may sometimes take this in ignorance or thoughtlessness.

Equally changed are her living conditions here. She has the same ways of living open to her that are open to the man—boarding or lodging with a family group or setting up a co-operative household with a group of girls. The girl living in the latter way does not have as many difficulties as the man in the same situation, for women are used to doing housework. Yet if men find it too difficult to be both wage earners and housekeepers, it is surely too hard for girls.

If, on the other hand, the girl finds lodging with a family group, life is not much easier, for she is expected to help with the household tasks, [31]even though she is charged as much as the man lodger, who usually is exempt from any household responsibility. The inevitable assumption that any extra tasks of housework or sewing should fall to the women may make for a disproportionately long and tedious day for the woman lodger. The compensation of having the protection and sociability of a family group may thus be outweighed by the burden of overwork. Added to this, the prevalent necessity of overcrowding the households with boarders, puts a hardship upon women that often is not felt by men.

The need of providing adequate and safe lodging for the girl away from home has been felt in many places and by numerous organizations. Too often facilities have appealed only to the native born or thoroughly initiated immigrant girl. The International Institute of the Young Women's Christian Association has helped immigrants to find suitable homes. This has local branches in more than thirty cities, many of which are helping to meet the housing problems of the immigrant girls.

The government, in its housing projects, provided accommodations for the single girls similar to those provided for single men. They built boarding houses for from seventy-five to a hundred and fifty girls, with separate rooms and adequate toilet and bathing facilities. Each floor[32] had a matron's office, so placed as to overlook the entrance and access to the sleeping quarters, and there was either a reception parlor or alcove for every twenty women, or a large parlor with furniture arranged for privacy in conversation. An assembly hall was provided with movable partitions and set stage. Kitchenette, sitting room, and sewing room were provided on at least alternate floors, and the building contained an infirmary and laundry for the use of the girls.[5]

Information is not at hand as to whether any of these houses were used by groups of immigrant girls. Similar houses could, however, easily be made useful for them if care were taken to put them in charge of some one who understood the problems of the foreign-born girl. More desirable still are projects undertaken by groups of foreign-born women themselves.[6] In this way the problems and tastes of the different nationality groups are taken into consideration, confidence and co-operation on the part of the girls more easily won, and an independent and ultimately self-directed plan will be realized.

THE MIGRANT FAMILY

Even when all the family has reached this country the problems of migration have not always [33]ended. Many families do not establish a permanent home in the first place in which they settle, but move from place to place, and in each place there is a new set of conditions to which to adjust themselves. Of the ninety families visited in Chicago for this study, information on this point was obtained from only forty-two. Nineteen of these came directly to Chicago, but twenty-three had lived in other places. Five of them had been in the Pennsylvania mining district around Pittsburgh, two had been in North Dakota on a farm, two had been in a New Jersey manufacturing town, and the others had been at widely different places in other cities—New York, Philadelphia, Galveston, Texas, Boston—in small towns in the Middle West, and on plantations in Louisiana.

Some had moved several times. A Polish family, for example, had lived first in Boston, then in New York City, then somewhere in Canada, before they finally settled in Chicago. Another Ukrainian family, from Galicia, lived first in one mining town in Pennsylvania, then in another in the same state, and later moved to Chicago. The mother, who is a very intelligent woman, described her first impression of America when she, with her four children, arrived in the little mining town. She said that immigrants were living there, everything was dirty and ugly, and she was shocked by the number of drunken men[34] and women she saw on the streets, "having not been accustomed to see them in the old country." She wished to return immediately and did not even want to unpack her belongings. For a whole year she lived amid these squalid surroundings, until her husband got work in another town where conditions seemed a little better.

Sometimes these changes mean family separations, as the man again goes ahead, as he did in coming to this country. The experience of a Polish family is typical. When the family first came to this country they went to Iron Mountain, Michigan, where the father worked in the ore mines until he lost his health. Then a sister of his wife, who was living in South Chicago, invited him to visit her family, and offered to get work for him in the steel mills. He came, living with his sister-in-law, and after a few months obtained work in the mills. Then the mother and children followed him.

FROM FARMING TO INDUSTRY

Another fact to which attention should be called is the adjustment in family life required by contact with the modern industrial system. Some of the immigrant groups come from countries more developed in an industrial way than others, but none of the newer groups come from any country in which the factory system has become so prevalent as in the United States. In the old[35] country the family still exercised productive functions as a unit. It had access to tillable land, and was an essential part of an industrial system that is still organically related to the stage of development of the country. It had, therefore, within itself, the sources of self-support and self-determination. The civilization of which it was a part may be a declining civilization; but the conditions of life were those to which the wife and mother were accustomed. She took them for granted, felt at home among them, and was not conscious of being overwhelmed by them.

In the modern American industrial community, however, the family as a whole is generally divorced from land. It is not a unit in relation to the industrial organization, but in its productive function is usually broken up by it. For the family must live, and yet its income is dependent, not upon its size nor the volume of its needs, but upon the wage-earning capacity of the man under the prevailing system of bargaining. That the resulting income has often been wholly inadequate, even according to the modest standards set by dietetic experts and by social investigators, is testified to by an enormous body of data gathered during the decade preceding the Great War.[7]

[36]

It is unnecessary to review these studies in detail, but attention may be called to the findings of the Immigration Commission. Of the foreign-born male heads of households studied, 4,506, or 34.1 per cent, earned less than four hundred dollars a year at a time when dietetic experts agreed that five hundred dollars was a minimum below which it was dangerous for families to fall. Seventy per cent earned less than six hundred dollars.

These figures may be said to come from "far away and long ago," but while there has not been time for widespread inquiry, there is a considerable body of evidence indicating that the same condition prevails to-day. Wages have increased greatly during the war, but with the increase in prices there is doubt as to whether real wages have increased or decreased. Certainly the increase has been irregular and uneven, affecting the workers in some industries much more than in others.

The New York State Industrial Commission made a study of the average weekly earnings of labor in the factories of the state. They found[37] that between June, 1914, and June, 1918, wages had increased 64 per cent.[8] The United States Bureau of Labor Statistics made a study of food. Taking the year 1913 as the base, or 100, wages in 1907 were 92 and the retail prices of food, 82, and in 1918 wages were 130 and food 168. That is, the price of food increased much more rapidly than the average union wage scale between 1907 and 1918.[9]

As a result of these low earnings, the wife and children in many immigrant families have been forced into the industrial field and even then the resulting incomes have often been inadequate. The Immigration Commission found that almost one third of the foreign-born families studied had a total family income of under five hundred dollars, and almost two thirds had incomes less than seven hundred and fifty dollars.

Not only is the family income often inadequate and composite, but precarious and uncertain. The need for food is a regularly recurring need; the demand for labor may be seasonal, periodically interrupted, and in time of crisis wholly uncertain.

Although child labor laws have been enacted in many states and by the United States Congress, they are comparatively recent. Their absence in earlier years has had its inevitable [38]effect on many foreign born. Many of the leaders in the immigrant groups who came here when they were still children, tell of stopping school and going to work. One Lithuanian woman, who is among the more prosperous of the group in Chicago, said that she stopped school when she was twelve, and went to work in a fruit-packing concern, working ten hours a day and earning five dollars a week, which she gave to her father. Another worked as a cash girl in a downtown store at the age of thirteen. Similarly, in one of the Russian families now living in Chicago, the girls were fourteen and nine when they came to this country and settled in a New Jersey town. The older was sent to work at once, and the younger a year later. Now, after nine years in this country, neither girl can speak English.

The present laws are not always efficiently enforced, and the child of the foreign born suffers especially from such failure to enforce the law. In one of the mining communities of Illinois, visited in the spring of 1919, Italian boys as young as twelve were found working in the mines. In New Mexico, children of twelve and ten, and even younger, were taken out of school each year in the spring to go with their fathers to work on other men's farms or to herd sheep. Our investigator was impressed, in Rolling Prairie, with the need of including agriculture among the[39] occupations from which young children are prohibited as wage earners.

THE WAGE-EARNING MOTHER

Of the mother's work, notice must be taken. People interviewed in this study were almost unanimously of the opinion that immigrant women were adding to the family income in many cases. If the children are too young to be left alone, the father's inadequate income is supplemented by taking lodgers. Too often, however, the mother works outside the home for wages.

Indeed, a number of people were of the opinion that the employment of women has increased during the war. Among the more recently arrived Bohemians, for example, it was said that mothers of small children were going to work as never before, because taking lodgers was not possible, as single men have not been coming in such large numbers since the war. The older settlers felt that they must take advantage of the relatively high wages offered women to make payments on property. Lithuanian observers say that partly because of prejudice against it, Lithuanian married women have not gone out of their homes to work until recently. With the war, the increased cost of living, the higher wages offered to women, and the appeal that was made to their patriotism, many women had gone into industry,[40] especially to work in "the yards." Ukrainian and Slovenian women are also said to be working in large numbers, but Croatian women are still said to stay in their homes and contribute to the income by taking lodgers.

In addition to this testimony, which was obtained from leaders of the national groups, there is also the information obtained from individual families. Of the ninety women from whom information was obtained in Chicago, twenty were working outside their homes and twenty-four had lodgers at the time of the study. When it is remembered that these families were those who have worked their way through the first difficulties, these figures become doubly significant.

There is, for example, a Ukrainian family from the Russian Ukraine. It consists of the parents and four children between the ages of three and fifteen. Ever since the family came to the United States they have had one or more lodgers to help them pay the rent. At present they have three men paying four dollars a month each; and as the father, who had been working in the stockyards for nineteen dollars a week, was discharged two months ago, the wife has been working in a spring factory to support the family.

Then there is a Polish family, composed of the parents and four children under fourteen, two of them children of the man by a former wife. The father has been in this country since 1894,[41] but his wife has been here only since 1910. For two years after their marriage the wife worked at night, scrubbing from 6.30 to 9.30 p.m., and received twenty-four dollars a month. Then there was an interval while her children were babies, during which she did not work, but the family lived on the earnings of the father. For the last two years, however, his work has been slack, first because of a strike, and later due to an industrial depression in his trade, and the mother is again at work, this time in a tailor shop, earning ten dollars a week.

The effect of the mother's work in decreasing the child's chances for life has been made clear by the studies of the Children's Bureau in Johnstown,[10] Montclair,[11] and Manchester,[12] in all of which a higher rate of infant mortality was shown for children of mothers gainfully employed.

The effect of the mother's work on the family relationship and the home life of the family group is, of course, not measurable in absolute terms. The leaders of the various national groups, however, have repeatedly emphasized the fact that the absence of the women from the home has created entirely new problems in the family life. [42]They have pointed out that while the peasant women have been accustomed to work in the fields in the old country, their work did not take them away from their homes as the work in this country does. If they were away there was usually some older woman to take care of the children. Here the work of the mother frequently results in neglect of the children and the home.

In recognition of this fact attempts have been made to solve the problem. Among Slovenians it was customary, before the war made it impossible, to send the children back to the old country to their grandmothers to be cared for. One priest said he had seen women taking as many as twelve children to a single village. The Ukrainians in Chicago have talked of establishing a day nursery to look after their children, but the people are poor, and it has not been possible to raise the money. In the meantime children are not sent to the day nurseries already established, but are commonly taken to neighbors, some of whom are paid for taking care of ten or twelve children. This arrangement constitutes a violation of the city ordinance requiring day nurseries to be licensed, but is evidently a violation quite unconsciously committed by both parties to the transaction.

A group of nonworking Lithuanian women heard that neglected children were reported to the settlement in the neighborhood. One of the[43] women investigated, and found many children locked in houses for the day, with coffee and bread for lunch. One child, too small to shift for himself, was found with his day's supply of food tied around his neck. The women decided to open a nursery in charge of a Lithuanian woman who would be able to speak to the children in their own language, as few children below school age spoke English. The original plans were to accommodate ten or twelve children, but as soon as the nursery opened there were so many women wanting to leave their children there that it took as many as thirty children. The nursery was maintained for about eighteen months, and was then closed because of the difficulty of raising the necessary funds.

Some such plan must be developed that takes care of the foreign-born mother's work if she is forced to supplement the family's income outside of the home. The organization of family life that has grown up parallel with the industrial system assumes her presence in the home. When misfortune makes this impossible some provision for caring for the children must be found.

CHANGED DUTIES OF A MOTHER

Another changed condition in the life in this country is that the family group is usually what the sociologist calls the "marriage" group, as[44] distinguished from the "familial" group, which is generally found in the old country. The grandmothers and maiden aunts, who were part of the group in the old country, and who shared with the mother all the work of the household, are not with them in this country. The older women are seldom brought on the long journey, and the maiden aunt is either employed in the factory system, or she sets up a house of her own, so that in any event her assistance in the work of the household can no longer be relied on. It is perhaps the grandmother that is missed the more, because it was to her that the mother of a family was wont to turn for advice as well as assistance.

This decrease in the number of people in the household is not compensated for by the diminution in the amount of work, which is another fact of changed conditions. For in this country the housewife no longer spins and weaves, or even, as a rule, makes the cloth into clothing. She does not work in the fields, or care for the garden or the farm animals, all of which she was expected to do in the old country. The loss of the older women in the group, however, means that what tasks are left must all be done by her.

The duties of the housewife may not be as many, but the work they involve may be more. This is true, for example, in the matter of feeding the family. In Lithuania soup was the fare three[45] times daily, and there were only a few variations in kind. Here the family soon demands meat, coffee, and other things that are different from the food she has cooked in the old country.... Occasionally the situation is further complicated by the insistence of dietetic experts that the immigrant mother cannot feed her family intelligently unless she has some knowledge of food values. In other words, the work of the housewife was easy in the old country because it was well done—if it was done in the way her mother did it—and conformed to the standards that she knew. It could thus become a matter of routine that did not involve the expenditure of nervous energy. Here, on the other hand, she must conform to standards that are constantly changing, and must learn to do things in a way her mother never dreamed of doing them. And there is the new and difficult task of planning the use of the family income, which takes on a new and unfamiliar form.

In spite of all that has been taken out of the home the duties of the housewife remain manifold and various. She is responsible for the care of the house, for the selection and preparation of food, for spending the part of the income devoted to present needs, and for planning and sharing in the sacrifices thought necessary to provide against future needs. She must both bear and rear her children. The responsibilities and satisfactions[46] of her relationship with her husband are too often last in the list of her daily preoccupations, but by no means least in importance, if one of the essentials of a home is to be maintained.

The enumeration of the tasks of any wife and mother throws into relief the difficulties of the foreign-born mother. The all too frequent cases where homes are deprived of her presence emphasize how indispensable she is. All case-work agencies have had to grapple with the problem of families suffering this deprivation. It is these motherless families that make us realize how many tasks and responsibilities fall to the lot of the mother.

There was a motherless Russian family, consisting of the father and six children, the oldest a girl of thirteen and the youngest a five-month-old boy. For a time the family tried to get along without asking advice of an outside agency. The baby was placed with friends, and the thirteen-year-old girl stopped school to care for the five-room flat and the other four children. In a short time the family with whom the baby was placed wanted to adopt him, and refused to keep him longer on any other condition. At this time the Immigrant's Protective League was appealed to for help in placing the baby where he would not have to be given for adoption. They found the father making a pathetic attempt to keep the[47] home and children clean, and the oldest girl, Marya, trying hard to take her mother's place. The best plan they were able to work out for the family was institutional care for the youngest two children, nursery care outside of school hours for the next two, and the two oldest left to take care of themselves, although given lunch at the school. Marya, of course, was sent back to school, and she and her father share the housekeeping.

PATERNAL AUTHORITY PASSING

A third change should be taken into account. There is a marked difference between the general position of women and children in relation to the authority of the husband and father in this country and that in the old country. It is indicated in both general opinion and express statutory amendment in this country, although not in the so-called common law. The latter, in common with practice in the native lands of immigrants, provided that marriage gave the husband the right to determine where the domicile should be, the right "reasonably to discipline" wife and children, the right to claim her services and to appropriate her earnings and those of the children, the right to take any personal property (except "paraphernalia" and "pin money") she might have in full ownership, the right to manage any land she might become entitled to, and the right to enjoy the custody of the children,[48] regardless of the maintenance of his conjugal fidelity, in the absence of such obscene and drunken conduct on his part as would be obviously demoralizing to the young child.

There existed no adequate provision for enforcing the father's performance of either conjugal or parental obligations, and the result has been the development of two bodies of legislative change. One of these has granted to the wife certain rights as against the husband, on the theory that the wife retains her separate existence after marriage and should retain rights of individual action. The other body of statutes imposes on the man the duty of support, making abandonment or refusal to support punishable by fine or imprisonment, or both.

The theory of this legislation is that the support of wife and children is to be a legally enforceable duty, which may rightly be laid upon the man because of his special interest and special ability. Moreover, through the establishment of the juvenile court, the community has undertaken, not only to say that support must be given, but to set a standard of "proper parental care" below which family groups are not to be allowed to sink and still remain independent and intact. By creating the juvenile probation staff, an official assistant parent is provided. In the same way, by authorizing commitment of children to institutions, the dissolution of the[49] home that falls persistently to too low a standard is made possible.

The common law, as accepted in the various states, was not entirely uniform, but it was substantially the universal family law; now the states differ widely in the body of statutory enactments developed in this field. All have some laws recognizing the claims of children to have their home conditions scrutinized—though they may have no express juvenile-court law, all recognize to some extent the separate existence of the married women—though only twenty-one have given the mother substantial rights as against the father over their children, and they all recognize the parent's duty to secure the child's attendance at school, and have imposed some limitation on the parent's right to set his young child to work. In other words, in all the states the idea of the separate existence of the wife and of the interest of the community in the kind of care given the child has been embodied in legislation.

These statutes have been enacted by legislatures composed largely, if not exclusively, of men, and register the general change in the community attitude toward the family group. An unlimited autocracy is gradually becoming what might now be termed a constitutional democracy. But the law of the jurisdictions from which most of the immigrant groups come, undoubtedly[50] represents a theory of family relationship not widely different from that underlying the common law. The South Italian group, in which the right of the father to discipline wife and daughter is passed on to the son, may represent an extreme survival of the patriarchal idea; but almost all the foreign-born groups hold to the dominion of man over woman, and of parents over children.

Immigrant groups evidence their realization of the changed conditions in different ways. Among the Ukrainians in Chicago, for example, it is said that, whereas in the old country the men kept complete control of the little money that came in, here they very generally turn it all over to their wives. Some of them have laughed, and said that America was the "women's country." Among other groups, notably the Jugo-Slav and the Italian, there is said to be a general attempt to keep the women repressed and in much the same position they held in the old country. Sometimes the woman perceives the difference in the situation more quickly than her husband. Then if he attempts to retain the old authorities in form and in spirit, she may submit or else she may gradually lead him to an understanding. But she may not understand and yet may rebel and carry her difficulty to the case-work agency.

One of the settlements in Chicago is said to have become very unpopular with the men in its neighborhood, as it has the reputation of[51] breaking up families, because women who have been ill treated by their husbands have gone to the settlement to complain, and have there been given help in taking their complaints to court.

The Immigrant's Protective League in Chicago receives many complaints from women who have learned that their husbands have not the right to beat them or their children. One Lithuanian woman, who had been in this country six years, came to the league with the statement that her husband often threw her and their eight-year-old son out of the house in the middle of the night. Another Lithuanian woman living in one of the suburbs took her three children and came to Chicago to her sisters, because her husband abused her, called her vile names, and beat her. When the husband was interviewed he agreed not to do so again, and his family returned to him.

Of course, the theory underlying even the feminist "married woman's property laws" included not only her enjoyment of rights, but her exercise of legal responsibility; but the restrained exercise of newly acquired freedom is evidence of high social and personal development. And the women in the foreign-born groups come from the country, the village, the small town. They have had little education, their days have been filled with work, so that there has been little time for reflection, they come from a simple situation in which there was little temptation to do wrong.[52] They find here, on the other hand, a situation which is complex in the extreme, and in which there are elements that tend to make matters especially difficult for women.

Attention has already been called to the confusion created by the lodger in the home and the special temptation to the woman to desert her husband for the lodger. The relative scarcity of women in the group, the presence of large numbers of men who cannot enter a legal marriage relationship because they have wives in the old country, the spiritual separation that often results from physical separation caused by the man's coming ahead to prepare a place—all these are undoubtedly factors that enter in to make difficult the wise use of her freedom. Native endowment, moral as well as physical and mental, varies among these women as among other women. Confronted with this confused and difficult situation, the change from the old sanctions, the old safeguards, even the old legal obligations, is difficult.

It is inevitable that a few will find themselves unequal to the task of readjusting their lives. The father of one family came to the Immigrant's Protective League in Chicago, asking help because his wife had turned him out of his home. He said that she drank and was immoral. Instead of caring for the home and the two-year-old child, she spent her time behind the bar in her brother's saloon, having "a good time" with the[53] customers. She had deserted six weeks before, but he had found her and had had her in the Court of Domestic Relations, where he had been persuaded to take her back. He said she was still drinking and still neglecting the child. Shortly after asking the help of the league, the father ran away, taking with him the child whom the mother left alone in the house while she went to the "movies."

The women who assert themselves in their new rights are in a small minority. A young Polish woman complains that the women of her group are too submissive even in this country, and "bear beatings just as their mothers did in the old country." In the great majority of foreign-born families, as in all families, the question of the legal rights of the woman is never raised. The habits and attitudes formed under the old system of law and customs are carried over into the life in the new country, and are changed so gradually and imperceptibly that no apparent friction is caused in the family group. Moreover, in many cases where the woman perceives her changed position she is able to make her husband see it too, and she herself is able to work her way through to a new understanding. It is interesting to note that the women of the foreign-born groups who have worked their way through are now bending their energies toward helping the women who have not yet started.

[54]

III

THE CARE OF THE HOUSE

The work that the housewife must do in the care of the house is the maintenance of such standards of cleanliness and order as are to prevail. It includes the daily routine tasks of bedmaking, cooking, sweeping, dusting, dishwashing, disposing of waste, and the heavier work of washing, ironing, and periodic cleanings.

NEW HOUSEKEEPING CONDITIONS

The foreign-born housewife finds this work particularly difficult for many reasons. In the first place, housekeeping in the country from which she came was done under such different conditions that it here becomes almost a new problem in which her experience in the old country may prove of little use. The extent to which this is true varies from group to group. To understand the problems of any particular group, careful study should be made of the living conditions and housekeeping practices in the country from which it came.

Some of the women with whom we have conferred[55] have described housekeeping as they knew it in the old country. These descriptions are suggestive of the character of the change and the difficulties involved. Mrs. P., a Polish woman from Posen, for example, said that:

Houses in the village in which she lived were made of clay, with thatched roofs, clay floors, and about ten feet high. They were made in rows, for four families or two families, with one outer door opening from a hall into which the doors from all the dwellings opened. Each dwelling had one small window, and a fireplace. Water was out of doors. In the four-family house there were two chimneys. The outside door did not open into the road.

FLOOR PLAN OF HOUSES IN POLAND

The floors were covered with sand, and new sand was put on when the room was cleaned. The fireplace had a hook from which hung the kettle, and in one corner was the oven, a little place set off by a board covered with clay. Walls were whitewashed. Mrs. P. said that the housework is much more difficult in this country, with the cleaning of woodwork, washing windows, care of curtains, carpets, and[56] dishes, and more elaborate cooking. In the old country the family washing was done only once a month, except in cases where there were small children. Then it was done weekly; and if the family lacked sufficient clothing, the washing had to be done oftener. There the meal was one dish, from which the entire family ate; here there is a variety of food and each person has his own plate and eating utensils, so that even the dishwashing is a greater task. In coming to this country many women do not see that the windows need washing or that the woodwork should be cleaned, etc.

The beds were made of boards covered with straw, not as a straw mattress. Sheets were laid over the straw to make it softer. Each person had two pillows, very large and full, so that they sleep in a "half sitting" position. Feather beds are used for warmth, and no quilts or blankets were known in the old country.

Lithuanian women, likewise, have pointed out that at home most of the women worked in the fields, and that what housekeeping was done was of the simplest kind. The peasant house consisted of two rooms, one of which was used only on state occasions, a visit from the priest, a wedding, christening, or a funeral. In summer no one sleeps in the house, but all sleep out of doors in the hay; in winter, women with small children sleep inside, but the others sleep in the granary. Feather beds are, in these circumstances, a real necessity. Thus the bed that is found in this country is unknown in Lithuania, and the women naturally do not know how to care for one. They not only do not realize the need of airing it, turning the mattress, and changing[57] the bedding, but do not even know how to make it up properly.

Other processes of housekeeping—dishwashing, scrubbing, and washing—prove equally difficult, and it is said that most of the women do things in the hardest possible way, chiefly because the processes are different here and they lack the technique to do their work in the easier way. Naturally, too, when work in the fields has occupied most of their time, they lack also habits of order and routine in their household tasks.

The Italian women, especially those from southern Italy and Sicily, have also spoken of their difficulties in housekeeping under new conditions. In Italy the houses, even of the relatively well-to-do peasants, were two-room affairs with earthen floors and little furniture. The women had little time to give to the care of the house, and its comfort and order were not considered important.

The experience in doing the family washing is said to typify the change. In Italy washing is done once a month, or at most, once a fortnight, in the poorer families. Clothes are placed in a great vat or tub of cold water, covered with a cloth on which is sprinkled wood ashes, and allowed to stand overnight. In the morning they are taken to a stream or fountain, and washed in running water. They are dried on trees and bushes in the bright, Italian sunlight. Such methods of[58] laundry work do not teach the women anything about washing in this country, and they are said to make difficult work of it in many cases. They learn that clothes are boiled here, but they do not know which clothes to boil and which to wash without boiling; and as a result they often boil all sorts of clothing, colored and white, together. In Italy washing is a social function; here it is a task for each individual woman.

DEMANDS OF AMERICAN COOKERY

Cooking in this country varies in difficulty in the different national groups. In the case of the Lithuanians and Poles, for example, the old-country cooking is simple and easily done. Among others it is a fine art, requiring much time and skill. The Italian cooking, of course, is well known, as is also the Hungarian. Among the Bohemians and Croatians, too, the housewives are proverbially good cooks and spend long hours over the preparation of food. Croatian women in this country are said to regard American cookery with scorn. They say that Croatian women do not expect to get a meal in less than two or three hours, while here all the emphasis is on foods that can be prepared in twenty or thirty minutes.

It is not always easy to transplant this art of cookery, even if the women had time to practice[59] it here as they did at home. The materials can usually be obtained, although often at a considerable expense, but the equipment with which they cook and the stoves on which they cook are entirely different. The Italian women, for example, cannot bake their bread in the ovens of the stoves that they use here. Tomato paste, for example, is used in great quantities by Italian families, and is made at home by drying the tomatoes in the open air. When an attempt is made to do this in almost any large city the tomatoes get not only the sunshine, but the soot and dirt of the city. The more particular Italians here will not make tomato paste outdoors, but large numbers of Italian families continue to make it, as can be seen by a walk through any Italian district in late August or early September.

In general, in the groups in which cooking was highly developed, a great deal of time was devoted to the preparation of food. If the housewife wishes to reduce her work in this country, she finds that some of the ingredients which make our cooking simpler are unknown to her. The Bohemians, for example, do not know how to use baking powder, and the same is true of the women in Lithuanian, Polish, and Russian groups, where the art of cooking is less developed.

With this lack of experience in housekeeping under comparable conditions, the foreign-born[60] housewife finds the transition to housekeeping in this country difficult at best. As a matter of fact, however, the circumstances under which she must make the change are often of the worst. She is expected to maintain standards of cleanliness and sanitary housekeeping that have developed with modern systems of plumbing and facilities for the disposal of waste that are not always to be found in the districts in which she lives. Even a skillful housewife finds housekeeping difficult in such houses as are usually occupied by recently arrived immigrants.

WATER SUPPLY ESSENTIAL

In the first place, there is the question of water supply. Cleanliness of house, clothing, and even of person is extremely difficult in a modern industrial community, without an adequate supply of hot and cold water within the dwelling. We are, however, very far from realizing this condition. In some cities[13] the law requires that there shall be a sink with running water in every dwelling, but in other cities even this minimum is not required. The United States Immigration Commission, for example, found that 1,413 households out of 8,651 foreign-born households studied in seven large cities, shared their water supply with other families. Conditions [61] have improved in this respect during the last decade, but it is a great handicap to efficient housekeeping if water has to be carried any distance. Further inconvenience results if running hot water is not available, which is too often the case in the homes of the foreign born.

THIS PUMP SUPPLIES WATER TO FOUR FAMILIES

Cleanliness is also dependent, in part, upon the facilities for the disposition of human waste, the convenient and accessible toilet connected with a sewer system. These facilities are lacking in many immigrant neighborhoods, as has been repeatedly shown in various housing investigations. For example, in a Slovak district in the Twentieth Ward, Chicago, 80 per cent of the families were using toilets located in the cellar, yard, or under the sidewalk, and in many cases sharing such toilets with other families. One yard toilet was used by five families, consisting of twenty-eight persons.[14] The danger to health, and the lack of privacy, that such toilet accommodations mean have been often emphasized. In addition, it enormously increases the work of the housewife and makes cleanliness difficult, if not impossible.

There is also the question of heating and lighting the house. Whenever light is provided by the oil lamp, it must be filled and cleaned; and [62]when heat is provided by the coal stove, it means that the housewife must keep the fires going and dispose of the inevitable dirt and ashes. In the old country the provision of fuel was part of the woman's duties; and in this country, as coal is so expensive, many women feel they must continue this function. Here this means picking up fuel wherever it can be found—in dump heaps and along the railroad tracks. A leading Bohemian politician said that he often thought, as he saw women prominent in Bohemian society, "Well, times have changed since you used to pick up coal along the railroad tracks."

OVERCROWDING HAMPERS THE HOUSEWIFE

The influence of overcrowding on the work of the housewife must also be considered in connection with housekeeping in immigrant households. That overcrowding exists has been pointed out again and again. Ordinances have been framed to try to prevent it, but it has persisted. In the studies of Chicago housing a large percentage of the bedrooms have always been found illegally occupied. The per cent of the rooms so occupied varied from 30 in one Italian district to 72 in the Slavic district around the steel mills. The United States Immigration Commission found, for example, that 5,305, or 35.1 per cent, of the families studied in industrial centers used all rooms but one for[63] sleeping, and another 771 families used even the kitchen.

Crowding means denial of opportunity for skillful and artistic performance of tasks. "A place for everything and everything in its place," suggests appropriate assignment of articles of use to their proper niches, corners, and shelves. One room for everything except sleeping—cooking, washing, caring for the children, catching a breath for the moment—means no repose, no calm, no opportunity for planning that order which is the law of the well-governed home. Yet there is abundant evidence that many families have had to live in just such conditions.

The housework for the foreign-born housewife is often complicated by other factors. One is the practice to which reference has been already made of taking lodgers to supplement the father's wages. In discussing this subject from the point of view of the lodger, it has been pointed out that the practice with reference to the taking of boarders and lodgers varies in different places and among different groups. The amounts paid were not noted there, but they become important when considered together with the service asked of the housewife. Usually the boarder or lodger pays a fixed monthly sum—from $2 to $3.50, or, more rarely, $4 a month—for lodging, cleaning, washing, and cooking; his food is secured separately, the account being[64] entered in a grocery book and settled at regular intervals.

Sometimes the lodger does his own buying, but the more common custom is to have the housewife do it. Occasionally he does his own cooking, in which case payment for lodging secures him the right to use the stove. More rarely, as in some of the Mexican families visited in Chicago in 1919, he is a regular boarder, paying a weekly sum for room and board.

Just what keeping lodgers means in adding to the duties of the housewife can be seen from the following description of the work of the Serbo-Croatian women in Johnstown, Pennsylvania:[15]

The wife, without extra charge, makes up the beds, does the washing and ironing, and buys and prepares the food for all the lodgers. Usually she gets everything on credit, and the lodgers pay their respective shares biweekly. These conditions exist to some extent among other foreigners, but are not so prevalent among other nationalities in Johnstown as among the Serbo-Croatians.

In a workingman's family, it is sometimes said, the woman's working day is two hours longer than the man's. But if this statement is correct in general, the augmentation stated is insufficient in these abnormal homes, where the women are required to have many meals and dinner buckets ready at irregular hours to accommodate men working on different shifts.

The Serbo-Croatian women who, more than any of the others, do all this work, are big, handsome, and graceful, proud and reckless of their strength. During the progress[65] of the investigation, in the winter months, they were frequently seen walking about the yards and courts, in bare feet, on the snow and ice-covered ground, hanging up clothes or carrying water into the house from a yard hydrant.

WOMEN WORK OUTSIDE THE HOME

Another factor that renders housekeeping difficult is the necessity of doing wage-paid work outside the home, to which reference has already been made. Women interviewed have repeatedly emphasized the difficulties that this practice creates in connection with the housekeeping.

A recent study of children of working mothers, soon to be published by the United States Children's Bureau, carried on at the Chicago School of Civics and Philanthropy, obtained the testimony of the mothers as to the difficulties involved. This study showed that in many cases the household duties could not be performed at the proper time; 60 women, for example, of the 109 reporting on this question, said that they did not make their beds until night; 105 said their dishes were not washed after each meal, but in 41 cases were washed in the mornings, and in 56 not until night. Three washed them in the morning if they had time, and five left them for the children, after school.

Many women who worked outside the home did their housekeeping without assistance from other members of the family. This meant that[66] they had to get up early in the morning and frequently work late at night at laundry or cleaning; 49 women, for example, washed in the evening; 25 washed either Saturday, Sunday, or evenings.

HOUSING IMPROVEMENT

Enough has probably been said to show that the work of caring for the house under the conditions existing in most immigrant neighborhoods, is unnecessarily difficult for the foreign-born housewife. The most obvious point at which these burdens might be lightened so that the housewife could have time for other duties, would appear to be through improvement of housing. With an awakened realization of this fact, both on the part of the foreign-born woman herself and the community of which she is an inevitable part, will come the solution of these difficulties. A protest, however inarticulate or indirectly expressed by her, will find its response in a growing realization that plans for improvement must be developed.

The several housing projects that have already been offered are suggestive of the problems and possibilities along this line rather than useful as hard-and-fast solutions. They not only meet the needs of the more inadequate immigrant housing conditions, but provide improvement upon most native-born conditions. In this connection interest naturally centers on the war-time[67] housing projects of the United States government, on the experiment of the Massachusetts Homestead Commission at Lowell, and on certain enterprises carried out by so-called limited dividend companies. The first two are especially interesting, in that they recognize that supplying houses to the workers is not a function that can be wholly left to private initiative.

It is not possible to discuss these projects in detail, nor is it necessary.[16] It is sufficient to consider them here with reference to the contributions they might make in helping the immigrant housewife. In the first place, they provide for a toilet and a bath in every house, and a supply of running water that is both adequate and convenient. In the matter of kitchen equipment there is an attempt to provide some of the conveniences. Both provide a sink and set wash-tubs equipped with covers. They must be set at a minimum of thirty-six inches from the floor in the United States plans. Both make provision for gas to be used for cooking, although the coal stove is accepted. The kitchens in the Massachusetts houses are also provided with kitchen cabinets, with shelves under the sink, and with a drain for the refrigerator.

In other ways also consideration for the housewife [68]is evidenced. Electricity is urged for lighting, passages through which furniture would not go are avoided, the size of the living room is adapted to the sizes of the most commonly purchased rugs, etc. Study of the Massachusetts plans reveals other interesting features, such as the care given to the location of the bathroom and the attention to the size of the doors, so that the mother at work in her kitchen can watch the children at play in other rooms.

Both projects are interesting also in that they realize the necessity of a "front room" or parlor, and prescribe a minimum number of bedrooms—three in the Massachusetts, and two in the United States experiment. Both require closets in every bedroom wide enough to receive the men's garments on hangers, and rooms of such size that the bed can stand free of the wall and out of a draught. It is evident that the plans for houses in both projects provide very definite improvements in the matter of the conveniences to which the immigrant is not accustomed in the houses at present available to him.

Some limitations, however, become apparent by comparing them with the recommendations of the Women's Subcommittee of the Ministry of Reconstruction Advisory Council, England. That committee emphasizes the importance of electricity for lighting, and urges "that a cheap supply of electricity for domestic purposes should[69] be made available with the least possible delay." The American plans agree that electricity is the preferred lighting, but gas is accepted by the United States government, although not by the Massachusetts plan. There is no suggestion of developing a cheaper supply of electricity.

The English women also suggest the desirability of a central heating plant as a measure that would lessen the work of the household, afford economies in fuel, and render a hot-water supply readily available. They urge, therefore, further experimentation with central heating. The American plans have no suggestions to make at this point, but accept the coal stove or the separate furnace in the higher-priced houses as the means of heating. While they provide for hot water, no suggestions are made as to how this is to be supplied. It is presumably done by a tank attached to the range, which means that hot water is not available when there is no fire in the range; that is, in summer and during the night. It should also be noted that these plans make no suggestions for co-operative use of any of the equipment of the household.

There is another point at which the architects and builders failed to take sufficient notice of the problem of lightening the women's work—namely, in their attitude toward the separate family home as compared with the multiple family dwelling. The Massachusetts Commission[70] was, by the terms of the Act creating it, limited to the provision of one or two-family houses; the United States government standards were definitely against the building occupied in whole or in part by three or more families.

Tenement and apartment houses are considered generally undesirable, and will be accepted only in cities where, because of high land values, it is clearly demonstrated that single and two-family houses cannot be economically provided, or where there is insistent demand for this type of multiple housing.

This judgment, however, has by no means met with universal approval. Those architects who think in terms of the woman's time and strength consider the merits of the group and of the multiple house. For example, those who planned the Black Rock Apartment House Group in Bridgeport, Connecticut, the open-stairway dwellings, the John Jay dwellings on East Seventy-seventh Street, New York City, and the Erwin, Tennessee, development, maintain that the advantages of the separate house in privacy, independence, and access to land can be secured by the multiple arrangement. Not only can economies in the use of the land be practiced, but protection and assistance for the women and children can be obtained, and there is the possibility of devices for convenient and collective performance of many tasks.

It is unnecessary to review the arguments for[71] the one or for the other. It is evident that the group house, and perhaps the multiple house, offer such inducements in the economy of space and the possibility of assigning areas of land to definite and anticipated uses, that their further adaptation to family needs must be contemplated. It is generally assumed that the family group wants the separate house. The question of interest for this study is one of the desire of the immigrant groups in this respect. Their preference should be an indispensable element in the formulation of housing standards.

There is not, however, a great deal of evidence on this subject. The fact that immigrants live in the city in the congested districts may only indicate that they have had no choice in the matter. Most of the officers of certain immigrant building and loan associations interviewed for this study thought there was a preference for the single-family dwelling when it could be afforded. That also is the belief of the investigators in this study, who think that the use of multiple houses indicates not the immigrants' desires, but their acceptance of what is before them, and that the dream of almost every immigrant family is to have a house of its own, to which is attached a little garden.

How far the desire for the separate house is confused with the desire for the garden would[72] be difficult to say. It is certain, however, that in general the immigrant has known only one way to have the garden, and that was by having a separate house. There is universal agreement that especially the foreign-born family desires access to land for whose cultivation they may be responsible, and whose produce both in food and in flowers they may enjoy. Recently, however, certain architects have been interested in working out plans by which this advantage might be retained for dwellers in group or tenement houses. They have pointed out that one advantage of the group and multiple house is the setting free of spaces to be more skillfully adapted to the size and composition of the family.

Attention may be called to certain devices that are urged by experienced architects in the matter of the use of land. For example, in the Morgan Park, Minnesota, development of the Illinois Steel Company, the architects have developed interesting plans in connection with their low-cost houses. These are all group houses, with a front space opening on an attractively planned street. At the rear of the house is a latticed porch—a small area graveled, but not grassed—and then the alley. Across the alley is the rear garden, which may thus be fenced in and kept separate from the house lot.

A COMMUNITY PLAN SUBMITTED BY MILO HASTINGS IN THE AMERICAN HOUSING COMPETITION, 1919, SHOWING THE U VARIATIONS, THE BACK SERVICE STREET, THE PROVISION FOR REAR GARDENS, AND THE OPEN AREAS ON WHICH ALL THE HOUSES WILL FRONT
(Reprinted by permission from the Journal of the American Institute of Architects, June, 1919)

Interesting suggestions on this point are to be found in the two articles, to which prizes were[74] given by the American Institute of Architects in the June and July, 1919, numbers of their journal. There is much experimentation yet to be done, as the question of the separate house with its separate plot of ground is by no means a settled one. It is particularly desirable that the interest of the foreign born be enlisted, both that they may contribute to the solution of the question and that they may become acquainted with all the possibilities of access to the land which are being worked out.

In spite of some defects and the need for further experimentation along the lines suggested above, there is no doubt that the projects of Massachusetts and of the Federal government mark a very real advance. The most pressing need is to construct a sufficient number of these houses so that they may be available for immigrant groups. One means of doing this is by the employer's building houses for the workers to buy or to rent. Although this has sometimes been found to help solve the housing situation, factors may enter that limit its usefulness. The industrial relationships between employer and employee may be such that subsidy for housing by employer would hinder rather than help. Where a community is largely comprised of one industry it may be very unwise for the industry to go so far toward the control of community affairs. Labor unrest in the northern iron ranges[75] can be traced in part to such company provision of housing and sanitation.

The limited dividend company, organized not for profit, and operating under the careful supervision of a governmental department, is another solution. This agency has been particularly successful in Massachusetts under the stimulus as well as under the supervision of the Massachusetts Homestead Commission, and is undoubtedly capable of further development.

GOVERNMENT BUILDING LOANS

Another possibility is that the local or state government advance the money and enable the worker to buy his own home. That is the plan adopted by the Massachusetts Homestead Commission in its experiment at Lowell. It is also one of the policies adopted by the Canadian government, which will loan money to provincial governments to be advanced for building houses on land owned (a) by the provincial or municipal government, (b) by the limited dividend company, (c) by the workman himself. This latter plan would probably commend itself most readily to the foreign-speaking groups.

Direct loans by the local government to the worker are advocated in the careful and thorough plan worked out by Mrs. E. E. Wood.[17] One suggestion [76]is a proposed amendment to the Postal Savings Law, authorizing loans from postal savings deposits to workers with annual incomes not in excess of twelve hundred dollars. The investigation of the application is to be in the hands of the nearest local housing board. A suggested amendment to the Farm Loan Act is that housing loans be made by the Farm Loan Board on the same terms on which farm loans are now authorized. It is interesting to note that this plan contemplates the continued activity of the building and loan associations with which the foreign born are already familiar. It suggests that the first loan be given by the government and the association be content with a second mortgage, receiving in return the greater stability that is secured from a transaction carried on under governmental supervision.

According to Mrs. Wood's report, before 1915, 700,000 houses had been built or acquired in the United States through the aid of building and loan associations.[18] She thinks that the moderately paid wage earner, but not the unskilled worker, was benefited. This conclusion is disputed by officers of four building and loan associations in Chicago interviewed in connection with this study. That the associations reach the foreign-speaking groups seems to be evident from [77]the names in the Annual Report of the auditor of the state of Illinois for 1918. The Bohemians had the largest number of societies, and the Poles were second. The Italians alone of the large national groups were unrepresented.

Mrs. Wood's plan also calls for a national housing commission in the Department of Labor, to be created under congressional act, with organization and powers analogous to those exercised by the Federal Board for Vocational Education. For the use of this commission it is proposed that a fund be created by the issue of bonds, from which loans could be made to certain designated agencies for the clearance of congested areas and the increase of housing facilities.

The Federal legislation is to be supplemented according to Mrs. Wood's plan by state legislation, including:

1. A restrictive housing law, a constructive housing law, and a Town Planning Act. This plan contemplates a state commission on housing and town planning through which the Federal aid for the state would be made available; to which should be intrusted the responsibility of investigating and approving or disapproving housing schemes proposed by local agencies and associations.

2. A state fund similar to the Federal fund is proposed, and definite suggestions for its use are worked out. For the local authorities, local housing[78] and town-planning boards, probably with the county as the basis of organization, are proposed.

This housing fund, composed of the Federal fund, the state fund, and in some cases local funds, is to be used to make loans to municipalities, housing organizations that are not organized for profit, limited dividend companies, co-operative associations, or even employers. The plan contemplates that the lowest paid wage earners, among whom are numbered a large per cent of the foreign born, should continue to rent; but the landlord should not be a private individual seeking to make profit from providing the workers with shelter.

The plan also takes note of the plan for co-partnership ownership adopted by the United States Housing Corporation. The main features of this arrangement are:

1. Ownership vested in a local board of trustees bound to operate the property in the interest of the tenants and until the property is fully amortized in the interest of the government.

2. Formation of a tenants' association to which all residents of three months are eligible on payment of small yearly dues. This association to elect a tenants' council to act as directors of the association, to confer with the board of trustees, and to carry out such duties as trustees direct.

3. Any tenant may become a co-partner by[79] applying for bonds to the amount of 25 per cent of the value of his dwelling, and accompanying his application with a cash subscription of one half per cent of this.

4. Tenant co-partners are given a voice in the management by the right to elect trustees, the number increasing with the amount of subscriptions to bonds.

5. Tenant co-partners granted remission of one month's rent a year.

6. Tenant co-partners leaving or desiring to discontinue as co-partners have the right to sell their bonds to trustees at par.

Mr. A. C. Comey, the author of the plan, says of it:[19]

Such a co-partnership scheme as this will present to workmen a unique opportunity for saving, for not only will they get as high a rate of interest as a safe investment justifies, but they will be to a large degree custodians of their own security and will thus be able to protect their investments in much the same way as actual home owners. On the other hand they will avoid most of the pitfalls of home owning, such as loss through deterioration of a neighborhood, forced sales in case of departure, and inability to realize on assets locked up in private homes. Moreover, they will tend to develop a high degree of community spirit, usually so lacking among apartment dwellers, and thus take more interest in public affairs and become better citizens generally.

These are advantages which it would be especially desirable for the foreign-born groups, as [80]many of them have experienced the pitfalls of home ownership. It is a complicated system and would have to be explained in detail to the various groups. The medium for such explanations is at hand in the foreign-language press and in the immigrant societies, and the effort that it would involve is surely worth making. It should also be noted that it is not so complicated a system as the land tenure in many of the countries from which the immigrants come.

INSTRUCTION IN SANITATION

The subject of housing reform as a means of easing the housewife's task was considered first, as it is useless to talk of helping her in her work until she is given some of the conveniences with which to work. It is evident, however, that that is not all that is necessary for the foreign-born housewife. She is not accustomed to the use of a house of the size contemplated by the proposed plans—the Italians, Lithuanians, Poles, Russians, Hungarians, and doubtless others have known only the one and two-room house—and there is always the possibility that, given more rooms, they may be used to take in more lodgers. Such was the case, for example, in the relatively adequate houses provided by the United States Steel Corporation at Gary.

It is not necessary, however, to use the method of that corporation, and turn out of the houses[81] persons who need instruction in the use of the house. Persuasion and instruction in the uses of the special features of the house could have been tried. It might have been possible for the rent collector or a sanitary inspector with a social point of view to establish friendly relations on their regular visits to the families. With confidence gained and tact displayed, much in the way of education could be accomplished. To construct houses so that each room can serve one and only one purpose would in part meet the difficulties. Above all, patience and a realization of the difficulties that the foreign-born housewife meets, are essential.

A point on which some architects lay special stress in the structure of low-cost houses is the devotion of the entire first floor to cooking and living uses—not sleeping. That is, the living room, dining room, and kitchen are either combined or so open into each other that no temptation is offered to close off part for sleeping purposes. The bedrooms are then on the second floor, each room having only one door, and the bathroom and the storage space are slightly elevated above the second and offer no temptation to be used for purposes other than those for which they are designed. If, then, families inexperienced in the use of modern accommodations come into the community, they may perhaps be helped to an understanding of modern[82] devices by the experience of living in houses arranged in this way.

Both the rent collector, if it be a case of tenancy, and the building official, if it be a case of ownership, should not only understand the principles of sanitation and hygiene, but should understand the people they serve. To render the best service to immigrant groups, such officials must speak the language of the group and understand something of its peculiarities. They should, in fact, be public assistant housekeepers, through whose assistance the gradual and voluntary initiation of our foreign-born neighbors into community life can take place. New standards of efficiency and new amenities can be developed. Our community life might, then, be freed from the old physical dangers connected with human adjustment to physical surroundings, and take on new dignities suitable to a democratic and adequate life for the whole people.

There remain the difficulties described at the beginning of the chapter, which come from the fact that the processes of the work of caring for the house are different in this country from those in the country from which the foreign-born housewives came. These difficulties are not so easy to solve as those of housing. They are undoubtedly surmounted as time goes on, but it is a gradual process. Many forces are at work. Necessity[83] is probably the primary one. The foreign-born woman early learns to use American cooking utensils and fuel because they are all she can get. She has to feed her family with the only food the store at the corner furnishes. American furniture and furnishings soon attract her attention, and she is curious as to their purposes and uses.

In part, the foreign-born housewives have learned from one another; that is, from the members of the group who have been here longer; and in part they have learned by going into the more comfortable American homes as domestic servants. Those who have done the latter are, usually, the girls who come alone or the elder daughters of the family. In some communities, such as a Bohemian community near Dallas, Texas, it is said to be well understood that the girl will learn domestic science by a kind of apprenticeship in the home of her employer. When she has learned what she thinks sufficient, she leaves to practice in her own home and to show her family how things should be done. The limitations and difficulties of domestic service for the inexperienced immigrant have been well set forth in the reports of various protective societies.[20] But the foreign-born women with [84]whom we have conferred in this study have repeatedly emphasized the advantages that come from being shown how to do housework under the conditions in this country. Yet women of the "new" immigrant groups enter domestic service much less than those from the "old" ones.

In the end, no doubt, many foreign-born housewives have learned to care for their homes and raise their families as systematically as their American neighbors, who have had fewer difficulties to contend with. It is, however, a wasteful system which leaves the instruction of the immigrant housewife to the chance instruction she can gain from fellow countrywomen who have themselves learned only imperfectly. If the community only realized what the difficulties were for the housewife from a different civilization, it would undoubtedly stretch out a friendly and helping hand to assist her over the first rough path. Whatever form this help takes, it must be offered in the spirit of friendly co-operation, and not of didactic superiority, if the desired result is to be gained.

[85]

IV

PROBLEMS OF SAVING

There has been in the past much harsh and thoughtless criticism of the foreign-born groups, because of the extent to which they have seemed able and willing to subordinate present necessities and enjoyments to provide for certain future contingencies.

PRESENT AND FUTURE NEEDS

Many of those who come to this country are in debt for their passage. Others have left near relatives at home who must be helped to come over. Some have come, intending to establish themselves and to be married here. Some expect to take back a part of their earnings to better the condition of those left behind. Their coming, whether to stay permanently or to return, often does not relieve them of their obligations to the group in the old country.

One of the strongest impressions that the reader gets from the letters in The Polish Peasant is that of the frequency with which relatives in[86] the old country ask for money from the one who has gone ahead. It is not only his wife and children, or aged parents, that ask for money, but all the members of the wider familial group, and sometimes even friends with no claim on the score of kinship.

The purposes for which they ask money are various; in the Borek series, for example, a son of the family is asked to send money because the family is in debt and has taxes to pay; to send money for the dowry of his sister; for a forge; for a sewing machine, and for a phonograph. He is also told that if he sends money home it will not be wasted, but will be put out at interest. Other claims for money are put forward in other series, possibly the most common one being a request for a steamship ticket. The letters show clearly that it is customary to send money for fête days, "name days," or birthdays, Christmas, Easter, and other occasions. A failure to do so brings reproach coupled with a reminder that others who had gone from the village had sent money. In the Wrobelski series the family ask money from the member in this country for a new church at home. Every Sunday the priest reads aloud the names of those who have contributed. It therefore seems to the immigrant imperative that from his present earnings certain amounts shall be set aside.

When the first hard times are past and the[87] members of the immediate family are reunited, there comes the reaction to the experience of depending on the money wage. There arises the fear of disaster growing out of interruption of the income, or misfortune involving especially heavy expenditure.

The United States Treasury Department in its "Thrift" campaign lays down the doctrine save first and spend afterward.[21] This is what the members of the foreign-born groups have long been doing, and probably this policy is the only possible basis for a rational use of one's resources. Yet doing this gives rise to comment on the "low standard of life." And thrift often seems to border on miserliness.

Indeed, the problem is by no means so simple as the use of the categorical imperative would indicate. The whole question of deciding between the claims of the present and of the future is a very difficult one. The economist gives us little definite help. He lays down the so-called "rule of uses" and tells the housewife so to apply her resources that the utility extracted from any unit may be at least as great as if that unit were applied elsewhere. Now the foreign-born housewife, like other housewives, has certain resources of money and time and strength, and these she wishes to distribute wisely. But she labors under [88]many disadvantages, of which it is only fair to take notice.

UNFAMILIARITY WITH MONEY

In the first place, her income is in an unfamiliar form. There is first the fact that the money units are strange to her. A woman who recently came over, being called on to make an unexpected payment, handed her purse to a fellow traveler, asking that the required amount be taken out. In the second place, for many there is the difficulty growing out of the exclusive dependence upon money payments, when before there were both money and the products of the land.

The fact should always be kept in mind that, to the extent to which the foreign born are from rural districts, they have the difficulty experienced by all who are forced to adjust themselves to an economy built on money, as distinguished from an economy built on kind. In the country where things are grown, there is little opportunity for acquiring a sense of money values.

It is then peculiarly difficult to value in terms of the new measure those articles with which one has been especially familiar under the old economy. For example, when vegetables and fruits have been enjoyed without estimating their value, it is difficult to judge their value in money. While[89] meat was before thought out of reach, it may be purchased at exorbitant rates under the new circumstances, because one has no idea of how much it should cost. Evidence as to this kind of difficulty is found among all groups. It takes the form, sometimes, of apparent parsimony, sometimes of reckless and wasteful buying.

The Lithuanians seem, for example, to experience difficulties of this kind everywhere. The small farmer in Lithuania was accustomed to an irregular cash income at harvest time. Sometimes it carried over from one year to another, while young stock was growing. He had little need of money except for extraordinary expenses, such as those for farm machinery, or building. The local store, which was usually co-operative, carried only such imported articles as salt, sugar, spices, tea, and coffee. All other foods were produced at home or secured through neighborly exchange. All the clothing for the family was of home manufacture, even to the cloth. If a boy were sent to school in the nearest large town, his board was paid with poultry and dairy products.

The tenant laborer had house rent free, a garden, a cow, a few pigs, and all the poultry he cared to raise, in addition to the yearly wage of from 125 to 150 rubles a year.

Other farm laborers had board and clothing in addition to their wage of 25 rubles a year. Women[90] received 3 rubles a year for farm labor, in addition to board and all ordinary clothing. The food provided by the farmers was coarse and monotonous, but it was plentiful and nourishing. Laborers were housed in two-room log or board houses, with thatched roofs; farm workers without families slept in the farmer's granaries and ate at a common table.

To the inexperienced peasant the daily wage of $1.50 and $2 in the United States seemed ample, but it was not long after the family arrived before it was found inadequate. The situation becomes still more confusing if employment is seasonal and irregular. In Lithuania, contracts were made by the year and unemployment was unknown. Through apprehension they begin to adopt a low standard of living in order to economize, a practice now common in many Lithuanian communities in this country. They have never paid rent in their native country, so one of their first instincts is to economize at that point in the new country by taking lodgers.

Among other national groups there are evidences of the same difficulties. Bohemian women, it is said, buy recklessly at first, spending money for jewelry and all sorts of things they see for sale in the neighborhood stores. Ukrainian women control the expenditure of the family income here, but in the village life in Galicia[91] they never had much money to spend; the table was supplied from the farm, clothing was of home manufacture, furniture was seldom bought. They are, therefore, when they first come, little fitted by previous experience for wise expenditure of the family income.

IRREGULARITY OF INCOME

To these difficulties are added those connected with the uncertainty and irregularity of wage payments and with the length of intervals recurring between these payments. The ways in which periods of unemployment and consequent cessation of income are met are illustrated by the following experiences described by those with whom we have conferred.

The story of how the mother or children have gone out to work, of how boarders have been taken into the home, savings have been spent, money has been borrowed from friends, or charity has been accepted, occurs over and over in the experience of all the national groups. A Ukrainian mother tells how she and the older children at various times have worked during the father's unemployment. A few years ago, when it lasted for two years, she was no longer strong enough to work, and they sold their home in order to keep the children in school.

Another Ukrainian family has of late depended upon the earnings of the children and savings,[92] but there have been times when they had nothing in the house but water, and could not buy food. A Polish mother borrowed money of the Jewish grocer when her savings were gone and her earnings insufficient. One Bohemian family had to draw on their savings in the building and loan association during a year of unemployment.

RESERVES FOR MISFORTUNES

It is easy, then, to understand how out of the most meager present income some provision for possible disasters will be attempted. The urgency of this claim of the future explains the fact that the possession of a balance at the end of the year constitutes no evidence that the income for the year has either been adequate or been regarded as adequate. The social investigator has found savings taken from the most inadequate incomes; and judgment has been sometimes passed on the "low standard of life" of the immigrant, when a moment's sympathetic consideration of the problem would have discovered the explanation in the ever-present fear of being caught unprepared.

The occasions for which this provision is made are, to be sure, not all of the nature of an unexpected disaster; they are, often, the ordinary events of life. There is, first, the constant possibility of sickness and of death. After the establishment of the family group, these perhaps make[93] the first claim on the family's savings. The fear of these events may be so great that even the well-being of the children in the present may be sacrificed. For example, a Polish widow with two children, who was being supported by the United Charities in Chicago, was found to have a bank account of $192.57 which she had saved from her allowance of $3 a week in addition to her rent. When the visitor talked with her about it, she explained that she was afraid of dying and leaving her children unprovided for, and that her husband had always told her to put away part of her income.

While the need for providing for dependents is thus felt, most wage earners realize that they cannot during their own lifetime lay aside enough money to provide for their children. The most that they can do is to provide some life insurance. Even this, in most cases, must be entirely inadequate, since the premiums mean a great drain on the family's resources.

In a study of 3,048 families in Chicago, the Illinois Health Insurance Commission found that 81.9 per cent of all the families carried some kind of life insurance. The average amount of the policy, however, was only $419.24. The following table shows for the various nationalities in the group the per cent carrying insurance and the average amount of the policy.[22]

[94]

TABLE I

Number and Per Cent of Families Carrying Life Insurance, and Average Amount of Policy According to Nativity of Head of Family

It is interesting to note that the Bohemians are among the national groups showing the largest per cent (88.9) of families having life-insurance policies. They also show the largest average policy ($577.58) of any national groups, including the native-born white.

The method by which this particular provision is made is often through the fraternal order, the benefit society, and the form of commercial insurance known as industrial insurance. The fraternal orders that are used by foreign-born groups are usually societies of their own national group, such as the Polish National Alliance, the Croatian League of Illinois, the Lithuanian National Alliance.[95] They differ from the benefit societies, such as the Czecho-Slav Workingman, the Znanie Russian Club, and the Congrega di Maria Virgine del Monte Carmelo, in that the fraternal orders are organized under the state laws governing fraternal insurance societies, are incorporated, and usually have a more than local membership. Most of the benefit societies are small local societies without national affiliation, often not observing good insurance principles and without the needed succession of young lives.

These types of insurance were made the subject of special study by the Illinois Health Insurance Commission of 1919. The judgment of the Health Commission as to the value of these organizations is, that the fraternal societies, although they are democratic, co-operative, and nonprofit-seeking organizations, thus being particularly attractive to wage earners, are often not on an actuarially sound basis.[23] The benefit societies of the foreign born present an even more precarious means of providing for future needs.[24] Sooner or later they find that the dues must be increased, their membership declines, and the period of decay sets in.

Industrial insurance provides a safer method than either of these, but it presents a number of other disadvantages.[25] The policies are usually [96]small, sufficient only for burial expenses, and the rates are relatively high because of the bad risk among the wage earners, and especially because of the expense of weekly collections. Here, as everywhere, the poor who must buy in small quantities get relatively less for what they pay.

It is often urged against industrial insurance that it makes no real provision for dependents, and merely pays for a somewhat elaborate funeral. It must be borne in mind that the funeral, however modest, is an expense that often places the family in debt, and that even the thriftless will try to make some provision for it. The following expense account of the funeral of a Polish man is typical of the accounts received during this inquiry, and exhibits no unusual expenditure when compared with American customs:

It is a matter of common knowledge that unscrupulous undertakers often obtain possession of the insurance policy and make the charge for[97] the funeral equal to the whole amount. This may, in part, explain the criticism that the funerals in foreign-born families are often unnecessarily expensive. An Italian woman interviewed, the president of one benefit society and a member of four others, speaks of going to buy a casket at the time of the death of a friend during the influenza epidemic. The cheap, wooden casket cost $150. The next day, when she went with another friend to the same undertaker, the casket which had been $150 cost $175. She could not understand how such prices could be allowed, and exclaimed, "The government regulates prices of flour and sugar, and why not such things as the cost of coffins in times like these!"

There may also be expenses connected with the service itself. In some churches the tolling of the bells must be paid for by the mourners, and sometimes it is the poorest who will insist that the bells be tolled the longest. In a church in South Chicago it is said that the parishioners paid for the chimes with the definite understanding that the bell-tolling at funerals should no longer be a special charge. The need of provision against sickness and death is keenly felt in every immigrant community. One of the older women, who had been frequently called into the homes in cases of sickness and death, said that in sickness there was never money for the doctor, or night[98] clothes, or bedding, and in case of death never enough of anything.

THE COST OF WEDDINGS

After providing for sickness and death, a family must lay aside the sum necessary to secure an advantageous marriage for the daughter, and to meet her family's share of the wedding. Similarly, the young man anticipates marriage as a natural development in his life. It is interesting to consider the share of the cost borne by the girl's family and that borne by the young man, and to notice also certain customs connected with the wedding itself that contribute toward the expense.

The customs connected with weddings which have grown up in the old country may, when transplanted, mean an expense which seems entirely out of proportion to the family's economic status, especially when American customs are added to those of the native country. An Italian woman says that weddings were, as a rule, much simpler in Italy than in the United States. There a maid of honor and "other frills," such as automobiles, flowers, and jewelry, were unknown. A large feast, usually of two days' duration, was customary, and is continued here, even in a city. A hall must be rented for the dance, and when food prices are high the cost is enormous.

To avoid the expense of renting a hall which[99] would cost $100 for six hours, a recent Italian wedding reception in Chicago was held in the butcher shop owned by a cousin of the bridegroom. The living rooms in the rear were used for the dinner, and the shop itself became the ballroom. The floor was crowded, and the children had to be turned out into the street to play, but the enjoyment of the party was evidently not at all lessened by the somewhat incongruous surroundings. The fact that there is near by not only a great settlement where a comfortable hall might have been available, but likewise a park house similarly equipped, is perhaps indicative of a failure of these institutions to meet the very needs of the neighborhood they are designed to serve.

It is an Italian custom for the father of the bride and the father of the bridegroom to share the expense of the feast, although the bridegroom sometimes pays for the music and the hall, and the bride's family furnish the food. An Italian pastry dealer says that the amount spent for pastries varies from $15 to $120, and an equal amount is spent in home baking. For well-to-do families the expenditures may be much larger; for example, one family recently spent $200 for pastry alone.

There is, however, a feature of the wedding feast which reduces the cost to the family. It is customary, when the party is assembled after[100] the wedding, for the bride to be placed on a "throne," and the guests place their presents of money in her lap. Money is usually given, although useful articles for the home are sometimes included. The greater the number of guests invited perhaps the lower the net cost of the ceremony.

The other principal expense of the Italian bride's family is for the bridal linen and the girl's underwear. These, of course, vary with the circumstances of the family. These articles are usually the accumulation of several years.

The bridegroom pays the other costs. He buys not only the household furniture and his clothing, but the wedding ring, earrings, a gift for the bride, and some of her clothing. If the girl is poor he may even buy her underwear and the linens. It is said that these things often cost all the bridegroom's savings, and that the couple start married life with nothing saved for emergencies. The expense of the bridegroom in a recent Italian wedding in Chicago was $2,000.

It is the custom for the man to buy for the bride a complete costume for two days—the wedding day and the eighth day—when the newly married couple return the calls of the wedding guests. An Italian saleslady in a store in the Italian district says that the amount usually spent on the bride's clothes is $200 or $250. The very least spent in these days is $100, and the[101] outfit may cost as much as $500. When the family is a recently arrived one, the man usually accompanies the girl or her mother to the store and pays the bills on the spot.

Among other groups as well as among the Italians it seems to be customary for the bridegroom to bear part of the expense of the wedding and of the bride's outfit. The Polish bridegroom often gives $50 to the bride, and she buys her clothes, linens, and the food for the feast. The Russian girl gives a white handkerchief to the groom, and he pays for her dress.

Another item in the expenses of a wedding is the cost of photographs. It is the custom in most foreign-born groups to have large photographs, not only of the bride and groom, but of the whole wedding party. The Polish people also have another picture of the bridesmaid taken with the best man. These photographs cost as much as $30 a dozen and at a higher rate if less than a dozen are ordered. The number ordered depends on the economic condition of the family, but the minimum is six of each. The pictures of the bridal party are the largest and most expensive and are usually given only to the immediate family and the attendants. The smaller pictures of the bride and groom are given to all the friends and relatives, especially those in the old country. This is an important means of keeping up the connection with those at home. An enlarged and[102] colored copy framed in an ornate gilt frame is usually ordered for the newly married couple, and is an added expense.

The cost of automobiles is also important. The bridal party, and sometimes the guests whom it is desired to honor, are taken to the church, then to the photographer's, and then to the hall where the feast and dance are held. Sometimes as many as six automobiles are observed drawn up in front of one of the little photographers' shops in an immigrant district.

Many people seem to think that the festivities among the foreign born are becoming simpler. The extravagance is perhaps again a question of the transition to a money economy. The ceremony in the old country was an occasion for great celebration, with feasting and dancing for several days, but was perhaps not expensive when the necessary articles were produced at home or received in exchange for home products. Here the immigrant family does not at first realize the real value of the money which seems so plentiful, and the old customs are not only carried out, but elaborated because of the added feeling of prosperity.

In many ways the old customs are now being modified. Among the Polish, for instance, the guests used to give presents of money, practically buying a dance with the bride. The custom has been frequently abused here, as the men have[103] divided their gifts into small parts and demanded many dances with the bride, often causing her to dance so much as to cause serious fatigue. For this reason we heard of one bride who simply "walked with the plate" instead of dancing. Another story is told of a wedding in a Polish community, at which the men threw dollars at a plate. The one who was successful in breaking the plate might dance with the bride.

This Polish custom of giving money gifts offsets to a large extent the cost of the wedding. Among three Polish families visited, one whose wedding cost $200 collected $60; another spent $150 and collected $160; and a third spent $200 and collected $300. But this custom, too, tends to disappear in the second generation. A young Russian couple, for instance, were opposed to a regular collection, but the parents, who consider it the blessing to their daughter, could not resist each leaving a ten-dollar bill as they left. The young people were embarrassed, but the other guests quickly followed the suggestion, and $100 was collected.

CHRISTENINGS AND FÊTE DAYS

This naïve solicitation of gifts is also practiced on the occasion of the christening of the infant. An unmarried godmother may be preferred because, having no children of her own, she is more able to make handsome gifts at the time and to[104] continue her contributions. One young Russian girl, whose marriage with the father of her unborn child was arranged by a social worker, asked the new friend to serve as godmother, and then expected an outfit for the infant in christening robes, little veils, and other articles, costing about $75.

Observers interested in customs in immigrant districts say that the custom of soliciting gifts at christenings was modified during the war. Among Polish families, for example, each guest used to make a present in money to the child who was christened. During the last few years it has become more and more customary for the collection to be taken for the benefit of Polish war orphans. The amount collected is then announced in the paper and serves as a source of prestige to the family.

There are also numerous fête days and religious celebrations which call for special expenditure. It is impossible to consider all these here, but attention should be called to an important event in the religious life; namely, the occasion of the first communion. The expenses for the confirmation of a boy are not great. He usually has a new suit and wears a flower in his buttonhole. He must have beads, prayer book, and, if he is Polish, a candle.

One little Polish girl who made her first communion in the summer of 1919 had an outfit that[105] cost her $30. This did not represent the entire cost, as she had several parts of the outfit given to her; her godmother made the dress, although the little girl herself furnished the material; the veil with the wreath of flowers was given her by a nun who had taken an interest in her, and the candle, which it is still customary in Polish churches to carry, was given by a cousin who is a nun. She had to buy the material for her dress, white slippers, stockings, and long white gloves, beads, flowers, and photographs. If she had herself borne all the expense, a minimum estimate of the cost would be $50.

BUYING PROPERTY

A third motive for saving is the desire for home ownership or for acquiring land. There is no doubt that to own a home of their own is the desire of most immigrant families. Many of them come from countries where the ownership of land carries with it a degree of social prestige that is unknown in more highly developed communities of the modern industrial civilization.

Representatives of the Bohemians, Lithuanians, Poles, and Italians have all emphasized the fact that their people want to own their own homes, and bend every energy toward this end, so that the whole family often works in order that first payments may be made or later payments kept up. The Croatians, Slovaks, Hungarians,[106] and Slovenians are also said to be buying houses, although, as they are newer groups, they have not yet done so to the same extent as the other groups. The Serbians, Rumanians, Bulgarians, and Russians in Chicago are, on the other hand, said to be planning to return in large numbers to the old homes in Europe, and hence are not interested in buying property in this country. Their feeling for the land and their desire to own their homes in the country in which they decide to settle is said to be as strong as in the other groups.

The longing for home ownership was apparent in the family schedules we obtained, and in studies of housing conditions[26] in certain districts of Chicago we find additional evidence of the immigrants' desire to own their own homes, and the way in which this desire leads many to buy, even in the congested districts of the city. The following table gives the number and the percentage of home owners in eight selected districts. It will be noted that the percentage of owners varied from eight in one of the most congested Italian districts known as "Little Sicily," to twenty-four in the Lithuanian district.

The strength of the desire for homes can also be measured by the sacrifices which many of the [107]families make to enable them to acquire property. It means in some cases the sacrifice of the children's education, the crowding of the home with lodgers, or the mother's going out to work. In fact, immigrant leaders interviewed seem to think that women's entrance into industry during the war was largely due to the desire to own their own homes. After the title to the house is acquired, it is often crowded with other tenants to help finish the payments.

TABLE II

Number and Per Cent of Immigrant Home Owners in Different Chicago Districts

The housing studies in Chicago furnish many illustrations of this sacrifice.[27] For example, among the Lithuanians in the Fourth Ward, there was a landlord who lived in three cellar rooms so low that a person more than five feet [108]eight inches tall could not stand upright in them. The kitchen, a fair-sized room with windows on the street—though its gray-painted wooden walls and ceiling served well to accentuate the absence of sunlight, was merely gloomy, but the other two rooms were both small and dark, with tiny lot-line windows only four square feet in area. In one of these rooms, 564 cubic feet in contents, the father and one child slept; the other, which contained only 443 cubic feet, was the bedroom of the mother and two children. One of the highly colored holy pictures common among the Lithuanians and Poles, though it hung right by the window, was an indistinguishable blur.

The agency through which the purchase is made may be either the real-estate dealer of the same national group, or, more commonly, the building and loan association. The real-estate agents to whom the foreign-speaking immigrants go are like the steamship agents, the immigrant bankers, the keepers of special shops. Those who are honest and intelligent render invaluable services; those who wish to exploit have the same opportunity of doing so that is taken advantage of by the shyster lawyer, the quack doctor, the sharp dealer of any kind who speaks the language and preys upon his fellow countrymen. Reference has been made in an earlier chapter to the services rendered by the building and loan associations in enabling the foreign born to obtain[109] homes. They also render services in providing the means for safe investment for those with only small sums to invest.

BUILDING AND LOAN ASSOCIATIONS

These societies are frequently organized along national lines. For example, among those listed in 1893 by the United States Commissioner of Labor[28] are the Bohemian Building and Loan, organized February 1, 1886; the Bohemian California Homestead (February 15, 1892); the Bohemian National Building Loan and Homestead (January 30, 1888); the Bohemian Workingmen's Loan and Homestead (April 20, 1890); the Ceska Koruna Homestead (May 6, 1892); the King Kazimer the Great Building and Loan (January 27, 1886); the King Mieczyslaus the First National Building Loan and Savings Bank (June 3, 1889); King Zigsmund the First Building and Loan (April 15, 1891). December 1, 1918, there were 681 such organizations in Illinois; 255 of these were in Chicago and the majority were conducted and patronized by the foreign born.

The following is briefly the method by which the building and loan associations perform the two services of providing for investment and lending money on homes:[29]

[110]

The stockholder or member pays a stipulated minimum sum, say one dollar, when he takes his membership, and buys a share of stock. He then continues to pay a like sum each month until the aggregate of sums paid, augmented by the profits, amounts to the maturing value of the stock, usually $200, and at this time the stockholder is entitled to the full maturing value of the share, and surrenders the same.

A shareholder who desires to build a house and has secured a lot for that purpose, may borrow money from the association of which he is a member. Suppose a man who has secured his lot wishes to borrow $1,000 for the erection of a house. He must be the holder of five shares in his association, each share having as its maturing value $200. His five shares, therefore, when matured, would be worth $1,000, the amount of money which he desires to borrow.... In a building and loan association the money is put up at auction, usually in open meeting on the night or at the time of the payment of dues. Those who wish to borrow bid a premium above the regular rate of interest charged, and the one who bids the highest premium is awarded the loan. The man who wishes to build his house, therefore, and desires to borrow $1,000, must have five shares of stock in his association, must bid the highest premium, and then the $1,000 will be loaned to him. To secure this $1,000 he gives the association a mortgage on his property and pledges his five shares of stock. To cancel this debt he is constantly paying his monthly or semimonthly dues, until such time as the constant payment of dues, plus the accumulation of profits through compounded interest, matures the shares at $200 each. At this time, then, he surrenders his shares, and the debt upon his property is canceled.

ITALIANS HAVE THEIR OWN FINANCIAL CENTER AND LABOR MARKET IN BOSTON

In some cases the sums paid are fifty or even twenty-five cents a week, and the shares may be $100 instead of $200. Among some groups shares are taken in the name of each of the children, and the investment constitutes an educational fund.[111] There are those, however, for whom the building and loan has not provided adequate opportunity for deposit and safe investment. It is probable that the building and loan has proved most efficient for the income group $1,500-$1,800. For the group below that, home ownership is for the time impossible. As a device for saving, for both the lower and higher income groups, who come from countries familiar with similar devices, the postal savings banks are supposed to offer efficient, honest, and convenient service.

POSTAL SAVINGS BANKS

These banks were established under an act that went into effect June 25, 1910. Under this law, as amended May 18, 1916, persons over ten years of age may deposit any amount, providing the balance to the credit of one depositor does not exceed $1,000. Two per cent interest is paid on deposits, and there is provision for exchange of deposits for United States bonds of small denominations.

The facilities thus provided were immediately taken advantage of by the foreign-born groups, and the postal savings banks became almost banks for the foreign born. That is, in September, 1916, 375,000, or 80 per cent, of the total number of depositors were persons of foreign birth, and they owned 75 per cent of the deposits. In proportion to population the deposits were in[112] 1916 about eleven times as great as those of the native born (due allowance being made for the age of the two population groups). The Greeks, Italians, Russians, and Hungarians, all coming from countries in which there are postal savings arrangements, found it especially easy to make use of them.

The department felt, however, that the facilities could be greatly extended, even among the foreign born. Therefore, circulars describing the organization, methods, and advantages were distributed. They were written in the following languages: English, Bohemian, Bulgarian, Chinese, Croatian, Danish, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Hungarian, Italian, Japanese, Lithuanian, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Ruthenian, Serbian, Slovak, Slovenian, Spanish, Swedish, and Yiddish.

In spite of the fact that this system is characterized not only by security, but also by certain democratic and convenient features especially serviceable to many foreign born, there are certain limitations to which Professor Kemmerer has called attention in the following statement:

As a matter of fact, the interest rate paid is so low that it makes a very weak appeal to the class of people who deposit in the postal savings banks. Their motive is primarily security. The government is now realizing large profits from the postal savings system—for 1916 the estimated[113] profit was $481,816—and this profit is coming from a class of people in the community, the thrifty poor, from whom it is bad social policy to take it. Of course it would be administratively impracticable to pay interest to depositors on average daily balances—no savings banks do that. Would it be expecting too much, however, to ask for our postal savings depositors the allowances of interest on half yearly or even quarterly balances? Moreover, is it unreasonable to ask the Board of Trustees, in view of the nomadic character of our foreign-born population which patronizes the postal savings system most, to devise a simple system of transfer by which a depositor who is changing his place of residence may transfer his postal savings account without forfeiting his accumulated but yet undue interest?[30]

Not only should the postal savings bank law be amended, rendering it more flexible and more attractive, but there should also be enacted in those states in which no such legislation is yet on the statute books, laws regulating the conduct of banks, steamship companies, and all agencies receiving deposits or otherwise performing banking functions.

It is clear that the foreign born, during the early years of their residence in the United States, encounter all the difficulties of others whose incomes are inadequate and precarious, and are also the easy victims of special forms of exploitation. In addition, they find themselves unfamiliar with the standards and customs connected with the great events of family life. In [114]the matter of weddings and funerals and other ceremonial occasions there is no reason to expect them to be wiser, more economical, and farsighted than the native-born group.

In the adjustment between future and present needs, foreign-born housewives need, as most housewives need, instruction in the art of spending, in the selection of food and clothing, and the variety of demands for which provision must be deliberately made in a modern industrial community. In an earlier and simpler situation provision for these needs was made without conscious effort.

In this connection it is interesting to note that the "Thrift Leaflets" prepared by the United States Department of Agriculture and the Department of the Treasury for the war saving stamps thrift campaign, urged care in the use of articles and dealt with prevention of waste rather than with saving. Obviously, if goods were more carefully used, more could be saved and invested in the securities thus being indirectly urged. It is conceivable, however, that wise use may mean the purchase of better food, the selection of more satisfactory clothing, and the enjoyment of better housing, rather than investment in government or any other securities. The thrift campaigns of the United States Treasury proposed standards of saving only for those receiving an income of $1,200 or more, with the[115] exception of unmarried persons earning as much as $780.

ACCOUNT KEEPING

The basis of sound saving or spending is the account book, carefully kept over an interval of time, allowing comparison between the outlay and enjoyment as experienced at different periods. Such account books are being urged by the extension departments of the state agricultural colleges in co-operation with the Departments of Agriculture.

Most account books that have been so far devised are, however, quite difficult and uninteresting, even for the American housewife, demanding classifications of items which require too much time and consideration. An account book on a weekly basis, providing very simple divisions of the expenditures of the household, and giving space also for the personal expenses of the various members of the family, has been published by the Committee on Household Budgets of the American Home Economics Association.[31]

These books could be easily issued in different languages and be made available for the foreign-born housewife. She, like all housewives, would be benefited by seeing what she is spending her [116]money for. It would lead to a definite planning of her expenditures. By this means it could be suggested that things may have changed in value for her in the new country. Old wants are replaced by new ones, and a new system of saving and spending might be worked out.

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V

THE NEGLECTED ART OF SPENDING

Saving is the problem of over there, and of the future. Spending is the problem of here and now, and in the expenditure for present needs as well as in saving for future wants the foreign-born housewife meets with special difficulties. She is handicapped by the kinds of places at which she must buy, because of language, custom, and time limitations, as well as the grade of article available. Through the complicated maze of choices open to her she must steer her way to obtain for her family the highest returns for an all too small expenditure. The art of spending, too often neglected by her native-born sisters, takes on added difficulties for the untrained immigrant woman.

From the point of view of the housewife the desirable thing is that the transaction of buying her household goods and food and of selecting her house, shall be as simple as possible. It should be made easy for her to know the quantity and to judge the quality of any article she considers, so that she may the more easily compare its possible[118] use to her with the use of other articles that might be secured for the same amount of money. It is also important that she have as definite ideas as possible as to the range of the demand for different kinds of goods, so that she may buy as few as possible of the goods on which the price of special risk is placed. In many cases she needs really expert advice. In the absence of such help she may do her buying in either of two states of mind. She may think that all merchants are cheats, there "to do her and to do her first," or she may think that she has a right to expect from the dealer frank and kindly advice.

In the present state of the retail organization she may find either attitude. In shops kept by her co-nationals she will naturally have the utmost confidence. This puts the small neighborhood stores in a position of peculiar privilege, and makes it doubly easy for them to take subtle advantage of the unwary customer. Even when the dealer takes no special advantage of his customer, in following the general practice of the trade, he can create innumerable situations in which her problem is rendered more, rather than less, complicated. The indefinite package is substituted for the definite weight or measure. The "bars" of soap vary in weight and in composition. The trade mark used to tell her that X made goods whose quality she knew; the trade name, based on incalculable sums spent in skillful[119] advertising, tells her nothing that is of intrinsic use to her. It connects a name with a repeated suggestion that she buy. By the trading stamp, the premium, and the bargain counter the merchant tries to persuade her that she is getting more than she pays for. He appeals to the gambling instinct and introduces into a drab life something of the excitement of the roulette table.

THE COMPANY STORE

In mining communities and other places in which there are "company stores," there is the pressure exercised by the employer to force the employee to deal only with the company store, even when there are other stores in the neighborhood.

The United States Immigration Commission had something to say on this point. It made it clear that, while there are instances of an employer giving his employees a fair deal when he becomes merchant and they purchasers, the combination of employing and merchandising functions is often perilous. Even if the employee appears to have a choice, he fears the loss of his job if he does not buy at the company store. The evils connected with so-called "truck payments" have long been recognized. They change only in form when the company check replaces the old payment in kind.[32]

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In some states this evil has been recognized by legislation prohibiting the combination of industrial and merchandising functions. Where such is the case, as in Pennsylvania, the statute is evaded. A separate corporation is organized by the same individuals, or a store is conducted by an individual who is a member of the mining corporation. Where there is a "store" administered in any of these ways, "company checks" may be issued between pay days. Or "store books" may be issued, the items purchased being recorded, and deducted on pay day from the wages of the employee.

The Immigration Commission published a table[33] of the expenditures at such stores, the amounts deducted from the wages, and the proportion of earnings left to be collected at the end of the month, illustrating the confusing effect of these practices on the housewife whose income should be a settled and regular amount. While some of the Croatians and Magyars spent hardly a fourth or a third of their earnings at the company store, others in the same national groups collected on pay day less than a fifth or even less than a tenth of their earnings. From this balance must come the payments for rent, medical service, entertainment, school, for all things other than food, clothes, and furniture.

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It may be that in some cases the employee is able to secure at the company store as good articles as he can obtain elsewhere and for the same prices, but this is by no means common. In West Virginia it was found necessary to enact legislation forbidding a company which ran a store to charge its own employees higher prices than the employees of other companies were charged.[34] The Immigration Commission found not only that in some cases the stock was inferior and the prices high, but that there was a sense of compulsion that made it almost impossible to adjust income and needs.

It is hardly necessary to point out that the supply of housing accommodations by the employer has the same influence as the supply of food and clothing. The power as employer may be, and often is, exerted to fix the conditions under which the family life goes on; and the tenant is deprived of the experience of selecting, of choosing, of balancing what one gives with what one gets.[35]

A similar objection may be raised to payment of wages by check. In the old days, before the world went dry, one service the saloon was frequently [122]called on to render was that of cashing checks. Either payment in "lawful money" or an opportunity to exchange at once for lawful money is the only method of paying wages that gives the housewife her full opportunity.

SHOPPING HABITS

The immigrant housewife is restricted by her ignorance of places and methods of marketing, and so feels the necessity of buying in the immigrant neighborhood. Among the 90 Chicago families from whom schedules were obtained, representing Bohemian, Croatian, Italian, Polish, Russian, Serbian, Slovak, Slovenian, and Ukrainian groups, 72 purchased all their food in the neighborhood stores, 2 kept their own stores, and only 16 were seeking bargains in other localities. Among these 16, 5 were going to larger business centers near their neighborhood, 4 bought in downtown department stores, 1 used a mail-order house, 1 went to a well-established "cash and carry" store, 2 bought in the wholesale markets, and only 2 took advantage of the co-operative association of their own group.

The 72 families who were marketing exclusively in their own neighborhoods were patronizing for the most part stores owned by foreign-speaking people or those employing foreign-born salesmen to attract the housewives of particular groups. A Croatian woman says that[123] when she tries to do her marketing downtown she sees many new things and would like to ask what they are used for, but she does not know how to ask. In her neighborhood store the grocer can easily explain to her. One Polish woman reads the advertisements in the papers and buys where there is a sale. She thinks that an alleged Polish co-operative is expensive and prefers the large department stores, but for the first few years she bought everything in her neighborhood where the clerks speak Polish.

The prevalence of the immigrant store may be illustrated by a detailed study that was made of the Sixteenth Ward in Chicago. The population of the ward is predominantly Polish, with an intermingling of Jewish, German, and Slovak in the southern portion. In the twenty-five blocks there are 113 retail stores, 44 of which are grocery and delicatessen stores, meat markets, and bakeries. In one block there are 5 grocery and delicatessen stores, and at least 1 in every block which has any stores. Most of these shops are small and crowded, with family living rooms in the rear. For the most part, the nationality of the proprietor is that of the majority in the block, and there are only 14 proprietors of all the 113 stores who are not Polish.

The difficulty with the language, however, extends beyond merely talking in the store. A Ukrainian mother, who admits being afraid to[124] go beyond her own neighborhood, is perhaps typical of many foreign-born mothers to whom a trip to the central shopping district is a strange and terrifying adventure.

There is also the question of the means with which to buy. An Italian mother says that she buys at the chain store when she has the cash, and at other times in the Italian stores where, although the prices are higher, she can run a charge account. The system of buying on credit at the local store is spoken of as practically universal in all the foreign-born groups. The purchaser carries a small blank book, in which the merchant enters in large figures merely the sum charged, with no indication of what was bought or the amount. The account is settled on pay day by the man of the family. There is, of course, every chance for inaccurate entry. It is not surprising, then, that one hears from many sources that buying food is generally extravagant.

Women often do the buying. Whether or not it is the more common among foreign-born families than among native born for the children to be sent to the store, we cannot say. Since the marketing is done so largely in immigrant stores, there is perhaps not the need for an English-speaking member of the family to do the purchasing. We find among 89, 43 mothers who still do all their own buying, 32 who allow[125] the children to do part, 4 who share the task with the father, and only 10 who never do any of the buying. In this last group of 10 families there are 7 in which the children do all the marketing and 3 in which it is done by the father.

Even the skilled housekeepers have little experience in buying. At home they were used to storing vegetables in quantities; potatoes in caves, beets and cabbage by a process of fermentation, other vegetables and fruits by drying. In the United States this sort of thing is not done. There is, in the first place, no place for storage, and the initial cost of vegetables is high and quality poor, and the women know nothing of modern processes of canning.

It is difficult to discover the general practice with regard to the quantity of food bought at one time, since it must necessarily vary considerably. Meat, milk, bread, perishable fruits and vegetables must usually be purchased daily. As for staple food, the thrifty housewife will buy in as large quantities as she can afford in order to save both money and time.

Reference has been made, however, to the lack of storage space and the consequent necessity of buying very little at one time. Thirty-three, or two fifths, of the 81 foreign housewives who were interviewed on this subject report that they buy food in daily supplies; 1 buys twice a[126] day and 1 for each meal. Forty, however, buy in larger quantities. Twenty-nine for the week and 11 for a month at a time. Six say that they buy whenever they have the money. It must never be forgotten that among the lower-income groups, to have more in the house is to have more eaten, and that cannot be afforded.

Besides the high prices, one of the other limitations of the foreign-born neighborhood store is the low quality of the food. This may be illustrated by a description of the markets in one Lithuanian neighborhood back of the stockyards, where men are working at low-grade labor in the yards, and the women are keeping lodgers, where few speak English and not many ever go more than a few blocks from home. The typical market in this neighborhood—and there are sometimes as many as ten in a block—is a combined meat market and grocery store. Such stores are found in the poorer neighborhoods of every settlement.

Stock in all these stores is the same; there is a great deal of fresh meat, apparently the poorer cuts, scraps, etc.; shelves are filled with canned fruits, canned vegetables, canned soups, and condensed milk; there is much of the bakers' "Lithuanian rye bread," and quantities of such cakes as are sold by the National Biscuit Company. No fresh vegetables are to be seen in any of these stores. The reason given by shopkeepers[127] is that they are little used in the neighborhood and that the truck wagons supply the demand.

Women who actually depend upon these stores and the truck wagons for all their supplies find them very unsatisfactory. No really fresh vegetables are to be found in either stores or wagons, they say. In commenting upon this situation, several persons have expressed a belief that the restriction of diet among Lithuanian immigrants was largely due to the fact that the markets afford so little variety, and that an effort to extend the stock in the stores would find a response in the community.

These stores, however, are widely different from those found in Italian neighborhoods. Practically all the food used by the Italian families of one such neighborhood is bought in these stores. In this district the population is as dense as back of the stockyards, and the families have comparable incomes, the men being engaged in unskilled occupations and their earnings being supplemented by the earnings of women and children. The number of food stores in a block is about the same as in the other district, but the stock carried differs greatly. Here, in place of shops that carry only meat, canned goods, and potatoes, cabbages, and beets, the greengrocery stores largely predominate.

There are four or five greengrocery shops to[128] one meat market, and these stores have a surprising variety of fresh vegetables and fruits all the year. The variety of salad greens is remarkable. More Swiss chard, mustard, dandelion leaves, endive, squash blossoms and leaves, escarole, are to be seen in one little Italian store than in a half dozen American markets. Legumes are in stock in great quantity and variety—there are some little stores that do not handle greengroceries, but carry large stocks of legumes. Every store has a large case of different varieties of Italian cheese, and the variety of macaroni, spaghetti, and noodles is amazing to an American. Fish is frequently sold from stalls along the street, and on Friday fish wagons go about through the district. Sometimes meat is sold from wagons, but less to Italians than to other nationalities living in the neighborhood.

Certainly one effect of the organization of these shops on the basis of nationality is to prevent the members of one group from gaining the advantage of dietetically better practices followed in other groups. The Lithuanian and Italian neighborhoods described happened to be in widely separated districts of the city, but often similar differences may be observed between two shops within the same block that serve different national groups.

It is clear that the retail trade, being unstandardized, gives no help to the immigrant[129] woman in the matter of efficient buying. There is as yet no fine art of service in this field based on careful accounting of cost and service. Obviously there is great waste in the number of stores, in the number of persons engaged in conducting them, in the needless duplication of even such meager equipment as is found in them. This waste will reflect itself in needlessly high prices which, while they mulct the buyer, bring the seller little gain.

Evidently, then, little or no help is given through the system of retail trading to the foreign-born housewife in the matter of adapting the diet of her family to American or dietetic requirements. Yet food demands a large share of the income. In the latest report on the cost of living in the United States, in only 8 out of 45 cities were the food demands met by less than 40 per cent of the entire expenditure in the group whose incomes were between $900 and $1,200.[36] Those cities were:

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The lowest proportion was in Fort Wayne, where over a third of the income was required for feeding the families in this income group.

MODIFICATION OF DIET

No extensive study of the dietary practices of the different groups, either here or in the old country, has been undertaken, but considerable evidence has been secured in substantiation of the fact that their old-country practices are being modified in this country. This is not being done consciously in response to dietetic requirements, but often blindly in response to what seem to be American customs or necessities. There has been some conflict of testimony with regard to the changes in the Czecho-Slovak and Croatian groups. The Italians are said by all to have made very slight changes in their diet in this country. The Lithuanians, Poles, Russians, and Ukrainians, on the other hand, are said to have made very radical changes.

The modification that is spoken of most frequently and that is of gravest concern to many of their leaders, is the increased use of meat. Attention has already been called to the explanation of this in the fact that the price of meat was prohibitive at home, and that fruit, vegetables, and dairy products were enjoyed without expenditure of money. The large number of stores in which meat is offered for sale, although undoubtedly[131] reflecting the general wishes of the group, offers constant suggestion to the individual purchaser to buy meat. The naïve belief that much meat must be eaten by men doing manual labor is said to be another factor.

Excessive use of coffee is said by visiting housekeepers and others familiar with dietetic problems to be one of the most serious faults of the diet of many groups, especially the Slavic groups. It is a general custom to put the coffee pot on the stove in the morning and leave it there all day for any member of the family to help himself to coffee when he wants it. This is entirely a new habit which has been learned in America, as coffee was almost unknown in the poorer groups in the old country. One explanation that was given by a foreign-born woman was that these families were used to a diet of soup at home, and that as they gave this up in this country they felt the need of some liquid to replace it. One Polish woman who was asked if she had changed her diet in this country, replied, "Naturally, at home everyone had soup for breakfast, and here everyone has coffee and bread."

Another change that was reported over and over again was the use of more cakes and sweet rolls. This seemed to be considered a peculiarly American change, as was evidenced by the families who reported that they had not changed[132] their diet, as they didn't like the American diet of cakes. Some of them, indeed, were very scornful of what they considered the American diet, saying among other things that they could not afford to eat steak and chops every day, that they did not like sweets, that their "men" would not eat "out of a can," that they did not like fried things. Their ideas of American diet were gained in part from the food in restaurants, in part from what the children learned in cooking lessons in school, and in part from general suggestions that they have picked up.

Undoubtedly misguided social workers who have tried to give advice on diet without themselves knowing much about it, are responsible for some of these ideas. In a certain mill town in Massachusetts, for example, a social worker employed by the mill discovered what she thought was the cause of the paper falling off the walls in the fact that the people boiled their food. She therefore went in and taught them to fry meat and other foodstuffs.

The problem of how far the immigrant groups should be encouraged to modify their diet can be determined only after a careful study of their dietary practices. The price and quality of food available to immigrants must be ascertained. Their habits, customs, and preferences must be thoroughly understood. There can be no question, however, that help should be given them[133] in making the modifications required by the changed environment.

There have been a number of suggestions of the best way to accomplish this. Visiting housekeepers or visiting dietitians have been suggested and will be discussed later. It is highly probable that help must first be given to immigrant women in their homes before they can be persuaded to attend any classes or demonstrations outside of their homes. They must gradually be persuaded to take advantage of the help obtainable in this way.

That the whole problem of diets suited to special needs of people is being considered is evidenced by the fact that it has been suggested that food be sold by units of energy value. Dr. Graham Lusk, for example, proposed at a time of great distress in New York that the Health Commissioner attempt to persuade grocers to prepare "Board of Health baskets" which would provide 10,000 calories daily for a family of five at a minimum cost.[37] The United States Commissioner of Labor indorses the idea in the following words, "There are no insuperable obstacles in the way of selling bread, beef, pork, eggs, milk, cabbage, onions, corn, sugar—by the 100 or 1,000 calories."[38] Professor Murlin has advocated [134]that manufacturers be compelled to place on food containers the calorie content of the package.

If such a plan could be worked out, the dietetic virtues and weaknesses of the different groups could serve as a basis for the special form in which foodstuffs were marketed in different areas. Any such project as applied to the foreign born is far from accomplishment. It is suggestive of a new attitude which does not continue to leave the matter of diet to chance.

FURNITURE ON THE INSTALLMENT PLAN

In the purchase of furniture and of clothing there is the temptation to buy on the installment plan. This plan is open to all the objections ordinarily brought against buying on credit. The buyer is tempted to overestimate his ability to pay in the future, and he may not take the same trouble to calculate the actual value of his purchase as when he pays money down. In the past the form of sale has often been such as to place him peculiarly at the mercy of the seller, who might find it more profitable to reclaim the possession of goods on which a considerable share of the price has been paid than to extend the time of payment and allow the payment to be completed.

The superintendent of the Bohemian Charitable Association says, for example, that it is very common for newly married people to load themselves[135] with debt for household furniture, and that at least two thirds of the stoves which are commonly bought on the installment plan are taken back by the dealers before payments are finished. The immigrant from the rural community may be quite unused to purchasing furniture of any sort, and may be easily persuaded to buy what he thinks is "American style."

The Lithuanian peasant, for example, had little furniture at home. In the cottage of two rooms, one was used on the occasion of the visit of the priest or at the time of a wedding or funeral, and contained nothing but the shrine and the dowry chest of the daughters. The walls were decorated with paper flowers and cheap lithographs. In Lithuanian homes here one is struck by the fact that among the more prosperous the same sort of furniture is seen in all the houses. This consists of the heavy oak and leather sets of three or four large pieces usually sold on the installment plan by stores in the immigrant districts. It is not beautiful, and there is no reason to think that it is distinctly American, but the immigrant is not in a position to know that.

NEW FASHIONS AND OLD CLOTHES

Then there is the unsolved problem of clothing. As in the case of food, so with dress; the general effect of the organization of the department stores[136] in the different neighborhoods can be only misleading and confusing. Many misleading devices that would no longer deceive the older residents are tried again on the newcomer.

The women at first find it difficult to judge of values and prices. The local stores are there with the bargain counter and the special sale and all the other devices. The Poles and the Lithuanians with whom we have talked have dwelt especially on the helplessness of their countrywomen in the hands of the unscrupulous merchant or the shrewd clerk.

Clothing presents to even the enlightened and the sophisticated a most difficult problem in domestic management. "Fashion wears out more garments than the man." The anthropologist, the physiologist, and the sociologist are all concerned to explain why the clothing worn to-day is often so unsuited to bodily needs as well as to the demands of beauty and fitness.[39] To a very real extent practices of waste prevail in the selection of clothing, and to that extent neither reason nor art finds a place in the scheme. Where an attempt at economy is made, the influence of the new science of hygiene is impeded by old ideas of durability. So that from the well-to-do of the community comes little suggestion that [137]can be of service in directing the expenditures for clothing of any other group.

IT'S A LONG WAY FROM THIS ELABORATE CZECHO-SLOVAK COSTUME TO THE MODERN AMERICAN STYLES

The foreign born are faced with a particularly difficult problem. They often come from places where dress served to show where one came from, and who one was. In the United States, dress serves to conceal one's origin and relationships, and there results an almost inexorable dilemma. Follow the Old-World practice, and show who you are and where you come from, and the result is that you remain alien and different and that your children will not stay with you "outside the gates." Or follow the fashion and be like others, and the meager income is dissipated before your eyes, with meager results. The Croatians have emphasized the waste of American dress and the immodest styles often worn, while the Italians have chiefly dwelt upon the friction between parents and children.

In some neighborhoods Jewish agents go about offering clothing on the installment plan at prices much higher than those charged even in inefficient neighborhood shops. Shoes are particularly a source of difficulty, both those for the younger children and those for the older boy or girl who goes to work. In some neighborhoods where the older women go barefooted and are thought to do so because they wish to cling to their Old-World customs, they are simply saving, so that the children may wear "American shoes."[138]

Certainly the foreign-born woman who undertakes to manage her family's affairs in an American community is confronted by no easy task. The question arises as to what might be done to render that task less difficult. The dull of sight cannot lead the blind at a very swift pace. But certain steps might be taken to simplify the problems for all consumers, including the foreign born. In fact, whatever renders the system of retail dealing less chaotic and less wasteful will benefit all. The establishment of markets for foodstuffs at appropriate places where grower and consumer can meet, and certain costs of double cartage can be eliminated, is, for example, a recognized item in reform of the present food traffic.

TRAINING NEEDED

The importance of the spending function of the housewife must be brought home more clearly to great numbers of women. Too few native-born housewives realize that they have any problem to work out, or that there may be an "art of spending." None of the ninety foreign-born women interviewed had received any instruction in buying except advice from friends or from their own children. What little instruction they had received had been concerned only with cooking. Not one of these women recognized any difficulty in buying except the difficulty of speaking[139] the language well enough to ask for things or to understand how much they cost, or of getting the wherewithal to pay.

It is by the slow process of continual suggestion that both women consumers and distributing agencies will be awakened to the problem. Evidence of this awakening is already apparent. Schools and colleges, with their domestic-science and household-budgeting courses, are raising the question among an ever-widening circle of people. Banks and brokers with their special woman's department are advising and suggesting ways of spending that save. Newspapers, magazines, and clubs are discussing household problems. Organizations, public and private, have worked out ways and means of helping women budget their expenditures. So far these varied efforts have reached chiefly the American women. But no one group is isolated to-day, and as some awaken they set in motion the waves of thought and action that reach their foreign-born neighbor. Her institutions of press and bank respond with information and assistance. Inevitably better housekeepers will result.

In the meantime, all possible assistance must be given. It is therefore especially important to establish contacts between agencies already responsible for developing an art in household management and the leaders among the various foreign-born groups. Provision should be made[140] for young women from among those groups to obtain a higher education than has been commonly thought necessary by them or than has in many cases been possible from a pecuniary standpoint.

Much could undoubtedly be accomplished by the establishment in connection with departments of home economics and household arts in the various colleges of funds making possible the compilation of material bearing on these particular points. Scholarships and fellowships can be made especially available to young women from among these groups who desire to pursue their education in these lines.

The household arts departments of the various universities are attempting to plan a "standardized dress," the social workers are developing a list of garments,[40] and an estimate of expenditures for the use of case-work agencies in the care of dependent families,[41] the Young Women's Christian Association is carrying on a health campaign[42] directed particularly at the problem of proper shoes. In the meantime the Sunday papers carry full-page advertisements describing in specious and misleading terms the bargains in clothing to be had the following day, and the [141]merry round continues. The tragedy works itself out both in the dissipation of the income and in the friction created between parents and children, to which reference will be made in another place.

But perhaps more important is the possibility of modifying the practices of the retail trade itself. Restrictions have been placed about the trade in such legislation as has been passed against fraudulent advertising and other fraudulent practices, as well as by the so-called pure food laws of the United States and of the various states. And some influence has been exercised on the conditions under which goods are made, or under which they are sold, by the Trade Union Label League and by the Consumers' League. Neither of these organizations would, however, directly touch the life of the foreign-born housewife.

CO-OPERATION IN SPENDING

The question arises as to whether help is to be expected from co-operative distribution, which has had such an extraordinary history in England and been highly developed in a number of the other European countries. There is always the temptation to recall the winter evening in December, 1844, when twenty-eight weavers, of whom two were women, opened in Toad Lane, Rochdale, Lancashire, a little shop, and began to sell themselves the necessities of life. Their[142] remarkable services in England have not been confined to their business undertakings, but have always included important educational activities.

In America there have for many years been a few co-operative stores, some succeeding, some failing, most of them working out their plans independently without connection with other similar stores from whose experience they might profit. Within the last few years, however, the number of such stores has greatly increased and the need for closer union has been felt. This has resulted in the formation of the Co-operative League of America. Education in co-operative buying is its main purpose. At what appears to be the beginning of an important period in the extension of the movement in this country it is worth while to consider how far the existing co-operative stores in this country are helping the foreign-born women.

Anything that assists her to lower the cost of living is beneficial. Although sound practice dictates that consumer's co-operatives sell their goods at prices current in their neighborhood, the profits to the members appear in the return of a per cent of all purchases. In proportion as the local stores are able to supply the housewife with all her goods, the saving on the purchase of her daily needs will be more appreciable. Her interest in the enterprise will make her demand both greater variety and better quality of goods.[143]

Moreover, there may be other than material gains to the foreign-born woman from her contact with a co-operative. If it is one formed by her countrymen, where her mother tongue is spoken, it may be her first and for a long time her only contact with anything outside her home. Natural timidity will readily be overcome if she can go around the corner to a store kept by people who speak her language and understand her wants. As confidence is established she may venture to other neighborhoods or centers of distribution where more advantages can be gained. But unless she gains the confidence which few immigrant women have at first, she is an alien and isolated unit in a vast, strange country. Eventually she may become a member of a co-operative store.

If she does this, perhaps the most benefit to the foreign-born woman results. Her incorporation into this country may well be said to have been started when she has become an active member of an institution which is a part of American life. The benefits are those which result to any individual from participation in a going concern. Sharing responsibilities and evolving policies for a joint enterprise have educational implications that no other activity can supply.

The question, then, may be raised as to the extent to which a development of the co-operative[144] methods in the United States may be looked to as likely to become an important educational agency in intelligent spending for the foreign housewife, enabling her to develop in her task something of a technique. As to the possibility of developing co-operative societies because the ordinary trade is wasteful, it should be recalled that the retail trade in the United States, while wasteful, is probably not less, but rather more efficient than in other countries. Moreover, in the United States there are often lacking those conditions that give rise to a sense of a permanent division of interest between those who sell and those who buy. In fact, when the foreign-language store exists, there may be a tie between shopkeeper and purchaser.

In communities in which there is an apparent division of interest between the foreign born and the native, or between two foreign groups, the national bond may grow into a social bond that for a time at least would serve as the basis for the collective action by one group against the other group. If the dealers then belong to the outside group, or if the dealers of the foreign-born group seem to betray their fellow countrymen, there may develop a movement strong enough to carry over into organization.

Among some groups, such as the Finns, the language constitutes a permanent barrier for the adult members of the group, and with a skillful[145] and intelligent leadership the co-operative undertakings may be expected to prosper for a very considerable period of time. The immigrants have probably twice as many successful co-operative stores as the native born.

In a community like a mining town, that is almost or altogether an industrial community, with no leisure class, the pecuniary resources of all are fairly well known to all, and the temptation to spend conspicuously is therefore lacking. It will be recalled that these are the communities in which the employers have specially abused their power by forcing the employees to buy at company stores. In such communities there are always considerable numbers of competent, efficient, intelligent persons. Under a specially able leadership, a special hardship through high prices, or a condition of special exploitation, the co-operative store may be expected to develop. Then, too, a sense of identity of interest may find its basis in trade-union membership or in membership in a special trade, as was the case with the miners in a store at Staunton, Illinois, where the union managed the store for years at a profit.

With the exception of these few bonds, however, there are lacking in most communities several elements present in the foreign experience that have undoubtedly contributed materially to the success of co-operative enterprises. There is,[146] in the first place, the lack of stability caused by the rapid movement from group to group. The older people do not speak English; the children learn English and often do not want to speak the language of their parents. They want to be American and to buy as Americans buy. They therefore resent any organization that tends to emphasize their foreign origin.

Also no sense of class consciousness among customers arouses antagonism against retailers. In the cities, particularly where there are large foreign colonies, the retail trade in those colonies, especially the trade in foodstuffs, is largely in the hands of fellow countrymen whose background is much the same as that of their customers. Most of the stores are small, and the proprietors, who are not skilled in modern business methods, do not make much more than a living from their stores, so that there is no great contrast in prosperity to arouse a feeling of antagonism.

On the contrary, the proprietor and his family usually live in the district—often over the store—in much the same condition as the rest of the group. They are friends of all, and by their knowledge of the group can meet certain needs and appear to serve as a connecting link between the separate group and the general community. How far the desire of the more ambitious group members to open up a shop of their own acts as a deterrent to interest in co-operation would be[147] difficult to estimate, but it seems probable that this has some weight.

On the other hand, attention may be called to the fact that the retail trade, and especially the marketing of food, has been so slightly reduced to an art, it is still so empirically and wastefully carried on, that there are many possibilities of reasonable success of co-operatives. For a time, at least, this will be true if the undertaking is on a modest scale and does not seem worthy of attack by a relatively powerful group.

Among the obvious wastes are those connected with the transportation (cross freights), the display and salesmanship, the marketing of novelties, and the use of the indefinite measures. Besides these there are the bad debts resulting from careless credit transactions, the waste involved in deliveries of packages, the waste of the repeated purchase of articles known to be regularly needed. Wherever any group can be led to consider the wastes involved in these methods of doing business, their good sense will make them perceive easily the folly of persisting in those ways, and the practice of this minimum of self-restraint will serve as a basis for a considerable balance, out of which dividends may accumulate.

The use of the co-operative idea has, therefore, great possibilities as the basis for discussing the wastes of the present system and for deliberation[148] as to the best or as to any possible way out. In other words, experimenting in democratic organization in obtaining the necessities of life is an important next step. As in the matter of copartnership in relation to housing, co-operative distribution may serve as a point of departure, an object lesson worthy of closer study and experimental imitation. Especially would the experience of the Women's Co-operative Guild be helpful in bringing the idea to the attention of the influential women among the various groups.

The importance of doing this cannot be overestimated. For, as has been so often suggested, the wastes of retail dealing, while probably not so great here as in some other countries, are so enormous that great economies are possible from even a slight rationalizing process.[43] The development of a general consciousness of the nature and extent of these wastes would in itself serve as a corrective. Moreover, the experience of the co-operative enterprise may often be carried over into legislative policy, and in this way give to the community the benefit of the experiment tried by a group. Co-operators in England have both initiated and backed such social legislation as the Trade Boards Act, the provision for general maternity care under the Ministry of Health, and other measures.

[149]

VI

THE CARE OF THE CHILDREN

The care of the children is the most important of the mother's duties. It cannot be thoroughly done under modern conditions unless the mother has leisure to inform herself about conditions surrounding her children at work and at play, and to keep in touch with their interests, especially as they grow older. It includes caring for their physical wants, bathing them and keeping them clean when they are little, feeding them, providing their clothing, taking care of them when they are sick; it also includes looking after their education and training, choosing the school, seeing that they get to school regularly and on time, following their work at school as it is reported on the monthly report cards, encouraging them to greater efforts when their work is unsatisfactory, praising them when they do well, and, above all, giving them the home training and discipline that they need. It is the mother who can teach the children good habits, forming, as only the home life can form, their standards of right and wrong; it means watching them at their play or[150] seeing that they play in a place that is safe without watching.

As they grow older it means a general supervision of their recreation and their companions, judging surrounding influences, having in mind the dangers that lie in the way of the unwary maiden and the perils of the impetuous boy. Times have changed since she was young, and amid a great variety of choice she must decide for her children which are harmless influences and diversions. In the case of the older girls it means the serious problems of clothes, of amusements, of earnings, of prospective mating.

The mother shares many of these tasks with the father. Responsibility for discipline, decisions, and training must be joint, but the actual carrying out of these duties is the mother's. Usually the older children help with the care of the younger, but the final responsibility rests upon the mother.

A SLOVAK MOTHER, NEWLY ARRIVED

UNPREPAREDNESS OF THE IMMIGRANT MOTHER

Looking after the physical well-being of the children is primarily a matter of maintaining them in health, and hence the discussion of these problems is left to the division of this study devoted to that subject. It is sufficient here to note that it is a peculiarly difficult problem for the foreign-born mothers. Modern knowledge of child feeding and modern ideas with regard to daily bathing[151] are of recent origin. In many of the countries from which these women come they are unknown. A Croatian lawyer, who translated some of the Children's Bureau publications, was very much interested in the one on the care of the child of pre-school age. He told the investigator that there was nothing like that in his country, and he hoped that this translation might be used to reach the women in Croatia.

If this is true in matters that pertain to the physical welfare of children, it is even more marked in matters affecting their education and training. The modern idea is that the child should not be trained and disciplined to be subservient to the parent, but should be helped to develop his own personality. It is based on a greater respect for the intelligence of the child and on the idea that the early placing of the responsibility for his acts on the child himself will better train citizens for a changing world, and especially for democracy.

These ideas are of comparatively recent formulation, many of them dating from the impetus given to the study of the child by modern psychology. Although of gradual growth, they have been for a long time implicit in the current practices of the most enlightened section of the community. They are understood by a relatively small part of the community. They are acted on by much larger groups, so that it is common to[152] hear members of the generation that is passing lament the lack of discipline of the children to-day.

The situation is complicated by the fact that many people who talk the most about developing the child's personality stop in practice with the removal of restraints, without attempting the more difficult task of developing his sense of responsibility. The point to note is that the native born, in part through their own conscious choice and in part blindly moved by forces they do not understand, have been gradually moving away from the old tradition of strict and unquestioning obedience such as is exacted by military authorities.

With the immigrant parents the situation is very different. The countries from which they come are not republics, and hence the opportunities for training for intelligent citizenship have been lacking, especially in the lower economic groups. The idea of the government has often been rather to foster that training that makes for good soldiers. Moreover, the civilizations from which most of these people came were at the time static, so that the evils of blind obedience and rigid conformity were not present to the same extent as in our more rapidly moving civilization. Thus the tradition of absolute obedience of child to parent remained practically intact. Wherever this tradition existed the usual[153] method of enforcement was corporal punishment, generally inflicted with a strap. It is not intended to assert that a great deal of child beating was prevalent in the old country; in most cases the child learned quickly that the penalty of disobedience was the strap, and threats became as effective as its actual use.

BREAKDOWN OF PARENTAL AUTHORITY

The immigrant brings with him to this country this tradition of the authority of the parent, with no thought of doing anything but maintaining it here. There are, however, forces at work in this country that tend to make this impossible. There are suggestions of a different tradition in the general atmosphere. Many immigrants absorb these suggestions unconsciously, as they absorb those of a wider freedom for women. More important, however, is the development of the child. Circumstances of his daily life force him to take the lead in many situations. This has been pointed out in a study of the delinquent child, where it is said:[44]

Obviously, many things which are familiar to the child in the facts of daily intercourse in the street, or in the school, will remain unknown or unintelligible to the father and mother. It has become a commonplace that this cheap wisdom on the part of the boy or girl leads to a reversal of the usual relationship between parent and child. The child[154] who knows English is the interpreter who makes the necessary explanations for the mother to the landlord, the grocer, the sanitary inspector, the charity visitor, and the teacher or truant officer. It is the child again who often interviews the "boss," finds the father a job, and sees him through the onerous task of "joining the union." The father and mother grow accustomed to trusting the child's version of what "they all do in America," and gradually find themselves at a great disadvantage in trying to maintain parental control.

In the face of this situation the conduct of the immigrant parent generally follows along one of three very distinct lines: (a) he modifies his methods in family discipline little by little, himself unconscious of the implications, or (b) he stubbornly attempts to retain the old authority undiminished, or (c) he abandons the old system without having anything to put in its place. The first method of behavior is probably the most common; it usually leads to little difficulty within the family group if the parents' modifications are made as fast as the child becomes aware of the newer ideas. The attempt to maintain the old system in its entirety may also be accomplished without disturbance if the child is willing, and probably in most cases it is maintained without serious opposition on the part of the child.

Abandoning the old system without substituting something better is probably the least frequent reaction to the situation, but it is one that[155] is especially dangerous in immigrant groups. The native-born parent who relaxes all discipline has this advantage over the foreign born; in general he can at will demonstrate his superior knowledge, and the child looks up to him and takes his advice, while the foreign-born parent is peculiarly helpless because the child thinks that his own knowledge, demonstrably superior in some things, extends to all fields.

The relative frequency of these different modes of reaction would be a difficult matter to determine. They were all evident from the facts about discipline obtained from the families visited in this study. To some extent the maintenance of the old system intact may be judged by the prevalence of corporal punishment as a method of enforcing obedience.

A doctor of a Lithuanian district said that one thing he was very anxious to see disappear was the strap, which could now be seen in almost every home. Fifty-four of the eighty-seven families from whom information was obtained said that they used whipping as a method of punishment. In most of the cases there was nothing to indicate with what the child was whipped, but in five it was definitely stated that a strap was used. In very few cases was there any attempt to punish the child in private. It was usually stated that the whipping was done before all the other members of the family. Two or[156] three families stated that they did not whip the children on the street.

A significant fact was the frequently repeated assertion that the children were whipped because they were too young to understand anything else. An interesting state of transition was seen in some of the thirty-three families who had abandoned whipping but had not given up the idea of absolute obedience. It is evidenced in comments like the following: "They are not whipped. Father threatens with a strap." Or, "It [whipping] is not necessary. Father speaks, and children obey." Some families had relaxed the discipline sufficiently to be apparent to our investigators, who made such comments as "Children are making a terrible noise, but nobody seemed to mind."

It has already been said that whatever the reaction, the training of the children usually takes place without visible disaster to the family group. This is especially true while the children are young. As they grow older the dangers that are inherent in such a situation become more marked. The figures on juvenile delinquency show that an unduly large proportion of juvenile offenders are children of foreign-born parents. This subject will be discussed more fully at a later point in the chapter in connection with the problem of the older boy and girl. It is important to emphasize here that the foundation for later[157] trouble is often laid while the children are young, and hence consideration of the effect of modern ideas on discipline and training should begin with the very young child.

LEARNING TO PLAY

One of the needs of the growing child that is much emphasized in modern ideas of child culture is an opportunity for wholesome play. The foreign-born mother, from a rural district in Europe, where children were put to work helping the parents as soon as they could be in any way useful, frequently does not recognize this need, and hence does not even do those things within her power to secure it. From some opportunities which she and the children might enjoy together, she is cut off by lack of knowledge of English. A Bohemian woman, for example, said that she did not go with her husband and the children to the moving pictures, as she could not read the English explanations and often did not understand the pictures.

Even when the need is recognized it is still a very difficult problem. In the old country, when the child was too little to work, he could play in the fields quite safe, in sight of his mother at her work. In the city, however, especially in the congested districts, which are the only ones known to immigrants when they first come, the child cannot play in his own yard, for there is[158] nothing that can be called a yard. The alternatives are the city streets with their manifold dangers, or the public playground. From the point of view of physical safety as well as in giving a place for more wholesome play, the public playground is obviously the more desirable.

The provision of playgrounds, however, is everywhere inadequate, in some places much more so than in others. In Chicago, which is probably better equipped in this respect than most cities, there are large districts that have no easy access to a playground. Many of the women that were asked where their children played said that they played on the streets, not because the parents thought it safe, but because they could not go to a playground alone and the mother had not time to take them. It was interesting, too, to learn that some of the parents who preferred the playground, and whose children played there, did not think the children should be left there alone. In one Bohemian family the grandmother took the two little boys to the playground and stayed with them as long as they stayed.

In part, then, the problem of play space is a problem in housing reform. All the newer housing projects make provision for a space for this purpose, either by the individual yard or where the multiple house is used, by one playground for every three or four families. Housing reform,[159] however, comes slowly and immediate relief could be given by the provision of many more public playgrounds. It is obvious that these must be so directed and supervised that children can be left with perfect safety.

It would also be necessary to see that the foreign-speaking mothers were informed of the advantages of the playground and convinced of its safety for their children. The supervision of children's play in streets and vacant lots could be greatly extended. The establishing during certain hours of "play zones," from which traffic is excluded and in which the younger children and their mothers could be taught simple games and dances, has been found successful.

PARENTS AND EDUCATION

In the matter of education the state has relieved the parent of a large part of the responsibility by legislation prescribing the ages during which the child must attend school, and in some states the grade he must reach before leaving school. In spite of this there still rests with the parent the responsibility of choosing the school, getting the child to school promptly and regularly, following his progress, deciding whether he shall go beyond the time prescribed by law.

The choice of the schools means for most immigrant groups, a choice between the public and the parochial school. In very large numbers of[160] cases the parochial school is chosen. The reason for this is only in part the influence of the church, although this undoubtedly counts for a great deal. The people we have interviewed in this study have repeatedly pointed out that it is not only for religious education and training that the foreign-born parent sends his child to the parochial school, but that it is also because he wants him to learn the language of his parents, the history and traditions of the country from which he came, and to retain a respect for the experiences and associations that remain of great importance to the parents.

Another reason that has often been given for sending the children to the parochial school is the lack of discipline in the public schools. This has been especially emphasized by Italians, but it has also been spoken of by members of other groups. There can be no question that the parochial school, under the tradition of authority maintained by the church, is much nearer in its idea of discipline to the ideas the immigrant brings with him from the old country, than is the public school whose system of training the immigrant parent does not understand and has not had made clear to him.

IMMIGRANT CHILDREN ACQUIRING INDIVIDUAL INITIATIVE IN A MONTESSORI CLASS AT HULL HOUSE

The problem of the immigrant parent with regard to the education of his child is more difficult because of the change in the position of the child in this country, which he usually does not[161] understand. At home the child was important, not as an individual, but as a member of the family group, and home decisions about the child took into account the needs of the family in the first place and only secondarily the welfare of the child.[45]

This reversal of emphasis is confusing to the immigrant parents. Taken in connection with the fact that many of the immigrants are from countries where education is not compulsory, it leads them to sacrifice the welfare of the child at many points. It seems of much greater importance, for example, that the work of the household should be done than the child should get to school every day. The study of the reasons for absence in two of the immigrant neighborhoods of Chicago[46] shows the frequency with which children are kept out of school because of the needs of the family. Thus, of 1,115 children who were absent from school during a certain period 131 were out to do work at home; 81 were kept at home because of sickness in the family; 42 stayed home to interpret or run errands.

One boy, for example, was kept to watch fires for a sick father while his mother "got a day's work"; another had stayed at home because his sister's baby was in convulsions and his mother [162]had not been able to get him ready to go to school; John was staying at home because his mother had gone to see a doctor and wanted him to look after the children, who did not like to go to the day nursery; Bruno, aged twelve, was found at home helping his mother wash, but he explained that he had really stayed out to go "to tell the boss" that his father was sick; Genevieve, aged twelve, who had been absent fourteen half days and tardy twice within a month, was found alternately tending the shop and taking care of three younger children and of a sick mother, although her father was well able to hire some one to come in and help care for the family while the little girl was at school.

In the rural districts the failure to understand the necessity of complying with the compulsory education law is even more marked. In the Rolling Prairie group of Polish families many of the children were not sent to school until after two families had been fined for not sending them. There was the expense for clothes and books, and the extra work for the mother. The roads were bad, the children often had no shoes, even in winter, and, above all, the parents had no understanding of why they should go. After the prosecution, however, the school law was obeyed.

The parents' attitude toward the problem of keeping the child in school comes out quite[163] naïvely in the answers given to visitors for this study. The following comments, given in the quaint but forceful English of our foreign-speaking investigators, show what is meant:

Mother (a Russian woman with three children) visited school when teacher demanded her to send daughter to school when she wished her at home to help.

Mother (a Polish woman with six children under fourteen) feels that children study too much and ought to help their parents more.

Father (Italian) thinks there should be laws for protection of parents as well as child labor.

FOLLOWING SCHOOL PROGRESS

Following the child's progress at school is a difficult matter for parents who themselves have not had the benefit of education, or even for those who have been educated under a different system. It is, however, not impossible for them to do so; by means of reports in the language they can understand, by talking to the teachers or some one of the school authorities who knows about the child's work, they can keep closely enough in touch with his school record to enable them to give help at the point where it is most needed.

Many of them do this in spite of the inherent difficulties and in spite of difficulties which the school itself puts in their way. An Italian father in a little Illinois mining town brought out with pride the last report of his little girl and showed[164] the visitor that she had an average of 90 per cent. In the families studied in Chicago a few were evidently trying to keep in touch with their children's schooling. Thus of one family it is said:

"Mother not only goes to school entertainments, but follows up the children's work with the teachers, consults them, and accepts their advice." This family is Bohemian, and both mother and father are well-educated leaders in progressive Bohemian circles in Chicago.

In another Bohemian family the parents were also making an effort in this direction, but, being less well equipped, their difficulties were greater. The schedule says:

Mother never visits school as she cannot understand English. Parents are very much concerned about their boy who brought a poor mark from school. After family consultation, daughter visited teacher, who advised them to take the boy out of Bohemian school (a nationalistic school to which he went after school hours), because he might be overworked.

These are, however, exceptional cases in the families studied. Among the Bohemians and Slovaks, to be sure, a considerable proportion of the mothers visited the school occasionally or knew some of the children's teachers. Among the families of the more recent immigrants it was almost unheard of for the parents to visit the school. Of the eleven Russian families[165] studied not one reported any visits to the school or contact with the teachers, and only two of the Ukrainian families. One of these visited only when the children did not behave. This mother said that she thought she should know more about her children's school work, but that she had felt so much in the way when she visited the school that she finally stopped going.

An almost inevitable consequence of this failure to make contacts with the school is that the parents remain quite unaware of what their children are learning there. An attempt was made in our study of selected families to get the parents' opinion of the work the children were given at school, but very few parents felt they knew enough about the work to express an opinion. A few to whom reference has already been made thought the children gave too much time to study and not enough to helping their parents, one or two spoke of the lack of discipline, a few others thought the schooling must be all right as the children learned to speak English. A Ukrainian mother of two children, the oldest eight, "believes that it must be good, for the children speak English and the oldest girl can read and write."

Sometimes the failure to understand what the children are doing brings unnecessary worry. A Hungarian mother, speaking of the education of her children, expressed regret that they were[166] not taught carpentry. The visitor turned to the eleven-year-old boy and asked him if he didn't have manual training. He replied that he did, but "she doesn't understand."

A careful study of the answers to the questions in our attempt to get parents' attitude toward the children's schooling shows, then, that while a few exceptional parents have been able to follow their children's schooling, the great majority of them have not. It suggests that some of them are willing and ready to do it if only some of the obstacles were removed, and that there are also a large number who do not realize the necessity of it, and for whom something more must be done. The opportunity of the school, and various devices for rendering aid at this point, that have been tried, will be discussed in a later chapter.

The failure of the parents to understand not only means confusion and worry for them, but for the child lack of the help and sympathy at home that they might have. It becomes more serious as the child reaches the age when he is no longer compelled by law to attend school, and the decision as to whether or not he shall go on rests with his parents. When the parents have not known about the work he has been doing, and have no means of judging how much or how little he has learned, they are obviously in no position to make a decision about his further education.

There are many forces at work to influence[167] the immigrant parent to put the child to work at once. There is, first of all, in many cases, economic pressure. Sometimes the child's earnings are actually needed to make up the family budget for current expenditures. In some families, however, his earnings are not so much needed as desired, to help in buying property more often than for any other reason. In these cases it seems clear that the attitude toward the child as a means of contributing to the welfare or prestige of the family is a very important factor. One Polish doctor with whom we conferred emphasized this point. He said that the Polish parent expected to stop work at an early age and live on the earnings of his children. Hence he took his children out of school as soon as the law allowed, and had them start work.

Another factor that undoubtedly plays an important part is the parent's own lack of education. Never having had any opportunity for more than the most elementary education, it is only natural that it should seem that a child who had spent seven years in school should be fairly well educated. This attitude is strengthened if he has succeeded without education or if the people whom he looks upon as successful have had little education. He is further confirmed in this attitude very often by his failure to realize the extent of the change in conditions and the ever-increasing complexity of the situation[168] with which his child will have to deal. Thus he often fails to understand that an education that was quite adequate for the simple life in the old country is far from sufficient for life in this country to-day.

Some of the people with whom we conferred were of the opinion that many of the parents from groups oppressed in Europe failed to realize the full significance of the freedom here. There the higher positions and the professions had been closed to them on account of race or class, and many of them were not aware that here they would be open to their children if they could give them the necessary education and training.

There are, fortunately, forces at work to counteract this tendency to take the children out of school at the earliest possible moment. There is, too, among the foreign born, a very general desire to have their children do office work rather than manual labor, and an understanding that this means more than a grammar-school education. There is a certain naïve faith in the benefits of education even though they are not understood. This is particularly strong in people to whom the schools have been closed by a dominant race in Europe—the Jews from Russia, for example. And in proportion as the parents become educated so that they feel their own limitations, they appreciate education for their children and strive to give it to them. There is no[169] doubt that all these influences are felt in the foreign-born groups, but they win out gradually against the force of the traditions by which the parent is guided in his decision to take the child out of school.

The American community could hasten their action by helping the foreign-born parents to understand. There have been some attempts to enlighten the parents. The work of the Vocational Guidance Bureau in Chicago should be mentioned in this connection. When a child wants to leave school to go to work they explain to the parents the importance of keeping the child in school, and suggest means by which this can be done. This happens, however, only after the decision and plans have been made to put the child to work. The bureau has been handicapped in dealing with foreign-born parents by its lack of foreign-speaking visitors.

An attempt of a different order has been made to reach the Bohemian farmers in Nebraska. A professor in the state university has for a number of years gone out to these farming communities, urging in public speeches given in Bohemian the necessity of higher education for the children, and especially for the girls.

THE REVOLT OF OLDER CHILDREN

The problem of the older boy and girl is by far the most difficult of the parents' problems. Reference[170] has already been made to the fact that it is as the child grows older that the difficulties of maintaining the old system of parental authority become more apparent. It is at this time that the child sees that system is out of date, and then, if ever, he rebels against it. There is considerable evidence that the parents, on the other hand, feel the importance of maintaining their authority at that period of the child's life more than at any other. There are several reasons for this, among the more important being the fact that the child has reached an age when he can be economically helpful to the family group, and that the parents see dangers in his path. In other words, the maintenance of parental authority seems to be tied up with the control of the child's earnings and the maintenance of certain conventions regarding the association between young people of different sexes.[47]

The immigrant parent very generally asserts his legal right to the entire earnings of his minor child. In fact, the child often continues the practice of giving up his wages until his marriage. Out of forty-three families studied, in which there were children of working age, thirty-five parents took the entire earnings of the children. The amount that the parent should give back to the child is not fixed by law or by custom, and [171]it is at this point that conflict between the child and the parents is likely to arise.

The parents frequently expect to continue to provide for the boy and the girl of working age as they did when they were younger, and to recognize their maturity only by giving them small sums weekly for spending money. In the case of girls even this slight concession is not made, and the girl has to ask her mother for everything she wants. In only four of the thirty-five families in which the children turned in all their earnings was an allowance of as much as $3 a week given. In the others the working child was given 25 cents, 50 cents, or 75 cents a week, usually on Sunday, or was given no fixed sum but "what he needs." In a Slovak family a girl of sixteen earning $13 a week, and one of fourteen earning $9 a week, were each given 50 cents each pay day; a boy of fifteen in a Slovenian family, earning $15 a week, received 50 cents on Sunday; two Slovak girls of eighteen and sixteen years, earning $45 and $80 a month, turned in all their earnings and got back "what they asked for."

It is not surprising that a boy or girl should chafe under the system even if the resentment stopped short of open rebellion. In the families studied in which there was no evidence of friction it seems to have been avoided either by such a firm establishment of the authority of[172] the parents while the child was young, that the child had not yet questioned it, or by wise use of the child's earnings for the benefit of the child. In several instances it was reported that they gave the child "all she asks"; one girl was being given lessons on the violin, which she specially desired. In these cases the issue did not appear to have been raised, but we have no reason for thinking the children were satisfied with the arrangement.

In other families the beginnings of friction could already be seen. A Russian woman said that her two working girls, aged seventeen and fourteen, did not need money, and in the presence of the investigator refused the request of one for money for a picture show, telling her that men would pay her way. The eight parents who did not take all their children's earnings had not all changed their practices voluntarily. In some cases it was done because the children refused any longer to turn their earnings in.

When the parent takes the entire earnings of the child and continues to bear the burden of support, there is probably no question on which the ideas of the child and those of the parent are so likely to conflict as on the question of clothes, especially clothes for the girl. The chaotic and unstandardized condition of the whole clothing problem has been pointed out in an earlier chapter, and attention has been called to the fact[173] that it is one of the causes of conflict between parent and child.

It is only natural that the young girl should want to look as well as possible, and it is to be expected that the girl of foreign-born parents should quickly learn at school or at work the prevailing opinion that to be well dressed is to be dressed in the latest fashion. She is also in a position to observe how quickly the fashions change, and thus early learns the unimportance of quality in modern clothing. She undoubtedly underestimates its importance because her models are not those on display at the highest-grade department stores, where the beauty of the quality occasionally redeems in slight measure the grotesqueness of form; she sees only the cheap imitations displayed in the stores in her own neighborhood.

In her main contention that if she is to keep up with the fashions she need not buy clothing that will last more than one season, she is probably right. It is natural also that this method of buying should be distressing to her mother, who has been accustomed to clothes of unchanging fashions which were judged entirely by their quality. When to her normal distress at buying goods of poor quality at any price there is added an outrage to her native thrift, because the price of these tawdry fashionable goods is actually greater than for goods of better quality, it is not[174] surprising that she and her daughter should clash on the question of what to buy.

The question of shoes is said to be a special point of conflict. The girls insist on costly high-heeled, light-colored boots, while the mother sees that she could buy at less than half the price better shoes, more sensible, and of better quality. The conflict is more acute in proportion as the mother has lived an isolated life in this country and has not herself tried to keep up with American fashions. It is interesting to note that workers in the Vocational Guidance Bureau in Chicago state that this desire of the girls for expensive clothes is a leading motive in causing them to leave school to go to work.

RELATIONS OF BOYS AND GIRLS

The most serious of the problems in connection with the older boy and girl is that of the relations between the sexes. In the old country the situation was much more easily defined. The conventions were fixed, and had changed very little since the mother was young. In Italy, for example, daughters never went out with young men, not even after they were engaged. The same is said to be true in most of the other countries from which our immigrants have come. In Croatia, Serbia, and Bohemia it is unheard of for a young woman to go out alone with a young man.

Moreover, coming as so many of these people[175] do from small villages or rural communities, they have been used to a single-group life which is impossible in a city. As one Italian woman has expressed it, work and recreation went hand in hand in the old country. During the day there was the work of both men and women in the fields in congenial groups, and in the evenings songs and dancing in the village streets. The whole family worked and played together with other family groups.

It is not intended to assert that there were no problems with young people in the old country, for undoubtedly there, as everywhere, some of the young would be wayward and indifferent to the conventions. The point is that there the mother knew what standards she was to maintain and had, moreover, the backing of a homogeneous group to help her. In this country not only is she herself a stranger, uncertain of herself, not sure whether to try to maintain the standards of her home or those that seem to prevail here, but the community of which she is a part is far from being a homogeneous group and has apparently conflicting standards. The immigrant mother, then, has to decide in the first place what standards she will try to maintain.

The old standards can scarcely be maintained in a modern community where the girls go to work in factories, working side by side with men, going and coming home in the company of men.[176] It is manifestly impossible for the mother to watch her daughter at work. In the old country this was possible as long as she stayed on the farm. And when at school and at work she is constantly thrown with men, it is impossible to regulate her social hours by the old standards and to see that they are all spent under her mother's eye. Moreover, any attempt to do so is likely to provoke resentment, as a girl naturally thinks that if she can take care of herself at work she is equally well able to do so at play.

Furthermore, the character of the recreation has undergone almost as great a change as the character of the work. With the change from the country to the city, it has already been suggested that the old group life with its simple pleasures, which the whole family shared, has become impossible. If the mother then tries to see that her daughter has social life in which she herself may share, she either cuts her off from most of the normal pleasures of young people of her age, or the mother finds herself in places where she is not wanted, and where no provision has been made for her entertainment.

Most immigrant parents, except those from southern Italy, recognize the impossibility of maintaining the old rules of chaperonage and guardianship of the girls. One of the Slovak women with whom we conferred said that in all[177] her circle of acquaintance there was only one mother who was attempting to bring her daughter up by the old standards and was not allowing her to go places in the evening where the mother might not accompany her. All the others were allowing their daughters more freedom than they thought desirable, but they did not know what else to do.

The Italian parents, on the other hand, try to guard their girls almost as closely as they did in Italy. It is not especially to be wondered at, for what the immigrant father or mother sees is usually the worst in American city life. If the daughter could not be trusted alone or unchaperoned in a village in which they knew most of the people and all the places of amusement, is she any more safe in a city in which, as one foreign-born mother says, "You don't know what is around the corner from you"?

Moreover, realizing only the danger to the girl, and not being able in his ignorance to explain to her or to protect her in any other way, the father often resorts to beating the girl to enforce the obedience which generations have taught him is due to him. The head of the Complaint Department of the Cook County Juvenile Court in Chicago said that while cases of immorality were very rare among Italian girls, the attention of the court was called to a great many who rebelled at this attempt at seclusion and ran away[178] from home, often contracting hasty and ill-advised marriages.

While most parents of other nationalities see that the old standards cannot be maintained, there is a great deal of confusion as to what standards are to be considered right. This is illustrated by the following incident. A very intelligent Jugo-Slav woman, in discussing the problem, said that she did not know what she would do in her own family, as she hated to think of her girls adopting American standards. The matter had been brought to her attention recently by the conduct of two girls with a young Serbian officer who was visiting in this country. As he walked up one of the boulevards two girls, who were utter strangers to him, had flourished small feather dusters in his face by way of salutation. This woman was very much surprised to hear that the investigator disapproved of this; she had supposed it was just our "American freedom."

As long as the mother does not understand this tradition of freedom between the sexes nor realize its limits, it is natural that she should accept her daughter's dictum that everything she wants to do is "American" and that it is hopeless for the mother to try to understand. In many of the families visited in this study it was evident that the mother had completely given up trying to understand either the conditions under which[179] her children work or how they get their recreation. One mother, for example, said that she knew where her daughter worked when it was a well-known place, but otherwise not. Another said that her children told her where they worked, but she never remembered the names, for she knew that they would mean nothing to her.

Several said they did not try to advise their children about their work, because they knew they didn't understand. One Russian mother was very much worried about the future of her two boys, aged seventeen and thirteen. The older was working as a cash boy, earning twelve dollars a week, and the younger was working outside of school hours, sewing caps. The mother said that their father had learned one trade and followed that, but that her children changed work every two or three months. She seldom asked why they changed, because she did not understand conditions in Chicago.

Most of the women confessed to being equally at sea with regard to their children's amusements. Some of them accepted with resignation the fact that they could not understand, saying, as one woman did, that she thought they had too much freedom, but that young people lived very differently here. Some of the mothers, on the other hand, while thinking that young people in general had too much freedom, thought that they did not need worry about their own children,[180] because they had been able to make companions of their daughters. A few even were found who approved of the freedom allowed to young people, but thought children should be taught "more morality."

It is scarcely possible to say too much of the failure of the American community to assist the immigrant family at this point. It has neither tried to make the fathers and mothers understand modern American ways, nor has it exercised any community supervision so that the girl is in reality safe at work and at play. Furthermore, some of the agencies from whom the most help might have been expected have deliberately passed over the mother to educate the child, hastening the process by which the child becomes Americanized in advance of his parents.

The Church has had its share, as may be seen from the statement of one priest who holds a responsible position in the Church in Chicago. He believes that the parents are usually too advanced in years to assimilate or utilize whatever instruction is given them. In his opinion the ignorance of the parent is responsible for many bad tendencies in the children, but the difficulty can be corrected more surely and satisfactorily by dealing directly with the children.

The attitude of the public schools is illustrated by an interview with the principal of a public school in an immigrant neighborhood. He says[181] that his contact has been only with the children. The foreign-born parents of the first generation are, in his opinion, "so incorrigibly stupid" that any attempts to educate them are a waste of time. The only possible way, he thinks, of reaching the parents is through the children.

THE JUVENILE COURT

We should not expect the Juvenile Court, dealing as directly as it does with problems resulting from the breakdown of family discipline, to be itself a cause of breakdown. Nevertheless, interviews with court officers show a certain lack of understanding and the use of methods which, instead of relieving the situation, only aggravate it. When the case of a delinquent girl, for instance, comes to court, the officers believe that it has usually gone too far for the court to do anything with the family. The child is often placed out in a family home, always an American family; and the probation officer supervises the child and the foster home, but pays no attention to the child's own home, where younger children may be growing up in the same way and to which, ultimately, the delinquent girl should be allowed and encouraged to return.

The probation officers know very little of the old-country background of the people with which they deal, and are often not clear as to the differences in nationality. The foreign-born parent's[182] ignorance of laws and customs, and his inability to speak English, make him appear stupid to the officer. As a result, he may be ignored as quite hopeless.

In the absence of the court interpreter the child may be called upon to interpret to the parent the whole proceedings in court. While this is less common now than it was a few years ago, there is no reason to believe that the child is less used as interpreter between the probation officer and the parent at home.

From the records of the court proceedings it is often quite evident to the reader that the foreign-born parent has little idea of the reasons why he or his child should have been brought to court. In one Bohemian family studied the eldest boy, aged sixteen, was in the State School for Delinquent Boys. The parents seemed utterly unaware of the serious nature of the boy's offenses and of the blot on his record. They seemed to regard the school for delinquents somewhat as more prosperous parents are wont to regard the boarding school. In fact, they expressed regret that the boy was soon to be released. Yet this boy had been in the Juvenile Court three times; the first time for truancy, and the other two for stealing.

The attention of the community is usually called to the difficulties of the foreign-born parents only when a complete breakdown occurs, resulting[183] in juvenile delinquency. This result is, however, comparatively rare. Most families work their way through without getting into a situation that calls public attention to their family affairs. There is no question, however, that there is often a lack of harmony in the home. Sometimes the child of working age leaves home, to board perhaps in the same neighborhood or to contract a hasty marriage.

Occasionally there are situations in which the ordinary relations of parent and child have been completely reversed, and the children have assumed responsibility for the management of the home and the family. For instance, the Juvenile Court was asked by the neighbors to investigate conditions in a Polish family, in which a six-year-old boy was said to be neglected. The investigation showed no real neglect from the point of view of the court, but a situation that needed supervision.

The mother was a widow and had, besides the six-year-old boy, two daughters aged seventeen and nineteen. Both girls were born in Austria. The father had preceded his family to the United States, and for five years the mother had worked and supported herself and the children in the old country before he was able to send for them. He seems not to have had a very good moral influence over the children, but had been dead several years. The daughters were both supporting[184] the mother, who was doing one or two days' work a week. The daughters turned over all their earnings to the mother, but said that she was a poor manager and never had anything to show for it. They themselves had managed to buy new furniture and clothes for themselves. They said they were ashamed to go out with their mother, who remained unprogressive, would not dress as they liked, and would not manage the home as they wished. The girls told the officer that they did not take her out with them, but gave her money to go to the "movies." Yet she would do nothing but sit at home and cry.

At one time the boy was accused of stealing coal from a neighbor. The oldest girl wanted her mother to investigate, but the mother would not go near any of her American neighbors. The daughter herself found out that the child had really taken the coal from a neighbor, and whipped him. Gradually the daughters, especially the older one, have assumed entire control of the family. The mother can no longer discipline even the six-year-old boy. Since the daughter has undertaken to correct him, he pays no attention at all to his mother. The probation officer has tried to restore a more normal family relationship, and has tried to help the girls to understand their mother's position. She still speaks with pride of the five years in the old[185] country when she supported them alone, and when she was really of some use to them.

The older daughter threatened for some time to leave home if her mother could not be more agreeable. When the court officer remonstrated, she said that of course she would leave her furniture, and could not be convinced that that would not entirely compensate. Later she did leave home, and took some of her furniture. The family are Catholics, but the mother no longer goes to church, and, though the girls go, the priest seems to have had no influence over them.

Although the great majority of the foreign-born parents succeed in bringing up their children without the children becoming delinquent, the minority who are not successful is large enough to cause grave concern. This has been shown in all figures in juvenile delinquency. A study of delinquent children before the Cook County Juvenile Court shows that 72.8 per cent of the 14,183 children brought to the court between July 1, 1899, and June 30, 1909, had foreign-born parents.[48] A special study of 584 of these, who were delinquent boys, showed 66.9 per cent with foreign-born parents.[49] A comparison of the nativity of the parents of children in the Juvenile Court with the proportion of each group in the married population of Chicago indicates [186]that the number of parents of delinquent children in the foreign-born group is disproportionately large. That is, the foreign born form 57 per cent of the married population of Chicago, while "at least 67 per cent of the parents of delinquent boys of the court were foreign born, and there is reason to believe that the true percentage is above 67."[50]

This preponderance of children from immigrant homes must not be taken to mean that children of foreign-born parents are naturally worse than the children of American parents. It confirms the fact that immigrant parents have special difficulties in bringing up their children and are in need of special assistance. It suggests very forcibly the danger to the community in continuing to ignore their special needs.

[187]

VII

IMMIGRANT ORGANIZATIONS AND FAMILY PROBLEMS

In the former chapters an attempt has been made to set out some of the difficulties encountered by foreign-born families who attempt to establish themselves in the United States. The discussion has dealt with the problem as though the community were one factor and the immigrant family another factor, and as though the solution to be arrived at could be discovered by bringing them into new relations to each other. This treatment is justified, in view of the fact that even a slight analysis makes it clear that certain modifications in governmental and social machinery are highly desirable. When the limitations imposed by the war on freedom of migration have been removed, the possibility of dealing more wisely and more humanely with incoming family groups must be considered.

In a very real sense, during any period when the volume of immigration is considerable, the community is one factor and the immigrant is another factor, and a partial solution is to be[188] found in a new treatment of the relationships between these two. But in another sense the discussion is inadequate and perhaps misleading. The relationship between the community and the immigrant is not mechanical, but organic. So soon as he is admitted, he is in fact a part of the community, and what will be done, what can be done, depends in part at least upon the extent to which that relationship is developed. The currents of the community life must flow through and both enrich and be enriched by the life of the newcomer. If these currents are obstructed, he neither shares nor contributes as he might.

These channels of intercourse, however, have often been so obstructed that contacts have been denied. That segregation and separation have characterized the life of many of the groups for considerable periods of time has become a commonplace, and it has been generally known that the life of these different foreign-born groups was separate from the general life of the community, and the life of one group separate from the life of other groups. But the fact that within these separate groups was developed often a fairly rich and highly organized life has not been so widely recognized.

SAFETY IN RACIAL AFFILIATIONS

During the war, for example, the community became aware of the fact that within these national[189] groups there had developed more or less powerful and efficient organizations formerly active in behalf of political interests in the old country, capable, at least, of fostering a spirit of clannishness, of perpetuating the language, customs, and ideals of an alien population in the midst of American life, and of keeping alive in this country national and racial antipathies brought from Europe. Leaders in the European struggle came to these groups and obtained pecuniary support and political adherence. Recruiting for military service among the foreign born was successfully carried on.

Leaders of active societies among the different Slavic groups have stated quite freely that a spirit of unity and of nationality has been consciously fostered in America by these societies, so that, when the time came for the oppressed nation to strike for freedom in the European struggle, the representatives of the race in this country might stand solidly behind such efforts. It is impossible, after the exhibition of the generous support given among foreign-born groups during the war to the efforts of the United States, to raise the question of their loyalty; but their separateness has been far greater, their exclusion from many community efforts and activities far more complete, than the leaders among them had realized.

The leaders among the foreign born do not[190] wholly blame the leaders of the "American" group; they seem to feel that immigrants who came at an earlier date are in part to blame. These earlier arrivals knew what immigration meant, and might have been expected to help open the way for those who came afterward, but were, in fact, chiefly concerned to get ahead and to leave old associations behind. This was the opinion expressed by a Bohemian business man prominent in both local and national organizations. He also said that the reason that had in the past led to the formation and support of these organizations had ceased to exist; but now that the European struggle against oppression had ended for his people, and leaders understood how separate the life of the foreign-born groups had been, these very societies could be used to establish a variety of contacts and to develop among the foreign born a wider interest in the United States and its problems. Particularly the ability to act together learned during the war should be used to develop effective co-operation.

As the organization of these societies is discussed in another volume in this series, they will not be described here, except as they affect the position of women and so exercise an influence upon the adjustment of family life.[51]

Possibly the most significant fact revealed in [191]the course of the study has been the extent to which foreign-born groups have been inaugurating and developing educational and social movements, and establishing institutions and agencies, quite independent of the Federal, state, or local agencies at work along the same general lines. On the other hand, the national educational and welfare movements carried on by the "American people" have ignored the organization and leadership in the foreign-born community. This has been the case to an amazing extent, even when the public efforts have been ostensibly based upon studies of conditions existing in cities with a population that is largely of foreign birth.

When no channels of communication between the immigrant and the larger community seem to have been established, we have been concerned to inquire how such channels can be most effectively created. The barriers that through ignorance, indifference, and misunderstanding on either side have been allowed to grow up must be broken down. We have tried to follow up such avenues of communication as have opened naturally before us, after becoming acquainted with some of the leaders in the different groups.

The organizations with which we have become somewhat acquainted are representative of the types found in all the main Slavic groups and among the Lithuanians, Hungarians, Rumanians,[192] and Greeks. Suggestions applicable to them indicate a basis of co-operation with a very large proportion of our foreign-born population.

A list of the principal racial organizations in the United States is included in the Appendix. Information about local branches of these organizations can usually be secured by correspondence.

LOCAL BENEFIT SOCIETIES

The first incentive to organization among all the groups seems to have been the precarious economic situation during the years of effort to get a foothold here. The first association of the newly arrived immigrant is one of mutual aid. "Benefit" will be found as the basis of the important foreign-born organizations, no matter what new purposes may have been taken on with the establishment and progress of the group as a whole.

WHO WILL WELCOME THEM?

In the interviews we have had with the leaders among the groups the point has been repeatedly emphasized that Americans can never appreciate the situation of immigrants during their first ten years in this country. The strangeness, the poverty, the pressure to send money home, the inadequate, irregular income, the restriction to the low-skilled job—"there is in America, at first, nothing for an immigrant but the shovel"—the lack of knowledge of money values and ignorance of American domestic and social practices—these[193] conditions drive the immigrants into co-operative effort. The appeal sent out by a Russian national society organized in 1912 begins with some such words as these:

While we are in this country we are doing the lowest kind of work, and many accidents happen to us; if we do not belong to an organization we are without help.... The purpose of our brotherhood is to help our brethren in a strange country.

Not even in associated effort can they always find security, however. One of the reasons now being given very often by immigrants seeking passage back to Europe is their feeling of uncertainty about their future here. They say that America is all right so long as a man is young and strong enough to do the hard work in the industries, but they cannot see what is in store for them as they grow older, for they cannot save enough to provide for themselves; in Europe, a little land and a cottage are assurance of the necessities for old age.

There are, of course, many cases in which there is failure within the group as there is neglect without. Exploitation of immigrants by their fellow countrymen, and the evils of fraudulent banks, steamship companies, "tally-men," are well known. At the same time there is a great mass of neighborly service and of kindness of the poor to the poor, and of the stranger to the more recent comer.[194]

Benefit societies based either on neighborhood associations here or on village association in Europe, soon grow up. These are usually self-assessment societies, in which each member pays a small sum each month, often only 25 cents. Out of the funds thus raised, a sick benefit of from $3 to $5 a week is paid. On the death of a member an assessment of from 50 cents to $1 is laid on the surviving members, and the resulting sum is paid to the bereaved family, helping to meet the funeral expenses.

Such societies are not incorporated, their officers are usually without business training, and they are often unstable. They include, however, a considerable proportion of the more recent immigrants, who, through fear of falling into distress and dread of charity, are influenced to keep up the membership. In addition to the money benefit, these neighborhood societies often mean friendly interest and help in nursing, in the care of the children, and in household work. As the fees are low and as provision for the sick benefit seems very important, a person often belongs to several such societies.

Owing to the instability of these organizations the effort is often made to combine them and to establish them on a sound financial basis as national fraternal insurance societies. These societies substitute fraternal insurance for the sick and death benefit. As the immigrant family gains a[195] foothold in the new community the members are likely to join a national fraternal insurance society or, in the second generation, an organization of the type of the Catholic Order of Foresters, Knights and Ladies of Security, Tribe of Ben Hur, or Woodmen of the World.

The national fraternal insurance society is, among the Slavs, highly organized. Often in one national group as many as three flourishing societies will be found, with membership determined by religious or political preferences. As they exist now, these societies are all much alike, differing in the elaborateness of their organization in accordance with the period covered by the immigration of the group or with the strength of its cohesion in America. Leaders who wish to communicate directly with the great body of their co-nationals in America, do so through the channels provided by these organizations.

As the group develops a feeling of confidence, the insurance function becomes less urgent. In fact, officers of the national societies predict that the societies will gradually abandon the field of insurance and develop along other lines. Many societies already admit a considerable number of uninsured persons, who join in order to share in other enterprises. It would be neither possible nor profitable to describe all the groups, but the organization of a Croatian society and the relation[196] of women to certain societies in the Polish and Lithuanian groups will be briefly discussed.

NATIONAL CROATIAN ORGANIZATIONS

The strongest societies among the Croatians are the National Croatian Society of 50,000 members, and the Croatian League of Illinois of 39,000 members, sometimes called the "New Society," which in spite of its name is really a national organization.

The purpose of the National Croatian Society is set forth in its constitution:

... to help people of the Croatian race residing in America, in cases of distress, sickness, and death, to educate and instruct them in the English language and in other studies to fit them for the duties of life and citizenship with our English-speaking people, to teach them and impress upon them the importance and duty of being naturalized under the laws of the United States, and of educating their children in the public schools of the country; these purposes to be carried out through the organization and establishment of a supreme assembly and subordinate assemblies of the Croatian people with schools and teachers.

Those eligible to become members are:

Croatians or other Slavs who speak and understand the Croatian language, of all creeds excepting Jews. All between the ages of sixteen and fifty may be admitted, provided they are neither ill nor epileptic nor disabled, are not living in concubinage, and have not been expelled from the national society.

The structure of the society is quite elaborate, and the conditions of admission and of membership,[197] the organization and conduct of the lodges, the relations among the lodges and between a lodge and the national society, are all carefully specified in the constitution and by-laws.

Lodges are often organized on a sex basis, and in a community in which there is a lodge for men and a lodge for women, no one of one sex can be admitted to the lodge organized for the other. There is no special notice taken of women's interests in the structure of the national society, but there are local women's lodges, and women constitute about one tenth of the total membership.

The functions of these local lodges, aside from their official relation to the national organization, as specified by the by-laws, are:

... to assist those members who do not know how to read and write (either an officer or member shall, at least once a week, teach such members reading and writing); to establish libraries for members and gradually supply the same with the best and most necessary books; to hold entertainments with a view to building up the lodge treasury and to provide for brotherly talk and enjoyment.

The officers and members of some of the local lodges in Chicago have endeavored to develop and extend the social and recreational features of the lodges to meet what they believe to be one of the greatest needs of their people, but the efforts have so far met with little success.

Failure has been attributed to conditions found[198] in the community and to the altered circumstances of family life in America. It has been difficult to find suitable meeting places, as Croatian people have no halls of their own and do not feel at home in the neighborhood recreation center. Any kind of recreational activity planned is, of necessity, so different from that to which these men and women are accustomed, that it does not interest them at once. Large families of small children make it impossible for men and women to take their recreation together, or for women to leave their homes at all except for a very short time.

Leaders whom we have consulted feel, however, that it is only through the development of such organizations within the group that Croatian women can be drawn into any social or recreational activities in considerable numbers; for, because they feel peculiarly strange and ill at ease when with persons who are not of Croatian origin, they lead secluded lives.

The important projects of the National Croatian Society have been the raising of funds for the establishment in each large colony of a national headquarters under the name Croatian Home, and for the erection and maintenance of an invalid home. A "National Fund," into which each member pays a cent a month, is created for the "culture and enlightenment of Croatians." The orphan children of members of[199] the society are given the preference in the distribution of any benefit paid from the national fund.

CARE OF CROATIAN ORPHANS

The Croatian community in the United States has been peculiarly confronted with the problem of care of orphan children. The estimated number of orphan children is large in proportion to the number of Croatian families because a very large proportion of the Croatian men work at low-grade labor in the steel industry, in which fatal accidents are common.

At the last convention of several of the national societies, the representatives agreed to form a new national council especially to undertake the care of orphan children and to raise funds for this cause. The plan was formed to buy a tract of land in the vicinity of Chicago, on which an orphan home and training school were to be erected. The sum of $10,000 was devoted to the site and $100,000 to buildings. As free thinking has spread rapidly among Croatians in America, it was intended to establish a nonsectarian institution and to take children of free-thinking parents away from the Roman Catholic schools as well as to provide for children who should be later orphaned.

Through contacts established in the course of this study, the leaders in this group have been[200] led to inquire concerning American methods of child care. Attention was directed to the latest standard discussions on the subject.[52] After some consideration of the method of caring for dependent children by placing them in family homes, the Chicago Croatian committee decided to delay action on the erection of a costly institution, to take time for further study and to hold a conference with the national committee representing the other Croatian societies interested. In the meantime action has been taken to change the name of the new national organization from the "Society for the Erection of a Croatian Orphanage" to the "Society for the Care of Croatian Orphans," and the by-laws of the society are being rewritten so that the movement need not be committed to institutional care at the outset, but will be free to choose in the light of the best information at hand.

Some of the leading members of the committee are convinced that placing-out should be included in their plan, but feel that it may take some time to convince the Croatian people of this wish to delay operation until the question can be freely discussed throughout the whole Croatian community in America. Plans are now being made for the national committee, representing [201]all the societies interested, to confer with the representatives of public and private child-placing agencies. The question arises as to how relations may be established between such organizations in the separate national groups and those in the American community who are concerned with improved methods in the care of dependent children. Until provision is made that such information will be shared with members of groups like these as a matter of course, there is great loss and waste.

ORGANIZATIONS OF POLES

The Polish people are, no doubt, the most highly organized of the Slavic nationalities. It may be said that Chicago is their national center in the United States, and the headquarters of the three great national fraternal insurance societies, the Roman Catholic Union of America, the Polish National Alliance, and the Polish Women's Alliance. As these organizations are much alike in general plan, a description of the organization, character, and methods of work of one will give an idea of them all.

While these societies have always been divided upon political issues, and while there has been at times considerable bitterness in the antagonism between them, they have been able to unite their efforts in important undertakings for the general welfare of the Poles throughout the[202] United States. Common interest in the Polish cause during the war, too, has united them as never before, and there is every reason for the confident expectation that they will co-operate in any new projects undertaken for the benefit of the Polish community in America.

The Polish National Alliance is the largest single organization. In addition to providing insurance, this society carries on, through its national organization, extended work of a social and educational character.

There is, for example, among its "commissions," an Emigration Commission for aiding immigrants, which is charged with the duty of framing rules for the proper supervision of homes established for the care of newcomers. Under this Commission the Alliance has maintained immigrant aid stations in New York, Baltimore, and Boston. In New York there is a home in which immigrant girls and women arriving alone may be accommodated until relatives can be located.

The Chicago office co-operates with the offices at the ports of entry in securing information about relatives of Alliance members, and in case of special necessity arranges to have immigrants destined for Chicago met at the station. As relatives are supposed to be notified of the expected arrival before the women leave New York, the Chicago office has done little in this direction.[203] The need for such services, however, has been made clear in the Annual Reports of the Immigrants' Protective League, showing the numbers of unattended Polish girls coming to Chicago to be much larger than the number in any other national group.

The Polish National Alliance has been carrying on a number of projects, both for the Polish people throughout the country and for the local community in Chicago. During the war many forms of work that had been developed for the service of Poles in the United States were laid aside for the more urgent needs of the time, and the funds of this organization were devoted to the support of the Red Cross and of other relief work. When the needs especially arising out of the war have been met and the necessity for sending relief to Poland is no longer urgent, these projects, abandoned for the time, will be taken up again. Polish immigration has for a time ceased. In the opinion of the Poles in Chicago it will be very light for years after the war, so that projects hereafter undertaken will be concerned with the welfare of the community as it has become established in the United States.

POLISH WOMEN'S WORK

There is a Women's Department, directed by a committee of fifteen women members. The central government frames regulations for this department[204] "conformably to the requirements of a given moment." An illustration of its activities can be found in a movement initiated to maintain oversight of the employment of Polish girls and women. A great many Polish girls go into domestic work in private homes and in hotels and restaurants. Because girls from the rural districts in Poland find customs and living conditions here so different the societies have undertaken to study the problem. In order to investigate places of employment the women found they must represent a regularly licensed employment agency. Some delay in securing a license has held up their work, but they plan to establish in the near future a "Polish Women's Employment Agency."

Many cases came to their attention showing the need of protective work and legal aid for workingwomen, so that in 1917 the "Polish Women's Protective League" was organized to provide free legal advice and aid to Polish workingwomen.

The official organ of the Polish National Alliance is a weekly publication, Zgoda. There is a daily, the Dziennik Zwaizkowy, that has a semi-official status. The Women's Department is represented in the official organ by one page of ordinary newspaper size, without illustration. In the daily paper one page each week is devoted to items of especial value to women. Different[205] material is used in the two issues, but both give considerable space to such subjects as household management, the care of children, and problems of health and hygiene.

There is, in fact, a marked development among the Polish, Bohemian, Slovenian, and Lithuanian groups, of a definite division between the men's and the women's departments. This began first in the local lodges as they grew from mere meetings for the payment of dues into something more in the order of a center for the discussion of questions of importance in group or family life, or for action on those questions.

A woman who, more than eighteen years ago, organized one of the first lodges in the Polish National Alliance said that in the lodges of mixed membership women were supposed to have the same rights and privileges as men. As a matter of fact, she said that they had no voice in matters in which they felt their interest as women were especially concerned; the women were always in the minority, and there were very few who would even voice an opinion in the presence of men.

The older women in the community came, therefore, to feel that there were many problems of vital interest and importance for the immigrant woman upon which action would never be taken in the lodge meeting, in which there was a mixed membership. They believed, too, that the[206] meetings of the local lodge might become a real source of help to the newly arrived immigrant women. The women's lodge was therefore formed, and to the first meetings came women who still wore the handkerchiefs over their heads. Some of the more prosperous members protested that they did not want such women as these in the lodge, but the leaders insisted that their purpose in organizing women's lodges had been to reach through them just such women. The leaders felt that women who knew little of American life and customs would gradually acquire that knowledge by coming into the lodge.

A lodge of this kind under the leadership of progressive women of the older immigration has become a center in which are discussed many of the questions the women have to face for the first time. The plan in the Polish National Alliance is to have lodges so organized that women from Russian Poland may be in one, those from Galicia in another, or to organize lodges on the basis of the neighborhood association in the United States.

It is hoped that by such a plan as this the more backward women may be drawn into some of the social activities of the Polish community. Although English has not been the language of the meetings, women have been encouraged to learn English as soon as possible after their arrival. The older women urge the younger women[207] to acquire the language. They have learned the importance of a knowledge of the language to the mother of boys and girls who are growing up in surroundings of which the mother knows little, and where custom and convention are so different from those to which she was accustomed.

With the multiplication of women's lodges came the demand on the part of the women for representation in the national organization. As a result, the Women's Auxiliary has been given an official place, and women have been elected to the national board of directors.

Polish women have felt that the welfare of the group as a whole is largely dependent upon the fitness of the women to meet the new situation. They have recognized the fact that, because of the national attitude toward women, Polish women of the class represented by the bulk of the immigration are very backward. They have therefore sought to inaugurate a campaign for the education of women on a national scale.

Another interesting development has been the growth of national organizations for women alone. One of the earliest and best known of these is the Polish Women's Alliance, an example of organized effort of women to deal with their own problems on a national scale. The leaders in this enterprise were women who, through their own experiences as immigrants, and through contact[208] with those who came later, had come to realize both the nature of the problems women were called upon to meet and the different position of women in America.

One of the women who had been active in inaugurating the movement spoke of the extreme difficulty of such work in the Polish community because of the prejudice against women's taking part in anything outside of their homes. Some of the more advanced women thought that the welfare of the whole Polish community was retarded by the ignorance and indifference and prejudices of the women which kept them clinging to Old-World methods and customs entirely unsuited to the new conditions. They hoped that by building a clubhouse for women, with library and reading rooms, a large hall for assemblies, and small rooms for clubs and classes, they might gradually interest the women in something outside their homes.

No one thought it possible, however, for women to organize in this way, much less to carry on a national movement and to build a clubhouse, as they have succeeded in doing. Some leading women felt that education must come, if at all, through the women's own efforts, and that the education involved in work for the organization more nearly than any other experience touched the needs of these women, in that it drew them out of their older habits and encouraged them to[209] take the initiative and so to gain the self-confidence they lacked.

The organization was at first possible only because of the benefit features through which the support could be gained of men and women who had no interest or confidence in such educational projects as attempt to interest the women in clean streets, satisfactory disposal of garbage, and improved housing conditions.

This movement does not represent hostility to the great joint organization. Most of the women interested in developing the movement have been members of the Polish National Alliance; but they have thought that to give the women a sense of confidence it was necessary to have a women's organization, quite independent of the men's. And there have developed then the three relationships between men and women: (1) the Women's Department as one of the divisions of work in the Alliance; (2) the Women's Auxiliary to the men's society, and (3) the National Women's Organization, in which men are not members.

LITHUANIAN WOMAN'S ALLIANCE

The idea of the separate woman's organization finds an interesting illustration in the Lithuanian Woman's Alliance. This national society, independent of any other organization, was organized in 1915 in Chicago. Only Lithuanian Catholic women who are in good standing in the Church[210] are admitted. The society has now grown, until there are over five thousand members in different Lithuanian communities throughout the United States.

The society was organized for the education of Lithuanian women in America. Those interested in the organization recognized that it would be very difficult to obtain support for such a movement among women of the type they most wished to interest unless it had the indorsement of the Catholic Church.

There are two departments, an educational (Absvieta) and a benefit (Pasalpa). It was recognized by the leaders that little appeal could be made to women for an educational enterprise, for the majority of women are too ignorant and indifferent; but like the Polish women they knew that "benefit" would appeal to every immigrant woman, for all belong to at least one friendly insurance society. The poorer women and the more recent immigrants are associated in the little parish self-assessment societies, in which each pays a small monthly fee, usually twenty-five cents. Membership in a substantial fraternal insurance society costs more than they can afford to pay.

The Lithuanian Woman's Alliance provides insurance for 35 cents a month. The benefit department provides for the payment of a death benefit of $150, and $5 per week will be paid[211] upon request to any member who is sick more than two weeks. In each case in which benefit is granted, two visitors are appointed to make arrangements for hospital care if necessary, and to render any other needed assistance.

The idea back of this organization has been to help immigrant women to adjust themselves to the new circumstances of life in America; the method chosen has been through education along general and very practical lines, beginning at the point where the women themselves have come to recognize their needs. The fact that few of these women can read even in their own language makes it very difficult to reach them. At present, however, the task seems less difficult than ever before. The fact that fewer lodgers are taken, that in some cases the higher wages have lessened the pecuniary problems—even the fact that women have been drawn outside the home to work—these facts, together with the activities of women in war work, have served to give them a sense of identity with the American community; so that there is now a greater demand for English lessons than ever before. Many women now realize the necessity of speaking the English language, and women who read in Lithuanian are eager to learn to read English so that they "may know what is in the attractive-looking magazines they see on the news stands."

The educational department is open to all[212] women, whether they wish to avail themselves of the benefit or not, but the benefit department is open only upon condition that members also take part in the educational movement. Dues in the educational department alone are ten cents a month. The educational program is to be carried on through the local lodge and the official organ, Woman's Field, issued monthly by the central committee.

The magazine, aside from such space as is needed for official notices, is devoted to educational material. A typical number includes articles on questions of general interest to women everywhere. Emphasis is laid on the necessity for women's learning English and assuming the duties of citizenship. One page each month devoted to questions of general hygiene and the care of children is edited by a Lithuanian woman physician. A page or section is given to instruction in the preparation of food, as the Lithuanians realize that one of the gravest problems for their people here has been that of diet. Space is given to articles about Lithuania, "so that the young people may know that they need not be ashamed of their country."

The educational work planned for the local lodge includes instruction along many lines. Classes are held two evenings a week in the parish halls. The work of one of the more active lodges gives an idea of the scope of the undertaking.[213] This chapter numbers over fifty members. Regular monthly meetings for the payment of dues and transaction of business are held on Sunday afternoon in the parish hall. After the business is finished there is a social hour.

Weekday classes have been held on two evenings each week; on one, English and sewing classes are held; on the other, cooking and housekeeping classes. Women who have had greater advantages in Europe as well as in the United States give their services as teachers. All courses are planned for women who have had very little opportunity in either country; the president of one of the lodges said, in explaining their program, "You know Lithuanian women are not high up like American women—they do not know how to keep house or cook or take care of babies."

On one evening in the week the whole time is devoted to housekeeping. The church hall has been equipped with a gas stove, a set of cooking utensils, dining-room table, linen, dishes, and silver. Lessons are given in the preparation and serving of a meal. Some attention is given to food values, but the object is mainly to show women how to prepare wholesome food as economically as possible. Processes of canning, preserving, and drying fruits and vegetables are demonstrated, as they are wholly new to most of[214] the women. The women are also shown how to scrub, wash dishes, and care for clothing.

Reference might also be made to a local society organized by Lithuanian women about twelve years ago on a mutual-benefit basis, for educational purposes, which were stated in the constitution to be:

... to provide sick and death benefit; to organize Lithuanian women for a better and larger education; to provide evening and day classes in reading, writing, sewing, sanitary housekeeping, and the care of children; to provide lectures, books, and programs to interest women in health and education; to encourage friendship among Lithuanian women, and provide social life; to provide scholarships for students seeking higher education; to encourage writers; to encourage women to read the newspapers in Lithuanian and English.

These women, who have all been in the United States for a considerable period, and know the needs of the newcomers, have fitted up a housekeeping center in the public park center in their neighborhood. They have a kitchen and dining-room equipment consisting of a stove, a set of cooking utensils, and a dining table with service. Here cooking classes are held once a week, the lessons given by the women who are skilled in cookery.

The attempt is made to create an interest in food values, in proper cooking, and in wise spending. In housekeeping lessons, washing, scrubbing, washing windows, and even dishwashing[215] and the setting of the table are taught. Classes in English have been organized, but these women have suffered as others have suffered from a lack of teachers skilled in teaching this kind of a group, and from a lack of classroom material suited to their needs.

The Polish and the Lithuanian societies illustrate the organized effort of women in those groups in which the group life is highly developed, in which a number of women have become conscious of separate needs and undertake to assist in the development of others of their sex.

UKRAINIAN BEGINNINGS

Among the Ukrainian women the beginnings of this process can be observed, but in this case there is common effort on the part of the most progressive men and women in behalf of the more backward women. We are told that the Ukrainian women have much greater authority and responsibility in the United States than in the Ukraine, so that some men say that here "the laws are made for women." They spend the money, discipline the children, and direct the household life. Many of the women have been poorly fitted, by their inferior status at home, for their new duties, and the Ukrainian Women's Alliance was organized in 1917 by both men and women in an attempt to meet this situation.[216]

This organization, too, is based on the benefit idea, which all the women can understand, but plans are already laid for a comprehensive educational program to be carried out not only through educational centers in the local lodges, but through a magazine of national circulation. This is a complete innovation, as there has never before existed among the Ukrainians a woman's association, nor has any attention been paid to their interests in Ukrainian publications. The organ of the Alliance had in October, 1919, put out four issues, and met with so cordial a response that its next number was double the size of the first numbers and the sales at news stands were sufficient to cover the cost of these first numbers.

The contents of one number indicate the purposes sought by its publication. Of the articles, one describes the organization of the Alliance, one discusses the relation of the institution of the home to the community, with special stress laid on the responsibilities of the mother in the home, one explains the woman-suffrage movement and urges the importance of woman's place in government. There is a department devoted to diet, food values, and recipes, and one devoted to hygiene, with special emphasis on child care.

In some of the other national groups the number of men is still so far in excess of the number of women that the energies of the group[217] seem to have been absorbed in dealing with the problems of the men or of getting a foothold as a group.

ITALIAN WOMEN UNORGANIZED

This does not apply to the Italian community. While benefit societies among the Italians are very numerous, there has until recently been little movement toward a national organization similar to those among the Poles and Lithuanians. The deep division in dialect, custom, and feeling between people from different sections of Italy accounts for the number of societies as well as for the lack of affiliation among them. Three of the largest societies in Chicago, in which membership is largely Sicilian, are now affiliated, but no effort has been discovered to make use of the organization as a basis for domestic educational enterprise.

Women are admitted to many of the societies on the same terms as men, but rarely attend meetings. There are many small self-assessment societies for women alone, but they have no social or educational feature; members seldom meet, and dues are often sent in by children.

The idea of using their own organizations as a means of carrying on educational work among women is a novel one in the Italian community, but it is being recognized as a possible method of attacking the great need for education in maternal[218] and infant welfare, in the care of small children, and in sanitary housekeeping.

The Italian physicians, for example, realize that the women need instruction, and the Italian Medical Association, in May, 1919, planned a series of lectures for mothers, in Italian, on these subjects, but found that there were great difficulties in reaching the mothers with such material. It is therefore very important that every device be tried for reaching the more intelligent women, who with the helpful neighborliness that exists in all the neighborhoods would share with their less-informed sisters the benefits of their aroused interests.

GROWTH OF NATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS

It is clear, then, that highly organized societies established primarily for mutual insurance often undertake educational and social projects which tend to overshadow their original purpose as the economic position of the members of the national group becomes more stable. Leaders who are inaugurating national educational movements in the less well-established groups are consciously using the benefit feature because of its universal appeal, and employing the general methods and machinery of the fraternal insurance organization.

Modification of the official machinery is the inevitable result of the change in purpose. We find, for instance, that the local lodge, originally[219] only a meeting for the payment of dues, becomes a center for discussion of problems of concern to the local community or to the national group, and often the field in which the educational program planned by the national society is carried out.

The official organ, designed to carry official communication and news, tends to subordinate this function to the educational and cultural features. To a certain extent it becomes a national educational journal. It is to be noted that with the separation of men's and women's lodges and the growth of the influence of women in the national policy of the society, the section of the official organ devoted to the interests of women is extended. The very real problem of the immigrant woman in adjusting herself and the family life to the new conditions here, is given greater consideration.

As these organizations have been so efficiently developed, and as the leaders in the different groups hope for a united group where before there has been a separate and segregated one, it seemed worth while to consult the representatives of the different groups in some detail with reference to the method of using educational material dealing with family adjustment. The subject of child care seemed the most obviously pertinent and interesting, and a section of the United States Children's Bureau Study on the[220] Pre-School Child was submitted for their consideration with the question as to its adaptation to the needs of the various groups.

All to whose attention it was called agreed that it was material of the highest importance, and that if translated it would prove of greatest interest. A translation was therefore presented to these representatives for their consideration. Again, all agreed that the only questions were the extent to which the material would have to be explained in terms of foodstuffs and methods of care familiar to the women in the different groups.

All agreed that the material should be given to the women in small doses graphically presented. The installment plan should be the rule. All agreed that illustrations would greatly add to the interest and the ease with which the lesson would be understood. And all agreed that a very effective way of arousing and maintaining interest would be to call in to conference representatives of the different important agencies, the Church, the school, the midwife, the doctor, to obtain common consideration of the material with reference to its more exact adaptation to the needs of the particular group.

Several editors agreed that much of the material could be used without such conference if it were only skillfully translated—which is a difficult and costly process. The Foreign Language[221] Information Service of the National Red Cross has begun this work, and finds a hearty reception for its translations of such material. But the editors likewise thought that such conferences as have been described would have very great effect in securing co-operation in the use of the material.

It is clear that the same general method could be applied to the use of other similar material bearing on problems of family adjustment, or on the other aspects of adjustment; but in the field of family adjustment there is available a great body of information and suggestion organized by the expert members of the various Federal bureau staffs for the purpose of accomplishing just the end we have under consideration. This is true not only of the work done by the United States government, but by the state and city governments as well.

The development and maintenance of an agency which could make available to foreign-speaking groups through their own organizations the material already awaiting use, would correspond with the hopes and the intentions of leaders among the various groups, facilitate their work, and make possible a fine and a fruitful co-operation among elements that have in the past been separate, if not hostile.

[222]

VIII

AGENCIES OF ADJUSTMENT

In the first six chapters an attempt has been made to set out certain difficulties with which foreign-born family groups are confronted on arrival. It has become clear that certain services skillfully rendered might prevent a great deal of needless suffering, discomfort, and waste, and also greatly facilitate the adjustment of the family to the new surroundings. The services that would be appropriate to the needs of all housewives might be classed under (1) the exercise of hospitality; (2) supplying information and opportunities for instruction; (3) assistance in the performance of household tasks. Suggestions that these services might prove useful are not based wholly on theory, and attention may at this point be directed to the work of certain agencies which have attempted to do these various things.

The suggestion has been frequently made that the immigrant should be the object of certain protective care during the journey across the[223] ocean and on arrival.[53] The proposal here is that the community would gain enormously through the creation of devices for the exercise of a community hospitality. This should include the receiving and distributing of new arrivals in such a way as to assure their being put into touch, not only with their relatives and friends, but with the community resources which could be of special service as well.

Attention has been called to the efforts put forth by organizations among the foreign-speaking groups. The possibility of their more efficient and wider activity should be always kept in mind. But the work of the Immigrants' Protective League of Chicago, in behalf of unaccompanied women and girls, illustrates both the nature of the task and the way in which the development of such services requires a familiarity with the governmental organizations and a capacity for utilizing official agencies not to be found among the groups most needing help.

IMMIGRANTS' PROTECTIVE LEAGUE

The work of this society has been referred to a number of times, and its methods and special objects should perhaps be briefly summarized. Its organization in 1907 grew out of a desire to [224]assist the immigrant girls coming into Chicago, with special reference to their industrial relations. The objects described in the charter of incorporation are, however, much wider than this. They were:

... to apply the civic, social, and philanthropic resources of the city to the needs of foreigners in Chicago, to protect them from exploitation, to co-operate with the Federal, state, and local authorities, and with similar organizations in other localities, and to protect the right of asylum in all proper cases. (By-Laws, Art. II.)

The services of the organization have been taken advantage of by members of all the national groups in Chicago, and these services have included meeting immigrant trains and distributing arriving immigrants to their destination in the city, prosecuting the agencies from which the immigrant suffered especial exploitation, visiting immigrant girls, securing appropriate legislation, and in general making known to the community the special needs of the newly arrived immigrants.

The League has from the beginning made use of the services of foreign-speaking visitors, and the volume and success of its work has varied with the number of these visitors, the extent to which they represented groups in need of special aid, and their skill as social workers. At the time of the publication of the last report, the following languages besides English were spoken by[225] these visitors: German, Bohemian, Italian, Lettish, Lithuanian, Magyar, Polish, Russian, Slovak, and Yiddish. Many aspects of its work do not bear on this discussion, but the following brief passages from the annual reports indicate the way in which the work in behalf of unaccompanied girls developed.

During the past year and a half the League has received from the various ports of arrival the names and addresses of the girls and women destined for Chicago. All of these newly arrived girls and women have been visited by representatives of the League able to speak the language of the immigrant. Four, and part of the time five, women speaking the Slavic languages—German, French, Italian, and Greek—have been employed for this work. In these visits information has been accumulated in regard to the journey to Chicago, the depot situation, the past industrial experience of the girls, their occupation in Chicago, wages, hours of work, their living conditions, the price they pay for board, and whether they are contributing to the support of some one at home. On this basis the League's work for girls has been planned. (Annual Report, 1909-10, p. 13.)

In these visits many girls needing assistance are found. The most difficult ones to help are those for whom the visitor sees a danger which the girl is unable to anticipate. Often a girl is a pioneer, who comes in advance of her family, and the friend or acquaintance whom she knows in Chicago undertakes to help her in finding her first job and a place to live, and then leaves her to solve the future for herself. If she should be out of work or in trouble she has no one whom she can ask for advice or help. In cases of this sort all that the visitor can do is to establish a connection which will make the girl feel that she has some one she can turn to in case of trouble or unemployment. (Annual Report, 1909-10, p. 15.)

Sometimes the League's visitor can do little more than[226] offer the encouragement which the girl so much needs during the first few years in America. Usually she tries to persuade the girl to attend the nearest night school; sometimes she helps her in finding work, or a proper boarding place; sometimes, when the immigrant is educated, she has to quite sternly insist that any kind of work must be accepted until English has been learned. Some girls are discovered only after it is too late to prevent a tragedy. In the cases of two girls, one Polish and the other Bohemian, who had been betrayed by the uncles who had brought them to this country, the results were especially discouraging because the efforts to punish the men failed and one of the girls who had suffered so much from the uncle whom she thought she could trust was deported. (Annual Report for the Year Ending January 1, 1914, p. 11.)

It is clear that such a plan involved the distribution of information from the ports of entry to the places of destination,[54] and the development of instrumentalities through which the immigrant on arrival at his destination can be placed in contact with those from whom help of the kind needed could be expected. A nation-wide network of agencies for such hospitality, with headquarters at the ports of entry, is seen to be necessary from the descriptions of the services to be rendered. The development of such machinery by the Federal Immigration Service, as at present organized, may be unthinkable; but with a change in personnel and with a wider [227]understanding of the nature of the problem, the apparently impossible might be realized.

In the meantime, the service need not wholly wait on this remote possibility. There are agencies, both public and private, which with enlarged resources might undertake a considerable portion of this task and develop more completely both the methods of approach and a body of persons skilled in this particular kind of service. Such work as that done on a small scale by the Immigrants' Protective League is especially instructive. The resources of that organization for all its tasks have been limited, so that visitors have been only to a slight extent specialized, except in the matter of language. But with enlarged resources, so that a larger number and better trained visitors might be employed, this gracious and important hospitality might be widely exercised.

A NATIONAL RECEPTION COMMITTEE

As this visiting developed among the different groups, several results could be anticipated. Just as the needs of the unaccompanied girls have been learned in this way, the needs of the families in the different groups could become more exactly understood, and devices for meeting those needs more efficiently worked out. It would perhaps be possible to urge the woman to learn English when she is first confronted[228] with the strangeness of her situation, and before she slips into the makeshifts by which she later is apparently able to get on without learning English. Instruction in English might be made to appear the path of least resistance, if it were made attractive and available to the immigrant housewife at a sufficiently early moment.

These visitors might preferably be English-speaking members of the foreign-speaking groups. If there were a sufficient staff, they might also render many similar services to other women in the foreign-born groups. They could persuade those who have not yet learned English to come into English classes; they could organize groups for instruction in cooking, child care, house and neighborhood sanitation; and gradually accumulate both additional knowledge as to the need and experience in meeting it.

A point to be emphasized in connection with this service is that it is not related in any way to the problem of dependency, but is directed wholly toward meeting the difficulties growing out of the strangeness of the newcomer to the immediate situation. By developing a method for lessening the difficulties connected with the migration of any group from one section to another differing in industrial or social organization, light would be thrown on analogous problems such as the movements among the negroes from the South to the North during the war, or[229] of the mountain people to the cotton-mill villages at an earlier date.

Another point to be emphasized is that while the method of approach and of immediate service can be developed independently, and while the amount of discomfort and genuine distress that can be prevented is very great—as is shown in the experience of families whom such organizations as now attempt work along this line have aided—the opportunity for swift and efficient adjustment will be dependent on the development of a body of educational technique.

It has been made clear that there are certain kinds of information that should be given to the newcomers, with reference, for example, to the change in the legal relationships within the family group, the new responsibilities of the husband and father, and the rights of wife and children to support. Attention has been called to the need of giving instruction regarding sanitary and hygienic practices, with reference to the new money values, and to the new conditions under which articles of household use are to be obtained, to the requirements in food and clothing, particularly for the children, in the new locality as compared with that from which the family comes. And, as has been suggested, above all there is always the question of teaching English.

Sometimes the necessary facts can be conveyed briefly and immediately. Sometimes patient[230] individual instruction will be necessary. Sometimes group or class instruction will be the proper device. It is highly important, then, that these various forms of instruction be developed into a technique. Courses of instruction to be given according to these different methods to those for whom a particular method is appropriate must be organized, and a body of teachers developed.

The question then arises as to the extent to which this task has been undertaken and the agencies that have undertaken it. As to the first great body of material, it may be said to have been ignored. Only when one is summoned to the Juvenile Court of Domestic Relations, or when one learns of another's being summoned, is the body of family law called to the attention of the group. In English, in cooking, and child care, some agencies have attempted instruction. They are the public school, organizations like the Immigrants' Protective League, the State Immigration Commission, the social settlement, recreation centers of various kinds, the Young Women's Christian Association in its International Institutes. The possibilities in the work of these agencies are numerous.

THE PUBLIC SCHOOL

The public school touches the foreign-born family at two points: First, in the compulsory education[231] of the children, and second, in the opportunities that it offers to the adult members of the family to learn English, to fit themselves for citizenship, and to adjust their lives to the new community.

The adaptation of the public schools to these tasks belongs properly to another section of this study.[55] In so far, however, as the school contributes through its attitude toward the parent to a breakdown in family discipline, and in so far as it tries or does not try to instruct the foreign-born housewife in the art of housekeeping, it is concerned with problems that are primarily family problems. It may be of interest, then, to cite certain evidence obtained from foreign-born leaders and typical foreign-born families as to the relationship existing between the schools and foreign-born parents, the methods used by the schools in the education of foreign-born women, and their apparent success or failure.

Reference has already been made to the place that the school sometimes plays in the breakdown of family discipline, because of ignorance on the part of the teachers concerning the social and domestic attitudes prevailing among the foreign-born groups.

The school has, in fact, been able to take so little account of the mother that so long as things run fairly smoothly she is usually unable to realize [232]that she has any place at all in the scheme. Again and again, to the question as to whether she visits the school where her children go, comes the answer, "Oh no, my children never have any trouble in school." As long as they are not in trouble she is not called into consultation. She may even be made to feel quite unwelcome if she is bold enough to visit the schoolroom, so she very soon comes to the conclusion that the education of her children is really none of her business.

Sometimes the teacher thoughtlessly contributes to the belittling of the parent in the eyes of the child. An Italian man tells the story of a woman he knew who whipped her boy for truancy and then went to consult the teacher. But instead of a serious and sympathetic talk, the teacher in the child's presence upbraided the mother for punishing the child. The child of foreign-born parents, as well as the native-born child, often learns in the public school to despise what is other than American in dress, customs, language, and political institutions, and both are thus influenced to despise the foreign-born parent who continues in the old way.

There is, of course, often a failure on the part of the teacher to uphold the dignity and authority of the parents in the native-born group, and the need of bridging the gap between school authorities and parents has been recognized by[233] the organization of the Parent-Teachers' organization as well as of the Patrons' Department of the National Education Association. It may be that at a later date, when certain general fundamental questions of co-operation have been dealt with, devices for meeting the difficulties of special groups of parents will be developed.

On the subject of courses of instruction attention has been called to the many points at which the foreign-born housewife needs instruction and assistance in familiarizing herself with the new conditions under which she lives. When there exists such a universal and widely felt need which could be filled by giving instruction in a field in which the material is organized and available, the opportunity of the school is apparent. Not only courses in English, in the art of cooking, in the principles of selection and preservation of food, but those describing the peculiarities of the modern industrial urban community as contrasted with the simple rural community, could be planned, methods of instruction could be developed, and regular curricula could be organized.

There are, to be sure, certain inherent difficulties to be met in the instruction of housewives. The old saying, "Man's work is from sun to sun, but woman's work is never done," has been so long accepted as the expression of the inevitable that it is difficult to persuade anyone, most of all the housewife herself, that she can manage to[234] give an hour or two a day to learning something new. Her time seems never her own, with tasks morning, afternoon, and night.

Nor is it only a question of overwork. Undoubtedly careful planning is uncommon, and the tradition that woman's place is in the home has its effect. In fact, there is a vicious circle; she cannot study because her housekeeping is too arduous, but it is so partly because she does not take time to learn better ways of doing her work.

There is, moreover, among most housewives, whether native or foreign born, a certain complacency about housekeeping and bringing up children. Housekeeping is supposed to come by nature, and few women of any station in life are trained to be homemakers and mothers. If they take any training it is generally designed to fit them to earn a living only until they are married. They do not realize how useful certain orderly instruction might be.

Moreover, instruction for foreign-born housewives must include the subjects needed for homemaking as well as English. Having survived the first hard adjustments it is difficult to persuade the foreign-born mother that she has any need for speaking English when housekeeping is all that is expected of her. The situation is often complicated, too, by her age at immigration and her lack of education in the old country, which make[235] her particularly ill-fitted for ordinary classroom instruction.

Besides these difficulties there are certain prejudices to be met. The middle-aged woman does not wish to study English in classes with her children of working age or others of their age. She dreads the implication of this association. Many of the foreign-born mothers also have a hesitancy about going into classes with men, as they feel a mental inferiority, and many prefer not to be in classes with students from other national groups.

The most frequent criticism by immigrant leaders interviewed is the inelasticity of the public-school methods. The classes are usually held three or four nights a week, and no housewife should be expected to leave home as often as that. The groups are composed of both men and women and of all nationalities, disregarding well-known prejudices that have already been mentioned.

A more fundamental criticism than these has reference to the failure to adopt or devise new methods of instruction for persons who cannot read or write in their own language, and who have arrived at a period in their lives when learning is extremely difficult. The classes are often conducted in English by day-school teachers, who are accustomed to teaching children and who are entirely unfamiliar with the background of the immigrant woman and her special problems.[236]

There are reports also of the unwillingness of the school authorities to relax formal requirements, with reference to the minimum number for whom a class will be organized. Often it is necessary to "nurse the class." In Chicago sixteen women have in the past been deprived of a class because the Board of Education refused at the time to open the schools to groups of less than twenty.

THE HOME TEACHER

The home teacher in California is an interesting educational device, of which much is to be expected. The Home Teacher Act, passed by the state legislature April 10, 1915,[56] permits boards of school trustees or city boards of education to employ one "home teacher" for every five hundred or more units of average daily attendance. The home teacher is

to work in the homes of the pupils, instructing children and adults in matters relating to school attendance and preparation therefor, also in sanitation, in the English language, in household duties, such as purchase, preparation, and use of food and clothing, and in the fundamental principles of the American system of government and the rights and duties of citizenship. She is required to possess the following qualifications:

1. A regular teacher's certificate under the State Education Law.[237]

2. Experience in teaching and in social work.

3. Good health.

4. Ability to speak the language of the largest group in the district.

5. Complete loyalty to the principal of the school.

6. Tact and patience for a delicate task.

7. Ingenuity in adapting all circumstances to the main purpose.

8. An incapacity for discouragement.

9. Comprehension of the reasons and objects of the work.

10. Finally, above all and through all, a sympathetic attitude toward the people, which involves some knowledge of the countries and conditions from which they came, and what "America" has meant to them.[57]

Her salary is paid from the city or from district special school funds.

The law authorizing the use of home teachers was enacted largely through the efforts of the State Commission of Immigration and Housing, and was from the first intended to be used for the benefit of foreign-born families. The first experiments were financed by the Commission of Immigration and Housing and by private organizations, such as the Daughters of the American Revolution, the Council of Jewish Women, and the Young Women's Christian Association. According to the latest report[58] there are twenty official home teachers at work in eight cities of the state. The Commission says of the purpose of this plan:

[238]

The interpretation of the need in California departs from that conceived elsewhere. There have been so-called home teachers in a dozen cities, of several Eastern states, for a number of years, but their purpose is to do follow-up work for absent, irregular, subnormal, or incorrigible children, and they are more properly visiting teachers. The home teacher, as we conceive her purpose, seeks not primarily the special child—though that will often open the door to her and afford her a quick opportunity for friendly help—but the home as such, and especially the mother who makes it. This discrimination as to aim and purpose cannot be too much emphasized, or too consistently maintained, for the care of abnormal children, important as it is, can by no means take the place of the endeavor to Americanize the families of the community.[59]

SETTLEMENT CLASSES

The social settlements are in many cases situated in congested city districts, and they have always dealt very directly with the family groups in their neighborhood. Settlements have, in fact, probably more than any other social agency, tried to become acquainted with the Old-World background of their neighbors in order to establish friendly relationships. The settlement ideal has included the preservation of the dignity and self-esteem of the immigrant, while attempting to modify his habits when necessary and giving him some preparation for citizenship.

LITHUANIAN MOTHERS HAVE COME TO A SETTLEMENT CLASS

Classes in English and Civics, mothers' clubs, and housekeeping classes have been part of the contribution of the settlement to the adjustment [239]of family life. Seventeen settlements in Chicago, for example, have conducted during the last year 36 clubs and classes of this kind for non-English-speaking women. Among these there are 9 English classes, 8 sewing classes, 10 cooking classes, and 9 mothers' clubs, with varied programs.

These classes have been conducted with a flexibility that is often lacking in the public-school classes. They are usually held in the daytime at the hour most convenient for the group concerned, and by combining social features with instruction the interest of the women is maintained longer than would otherwise be possible.

Sometimes the classes are conducted in a foreign language, but they are generally taught in English, occasionally with the assistance of an interpreter. The classes are usually small, so that considerable personal attention is possible. The season during which it seems possible to hold such classes lasts from September or October until June, and it seems necessary to expend considerable effort each year in order to reorganize them.

Trained domestic-science teachers are used for most of the cooking and sewing classes. The English teachers and mothers' club leaders are, however, usually residents in the settlement or other volunteers with little training or experience in teaching adults. They often find it quite difficult to hold the group together. Very valuable[240] work is done, however, especially in the cooking classes. Many such classes were organized to teach conservation cooking; for instance, in an Italian class, the women were taught the use of substitutes for wheat that could be used in macaroni; in another the cooking teacher took Italian recipes and tried to reproduce their flavors with American products which are cheaper and more available than the Italian articles.

What is gained in flexibility may, of course, be counterbalanced by a loss of unity. The settlement teaching lacks, on the whole, a unity and organization that the public school should be better able to provide.

CO-OPERATION OF AGENCIES

Sometimes co-operation among several agencies may be advantageous in meeting the various difficulties presented by the task of teaching adult foreign-born women. Such co-operation was developed between the Immigrants' Protective League of Chicago, the public schools, the Chicago Woman's Club and the Women's Division of the Illinois Council of Defense.

The Board of Education of Chicago, in 1917, passed a resolution to the effect that whenever twenty or more adults desired instruction in any subject which would increase their value in citizenship, the school would be opened and a trained teacher provided. The Immigrants' Protective[241] League then undertook to organize groups who would take advantage of this opportunity and to keep the groups interested after they had been organized.

The Chicago Woman's Club and the Council of National Defense undertook to supply kindergarten teachers to care for the children whose mothers were in the class, and the Visiting Nurse Association supplied nurses to examine the children, to advise mothers with reference to their care, and to make home visits when the condition of the children rendered this necessary.

The League visitors made very definite efforts to organize campaigns for acquainting the housewives of various neighborhoods with the opportunity thus provided, and for persuading the women to "come out." The services of the foreign-born visitors have been particularly valuable in the work of organization. These visitors certainly put forth valiant efforts in behalf of the plan. The Lithuanian and Italian visitors, for example, made in three instances 40, 96, and 125 calls before a class was organized, and even then less than twenty enrolled for each class. They have found it necessary to make visits in the homes of women whom they hoped to draw out, and have also used posters, printed invitations, and advertisements in foreign-language newspapers. Nor have their efforts ceased when the class was organized. Often misunderstandings[242] occur, the attendance begins to dwindle, and great efforts must be made to discover the cause and to bring back the members.

The classes organized in this way have usually been small, composed of housewives of a single national group. Considerable individual attention is given the members of the class, and the foreign-speaking visitors attend the classes so that they may interpret when necessary.

The plan has been carried out, of course, on an extremely restricted stage. The efforts have been limited almost entirely to English and cooking classes, and instruction in other phases of household management has been quite incidental.

The teachers supplied by the Board of Education have not, of course, always possessed social experience and training. The classes are sometimes short lived. In the case of a Lithuanian cooking class, to which the teacher came too late to give the lesson, or too weary to give the lesson, it was necessary to reorganize the group. Where the teachers change, the group will dwindle, and the efforts of the visitor will have been substantially wasted.

The subject matter is often poorly adapted to the needs and desires of the foreign housewife. A new domestic-science teacher, for instance, gave to a group of Lithuanian women seven consecutive lessons on pies, cakes, and cookies, in spite of the organizer's request for lessons on[243] "plain cooking." At times, as has been pointed out, the teacher is wholly ignorant as to the habits and tastes of the immigrant. There is, sometimes, an ill-advised attempt to substitute American dishes for foreign dishes instead of modifying or supplementing the well-established and perfectly sound dietetic practices of the foreign-born group.

The Lithuanian visitor of the Immigrants' Protective League, in speaking of the difficulties she had encountered in keeping together the classes she organized for the public school, says she has often been able to get together a group of women who want lessons in English and in cooking. The plan has been to give cooking lessons in English. The women have come, perhaps, three or four times. The first lesson would teach the making of biscuits; perhaps the second dumplings; the third sweet rolls. The teacher would be very busy with her cooking and talk very little. Then the women would not come back. They did not want to learn to make biscuits, about which they cared nothing; they were busy women and were aware that they were not getting what they wanted or needed.

INTERNATIONAL INSTITUTES

Another specialized agency for work with the foreign-born groups is the International Institute of the Young Women's Christian Association.[244] This association has attempted in a short period of time to develop over a wide area this form of service, so that between the spring of 1913 and March, 1919, there had been established 31 of these organizations, most of them in industrial centers in different parts of the United States. In general, their work, as outlined in the After-War Program of the association, includes (1) a foreign-language information office, (2) home visiting for newly arrived women and girls, (3) case work in connection with legal difficulties, sickness, and emergencies, and (4) work with groups, including organized classes and informal gatherings. The last are to be especially designed for women and girls unable or unwilling to attend night schools, and there is to be a persistent urging upon the public school of the importance of socialized methods in work for women.

The use of foreign-language visitors is considered to be one of the most important features of these undertakings. Although few of the institutes have been able to secure enough workers to reach all the language groups in the community, provision can usually be made for the most numerous groups. Among the 18 replies to questionnaires sent to these institutes only 4 show less than 3 languages spoken by visitors, 10 have as many as 4 or more, and 4 have 8 or 9 languages.[245]

These 18 institutes employ 76 foreign-language visitors. Forty-six of these are themselves foreign born. These visitors represent a great variety in training and experience, but the institute secretaries think that on the whole they are more valuable than native-born visitors would be even if these native-born visitors were more highly trained. The training of these particular visitors, while varied and often apparently inadequate, is on the whole surprisingly good. Fifteen of the 46 have had some college training; 3 have had kindergarten training, and 4 nurses' training. Eight have had previous case-work experience; 4 have lived in settlements. Eight have taken training courses given by the association, varying from a few weeks to several months at the national headquarters. A number have had religious training of one kind or another, 2 in a school for deaconesses, 12 as prospective missionaries, and 1 in a theological seminary.

The 18 International Institutes report the establishment of 134 clubs or classes in which married women are members, having an enrollment of 894 foreign-born married women. The subject most generally taught is English. Among 134 clubs and classes, 101 are organized exclusively for the teaching of English, and 7 others combine English with cooking or sewing.

Some attempt is made to teach housekeeping in classes. Ten of these are organized for cooking[246] or sewing, 7 for English and cooking or sewing, and there are 13 mothers' clubs with subjects of such general interest as health, the care of children, and home nursing. In addition to the organized clubs and classes, most of the institutes have given lectures in foreign languages to larger groups of women subjects such as "Women and the War," "Liberty Bonds," "Thrift," "Food Conservation," "Personal and Social Hygiene," "The Buying of Materials," and "What the English Language Can Do for You."

Most classes are composed of a single national group, but classes are reported in which there are Polish and Ruthenian, Slovak and Polish, Greek and Lithuanian, Armenian and French, and Portuguese, Magyar and Slovak, and "mixed" nationalities. English is used in practically all classes which are primarily for the teaching of English. Fourteen of the institutes, however, have foreign-speaking workers to interpret whenever the women do not understand the teacher. In answer to the question as to the success of the institute in connecting married women with classes in public evening schools, three reply that they have had no success because the public schools do not use foreign-speaking workers and the women cannot understand the teachers who speak only English.[247]

The institutes conduct vigorous campaigns to acquaint the mothers with their work, using posters, printed invitations, announcements at schools, notices in foreign papers, and particularly home visits by foreign-speaking workers.

With regard to home visiting it appears that there has not yet been time to work out a program for the teaching of improved standards of housekeeping, personal hygiene, and proper diet. The institutes, however, lend their foreign-speaking visitors as interpreters to other agencies organized for particular phases of work in the home, such as Visiting Nurse associations, Infant Welfare societies, Anti-Tuberculosis societies, and Charity Organization societies.

A very real effort is often made to reconcile foreign-born mothers and Americanized daughters. Those responsible for some of the institutes realize very keenly the significance of the problem, and impress upon the children they meet their great interest in the Old-World background of the parents, their appreciation of the mother's being able to speak another language besides English, their pleasure in old-country dances, costumes, and songs. They try in every way possible to maintain the respect of the daughter for her foreign-born mother. In home visits they try also to explain to the mother the freedom granted to American girls, the purpose of the[248] clubs for girls, and the need for learning English themselves to lessen their dependence upon the children.

TRAINING FOR SERVICE

It is obvious that the efficiency of the work of these various organizations can rise no higher than the level of efficiency and training of the workers available for such service. It is, therefore, most important that the materials necessary for the rendering of these services be made available at the earliest possible moment. Such materials include compilations of data with reference to the different groups, courses of study developed so as to meet the needs and educational possibilities of the women, devices such as pictures, slides, charts, films, for getting and holding attention of persons unused to study, often weary and overstrained and lacking confidence in their own power to learn.

It is also clear from the experiences of these various agencies that, while giving this instruction is essentially an educational problem, it is for the time so intimately connected with the whole question of understanding the needs of the housewife in the different foreign-born groups, of developing a method of approach and of organization, and of trying out methods of instruction as well as experimenting with different bodies of material, that for some time to come[249] experimentation and research should be fostered at many points.

There should, for example, be accumulated a much larger body of knowledge than is now available with reference to the agencies existing among the foreign-born groups in the various communities from whom co-operation could be expected; there should be a much more exact body of fact as to the needs of the various groups of women; at the earliest possible moment the material available with reference to these household problems, child care, hygiene and sanitation, distribution of family income, should be put into form available for use by the home teacher, the class teacher, the extension workers, and the woman's club organization. In the Appendix are some menus of four immigrant groups, which illustrate the kind of material which would be useful.

By stipends and scholarships promising younger members from among the foreign-born groups should be encouraged to qualify as home teachers and as classroom and extension instructors in these fields. This would often mean giving opportunity for further general education as preliminary to the professional training, for many young persons admirably adapted to the work come from families too poor to afford the necessary time at school. Scholarships providing for an adequate preparation available to members of the larger groups in any community, would give[250] a very great incentive to interest in the problem and to further understanding of its importance on the part of the whole group.

In addition to scholarships enabling young persons to take courses of considerable length, there might be stipends enabling older women of judgment and experience to qualify for certain forms of service by shorter courses. Those who can speak enough English could take advantage of certain short courses already offered by the schools of social work. Others who do not speak English could be enabled to learn enough English and at the same time to learn to carry on certain forms of service under direction.

As has been suggested, lack of resources in face of an enormous volume of educational work is one factor in this lack of teachers trained to meet the needs of women in the foreign-born groups and of material adapted to their class or home instruction. The question, then, has been raised as to whether the supply both of teachers and of material could be increased and whether, if these resources were available, they would be utilized by the great national administrative agencies to which reference has been made.

The following plan has been approved as thoroughly practicable by leading officers and members of the American Home Economics Association, including several heads of departments of home economics in the state colleges, by other[251] educators interested in the field of home economics, as well as by representatives of the States Relations Service, the Bureau of Home Economics Department in the United States Department of Agriculture, the Federal Board of Vocational Education, and the Home Economics Division of the United States Bureau of Education. The unanimous judgment of those consulted is that if such a plan could be carried out for the space of three years, the Federal service would be vivified and enriched and the educational institutions enabled to develop training methods from which a continuous supply of teachers and teaching material could be expected.

OUTLINE OF PLAN

I. Creation of committee composed of officers of American Home Economics Association, representatives from the United States Department of Agriculture, Bureau of Home Economics, the States Relations Service, the Home Economics Division of the United States Bureau of Education, the heads of departments of home economics in the state colleges, the technical schools and teacher-training schools, Federal Board for Vocational Education.

II. Increasing supply of teachers and teaching material.

1. Provision for assembling material in food, household management, including expenditures, and child care, particularly, and adapting this material to the needs of the members of the different foreign-born groups, by supplying salaries for two persons experienced in teaching, who would devote themselves to the preparation of classroom material, leaflets, charts, etc.—$2,400

$4,800

[252] 2. The granting of stipends to graduate students who would work at institutions approved by the committee and who would do practice teaching with such groups. In the assignment both of the stipends and of the institutional patronage, the interests of both urban and rural women would be taken into account by supplying scholarships for ten graduate students to teach under supervision and to assemble material under direction, these to be awarded by the committee with due regard to needs of rural and urban women—$750

$7,500

3. Securing the services of several highly skilled home-economics teachers, under whose supervision the practice teaching, and the preparation of these students would be carried on, and developing through advice teaching centers for the use of such material wherever possible, by supplying salaries for four persons to supervise and direct teaching—$4,000

$16,000

4. Securing teachers who are experienced housewives, who with short courses might assume certain teaching functions, supplying stipends, $75 a month for four months ($300) for fifty women who, selected under rules drawn up by the committee, would take short training courses, to be organized under the direction of individuals or departments or institutions approved by the committee

$15,000

III. There would, of course, be necessary a director of the work, who could be either one of the salaried teachers chosen as leader or an executive secretary. In any case clerical expenses and the costs of certain items incident to the instruction would be required.

The experiment should be assured for a term of three years.

The problem can be dealt with adequately only by state-wide and nation-wide agencies, and should as soon as possible be taken over by nonsectarian educational agencies. But the public-school[253] system is at present wholly without the equipment necessary for the performance of these functions. It is not only not national; it is in many states not even state-wide in its supervision and standards. In Illinois, for example, the school district is the unit, and until a board was created in 1919 to deal with the problems of vocational training, the control exercised by the state was negligible.

The situation in an Illinois mining town illustrates the waste resulting from treating these questions as local questions. The town referred to is a mining town, lying partly in one and partly in another county. The only public school available is in one county, and it is said to be overcrowded. The road from a settlement in the other county to the school is said to be impassable all winter or in bad weather. It leads over a mine switch that is dangerous as well.

The parents complained that the small children could not go so far, that there were no play facilities, that the location was secluded, so that it was dangerous for girls, that the term was too short, and that the attendance of the children seems unimportant to the school authorities. As the community was almost altogether Italian, the parents would have preferred a woman teacher for the girls over ten or twelve years of age. A more intelligent and a more incisive indictment of an educational situation than this[254] criticism expressed by the Italian families in this remote mining community could hardly have been drawn.

It is inevitable that similar dark spots should continue, so long as no central agency is responsible for the maintenance of a minimum opportunity everywhere. Of course it is not to be expected that those jurisdictions that so neglect the children will care for the adult. Many states have the central agency that could take over the work. And there exist Federal agencies able with enlarged resources to adapt their work to meet many of these needs. The United States Children's Bureau has published bulletins in simple form containing such information as every woman should have concerning the care of mothers and young children. Only the lack of resources has kept that bureau from undertaking to bring these facts to the knowledge of all mothers, including the foreign born.[60]

HOME ECONOMICS WORK

In the so-called States Relations Service of the Department of Agriculture, established under the Smith-Lever Act,[61] and in the Federal Board for Vocational Education, there are agencies which, if developed, can establish national standards in [255]these fields and do work of national scope. These acts constitute, in fact, so important a step in the direction of nationalization of these problems that items in the statutes creating them may be of interest here.

The first of these Acts provides for co-operative effort on the part of the United States Department of Agriculture and the state agricultural colleges. There is an agency provided to "diffuse among the people of the United States useful and practical information on subjects relating to agriculture and home economics, and to encourage the application of the same." This Act refers especially to the needs of the rural population, and the work done under it consists of instruction and practical demonstration in agriculture and home economics to persons not attending or resident in the agricultural colleges.

The methods should be such as are agreed on by the Secretary of Agriculture and the officials of the state colleges benefiting under the earlier Act of 1862.[62] To carry out this co-operative effort, an appropriation was provided, beginning at $480,000—$10,000 for each state—and increasing first by $60,000 and then by $500,000 annually, until after seven years a total of $4,500,000 was reached, the increase to be distributed [256]among the states in proportion to their rural population.

By the Smith-Hughes Act of February 22, 1917, both teachers and supervisors, as well as training for teachers and supervisors in the fields of agriculture, home economics, industrial and trade subjects, were provided.[63] The Federal Board for Vocational Education consisted of the Secretaries of Agriculture, Commerce, and Labor, the United States Commissioner of Education, and three citizens appointed for terms of three years, at $5,000 a year. One of these three is to represent the agricultural interests, one the manufacturing interests, and one labor.

The board was given power to make studies, among other subjects, of home management and domestic science. While instruction under the first of these Acts may be given by means of home demonstrations, it is limited under the second Act to such as can be given in schools and classes.

This Act provides for co-operative effort between the Federal government and the states. The large sum of $200,000 for the support of the board, and considerable sums for certain minimum contingencies, were appropriated. Major appropriations were provided for, beginning with $500,000 for paying salaries for teachers and supervisors in agriculture, and increasing by $250,000 until the sum of $3,000,000 was reached, [257]to be distributed in proportion to rural population among the states on condition that the states take appropriate action consenting to the Act and appropriating dollar for dollar (Section 2).

A similar appropriation was provided for the teaching of trade, home economics, and industrial subjects, beginning with $500,000, increasing by $250,000 annually, until the amount of $3,000,000 was reached, this to be appropriated in proportion to the urban population in the various states. Certain minima were prescribed, and it was laid down that not more than 20 per cent of the amount allotted for salaries should go to teachers of home economics (Section 3). No part of the appropriation is to pay for buildings or for work done in private institutions (Section 11).

In the same manner as in the earlier Act an initial appropriation of $500,000 was made toward meeting the cost of training teachers and supervisors in agricultural trade, home economics, and industrial subjects, these to increase by installments of $200,000 and then by $100,000, until $1,000,000 was reached, to be distributed among the states in proportion to population. Certain conditions were prescribed as to the action to be taken by the states, and the appropriation by the state of "dollar for dollar" toward the training of these persons was required.[258]

Questionnaires regarding the application of their work to the needs of foreign-born groups were sent to the State Supervisors of Home Economics functioning under these Acts, but few replies were received. In general, the replies indicate that the work has in many cases not been extended to meet the needs of foreign-born housewives. A few replies, however, are illustrative of what might be done with increased resources and effective interest on the part of the state and of the local community. From Lake Village, Arkansas, came the following graphic account of the work of the home demonstration agent:

I was very much interested in having you write to me concerning the work with the Italian women in Chicot County. When I first came into the county I was entirely inexperienced as far as this kind of work goes, but in time I saw that the Italians needed help and I wanted to give them what they needed most.

I became acquainted with the Catholic priest, as he was an Italian and could help me in talking and becoming acquainted with the people. The priest proved to be a very interesting man and helped me very much. In a short time I learned to speak a few words of Italian, which pleased the people very much. They seemed to feel that I was their friend, and wherever I saw a dusky face in town or country I would greet them with the words, "Como stati," which is to say, "How goes it?" or, "How are you?" and I would be answered with an engulfing grin and a flow of jargon, not a word of which I could understand, but with smiles and nods I would go on, having won a friend.

The first work I did among the Italians was to go into their homes and look at their gardens, show them how to[259] prune their tomato plants, dry their fruit and vegetables, can their tomatoes and beans, and bathe their babies. Not long after there were sewing and "cootie"-removing demonstrations, as well as removing head lice and care of heads and bodies taught with actual demonstrations.

All of my work has been taken with the most cordial attitude, and the methods have been adopted and used. This year I hope to have more work done among them than last, on the same line and others.

They now come to me when they are in trouble or in need of help, and this makes me feel that they consider this office is their friend, not a graft or money-making concern.

In Akron, Ohio, a home demonstration agent, under the Department of Agriculture and the Ohio State University Home Economics Department, has been definitely attached to a public school in Akron's most foreign-born district. Her special project is home demonstration work with foreign-born women, and each lesson is a lesson in English as well. The worker hopes to have an apartment equipped as a plain but attractive home, where all this work can be done.

The home supervisor in Massachusetts reports that the state-aided, evening practical arts classes have offered instruction to groups of foreign-born women in Fall River and in Lowell. In Fall River there were classes in cooking and canning for French women, and classes in home nursing for a Portuguese group. In Lowell there were classes in cooking for Polish women, and classes in cooking and dressmaking for Greek women.[260] These classes were conducted by foreign-speaking teachers, with the help of interpreters.

The work of the Syracuse Home Bureau included four projects: (1) Garden project, (2) Nutrition project, (3) Clothing project, and (4) Publicity project. The outline of the work under (2) and (3) is given below:

Nutrition Project

1. Home Demonstration Work. In co-operation with the Associated Churches and Charities—United Jewish Charities and School Centers—the agent goes into the home, making herself a friend of the family, taking necessary supplies with her, but using whatever utensils the housewife may have. She demonstrates simple, nourishing, economical foods, teaches the proper feeding of children, etc. She also suggests food budgets and plans their use. The leader of the organizations reports that much is being accomplished with families which otherwise could not be reached. Help with clothing work is also given sometimes.

2. Group Demonstrations. In co-operation with the Americanization work and churches, where this seems desirable, to groups of women.

3. Class Work in Cookery. In co-operation with units from the Girls' Patriotic League, International Institute, and factories.

4. Education in Food Values. Talks have been given at various schools in regard to proper luncheons and menus submitted to assist in this work. Conferences have been held with Y. W. C. A. manager in regard to luncheon combinations. Menus for the week, with grocery order, have been submitted for the use of social workers. Aid is being given in planning the meals for undernourished children at a special school. Talks are to be given to the children.

5. Home Bureau Day. Friday afternoon is "at home" day for members and their friends at the Thrift Kitchen.[261] Talks or demonstrations are given each week, and an exhibit in the window during the week corresponds with the subject.

6. Classes for Volunteer Aids. Classes for volunteer aids are being formed. These are to be two types. One class for experienced housewives, to deal particularly with the problem of presentation, and another class for college girls, to give them the simple principles of food values and preparation, taking up at the same time the method of presentation. It is hoped to use these aids particularly in the home demonstration work, which is already developing beyond the capacity of the trained workers.

7. General Use of the Thrift Kitchen. The kitchen is engaged by various church committees to do cooking in large quantities for church suppers. Various organizations use it to prepare special foods for institutions. We are encouraging the use of the kitchen by any individual or organization for any purpose. The only charge is for the gas used, besides a nominal charge of five cents for the use of the kitchen. The work is done under the supervision of one of the agents.

Clothing Project

1. Sewing Classes. In co-operation with units from the Girls' Patriotic League, International Institute, and factories. A sewing unit often follows a cooking unit with the same group.

2. Sewing Demonstrations. These are being given at some of the home demonstrations, as the need arises.

3. Millinery Classes. In co-operation with the Girls' Patriotic League, International Institute, and factories.

4. Millinery Demonstrations are being held for mothers' clubs connected with the church, and home demonstrations are given when needed.

The Rolling Prairie community mentioned above, too, benefited from a co-operative "County Project" work undertaken in 1913-14, under the supervision of Purdue University. A course[262] given during the year in the rural schools was continued during the summer, open to all children over ten and required of graduates from the eighth grade. The County Superintendent of Schools, the County Agent under the university (States Relations Service) and County Board of Trustees (La Porte County) sent teachers into all parts of the county teaching the boys farming, stock raising, and gardening, and the girls canning, sewing, bread making, cooking vegetables, and laundry work, or if they preferred, gardening. The teacher gave an hour and a half every ten days at the home of each child.

At the end of the summer there were exhibits and prizes in the shape of visits to the state fair, to the university, to Washington, or to the stock show in Chicago. The Polish children who took prizes and who went to the university (some of them had never been on a train) became enthusiastic about going to high school and college, and some are going to high school. The fact that they took prizes interested the whole group, and the experiment affected the agricultural and domestic practices of the community. The sad ending to the story is that the township trustees have never been willing to assume again the expense of the teachers' salaries, but the possibilities in the co-operative method are evident.

The States Relations Service and the work of[263] the Federal Board for Vocational Education are based on the so-called principles of the "grant in aid," which gives promise of both developing and encouraging local initiative and of obtaining "national minima" of skill and efficiency. Certainly the lack of any national body and often the lack of any state machinery with power to encourage local action and with facilities for gathering and comparing data, reduced the rate at which progress is made. For example, the device of the home teacher planned by the California Commission on Immigration and Housing, was only slowly taken over by the education authorities of California.

GOVERNMENT GRANTS IN ENGLAND

The experience of the English Board of Education may be noticed in this connection. Owing to the interest in national vigor aroused by the rejection of recruits during the Boer War, England took steps to provide food for the underfed school children and medical supervision of the health of the school children. This resulted in the accumulation of a great body of evidence showing the need of improvement in the conditions and household management in the homes from which these children came. Both schools for mothers and infant classes have been recognized as appropriate extensions of the work of the education authority, and the national character[264] of the problem has been embodied in provision for the grant in aid.[64]

The conditions on which grants to schools for mothers and infant classes are made, set a standard for those communities desiring help from the central authority, and furnish a basis of judgment as to the work of any local authority. Those conditions are stated as follows:

A school for mothers is primarily an educational institution, providing training and instruction for the mother in the care and management of infants and little children. The imparting of such instruction may include:

(a) Systematic classes.

(b) Home visiting.

(c) Infant consultations.

The provision of specific medical and surgical advice and treatment (if any) should be only incidental.

(d) The Board of Education will pay grants in respect of schools for mothers, as defined in Article II of their Regulations for the year 1914-15, subject to the following qualifications:

(I) That an institution will not be recognized as a school for mothers unless collective instruction by means of systematic classes forms an integral part of its work;

(II) That grant will only be paid in respect of "infant consultations," which are provided for women attending a school for mothers;

(III) That grant will only be paid in respect of expenditure[265] on "home visiting" of children registered at a school for mothers if neither the sanitary authority nor County Council undertake to arrange for such visiting;

(IV) The fact that a school for mothers receives a grant or assistance from a sanitary authority (or a County Council) or its offices will not disqualify it from receiving a grant from the Board of Education.

Thus the institutions included under the title "schools for mothers" have for their main object the reduction of infant sickness and mortality by means of the education of the mothers. They train the mother to keep her baby in good health through a common-sense application of the ordinary laws of hygiene. The training may be given by means of personal advice from doctor or nurse to individual mothers, by home visiting, and by means of collective teaching and systematic classes.[65] It is necessary to distinguish these "schools for mothers," which were educational, from the maternity centers maintained by the Local Government Board, intended to provide prenatal care of expectant mothers.

During the year 1917-18, two hundred and eighty-six such schools for mothers received aid from the central authority. The work of representative schools, as described in the medical officer's report,[66] includes instruction in hygiene, principles of feeding, needlework, and boot repairing.

In the same way the infant classes or nursery [266]schools are to be distinguished both from day nurseries which may, if they comply with stated conditions, receive grants, and from infant consultations.[67] It is interesting to note that these items in the educational program are closely related to the plan under which Mothercraft is taught to (1) the older girls in the public elementary schools, and (2) the girls between fourteen and eighteen in the secondary and continuation schools. Under the stimulus of the possible grant in aid from the central authority and of the supervision and advice of the central authority, this work is developed by the local authority. The day nursery or infant class is made to serve the purpose of training the older girl as well as of training and care of the young child.

The argument here is not affected by the fact that under the recent Act providing for a Ministry of Health, these functions are surrendered by the education authority to the New Ministry of Health, as are those of the Local Government Board. Certain functions remain educational, and must develop in accordance with educational principles. Others are sanitary and call for inspection and supervision.

THE LESSON FOR THE UNITED STATES

It is not suggested that the development in the United States be identical with that in England. [267]It is true that there are two specialized agencies referred to under which such work could be developed. Should a United States Department of Education or of Health be created, conceivably such functions could be assumed by either; and it is most interesting to notice that, with reference to this very problem, the method is already recognized as important and embodied in the educational program of the state of Massachusetts. Under a statute enacted in 1919,[68] the State Board of Education is authorized to co-operate with cities and towns in promoting and providing for the education of persons over twenty-one years of age "unable to speak, read, and write the English language."

The subjects to be taught in the English language are the fundamental principles of government and such other subjects adapted to fit the scholars for American citizenship as receive the joint approval of the local school committee and the State Board of Education. The classes may be held not only in public-school buildings, but in industrial plants and other places approved by the local school committee and the board. In the words of the Supervisor of Americanization,[69] "this provides for ... day classes for [268]women meeting at any place during any time in the day. The establishment of such classes is especially urged."

The development of the Federal agencies will probably be most efficiently stimulated if a considerable amount of such work is attempted by local authorities and such social agencies as have been described. If not only local educational bodies, but schools for social work, organizations like the Immigrants' Protective League and the Department of Home Economics, the State Immigration Commissions, and the Young Women's Christian Association, could train efficient visitors, prepare and try out lesson sheets on the essential topics, and develop teaching methods, the different branches of the Federal service would undoubtedly be able to avail themselves of such material and of such personnel as would be supplied in this way.[70] The plan outlined earlier in the chapter for educational work for foreign-born women would be a step in this direction.

MOTHERS' ASSISTANTS

Attention has been called to the fact that many housewives, either because the husband's income is inadequate or because their standard of family needs is relatively high, or because there is some special family object to be attained, become [269]wage earners and are away from their home during the hours of the working day. The devices used by these mothers for the care of the family during their absence have been described. The previous discussion has also made clear the fact that for many women of limited income who do not attempt wage earning, the task of bearing children and of caring for the home is too heavy, especially during the time when the children are coming one after the other in fairly rapid succession.

The visiting nurse may help in time of illness; the midwife may come in for a few days immediately after the child is born; the man may be very handy and helpful; the older girl or boy may stay at home from school; but it is evident that some agency should be devised for rendering additional assistance to such mothers. The day nursery suggests itself, and its possibilities are easily understood; but it is an agency that has been developed in response to the demand of married women for the chance to supplement the husband's earnings, or of widows and deserted women to assume the place of breadwinner.

For the kind of assistance we have in mind, some such agency as the mother's helper, proposed by the English Women's Co-operative Guild, is suggested. This proposal was developed as an item in a program for adequate maternity care, but has been extended in its application so[270] as to include all women who are attempting to carry the burden we have described. It expresses the widening recognition that the volume of tasks expected of the housewife as mother and caretaker is greater than one woman can be expected to perform. It rests also on the conviction that such assistance is professional in character and should be standardized in skill.

Experiments in this field might well be undertaken by the same agencies that attempt to receive and introduce the newly arrived groups, and as rapidly as the method becomes established the functions could be taken over by the appropriate specialized agency, whether public or private.[71] For example, the two following recommendations recently offered by official bodies in England illustrate the need to which we are calling attention. The first is taken from a memorandum prepared at the request and for the consideration of the Women's Employment Committee.

Home Helps

Closely linked with the problem of skilled midwifery, care of the working mother is the problem of arrangement for her domestic life during her disablement.

In the Home Helps Society a movement has been inaugurated which, if widely extended on the right lines for clearly subsidiary purposes, would prove of incalculable benefit to working mothers, and so to the general community. The[271] scheme provides, on a contributory basis, the assistance of trained domestic helpers for women who are incapacitated, especially in illness or childbirth, from attending to the normal duties of the home. A Jewish society has been in existence for twenty years to meet the needs of poor Jewesses in the East End of London, but the general scheme came into existence under the Central Committee for Employment of Women to provide employment for women who have been thrown out of work owing to the war. Three months is considered an average period of training, but a shorter time is sanctioned in special cases. The women are trained under supervision in the homes of families and in certain approved institutions. In the Jewish society no special period of training is demanded. If a candidate is competent upon appointment she is sent out at once. In Birmingham similar help is afforded by what is known as the "nine days'" nursing scheme, and Sheffield has a provision for a municipal allowance to a mother needing such help in a special degree. North Islington Maternity Center has a local scheme for home helps, managed by a subcommittee. Encouragement has been given to these schemes by the sympathetic interest in them of the medical women acting for the London County Council as inspectors, under the Midwives' Act. Similar arrangements have been proposed in various parts of the country.

The second is from the Report of the Women's Advisory Committee of the Ministry of Reconstruction on the Domestic Service Problem.

Subcommittee on Home Helps

After meeting several times this committee came to the conclusion that, in the light of the evidence that had been given before them, it was not advisable for them to proceed further without reference to the committee which was dealing with the question of subsidiary health and kindred services, as the question of the provision of Home Helps intimately affected that committee also.[272]

The committee on Home Helps passed the following resolution:

That with a view to preventing sickness which is caused by the unavoidable neglect of children in their home, the Local Government Board should be asked to remove the restriction which at present confines the provision of Home Helps to maternity cases, and to extend the scope of the board's grant for the provision of such assistance in any home where, in the opinion of the local authority, it is necessary in the interests of the children that it should be given, and agreed that if the Subsidiary Health and Kindred Services Committee were prepared to adopt it in their report it would be undesirable to continue their own sittings.

The resolution was adopted by that committee, and the Home Helps' Committee was dissolved.

We are not unconscious of the great need that exists for further preventive measures in connection with health services, more especially as regards children, and we think that the question of Home Helps must first be explored in this connection. We are of the opinion, however, that as regards help with domestic work, the position of the wives of professional men with small incomes, and of the large army of men of moderate means who are engaged in commerce and industry is becoming critical, and that some form of municipal service might help to solve this most difficult problem.

RECREATIONAL AGENCIES

The public parks, playgrounds, and recreation centers, and the social settlements, constitute the main community provision for the social and recreational activities of immigrant groups living in the congested sections of industrial cities. Certain problems in the adaptation of the services and resources of such agencies to the needs of an immigrant neighborhood have been brought out[273] in our consultation with representative men and women from various nationalities living in different sections of Chicago.

The history of Dvorak Park may serve to indicate the nature of some of these problems. Established when the population of the district it was designed to serve was almost exclusively Bohemian, this small park was given its distinctively Bohemian name, and the district chosen was Bohemian. It became at once a popular recreation center for the neighborhood, as the facilities provided in the playground and field house were admirably suited to the needs of the people. Representative men and women who have kept in touch with the later immigrants of their nationality speak with greatest enthusiasm of the value of the park to the Bohemian community. Its services in relieving the monotony of the lives of immigrant women, and especially of mothers of large families, is noteworthy.

For those to whom it is accessible it provides a type of entertainment which they really enjoy. It is said, in fact, that women who begin going to the park take a new interest in life. The moving pictures are especially popular. The director, a man thoroughly familiar with the lives of the families of the settlement, has sought to adapt the service of the park to their needs. Special entertainments for women with little children are given in the afternoon while older children[274] are in school, and mothers are encouraged to bring the babies. Mothers who have begun going to the park themselves feel greater security in allowing the older boys and girls to go to the evening entertainments and dances because they learn that there is trustworthy supervision.

During the last few years, however, there has been a great change in the character of the neighborhood surrounding Dvorak Park. Bohemians have moved away, and their places have been taken by Serbo-Croatians. The newcomers have found churches, schools, and public halls established by the Bohemian people, and the impression has gone out that the public park also is a national recreation center for Bohemians. No criticism of the management of the park has been made by leaders among the Croatians, who believe the director has earnestly sought to meet the requirements of the two groups impartially, frequently asking the advice and co-operation of well-known Croatian men and women. They do feel that it is unfortunate that the popular idea that the place is intended for Bohemians only is too deep to be easily eradicated.

In Chicago some of the older immigrant groups have made provisions for their recreational needs by building national halls, auditoriums, and theaters; and in groups representing later immigration, funds are being raised for the same purpose. In many instances it is admitted that the public[275] recreation centers in the immediate vicinity of the settlement afford adequate space and facilities for the requirements of the group. The reasons given for failure to take advantage of such opportunities or for duplicating such splendid community resources are varied. When analyzed, they are on the whole indicative of shortcomings in park management, which might be overcome if park supervision could be made a real community function.

In a Polish district, for instance, the people in the vicinity of one of the most completely equipped parks in the city have come to regard it with suspicion as the source of a type of Americanization propaganda too suggestive of the Prussians they have sought to escape. In a Lithuanian district, officers of societies which make use of clubrooms in the recreation centers say they prefer the rooms to any they can rent in the vicinity, but they often feel in the way and that their use of the building entails more work than attendants are willing to give. The Lithuanians, too, speak of feeling out of place in the parks. There has been little evidence that in any section of the city people of foreign birth feel that as community centers these parks are in a sense their own.

The social settlement, which shares with public recreation centers the functions of providing for the social life and recreation of immigrant communities, is confronted by many of the same[276] problems, often rendered the more difficult from the fact that it is usually regarded as even more alien to the life of the group than the park, and its purposes are less understood. Members of Polish, Lithuanian, Italian, and Ukrainian groups, who have expressed their own appreciation of the aims of the social settlement, and the highest personal regard for settlement residents whom they have known, believe that the "American" settlement can never reach the masses of people most in need of the type of service it offers. Repression under autocratic government in Europe and exploitation in America have made them suspicious, and they are apt to avoid whatever they cannot understand.

It is believed that these types of service, undertaken with a more thorough knowledge of the point of view of the immigrant and with the indorsement and co-operation of recognized leaders of the groups to be served, would much more nearly meet the needs of the people least able to adjust themselves to the new situations.

[277]

IX

FAMILY CASE WORK

The discussion up to this point has dealt with the family which has not fallen into distress. It has been confined to problems of adjustment. But there are numerous families which fall into distress and need the services of the social case-work agency. Because of limitations of space and because the principles applying to their care and treatment apply to other kinds of service, the following discussion will treat only of agencies concerned with the care of immigrant families in need of material aid. Of the 8,529 families cared for by the Cook County agent, 6,226 were from the foreign groups, and of the 569 under care by the Cook County Juvenile Court in its Funds to Parents' Department, 386 were foreign born.[72]

Attention is called, however, to the fact that the special application to the care of foreign-born families of the principles supposed to guide the conduct of good agencies in their care of any [278]family calls for the elaboration of much more skillful devices and for much more extensive and closely knit organization than has yet been developed. This chapter deals only with these special applications of general case-work principles.

The principles of care in any case of need are: (1) That such care shall be based on adequate understanding of the immediate individual problem; (2) that it shall be adapted to the special need; (3) that it shall look toward the restoration of the family to its normal status; and (4) that treatment, whether in the form of relief or service, shall be accompanied by friendly and educational supervision and co-operation.

These are no simple tasks when the family is English speaking, native born, and when no particular difficulties arise from difference in language and in general domestic and social habits. With the non-English-speaking family, the agency is faced with difficulties at each of these points. There is first the problem of getting at the facts as to the nature and extent of the distress and the occasion of the family breakdown.

In addition to the foreign-born families who actually need material assistance there are many who, because they are laying aside part of their income either to meet past debts or future needs, are living below the standard prevailing in their community. This family needs to be urged to[279] spend more rather than to save. Unless the agency coming in contact with it digs below the apparent poverty and finds the real income, it will be tempted to give pecuniary aid rather than the personal service the family is in need of. Its service must not result in increased dependency.

Special care in applying this principle of all good case work needs to be exercised in the case of the foreign-born family. Moving from one continent to another, with almost every element in the situation changed, makes the adjustment of the family to normal and healthy standards a delicate and important one. We have been told, for example, by thoughtful members of the Italian group, that in their judgment their fellow-countrymen are often led, through unwise alms-giving, not only to pretend to be poorer than they are, but to live in conditions of squalor detrimental to their well-being.

In fact, in order to understand that normal state from which the family departs when its members become applicants for aid from a case-work agency, the representatives of the agency must have at command facts with reference to the standards and practices prevailing in the particular community from which the family under consideration comes. Only then can the need of the family be estimated with any degree of exactness.[280]

When the facts are learned and the nature and extent of the need are understood, there is the question of resources available for treatment and the question of methods to be used in building and maintaining the family life and in fostering the process of adjustment between its life and that of the community as a whole.

To be able fully to utilize resources, to forecast the effect of certain kinds of care, it is surely desirable for the agency to know the life of the national group into which the family has come, the resources to which the family itself has access, and the ways in which others of the group expect care to be given.

THE LANGUAGE DIFFICULTY

The social case-work agency is faced, then, with several quite different and quite difficult problems in equipment. There is first the question of overcoming the language difficulty. The use of the foreign-speaking trained visitor would probably be regarded as the best way of doing this. The supply is so inadequate that the choice has been generally between a person speaking the language and a person knowing something of methods of case work. And unless the visitor is a fairly competent case worker she would probably better be used as an interpreter and not be given responsibility or allowed to make decisions.[281]

The use of an interpreter gives rise to many difficulties.[73] Because these difficulties are so universal and so important to the full use of the opportunities lying before the case-work agency, an attempt was made to obtain information as to the practice and as to the desires of a number of case workers. Case-work agencies, the district superintendents and visiting housekeepers in the United Charities, the Jewish Aid, the Juvenile Court in Chicago, relief societies in other cities, and the Red Cross chapters throughout the country, were consulted.

Six of the ten districts of the United Charities had foreign-speaking visitors. There were 14 in all—3 Italian, 8 Polish, 2 Bohemian, and 1 Hungarian. Nine of these speak other languages besides their own. All the Jewish Aid Society visitors speak Yiddish. The Funds to Parents' Department of the Juvenile Court has no foreign-born workers, but the Probation Department has 3—Polish, Italian, and Bohemian.

The five Red Cross chapters answering the questionnaire—New York, Brooklyn, Rochester, Buffalo, and Philadelphia—all employ foreign-speaking visitors—11 Italian, 8 Polish, 8 Yiddish, and 2 Russian.

Sixty-one of the members of the American Association for Family Welfare Work replied to questions about their methods of work and the [282]devices they had found successful. Twenty-eight of these were not doing work with foreign born or were not doing work along the line indicated. The other 33 described their work and their difficulties, and made suggestions.

Twenty-two of the thirty-three agencies did not make use of the foreign-language visitor, although Fall River in the case of the French, and Topeka in the case of the Mexicans, overcame the language barrier by the fact that their secretaries spoke the language of their largest foreign-born group. Three others did not have foreign-born visitors on their staff, but reported that they had foreign-born volunteers. It is interesting to note that among the 22 cities without foreign-language visitors there are 9 cities with over 100,000 inhabitants, and all but 2 of them have large immigrant populations. The other 13 cities on the list are all places of less than 100,000 inhabitants, and it is probable that the case-work agencies in most of them do not have more than one worker.

The case-work agencies in some cities with large foreign-born populations come in contact with many of the foreign-born families in distress, but not in sufficiently large numbers to take the entire time of a visitor. In other cities, however, a large part of the work is with foreign-speaking families. In Stamford, Connecticut, for example, 70 per cent of the families cared for are[283] foreign born, and 44 per cent are Italian. In Paterson, New Jersey, 120 of the 840 families were Italian.

Eleven case-work agencies did employ foreign-born or foreign-speaking visitors. Eight of these were in cities of over 100,000 population—New York City, Philadelphia, Boston, Cleveland, Pittsburgh, Milwaukee, Cambridge, and Grand Rapids. The other three were in smaller places; Waterbury, with a population of 73,000, El Paso with 39,000, and Kenosha with 21,000. While these 11 agencies do employ foreign-speaking workers, it appears in every case that they either do not have workers of all the groups with which they work, or do not have enough foreign-language workers to do all the work with the foreign-speaking groups. New York City, for instance, has 5 workers who speak Italian, of whom only 1 is an Italian and served in the course of a year over 1,000 Italian families. Philadelphia has only 1 foreign-speaking worker, who speaks Italian and some Polish. It reports the number of families as 526 Italian, 229 Polish, 69 Russian, and 43 other Slav.

There is, however, a decided difference of opinion as to the value of the visitor from the foreign-born group. All the agencies testify to the difficulty of getting workers with the same education and training demanded of the English-speaking visitor. One of the district superintendents of[284] the United Charities of Chicago, who in despair of her work with interpreters began to use foreign-born visitors, speaks of success with exceptional individuals, but says:

For the most part the foreign workers we have had have gained a certain facility in handling the general run of cases, but there is a discouraging lack of initiative or daring in their efforts. They seem to go just so far. It has seemed hard, too, to strike the happy medium in their attitude toward their own people; they seem either blindly sympathetic or peculiarly indifferent. In part I feel that this is an impression they give as a result of their lack of power of self-expression, and lack of confidence in themselves—this would undoubtedly be remedied by further education.

As a result of my efforts with about ten foreign workers I have traveled a complete circle in my way of thinking. I have come back to the conclusion that we cannot get satisfactory results if we accept very much less in the way of scholastic training or life experience, than is required of other workers.

Most of the agencies that have tried foreign-speaking visitors feel that in spite of these disadvantages it is a gain to the agency to have such visitors on the staff. This is especially true with those agencies that have or have had visitors with educational equipment that is comparable with that of most of their English-speaking visitors. One agency, for example, has only one foreign-born visitor, a Russian who speaks several languages and had a teacher's-training course in Russia. The superintendent reports[285] her "gratifyingly successful in her work with foreign families."

The Charity Organization Society in another city is divided in opinion about the foreign-born visitor. During the panic of 1914-15 they had a Russian man who had had a good technical education at the University of St. Petersburg, and two years in a medical school in this country. The assistant case supervisor of that organization reports that he not only accomplished a great deal with the unemployed men in the district, but also helped the district workers to understand the Russian, Slavic, Lithuanian, and Bohemian families in the district, and "demonstrated what the possibilities might be if we could have foreign-speaking people with requisite training and the proper spirit to work intensively with the families." On the other hand, the superintendent of this organization, who was not with them in 1915, says that their experience with foreign-born case workers has not been successful, and suggests as an alternative the instruction of American case workers in foreign languages.

The New York society agrees that better results are obtained by having native-born case workers learn the language of the group with which they are to work. They have found it possible to have native-born workers learn Italian, and have found them better workers than[286] any Italians they have employed who were people of less background and training.

STANDARDS OF LIVING

Secondly, there is the problem of building up in the family asking and receiving aid, domestic standards appropriate to the life in the community. This raises, first, the question of the responsibility of the case-work agency for the adjustment of the family life to such standards in household management and in child care as might be formulated on the basis of expert knowledge of community needs; secondly, the question as to ways in which such adjustment may be accomplished if the agency feels under an obligation to undertake it.

A number of the thirty-three case-work agencies which discussed this subject indicated that they thought this task one that should not be assumed by the case-work agency. Four agencies said they were doing nothing in this direction, though one of these was looking forward to the employment of a visiting housekeeper. One agency said that there was no difference in this respect between the care of native born and foreign born, and that all families were given such instruction as occasion demanded.

Seven agencies met the problem by co-operating with some of the public-health nursing organizations, especially the baby clinics, and one[287] of the agencies said that the nurses were doing all the educational work possible. Four other agencies supplied milk and co-operated with the public-health organizations of the community and also with visiting housekeepers in the service of settlements.

Two supplied milk where it seemed necessary, and three co-operated with agencies teaching food conservation. One of these supplied interpreters, organized classes, and helped the agent of the County Council of Defense to make contact with women in their homes. Another co-operated with a class of college students who were making a dietary study. The third had its own organization, which taught the use of substitutes and their preparation, in war time. Its work differed from that of others in that it was not organized for war-emergency purposes and was under the control of the case-work agency.

Several agencies mentioned the fact that their visitors gave advice as the case required, and it is probable that this is done in other cities also. Such advice, of course, would not necessarily conform to the standards formulated by home economics experts, but rather to the common-sense standards of the community at large, or rather that circle of the community from which the majority of charity visitors come. The difficulties inherent in such a situation were recognized[288] by the secretary of one society, who wrote, "Our staff has made an effort to become somewhat familiar with dietetics, but is having difficulty with foreign families because of failures thoroughly to understand their customs and the values of the food to which they are accustomed."

Other agencies are not so definite in their view of the problem. Thus one reports that they are not successful in their work on the diet problem because "the Italians, Polish, and Lithuanians prefer their own food and methods of preparing it." Another says, "They seem to know their own tastes and will do their own way mostly."

In Chicago some of the superintendents explain their difficulties in raising housekeeping standards by characterizing the women as "stubborn," "indifferent," "inert," "obstinate," "lazy," "difficult but responsible," "easy but shiftless, and not performing what they undertake." It is only fair to state that these were usually given as contributing causes of difficulties. Most of the superintendents saw clearly that the main difficulties were in the circumstances under which the people had to live, and the defects in their own organization, which was handicapped by lack of funds and workers.

A CASE-WORK AGENCY FOUND FOUR GIRLS AND EIGHTEEN MEN BOARDING WITH THIS POLISH FAMILY IN FOUR ROOMS

There is little that need be said about the work of these agencies as to other phases of the problem of housekeeping. Only one does anything to help the women buy more intelligently, except[289] in the way of such spasmodic efforts as are made by visitors who have only their own practical experience to guide them. Similarly, little is done to teach buying or making of clothing except that in some instances women are urged to join classes in sewing. One agency speaks of teaching the planning of expenditure by the use of a budget.

Most of the agencies that leave the problem of diet to the public-health nurse leave to her also the problem of cleanliness, personal hygiene, and sanitation. The majority of the agencies report, however, that their visitors are continually trying to inculcate higher standards. One agency says it is the stock subject of conversation at every visit. No agency reports any attempt to reach the women in a more systematic way than by "preaching." One agency only, that in Topeka, Kansas, reports anything that shows a realization of the peculiar problems of the foreign-born woman in this subject. In Topeka, American methods of laundry are taught to Mexican women in the office of the Associated Charities.

VISITING HOUSEKEEPERS

On the other hand, there are twelve agencies that approach the problem, or at least attempt to approach the problem of household management from a scientific standpoint, so that the work done shall be a serious attempt to adjust[290] the standards of the foreign-born women to the standards formulated by the home economics experts for families "under care." There are several methods used in this work. The first and most common is the employment of visiting housekeepers by the case-work agency; another is that of referring families to another agency especially organized to give instruction in the household arts, such as the Visiting Housekeepers' Association in Detroit; a third is the one used in New York City, that of a Department of Home Economics within the organization, and still another, used in Boston, is a Dietetic Bureau.

The cities in which there are visiting housekeepers in connection with the case-work agency are Chicago, Cleveland, Pittsburgh, Worcester, Fall River, Cambridge, Stamford, and Springfield, Illinois. In Brooklyn the visiting housekeepers are not employed by the case-work agencies, but are student volunteers from Pratt Institute. The visiting housekeeper in Springfield has worked almost exclusively with English-speaking families, and the one in Worcester "has had at different times foreign-speaking families." In other words, in two cities with large foreign-speaking populations the visiting housekeepers only occasionally helped immigrant families to adjust their standards and methods of housekeeping to the new conditions found in this country.[291]

The work that is expected of a visiting housekeeper has been frequently described. As it demands the combined qualifications of a case worker and a skilled worker in home economics, an attempt was made to learn the education and training of the various workers in the field. Information was available in only a few cases, but these cases seem to point to the fact that the visiting housekeeper is usually trained for one phase of her work only—either as a case worker or as a home economics expert. In either case she can be expected to give the type of service her position demands only in the field in which her interest and training lie.

Interviews with the five visiting housekeepers employed by the two largest relief agencies in Chicago in general bear out the impressions obtained from the statements of the agencies in other cities. None of those in Chicago speaks the language of the people with whom she works, though one agency is now training a young Italian girl to be a visiting housekeeper.

Most of the visiting housekeepers claimed very slight knowledge of what the diet of the family was in the old country, although they had considerable knowledge as to what was customarily eaten here. They had made very little study of the habits and tastes of their group; and although they were agreed that in most families the diet was inadequate, they had apparently not looked[292] far for the cause. Ignorance of food values and ways of preparing food seemed to them the chief reason; poverty, racial prejudice, and laziness might be secondary features.

Since the visiting housekeepers deal almost entirely with dependent families under the care of a relief agency, their work in helping the women provide for the clothing needs of the family is quite largely concerned with making over old clothing.

In the effort to raise the standards of cleanliness and sanitation the visiting housekeepers meet with great difficulty. One thinks the greatest difficulty is indifference on the part of the housewife and a lack of anything to which the visitor can appeal; another thinks that her greatest difficulties are that the mothers are usually overworked, that frequently they are kept worn out by having one child after another in close succession, and sometimes a woman has had to contend with a drunken husband. These cases she finds especially difficult to deal with. Some of them lay stress on the economic factor and point to the fact that most of these families are deprived of the conveniences which would make housekeeping a comparatively simple task. As one of the visiting housekeepers has said:

With modern equipment, steam heat, electric utensils, and new and sanitary apartments, it is not a difficult task to keep the quarters fresh and clean, but in rickety, shadowy[293] apartment buildings or houses where the floors are worn and rough, with no hot-water service, and too often without even gas for lighting, we can at once recognize the trials and handicaps which confront the housewife in the poorer districts.[74]

The visiting housekeepers interviewed saw many discouraging features of their work. All stated that improvement came very slowly. One worker stated that she had worked three years in her district and she had some families under care all the time, but that she was just beginning to see the results of her efforts. Others pointed out that their constant supervision was essential, that as soon as they relaxed their efforts at all the families dropped back to their old habits. There was, however, general agreement that in time, by much expenditure of effort, constant visiting, teaching, and exhorting, they did help some families to a better standard of living.

It was impossible to get an estimate from most of them as to how many families they thought they had helped, but the worker in one district said that for the three years it would not be more than five or six. Two workers who estimated the number of families with which they could work at one time, put the number at between twenty and twenty-five, and both thought that [294]they could do much better with twenty than with twenty-five. They did not know with how many families they were working at present, but thought they were not trying to do intensive work with many more than that number.

The explanation of failure may be that not enough care was taken to make the Old-World habits of cooking and diet the starting point of instruction in the use of American foods, utensils, and diets. Such procedure would be based on sound pedagogy in starting from the known and familiar and leading to the new and unaccustomed.

However, it may be true that even after sound methods have been given a thorough trial, arduous effort still will fail to bring desired results. Case-work agencies, however efficient, may not be fitted to raise the standards of living in the homes of immigrant dependent families. It may be taken care of by other community forces and only be effected in the way that the independent family's standards are changed and improved. The task for the case worker is to help the family make the natural connections with their neighborhood and community, which are the most effective means for creating and sustaining social standards.

Certain limitations to the present work of the visiting housekeeper appear in the above discussion. These are, the lack of persons with[295] combined training in case work, home economics, and knowledge of immigrant backgrounds, the limited number of families with whom intensive work can be done, especially if the visiting housekeeper tries to do all the work with the families she visits, the hardship to the family in the duplication of visitors if the visiting housekeeper tries to render only specialized services to a larger number of families.

Attempts have been made to overcome these limitations while still retaining the visiting housekeeper. In Cleveland the visiting housekeepers do all the work with the families assigned to them, as well as instruct the other visitors in the elementary principles of home economics and give advice on individual families, as occasion requires. Their work has been materially lightened by the adoption of a standardized budget prepared under the direction of a well-known expert in home economics. The superintendent of the Cleveland organization expressed himself as well satisfied with the work of the visiting housekeepers. It should be noted that one of the visiting housekeepers in that city not only is a skilled case worker with good training in home economics, but also is of foreign-born parentage and speaks most of the Slavic languages.

In other cities, however, notably New York and Boston, case-work agencies have given up the employment of the visiting housekeepers.[296] In New York there is a Home Economics Bureau and in Boston a Dietetic Bureau. The organization of the two bureaus differs, but the underlying principle is the same. Both are organizations of home economics experts, who give advice to the regular case workers both as to general principles and as to individual problems. They also make studies from time to time of problems in national groups. As its name would indicate, the scope of the New York organization is wider. It takes up problems of clothing and other phases of household management as well as of food.

The advantages claimed for this plan are that the home economics experts can devote their time exclusively to their own field. The visitors are thus enabled to advise the individual families with more effect than can the specialized worker. The question as to the best way of rendering to the family under care this combination of services is by no means yet decided, and it is evident that further experiment in the various methods is necessary. They are, in fact, not mutually exclusive, and perhaps combinations of various kinds of the skill of the home economics expert, of the skilled social worker, and a generalized helper, may yet be developed.

A third task to which some agencies address themselves is that of providing educational opportunities for the immigrant family. This effort[297] often consists first of inducing the mother herself to enter a class, and, second, of securing the attendance of the children at the public school rather than at the non-English-teaching parochial school. The difficulties in the way of securing the mothers' attendance at a class have already been described. It need only be pointed out here that the case worker who has won the mother's confidence may often persuade her to go when the stranger will fail. Where a regular allowance is given and support for a considerable period is contemplated, it has been treated as something in the nature of a scholarship or educational stipend and conditioned on the mother's fulfilling definite requirements in the way of better qualifying herself to use the allowance.

The subject of establishing connections between the members of the families and such educational opportunity has been somewhat confused by the fact that the case-work agency often depends upon the settlement to supply certain recreational facilities for the children in the families, and there is a temptation to use the settlement club or class rather than the school for the mother.

With reference to having the children attend the public school or the school in which all instruction is given in English, it would be less than frank to ignore the difficulty often occasioned in the past by the nationalistic and separatist[298] Church. The society may be faced with a real dilemma here, since it desires the co-operation of the Church and is loath to weaken any ties that may help in maintaining right family life. And so, when the Church conducts the school in which the mother tongue is used, and in which English is either inadequately taught or not taught at all, the relief agency may be practically forced into a policy involving the neglect of English in the case of both mother and children.

KNOWLEDGE OF BACKGROUNDS

These have been some of the fundamental difficulties in the relationship between the case-work agency and the immigrant family. The knowledge of the Old-World background and the impressions made by the experience of emigrating that should illumine all the work of the agency, are generally lacking to the case worker. Of course there are brilliant exceptions. One district superintendent of the Boston Associated Charities, for example, whose work lies in the midst of a Sicilian neighborhood, will have no visitors who are unwilling to learn the language and to inform themselves thoroughly concerning the history and the habits of the neighbors.

Her office has been equipped so that it takes on somewhat the appearance of a living room. It is made attractive with growing plants; an Italian[299] and an American flag are conspicuous when one enters the room; a picture of Garibaldi and photographs of Italian scenes are on the wall. Books on Italy are to be found in the office, and with the aid of an Italian postal guide the superintendent has made a card index of the home towns from which her families come. From one town in Sicily of seventeen thousand inhabitants, 108 families have come to the district office. Such an index is acquired slowly and must be used with great discretion. It is of assistance to one who understands how to use it, but it may suggest hopeless blunders to workers unfamiliar with the group.

In making plans for the care of families, leading Italians, such as physicians of excellent standing, with a practice in the district, a member of the Harvard faculty who has unusual interest in his less fortunate fellow countrymen, and others who have special knowledge along certain lines, are consulted.

One of the workers connected with the Vocational Guidance Bureau in Chicago has been trying an interesting experiment in the same direction of establishing contacts with the group among which she works. Many of the children who come to the Bureau for jobs are Polish children. She is, therefore, taking lessons in the Polish language from an editor of one of the Polish papers in the city, and through his interest[300] has secured board and room in a home for working girls that is run by one of the Polish sisterhoods. In a month's time she has learned a vocabulary of some hundred and fifty Polish words, and has gained an insight into the Polish attitudes toward some of their problems that she considers invaluable. She found the Polish people with whom she consulted as to the best means of learning the language very much interested and anxious to be helpful in any way in their power.

It is, in fact, clear that by the interpreter, or the foreign-speaking visitor, or the American visitor who learns the foreign tongue, the language difficulty must be overcome. In the case of the foreign-born visitor it should be noted that workers coming from among the various groups encounter difficulties not encountered by the American visitor. They seem to the members of their group to enjoy very real power, and they are often expected to grant favors and to exert influence. A Polish visitor in the office of a relief society in Chicago finds it very difficult to explain to her friends why they do not always receive from her fellow workers what they ask.

In another neighborhood three Italian sisters, better educated than their neighbors, have become visitors. One works for the Catholic, one for the nonsectarian, charitable agency, and one for the social-service department of the public[301] hospital. They seem to have a real "corner" on the aid given to applicants from their groups.

TRAINING FACILITIES NEEDED

It is clear, then, that before case-work agencies can be adequately equipped to perform these services, the supply of visitors trained as has been suggested will have to be increased, and certain bodies of material with reference to the various national groups will have to be organized and made available in convenient form, both for use in courses in colleges and schools of social work and in the offices of the societies.

One way in which an effort might be directed toward bringing about an increase in the supply of trained visitors would be the establishment of scholarships and fellowships in schools of civics and of social work, by which able persons from among the different national groups might be encouraged to take advantage of such opportunities as those institutions provide. This procedure has been elaborated in Chapter VIII in connection with service to nondependent families.

Special funds might also be provided in connection either with the various agencies or with schools of social work, which would render possible the collection and organization of such facts as would be valuable in understanding the problems presented by families from any special group. This body of fact would, of course, increase[302] as sound, sympathetic, and thorough work was developed.

Such studies would include information about the communities from which different groups come, as, for instance, the practice and influences prevailing in different villages in southern Italy, in Sicily, in northern Italy. The religious, national, and village festivals differ in almost every place. A native of Villa Rosa now receiving care from a public-health agency in Chicago has carefully pointed out to a visitor the differences between the festivals of Palermo and Villa Rosa. The different ways of preparing for and meeting the great events of family life, such as death, marriage, birth, are of vital importance.

Most important are the food practices, and the attitudes toward the care and discipline of children. A similar point has been developed in Chapter VIII and it need not be stressed. The fact is that while really sound and thorough case work cannot be done without such information, few agencies have such information, and all devices for accumulating it should be made use of.

The gathering of this body of information and its application require considerable time. In the meantime, while differences of opinion among the existing agencies on such questions as the use of the foreign or the native-born visitor who speaks the foreign language, the visiting housekeeper, or the specialized bureau, are being worked[303] out, specialized agencies for dealing with the problems of the immigrant family should be developed. Such agencies as the Immigrants' Protective League could prove of very great service in discovering promising visitors, in accumulating experience as to the nature of those problems, and in furnishing opportunities to professional students for practice work under supervision.

Further, there is the question of the resources within the group and the ways in which they can be taken advantage of. Reference has been made to the problem of securing and retaining the co-operation of the national Church. There are often national charitable societies. The case worker should be able to explain the methods and purposes of her society to these immigrant societies; but often there is a complete failure to interpret, and the two agencies go their separate ways, sometimes after the demoralization of the family both try to serve.

A few years ago a group of foreign-born men, prominent in business and politics in Chicago, organized a charitable association within their own national group. They felt that the United Charities did not understand their people and were not meeting their needs. These men had no understanding of accepted case-work principles, and the superintendent of the society herself says that she does not use scientific methods and does not co-operate with the United Charities.[304] She doubts whether her organization is doing much good, but she sees that the lack of understanding of the traditions and habits of the people on the part of the United Charities cripples their work among her people.

THE TRANSIENT FAMILY

The case-work agency as now organized might be equipped with trained foreign-speaking visitors and with visiting housekeepers or dietetic experts who know their neighborhoods, and the needs of the situation would still be far from fully met. It was pointed out in the first chapter that many immigrant families have to change their place of residence, often more than once, before they settle in a permanent home. The nature of their hardships and the slender margin of their resources have been pointed out. Special misfortune may therefore befall them at any point in the experimental period of their journey, as well as after they have reached their final and permanent place of residence.

The important moment in social treatment, as probably in any undertaking, is in the initial stages. "The first step costs." This brings us to the enormously important fact that distress outside the relatively small number of larger communities in which there are skilled case-work agencies, either public or private, will probably mean contact either with the poor-law official[305] under the Pauper Act, if it is a question of relief,—or with some official of the county prosecuting machinery or of the inferior courts, if it is a question of discipline.

The case of an Italian woman may serve to illustrate the contact with both these groups of officials. Mrs. C. was married in 1902 in a Sicilian village, at about sixteen years of age. In October, 1906, the husband came to the United States. In November, 1907, she and her one surviving baby, a girl of two, followed, going to the mining town in western Pennsylvania where he was working. There they lived until March, 1913, occupying most of the time a house owned by the company for which he worked. About 1913 she moved with her children to a near-by city, where, on June 3, 1914, she was arrested for assault, and the next day for selling liquor without a license and selling liquor to minors. After some delay she pleaded guilty and was sentenced to pay the costs of the prosecution ($76.42), and released on parole.

She then seems to have moved to a mining town in Illinois, and there lived with Mr. A. as his wife until March, 1916, when he was murdered. The union paid his funeral expenses of $186.75, and she also, as his widow, received his death benefit of $244.33. Through the summer of 1916 the Supervisor of the Poor gave her $3 every two weeks. On May 20, 1916, she applied[306] for her first citizenship papers, and on September 1st she was awarded an allowance of $7 a month under the Mothers' Aid law, this being granted her under her maiden name, as mother of a child born in Illinois in 1915. She was helped not only by the public relief agencies, but by the priest ($11); and the Queen's Daughters, a church society of ladies, gave her the fare to Chicago, where the Italian consul gave her money to go home again. The undertaker and other kind persons gave her and the children aid.

By December the union and the county agent both thought it would be well to shift the burden of her support, and gave her the fare back to Chicago. By the time she reached Chicago she was a very skillful and resourceful beggar. In Chicago she was a "nonresident," ineligible for a year to receive public relief under the Pauper Act and for three years under the Mothers' Aid law; and so she obtained from a Protestant church, from the Charities, and from an Italian Ladies' Aid Society relief of various kinds and in various amounts.

The story is a long and a continuing one. Two points are especially important from the point of view of this study. One is that the burden not only of her support, but of her re-education, fell ultimately upon Chicago agencies, and the cost to them is measured as it were by the inefficiency of her casual treatment at the hands[307] of both the courts and the less competent relief agencies along the way. The other is that such varied treatment leaves its inevitable stamp of confusion and disorganization upon the life of such a family. To find American officials getting very busy over selling liquor without a license, and at the same time ignoring adultery or murder committed in an Italian home, must surely result in confusion with reference to American standards of family relationship and to the value placed on life by American officials.

NEED FOR NATIONAL AGENCY

Irrespective of whether the family is of the native-born or foreign-born group, the problem of the case of those in distress should not be regarded as solely a local problem. It is indeed of national importance. Poverty, sickness, illiteracy, inefficiency, incompetence, are no longer matters of peculiar concern to a locality. The causes leading to these conditions are not local; the consequences are not local. The agency that deals efficiently with them should not be entirely local.

Yet at the present time there is lacking not only a national agency and a national standard; there is often lacking a state agency and a state standard.[75] In Illinois, for example, the Pauper Act is administered in some counties by precinct officials designated by county commissioners; in [308]other counties by the township officials.[76] The Mothers' Aid law is administered in Illinois by the juvenile court, which in all counties except Cook County (Chicago) is the county court. There is no agency responsible in any way for the standardization of the work of these officials, and niggardly doles or indiscriminate relief without either adequate investigation or adequate supervision, often characterizes the work of both.[77]

Not all states are in as chaotic a condition as Illinois. A few states have developed a larger measure of central control. Massachusetts, California, and New Jersey, for example, secure a certain measure of standardization in the administration of their Mothers' Aid laws by paying part of the allowances, in case the central body approves—the State Board of Charities in Massachusetts,[78] and California,[79] and the State Board of Children's Guardians in New Jersey.[80] Pennsylvania secures this by assigning to the Governor the appointment of local boards and providing central supervision, while in other cases there may be inspection, the preparation of blanks and requiring reports. A member of [309]the State Board of Education is supervisor of the Mothers' Aid law administration in Pennsylvania.[81]

The case cited above illustrates the way in which the demoralizing effects of unskillful treatment in Pennsylvania and then in Illinois lasted into the period in which Chicago agencies tried to render efficient service.

It would not be possible to develop at once a national or Federal agency for rendering aid to families in distress. Nor would such an agency be desirable if characterized by the features of the old poor law. But the development of a national agency for public assistance will undoubtedly be necessary before such problems as these can be adequately dealt with. It should be based on such inquiries as the United States Children's Bureau and other governmental departments can make as to the volume and character of the need and the best methods for dealing with that need. Undoubtedly the Grant in Aid, as proposed in the bill introduced into the Sixty-fifth Congress to encourage the development of health protection for mothers and infants, will prove the quickest path to a national standard. Careful study into the kind of legislative amendment necessary in the various states in order to reduce the chaos now existing in the exercise of these functions should also be made.

[310]

The present is in many ways an unfortunate moment at which to suggest the necessity of developing such an agency. The War Risk Bureau, created to provide certain services for the families of soldiers and sailors and others in the service, through the failures and imperfections of its service, has discouraged the idea of attempting such tasks on a national scale. It should be recalled, however, that the assignment of the War Risk Bureau to the Treasury Department concerned with revenue instead of to the Children's Bureau concerned with family problems, rendered it practically inevitable that such limitations of skill would characterize its work. Neither a taxing body nor a bank should be chosen for the supervision of work with family groups.

The "home service" work of the American Red Cross constituted such a national agency during the period of the war, and if the so-called "peace-time program" is successfully developed, the need urged in this chapter may be met.

The efficient local private agencies suffer in the same way from the lack of a national agency and a national standard in case work. The American Association for Social Work with Families, and the National Conference of Social Work, attempt by conference and publication to spread the knowledge of social technique and to improve the work done by existing societies. But there[311] are whole sections, even in densely populated areas, in which there exists no such agency.

If, then, the benevolence and good will of the community are to be embodied in such service for foreign-born families that fall into distress as will not only relieve but upbuild the life of the family, interpret to them the standards of the community, and help them to become a part of the true American life, a national minimum of skill and information must be developed below which the agencies for such care will nowhere be allowed to fall. From the experience both of these foreign-born families and of the communities into which they finally come we learn again the doctrine laid down a hundred years ago by Robert Owen, that the care of those who suffer is a national and not solely a local concern.

[312]

[313]

APPENDIX

PRINCIPAL RACIAL ORGANIZATIONS

The following list of racial organizations has been generously compiled by the Bureau of Foreign Language Information Service of the American Red Cross. Only those of national scope have been included, with the exception of those starred, which, although not strictly national, have a more than local importance. It contains those organizations and societies doing benevolent, philanthropic or educational work, and, in a few instances, those primarily political or religious in character whose activities have been extended to include other work.

The list was compiled in March, 1921, and, although it is reasonably inclusive, the organizations, the officers, and the addresses are constantly changing.

CZECH

Catholic Sokol Union
Secretary:
5798 Holcomb Street. Detroit, Michigan

Council of Higher Education
Secretary: P. A. Korab
[314]Iowa State Bank, Iowa City, Iowa

Czecho-Slavonian Fraternal Benefit Union
Secretary: August R. Zicha
516 East Seventy-third Street, New York City

Czechoslovak National Alliance
Secretary: Ferdinand L. Musil
3734 West Twenty-sixth Street, Chicago, Illinois

Czechoslovak National Council of America
President: Dr. J. P. Percival
3756 West Twenty-sixth Street, Chicago, Illinois

National Federation of Czech Catholics in America
Secretary: John Straka
2752 South Millard Avenue, Chicago, Illinois

Sisterly Benevolent Union, Supreme Lodge
Secretary: Mrs. Marie Zemanova
4934 Broadway, Cleveland, Ohio

Society of Taborites
Secretary: Fr. Cernohorsky
3416 East Fifty-third Street, Cleveland, Ohio

Sokol Gymnastic Organization of America
Secretary: Thomas Vonasek
1647 South St. Louis Avenue, Chicago, Illinois

Union of Czech Women
Secretary: Mrs. Marie Zemanova
180 Forty-first Street, Corona, New York

United Czechoslovak Legion of America
Secretary: Lada T. Krizek
3742 East 140th Street, Cleveland, Ohio

Western Czech Fraternal Union
Secretary: L. J. Kasper
307 Twelfth Avenue East, Cedar Rapids, Iowa

DANISH

The Danish Brotherhood in America
Supreme Secretary: Frank V. Lawson
[315]Omaha National Bank Building, Omaha, Nebraska

The Danish Sisterhood in America
Supreme Secretary: Mrs. Caroline Nielsen
6820 So. Carpenter Street, Chicago, Illinois

DUTCH

*Eendracht Maaht Macht
President: G. Verschuur
65 Nassau Street, New York City

Nieuw Nederland
President: A. Schrikker
Netherland Consulate, New York City

FINNISH

Finnish Apostolic Lutheran Church
Office of National Secretary, care of Valvoja
Calumet, Michigan

Finnish Branch, Industrial Workers of the World
Office of National Secretary, care of Industrialisti
22 Lake Avenue, North, Duluth, Minnesota

Finnish Congregational Church of the United States
Office of National Secretary, care of Astorian Sanomat
Astoria, Oregon

Finnish Lutheran National Church
Office of National Secretary, care of Auttaja
Ironwood, Michigan

Finnish Lutheran Suomi Synod Church of America
President: Rev. John Wargelin
Hancock, Michigan

Finnish National Temperance Brotherhood
National Secretary: Mrs. Hilma Hamina
Ishpeming, Michigan

Finnish Socialist Organization of the United States
National Secretary: Henry Askeli
[316]Mid City Bank Building, Chicago, Illinois

Knights of Kalova
National Secretary: Matti Simpanen
5305 Sixth Avenue, Brooklyn, New York

Ladies of Kalova
National Secretary: Miss Martha Hamalainen
266 Pleasant Street, Gardner, Massachusetts

Lincoln Loyalty League of Finnish-Americans
Secretary: J. H. Jasbert
1045 Marquette Building, Chicago, Illinois

Swedish-Finnish Sick Benefit Society of America
Secretary: John Back
Box 27, North Escanaba, Michigan

GERMAN

American Gymnastic Union (Turners)
First President: Theo. Stempfel
Fletcher American Nat. Bank, Indianapolis, Indiana

German Beneficial Union
Supreme President: Louis Volz
1505-07 Carson Street, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

National Federation of German Catholic Societies
President: Michael Girten
915 People's Gas Building, Chicago, Illinois

North American Association of Singing Societies
President: Charles G. Schmidt
2000 Central Avenue, Cincinnati, Ohio

North-Eastern Association of Singing Societies
President: Carl Lentz
77 Broad Street, Newark, New Jersey

Order of Harugari
Grand Treasurer: Henry F. Raabe
30 Vanderveer Street, Brooklyn, New York

Order of the Sons of Herman
Grand Secretary: Richard Schaefer
[317]New Britain, Connecticut

Workmen's Sick and Death Benefit Fund
Seventh Street and Third Avenue, New York City

HUNGARIAN

American Hungarian Reformed Society
Secretary: Steve Molnar
269 Plymouth Street, Toledo, Ohio

*First Hungarian Literary Society of New York
Secretary: Joseph Partos
317 East Seventy-ninth Street, New York City

First Hungarian Miners Sick Benefit Society of Ben Creek
Secretary: Stephen Beres
Box 244, Cassandram, Pennsylvania

*First Hungarian Sick Benefit and Funeral Society of New Brunswick
Secretary: Joseph Kopencey
Box 511, New Brunswick, New Jersey

*First Hungarian Sick Benefit Society of East Chicago and Vicinity
Secretary: Kovacs A. David
620 Chicago Avenue, East Chicago, Indiana

*Hungarian Public Association of Passaic
Secretary: Julius Faludy
127 Second Avenue, Passaic, New Jersey

*Hungarian Rakoczi Sick Benefit Society of Bridgeport
Secretary: Steve Koteles, Jr.
626 Bostwick Avenue, Bridgeport, Connecticut

*Hungarian Reformed Benefit Society of Pittsburgh and Vicinity
Chairman: Andrew Hornyak
600 Hazelwood Avenue, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

*Hungarian Reformed Sick Benefit Society of Windber and Vicinity
Secretary: Joseph Molnar
[318]542 R. Road Street, Windber, Pennsylvania

Kohanyi Tihamer's Hungarian Workman's Sick Benefit Society of Hungary and America
Secretary: Julius Sipos
Box 240, Homer City, Pennsylvania

Roman and Greek Catholic First Hungarian Sick Benefit Society of Benwood
Secretary: Ignac Kiss
R. F. D. No. 2, Box 346, Wheeling, West Virginia

Saint Laszlo Roman and Greek Catholic Hungarian Sick Benefit and Funeral Society of Johnstown and Vicinity
Secretary: John Angyal
205 Third Avenue, Johnstown, Pennsylvania

Saint Istvan Hungarian Workman's Sick Benefit Society of Snow Shoe
Secretary: Antal Polczar
Box 62, Clarence, Pennsylvania

United Petofi Sandor Association
Secretary: Bela K. Bekay
2196-98 West Jefferson Avenue, Detroit, Michigan

Verhovay Aid Association
Secretary: Stephen Gabor
Room 809-811 Markle Bank Building, Hazelton, Pennsylvania

Workman's Sick Benefit and Literary Society
Secretary: Joseph Kertesz
350 East Eighty-first Street, New York City

ITALIAN

Italian War Veterans
244 East Twenty-fourth Street, New York City

Order of Sons of Italy in America
President: Stefano Miele
266 Lafayette Street, New York City
[319]

JEWISH

Alliance Israelite Universelle
150 Nassau Street, New York City

Alumni Association of the Hebrew Union College
Hebrew Union College, Cincinnati, Ohio

American Jewish Committee
31 Union Square West, New York City

American Jewish Congress
1 Madison Avenue, New York City

American Jewish Relief Committee
30 East Forty-second Street, New York City

American Union of Rumanian Jews
44 Seventh Street, New York City

Baron de Hirsch Fund
80 Maiden Lane, New York City

Bureau of Jewish Social Research
114 Fifth Avenue, New York City

Central Conference of American Rabbis
Temple Beth El, Detroit, Michigan

Council of Jewish Women
Executive Secretary: Mrs. Harry Sternberger
305 West Ninety-eighth Street, New York City

Council of Reform Rabbis
1093 Sterling Place, Brooklyn, New York

Council of Y. M. H. and Kindred Associations
114 Fifth Avenue, New York City

Dropsie College for Hebrew and Cognate Learning
Broad and York Streets, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Eastern Council of Reform Rabbis
[320]1093 Sterling Place, Brooklyn, New York

Educational League for the Higher Education of Orphans
336 Engineer's Building, Cleveland, Ohio

Federation of Bessarabian Jews in America
52 St. Mark's Place, New York City

Federation of Galician Jews and Bukovinian Jews in America
66 Second Avenue, New York City

Federation of Jewish Farmers of America
175 East Broadway, New York City

Federation of Lithuanian and Latvian Jews in America
6 Ludlow Street, New York City

Federation of Oriental Jews of America
42 Seventh Street, New York City

Federation of Russian and Polish Hebrews in America
1822 Lexington Avenue, New York City

Federation of Ukrainian Jews in America
200 East Broadway, New York City

Hadassah
55 Fifth Avenue, New York City

Hai Resh Fraternity
St. Joseph, Missouri

Histadrut Ibrith
55 Fifth Avenue, New York City

Hebrew Sheltering and Immigrant Aid Society of America
229-231 East Broadway, New York City

Hebrew Technical Institute for Boys
36 Stuyvesant Street, New York City

Hebrew Technical School for Girls
Second Avenue and Fifteenth Street, New York City

Independent Order of B'nai B'rith
[321]1228 Tribune Building, Chicago, Illinois

Independent Order of Brith Abraham
37 Seventh Avenue, New York City

Independent Order Brith Sholom
510-512 South Fifth Street, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Independent Order Free Sons of Israel
21 West 124th Street, New York City

Independent Western Star Order
1227 Blue Island Avenue, Chicago, Illinois

Independent Workmen's Circle of America, Inc.
9 Cambridge, Boston, Massachusetts

Industrial Removal Office
174 Second Avenue, New York City

Intercollegiate Menorah Associations
600 Madison Avenue, New York City

Intercollegiate Zionist Association of America
55 Fifth Avenue, New York City

Jewish Academicians of America
125 East Eighty-fifth Street, New York City

Jewish Agricultural and Industrial Aid Society
174 Second Avenue, New York City

Jewish Agricultural Experiment Station
356 Second Avenue, New York City

Jewish Central Relief Committee
51 Chambers Street, New York City

Jewish Chautauqua Society
1305 Stephen Girard Building
21 South Twelfth Street, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Jewish Consumptive Relief Association of California
207 South Broadway, Los Angeles, California

Jewish Consumptive Relief Society
[322]510-512 Kittredge Building, Denver, Colorado

Jewish National Workers Alliance of America
89 Delancey Street, New York City

Jewish People's Relief Committee
175 East Broadway, New York City

Jewish Publication Society of America
1201 North Broad Street, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Jewish Socialist Federation of America
175 East Broadway, New York City

Jewish Socialist Labor Poale Zion of America and Canada
266 Grand Street, New York City

Jewish Teachers Association
Secretary: A. P. Schoolman
356 Second Avenue, New York City

Jewish Teachers' Seminary
252 East Broadway, New York City

Jewish Teachers' Training School of the Misrachi Organization
86 Orchard Street, New York City

Jewish Theological Seminary of America
531 West 123d Street, New York City

Jewish Welfare Board
149 Fifth Avenue, New York City

Joint Distribution Committee
20 Exchange Place, New York City

Kappa Nu Fraternity
2937 Schubert Avenue, Chicago, Illinois

National Association of Jewish Social Workers
Secretary and Treasurer: M. M. Goldstein
356 Second Avenue, New York City

National Conference of Jewish Social Service
[323]114 Fifth Avenue, New York City

National Desertion Bureau
Secretary: Charles Zusser
356 Second Avenue, New York City

National Farm School
407 Mutual Life Building, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

National Federation of Temple Sisterhoods
62 Dutenhofer Building, Cincinnati, Ohio

National Jewish Hospital for Consumptives
3800 East Colfax Avenue, Denver, Colorado

National Jewish Immigration Council
18 Maiden Lane, New York City

National Union of Jewish Sheltering Societies
229-231 East Broadway, New York City

Order Brith Abraham
266 Grand Street, New York City

Order Knights of Joseph
311-312 Society for Savings Building
Cleveland, Ohio

Order of Sons of Zion
55 Fifth Avenue, New York City

Order of the United Hebrew Brothers
189 Second Avenue, New York City

Pi Tau Pi Fraternity
New Orleans, Louisiana

Progressive Order of the West
406-407-408 Frisco Building
Ninth and Olive Streets, St. Louis, Missouri

Red Mogen David of America
201 Second Avenue, New York City

Sigma Alpha Mu Fraternity
[324]277 Broadway, New York City

The Mizrachi Organization of America
86 Orchard Street, New York City

The Union of Orthodox Rabbis of the United States and Canada
121 Canal Street, New York City

The Workmen's Circle
175 East Broadway, New York City

Union of American Hebrew Congregations
Cincinnati, Ohio

Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America
125 East Eighty-fifth Street, New York City

United Order of True Sisters
317 West 139th Street, New York City

United Orthodox Rabbis of America
121 Canal Street, New York City

United Sons of Israel, Inc.
18 Boylston Street, Boston, Massachusetts

United Synagogue of America
531 West 123d Street, New York City

Women's League of the United Synagogue of America
531 West 123d Street, New York City

Young Judæa
55 Fifth Avenue, New York City

Z B T Fraternity
237 West Eighty-eighth Street, New York City

Zionist Organization of America
55 Fifth Avenue, New York City

Zionist Society of Engineers and Agriculturists
122 East Thirty-seventh Street, New York City

JUGOSLAV

Carniolian Slovene Catholic Union
[325]1004 North Chicago Street, Joliet, Illinois

Croatian League of Illinois
2552 Wentworth Avenue, Chicago, Illinois

Croatian Union of the Pacific
560 Pacific Building, San Francisco, California

Jugoslav Benevolent Society "Unity"
408 Park Street, Milwaukee, Wisconsin

Jugoslav Catholic Benevolent Union
Ely, Minnesota

Jugoslav Republican Alliance
3637 West Twenty-sixth Street, Chicago, Illinois

Loyal Serb Society Srbadia
443 West Twenty-second Street, New York City

National Croatian Society
1012 Peralta Street, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

Serbian Federation Sloboda
414 Bakewell Building, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

Serbian Orthodox Federation Srbobran Sloga
Twelfth and Carsons Street, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

Slovene Benevolent Society
1064 East Sixty-second Street, Cleveland, Ohio

Slovene Catholic Benevolent Association
420 Seventh Street, Calumet, Michigan

Slovene Croatian Union
Fifth South Borgo Block, Calumet, Michigan

Slovene Free Thinkers Association
1541 West Eighteenth Street, Brooklyn, New York

Slovene Workingmen's Benevolent Association
634 Main Street, Johnstown, Pennsylvania

*Slovenic Benevolent Society
"St. Barbara"
[326]Forest City, Pennsylvania

Slovenic National Benefit Society
2657 S. Lawndale Avenue, Chicago, Illinois

Southern Slav Socialistic League
3639 West Twenty-sixth Street, Chicago, Illinois

The Holy Family Society
1006 North Chicago Street, Joliet, Illinois

Western Slav Society
4822 Washington Street, Denver, Colorado

Young National Croatian Society
President: Mark Smiljanich
2857 South Ridgeway Avenue, Chicago, Illinois

LITHUANIAN

American-Lithuanian Catholic Press Association
Secretary: Rev. V. Kulikauskas
2327 West Twenty-third Place, Chicago, Illinois

Auxiliary of Lithuanian Red Cross
Secretary: Rev. Petraitis
147 Montgomery Avenue, Paterson, New Jersey

Knights of Lithuania
Secretary: Vincas Rukštelis
3249 South Halsted Street, Chicago, Illinois

Lithuanian Alliance of America
Secretary: Miss P. Jurgeliute
307 West Thirtieth Street, New York City

Lithuanian National Fund
Secretary: J. Krušinskas
222 South Ninth Street, Brooklyn, New York

Lithuanian Patriot Society
Secretary: J. Sekys
101 Oak Street, Lawrence, Massachusetts

Lithuanian Roman Catholic Alliance of America
Secretary: J. Tumasonis
[327]222 South Ninth Street, Brooklyn, New York

Lithuanian Roman Catholic Charitable Association
Secretary: John Purtokas
4441 South Washenaw Avenue, Chicago, Illinois

Lithuanian Roman Catholic Federation of America
Secretary: J. Valantiejus
222 South Ninth Street, Brooklyn, New York

Lithuanian Roman Catholic Women's Alliance of America
President: Mrs. M. Vaiciuniene
442 Leonard Street, N. W., Grand Rapids, Michigan

Lithuanian Total Abstinence Association
Secretary: Vincent Bačys
41 Providence Street, Worcester, Massachusetts

St. Joseph's Lith. Roman Catholic Association of Labor
Secretary: A. F. Kneizis
366 West Broadway, South Boston, Massachusetts

The People's University
Secretary: Dr. A. L. Graiciunas
3310 South Halsted Street, Chicago, Illinois

NORWEGIAN

Knights of the White Cross
Care of Nora Lodge
1733 North Kedvale Avenue, Chicago, Illinois

Sons of Norway
Secretary: L. Stavnheim
New York Life Building, Minneapolis, Minnesota

POLISH

Association of Polish Women of the United States
General Secretary: Mrs. L. H. Dziewczynska
6723 Fleet Avenue, Cleveland, Ohio

Polish Alliance of New Jersey
General Secretary: J. Wegrocki
[328]84 Tyler Street, Newark, New Jersey

Polish Falcons Alliance of America
General Secretary: K. J. Machnikowski
Cor. South Twelfth and Carson Streets, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

Polish Military Alliance of the United States of America
General Secretary: P. Balecki
450 Pacific Avenue, Jersey City, New Jersey

*Polish National Alliance of Brooklyn
General Secretary: V. G. Nowak
142 Grand Street, Brooklyn, New York

Polish National Alliance of the United States of North America
General Secretary: J. S. Zawilinski
1406-08 West Division Street, Chicago, Illinois

Polish Roman-Catholic Alliance
General Secretary: J. Grams
6924 Worley Street, Cleveland, Ohio

Polish Roman-Catholic Association
General Secretary: L. F. Szymanski
755 Twenty-third Street, Detroit, Michigan

*Polish Roman-Catholic Benevolent Association of Bay City
General Secretary: J. Lepczyk
1112 Fifteenth Street, Bay City, Michigan

Polish Roman-Catholic Union
984 Milwaukee Avenue, Chicago, Illinois

Polish Socialists Alliance of America
General Secretary: R. Mazurkiewica
959 Milwaukee Avenue, Chicago, Illinois

Polish Women's Alliance of America
General Secretary: Mrs. J. Andrzejewska
1309-15 North Ashland Avenue, Chicago, Illinois

Polish Union
General Secretary: J. Dembiec
[329]Room 824, Miners Bank Building, Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania

Polish Union of America
General Secretary: F. Zandrowicz
761-765 Fillmore Avenue, Buffalo, New York

Human Catholic Alliance of America
General Secretary: W. Gola
59 Fourth Street, Passaic, New Jersey

The Polish Roman-Catholic St. Joseph Union
General Secretary: A. Kazmierski
2813 Nineteenth Avenue, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

RUSSIAN

League of Russian Clergy
43 Reed Street, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

North American Ecclesiastical Consistory
Archbishop Alexander
15 East Ninety-seventh Street, New York City

Russian Brotherhood Organization of U. S. A.
P. O. Box 475, Olyphant, Pennsylvania

Russian Collegiate Institute
219 Second Avenue, New York City

Russian Independent Orthodox Brotherhoods
34 Vine Street, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

Russian Independent Society
917 North Wood Street, Chicago, Illinois

Russian National Organization
P. O. Box 2066, Bridgeport, Connecticut

Russian National Society
5 Columbus Circle, New York City

Russian Orthodox Catholic Mutual Aid Society
84 Market Street, East, Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania

Russian Peasants' Union
[330]324 East Fourteenth Street, New York City

Russian Society "Nauka"
222 East Tenth Street, New York City

*Union of Russian Citizens
1522 Fifth Avenue, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

Women's Russian Orthodox Mutual Aid Society
P. O. Box 512, Coaldale, Pennsylvania

SLOVAK

Catholic Slovak Sokol
Secretary: Michael Kudlac
205 Madison Street, Passaic, New Jersey

First Catholic Slovak Ladies' Union of the United States
President: Mrs. Frantiska Jakaboin
600 South Seventh Street, Reading, Pennsylvania

National Slovak Society in United States of America
Secretary: Joseph Duris
P. O. Box 593, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

Slovak Gymnastic Union of Sokols
Secretary: Frank Stas
283 Oak Street, Perth Amboy, New Jersey

Slovak Protestant Union
President: Jan Bibza
409 South Second Street, N. S., Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

Tatran Slovak Union
President: Samuel Vrablik
2519 South Ridgeway Avenue, Chicago, Illinois

The First Catholic Slovak Union
President: Andrej H. Dorko
Marblehead, Ohio

Zivena, Benefit Society of Slovak Christian Women of the United States of America
President: Mrs. C. E. Vavrek
3 Stark Street, Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania
[331]

SWEDISH

American Society of Swedish Engineers
Secretary: N. V. Hansell
271 Hicks Street, Brooklyn, New York

Scandinavian Fraternity of America
P. O. Box 184, Spokane, Washington
(Membership consists of Norwegians, Danes, and Swedes)

The American Union of Swedish Singers
President: Hjalmar Nilsson
State Capitol, St. Paul, Minnesota

The Order of Vasa
President: Carl Festin
610 East Seventy-fifth Street, Chicago, Illinois

*United Swedish Societies of Greater New York
President: John Olin
Anderson's Assembly Rooms, Sixteenth Street and Third Avenue, New York City
(Consists of two delegates from each local society)

UKRAINIAN

Providence Association, Inc.
President: Eugene Yakubovich
827 North Franklin Street, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

The Ukrainian Federation of the United States, Inc.
President: Miroslav Sichinsky
166 Avenue A, New York City

Ukrainian Mutual Aid Society, Inc.
President: M. Porada
3357 West Carson Street, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

Ukrainian National Association, Inc.
President: Simon Yadlowsky
[332]83 Grand Street, Jersey City, New Jersey

Ukrainian National Committee
President: V. B. Lotozky
30 East Seventh Street, New York City

Ukrainian Women's Alliance
President: Mrs. C. Zubrich
932 North Okley Boulevard, Chicago, Illinois

Ukrainian Workingmen's Association, Inc.
President: George Kraykiwsky
524 Olive Street, Scranton, Pennsylvania

Union of Brotherhoods
President: George Hylak
107 Grant Street, Olyphant, Pennsylvania

[333]

MENUS

The following menus have been obtained from housewives who were glad to share in an effort toward better understanding between foreign-born groups and agencies either of adjustment or for case work. This small body of material is illustrative of the kind of information that is easily available to the agency and that would illumine the treatment of the families under care.

The menus given are those actually used by housewives of different nationalities during the periods indicated. A list of recipes will be found in another volume of this Study.[82]

BOHEMIAN

These menus were given by a Bohemian woman whose methods of cooking have changed very little in America. She has learned new ways of preserving vegetables and fruits, but uses those methods only when they seem to her more inexpensive than her earlier practices. In other respects the diet is said to be typical of the diet of a Bohemian family of moderate income in Moravia.

Breakfast

Oatmeal with milk.
Coffee, bread with butter or jelly.

There is always fruit in the house and the child of five is given bread and jelly at ten o'clock in the morning.

Lunch

Usually a meatless soup is served for lunch, or a simple dish of rice or vegetables. Eggs cooked in various ways, milk, bread, butter, and jelly, and baked porridge called [334]"kashe" made from farina, rice or millet, cooked with milk and sugar and butter, are also used at lunch.

Dinner

The dinner menus do not vary much. Soup made from meat stock is eaten every week day except Wednesday, when there is roast meat and no soup. On Sunday both soup and a roast are served. The meat from the soup is served with a variety of sauces and gravies. Dumplings are used often when Americans would serve potatoes. Rice and noodles are also used instead of potatoes. Such vegetables as beans, spinach, carrots, cabbage, kohl-rabi, sauerkraut, and salads are sometimes eaten with the meat instead of the sauce with dumplings. The following are typical menus:

Soup.
Meat with sauce and dumplings.
Apple sauce or preserves.
Coffee. Bread and butter.

Soup.
Meat with sauce and potatoes.
Stewed fruit.
Coffee with homemade raised tarts.

Soup.
Meat, beans, sauerkraut.
Apple sauce.
Coffee. Bread and butter.

CROATIAN

The following menus represent the diet of a Croatian family of moderate income. The family came from a village near Zara, and the influence of the Italian customs upon the food habits of the Dalmatians is indicated in the use of polenta.

August 6, 1919:

Breakfast—5 a.m.

One cup of coffee with one or two slices of bread. Coffee is made very strong, the cup filled two thirds full of hot milk; the coffee and some cream added.[335]

Second Breakfast—9 a.m.

A soft-boiled egg, with bread.
One cup of coffee.

The custom of having a second breakfast is Croatian. In this family it has been possible to keep it up in this country because the hours for a street-car conductor can be arranged to allow it.

Dinner—12.30 p.m.

Beef soup with dumplings.
Soup meat with sauce.
Mashed potatoes (browned).
Bread. Coffee.

Supper—7 p.m.

Soup with rice (from same stock as was used at noon).
Cabbage.
Bread. Coffee. Fruit.

August 7, 1919:

Breakfast

Early breakfast is always the same. The second breakfast varies little; sometimes bread and cheese or bread and meat sandwiches are eaten instead of the soft-boiled eggs.

Dinner

Goulash.
Polenta.
Lettuce salad.
Coffee.

Supper

Spaghetti with tomato sauce.
Celery.
Bread. Coffee.

ITALIAN (Sicilian)

The following menus represent the diet of a Sicilian family from Palermo. They have been in America over twenty years, but their diet has changed little. There are ten persons in the family—the mother and two unmarried daughters, a married daughter, her husband and four[336] children. The children are seven, five, and three years, and ten months. Food for the children is prepared separately. For breakfast they have cereal, milk, bread, and stewed fruit; for lunch, rice or potato, bread, milk, and the green vegetables cooked for the family if not cooked with tomato sauce. For supper the children have bread and milk. It is not common in Italian families to make so much difference in the diet for children; they are usually fed on the highly seasoned dishes the family eat, but in this family the mother prepared special food for her children, and her daughter is doing the same and planning their diet even more carefully.

Summer menus:

Monday, August 11, 1919:

Breakfast

Coffee or chocolate.
Toast. Italian cookies.
For children, bread and milk or oatmeal and milk.

The coffee is made strong, but is served with hot milk—the cup half or two thirds filled with milk before coffee is poured in. Very often nothing is eaten with the coffee.

Luncheon—Noon

Cold sliced meat (left from Sunday).
Tomato and lettuce salad.
Bread. Fruit.

Dinner

Spaghetti with tomato sauce.
Stuffed peppers.
Bread. Fruit.

Tuesday, August 12, 1919:

Breakfast

Same every morning.

Luncheon

Stew made of long, slender squash, potatoes, onions.
Bread. Fruit.

[337]

Dinner

Broiled veal.
Fried potatoes.
Fresh tomatoes with French dressing.
Boiled string beans.
Bread. Fruit.

Wednesday, August 13, 1919:

Luncheon

Boiled greens with olive oil.
Fresh tomatoes.
Bread. Cheese.
Fruit.

Dinner

Macaroni with peas.
Diced potatoes with tomato sauce.
Breaded asparagus.
Fruit.

Thursday, August 14, 1919:

Luncheon

Breaded fried liver.
Sauce for meat made of vinegar, sugar, chopped orange rind, and bay leaves.
Boiled greens with olive oil.
Bread. Fruit.

Dinner

Macaroni à la Milanese
Sauce of finocchi, bread crumbs, anchovi.
Potato cakes.
Fruit.

Friday, August 15, 1919:

Luncheon

Egg tamale.
String beans, French dressing.
Bread. Fruit.

[338]

Dinner

Fried fish.
Fresh tomatoes.
Cucumbers. Bread. Fruit.

Saturday, August 16, 1919:

Luncheon

Potatoes and eggs.
Greens with vinegar.
Bread. Fruit.

Dinner

Broiled steak.
Corn. Potatoes.
Salad. Bread. Fruit.

Sunday, August 17, 1919:

Breakfast

Coffee. Italian pastry.

Dinner

Homemade macaroni with tomato sauce.
Veal pot roast.
Corn. Eggplant. Bread.
Fruit salad.

The menus given are typical of the diet during the summer. A great variety of vegetables is used.

Winter menus:

Monday:

Breakfast

Coffee or chocolate.
Bread, toast, or Italian cookies.

Luncheon

Stew of spinach, lentils, and onions.
Baked apples. Bread. Coffee.

[339]

Dinner

Macaroni with tomato sauce.
Meat (left over from Sunday).
Bread. Coffee or wine.

Tuesday:

Breakfast is always the same.

Luncheon

Egg tamale (egg, cheese, and bacon).
Baked potatoes.
Bread. Fruit.

Dinner

Soup with macaroni.
Meat with vegetables, potatoes, carrots, cabbage, onions, etc.
Bread. Fruit.

Wednesday:

Luncheon

Salmon, lemon juice.
Spinach with olive oil.
Bread. Fruit.

Dinner

Macaroni with navy beans.
Fried eggplant, with tomato sauce and cheese.
Bread. Fruit.

Thursday:

Luncheon

Soft-boiled eggs.
Fried green tomatoes.
Bread. Baked apples.

Dinner

Breaded pork chops.
Potatoes. Spinach.
Fruit Salad. Bread.

Friday:

Luncheon

Egg omelet.
Chocolate. Bread.
Stewed fruit.

[340]

Dinner

Fish with tomato sauce.
Stuffed green peppers.
Bread. Fruit.

Saturday:

Luncheon

Broiled liver.
Lettuce salad. Bread.
Fruit.

Dinner

Lima beans with celery, onions, and tomatoes.
Stuffed artichokes.
Bread. Coffee. Fruit.

Sunday:

Breakfast

Coffee and Italian fried cakes.

Dinner

Macaroni with tomato sauce and chopped meat.
Pot roast. Peas.
Ice cream.

Supper

Rice cooked in milk with egg.
Cake. Coffee.

SLOVENIAN

Menus given by a Slovenian woman show the diet of a family of moderate income whose food habits have not been modified in America. Certain European customs are observed; no desserts are served, and no baking powder is used. Sweet cookies, raised with yeast, and fresh fruit, are given to children who are allowed candy, so that they may not feel deprived of sweets when they see other children eating candy at school. The older children have learned to prepare new "American" dishes at school, but these are not used at home, as the whole family prefer the Slovenian diet.[341]

Breakfast

Coffee, bread and butter.
(Breakfast is always the same.)

10 a.m.

An egg, a sandwich, or a cup of milk for parents.
Fruit for children.

Lunch

1. Rice cooked with mushrooms, celery, onions, and spice. In cold weather fifteen cents' worth of pork is cooked with the rice. Water with fruit juice to drink, or the water from cooked fruit.

2. Buckwheat cakes, eaten with cooked dried fruit or jelly.

3. Barley and beans cooked together. Colored beans are used, and must be tried to see whether they will cook in the same time as the barley. Olive oil, bacon or sausage, and a little garlic are added.

4. Millet (kasa) cooked in milk with sugar, then baked in the oven fifteen minutes and served with milk.

5. French toast.

6. Corn-meal mush, fried, with sauerkraut. "A good quality of corn meal is used, bought in Italian districts." Boiling water is poured very slowly into a dish of meal, and allowed to stand twenty minutes. Mush is fried in butter, eaten with sauerkraut, cooked dried fruit or honey.

7. Noodles with Parmesan cheese.

8. Noodles with baked apples.

3 p.m.

Coffee, bread with butter or jelly.
(Coffee is very weak for children; a great deal of milk is added.)

Dinner

1. Beef soup with farina dumplings.
Meat (from the soup) eaten with a relish.
Potatoes. Turnips. Bread.

2. Vegetable soup.
Roast meat.
Vegetables.
Bread. Water.

[342]

[343]

INDEX

A

• Abbott, Edith, 153, 161, 186, 308
• Abbott, Grace, 223
• Agencies:
  • Adjusting immigrants
    • American, 222-276
    • Case work, 277-311
    • Immigrant, 187-221
    • Studied, 7-8
• Agriculture:
  • Legislation, 38, 76, 254-257
  • Workers, 34-35
• Akron, Ohio:
  • Home Demonstration Agent, 259
• American Association for Family Welfare Work, 281
• American Association for Social Work with Families, 7, 310
• American Home Economics Association:
  • Committee on Household Budgets, 115, 250-252
• American Institute of Architects:
  • Articles on Housing, 72-74
• American Red Cross:
  • Chapter
    • Case Work, 281
  • Home Service, 7, 310
• Americanization:
  • Agencies and instruments
    • American organizations, 222-276
    • Case-work organizations, 277-311
    • Immigrant organizations, 187-221
  • Factors, 14-18
• Anderson, A. M., 270
• Anthony, Katharine Susan, 136

B

• Baltimore, Maryland:
  • Polish National Alliance, 202
• Banks:
  • Postal Savings, 111-115
• Benefit Societies:
  • Life and Health insurance, 94-95
  • Organization, 192-196, 201
• Birdseye, Clarence Frank, 226
• "Board of Health Baskets," 133[344]
• Boarders:
  • Relation to family problems, 23-27, 52, 63-64
• Bohemia:
  • Customs in, 174
• Bohemians:
  • Building and loan association, 76, 109
  • Child care, 158, 164, 182
  • Cookery, 59
  • Dvorak Park, Chicago, 273-274
  • Home ownership, 105, 107
  • In Chicago, 11
    • Nebraska, 169
  • Life insurance, 94
  • Menus, 333-334
  • Postal Savings circular, 112
  • Spending habits, 90, 122, 134-135
  • Unemployment, 92
• Boston, Massachusetts:
  • Boston Associated Charities
    • Office of District Superintendent, 298
  • Case-work agencies, 283, 295
  • Dietetic Bureau, 296
  • Polish National Alliance, 202
• Breckinridge, S. P., 153, 161, 186
• Bridgeport, Connecticut:
  • Black Rock Apartment House Group, 70
  • Study of housing project, 8
• British Board of Trade:
  • Cost of living in American towns, 7
• Brooklyn, New York:
  • Red Cross Chapter, 281
  • Visiting housekeeper
    • Pratt Institute, 290
• Brooks, John Graham, viii
• Buffalo, New York:
  • Cost of living, 129
  • Red Cross Chapter, 281
• Building Loans:
  • Government, 75-80
• Building and loan association:
  • Agency for buying homes, 109-111
  • In Chicago, 76
• Bulgarian:
  • Home ownership, 106
  • Postal Savings circular, 112
• Bureau of Education:
  • Home Economics Division, 251, 268
• Bureau of Labor:
  • List of building and loan associations, 109
  • Report of U. S. Housing Corporation, 29, 32
  • Statistics, 7, 129
  • Women and child wage earners, 6
• Buying:
  • Immigrant problem, 117-148

C

• California:
  • Home teachers, 236-237
  • Mothers' Aid Laws, 308
• California Commission of Immigration and Housing, 237-238[345]
• Cambridge, Massachusetts:
  • Case-work agencies, 283
    • Visiting housekeepers, 290
• Case Work:
  • With immigrant families, 277-311
• Case Workers:
  • Foreign speaking, 281-286
  • Training, 298-304
• Catholic Order of Foresters, 195
• Chicago:
  • Agencies, 8
    • Board of Education, 241-243
    • Building and loan association, 76, 110
    • Case work, 281, 298-299
    • Croatian, 197
    • Elementary schools, 161-162
    • Foreign born, 303-304
    • Immigrants' Protective League, 8, 46, 51, 52, 203, 223-227, 240, 303
    • Playgrounds, 158
    • Recreational, 273-276
    • Settlements, 50, 239-240
    • United Charities, 8, 281
    • Visiting housekeepers, 290-291
    • Visiting Nurses' Association, 241
    • Vocational Guidance Bureau, 169, 174
    • Women's Clubs, 240-241
  • Delinquent children, 185-186
  • Families, 93-94
  • Homes, 33
  • Housing, 62, 105-108
  • Italian wedding, 100
  • Russian women, 3
  • Shopping habits, 122-123
  • Study of races, 11-12, 50, 61
  • Women in industry, 40
• Child Labor:
  • Legislation, 37-38
• Children:
  • Care of, 4, 41-43, 149-186
  • Croatian, 198-201
• Children's Bureau:
  • Child care publications, 7, 219-221, 254
  • Infant mortality studies, 41, 64
• Chinese:
  • Postal savings circular, 112
• Christenings, 103-104
• Church:
  • Chimes, 97
  • Relation to parents, 180
• Classes:
  • Cooking, 228, 233, 240-243, 259-260
• Cleveland:
  • Case-work agencies, 283
    • Visiting housekeepers, 290, 295
• Clothing:
  • Problem of parents, 135-141
• Comey, A. C., 79[346]
• Community:
  • Recreation agencies, 272-276
  • Relation to immigrant, 169, 180, 187-192, 223
• Company store, 119-122
• Consumers' League, 141
• Cook County, Illinois:
  • Charity Service Report, 277
  • Juvenile Court, 185-186, 277, 281
• Cookery:
  • American demands, 58-60
  • Classes, 228, 233, 240-243, 259-260
• Co-operation:
  • For immigrant education, 240-243
• Co-operatives:
  • Housekeeping, 24, 27-29
  • In America, 141-148
  • In England, 141-148
• Court:
  • Domestic relation, 53
  • Juvenile, 181-186, 277, 281
• Croatia:
  • Customs, 174
• Croatians:
  • Child care, 151
  • Cookery, 58
  • Home ownership, 105
  • In Chicago, 11
  • League of Illinois, 94
  • Menus, 334-335
  • Organizations, 196-201
  • Postal Savings circular, 112
  • Spending habits, 122, 130, 137
  • Women in industry, 40
• Croatian League of Illinois, 196
• Cummin, John, 226
• Czecho-Slovak:
  • Czecho-Slovak workingman, 95
  • Diet changes, 130
  • Organizations, 313-314

D

• Dallas, Texas:
  • Bohemian Community, 83
• Daniels, John, 32, 190
• Danish:
  • Organizations, 314-315
  • Postal Savings circular, 112
• Day Nursery:
  • Lithuanian, 41
• Death:
  • Provision against, 92-93, 96
• Department of Agriculture:
  • Bureau of Home Economics, 7, 251
  • States Relation Service, 254-262
  • Thrift campaign, 114
• Detroit:
  • Visiting Housekeepers' Association, 289
• Diets:
  • Modification, 130-134, 249, 333-341
• Dover, New Jersey:
  • Cost of living, 129
• Dutch:
  • Organizations, 315
  [347]

E

• Earnings (see Income)
• Economy:
  • Built on money, 88
• Education:
  • Immigrant, 240-243
    • Women, 265-266
  • Parents' problem, 159-169
• El Paso, Texas:
  • Case-work agencies, 283
• England:
  • British Board of Trades, 7
  • Domestic Service Problem, 271-272
  • Government Grants
    • Schools for mothers, 263-265
  • Ministry of Reconstruction, 68, 271
  • Rochdale, Lancashire
    • Co-operative, 141
  • Women's Co-operative Guild, 269
  • Women's Employment Committee, 270-271
• English:
  • Postal Savings circular, 112
• Erwin, Tennessee:
  • Housing, 70
• Expenditures:
  • Budget, 139

F

• Fall River, Massachusetts:
  • Case-work agencies, 281
    • Visiting housekeepers, 290
  • Immigrant schools
    • Classes for women, 259-260
• Family:
  • Adjustment by organizations
    • American, 222-276
    • Case work, 277-311
    • Immigrant, 187-221
  • Child care, 149-186
  • Problem, 6, 14-18
  • Relationships, 19-53
• Farm Laborers:
  • Unfamiliarity with money, 89-90
• Farm Loan Act:
  • Proposed Amendment to, 76
• Federal Board for Vocational Education:
  • Supervisors of Home Economics, 7
  • Work, 251, 256-262
• Fête Days:
  • First communion, 104-105
• Finnish:
  • Organizations, 315-316
  • Postal Savings circular, 112
• Foreign Language Information Service, 220, 313-332
• Fort Wayne, Indiana:
  • Cost of living, 129
• Fosdick, Raymond B., viii
• Fraternal Societies (see Benefit)
  • Sound basis of, 94-95
• French:
  • Postal Savings circular, 112
  [348]
• Freund, Ernst, 119
• Funerals:
  • Expense, 96-97
• Furniture:
  • Buying, 134-135

G

• Gay, Edwin F., viii
• German:
  • Life insurance, 94
  • Organizations, 316-317
  • Postal Savings circular, 112
• Gilbert, Frank Bixley, 226
• Girls:
  • Conventions for, 174-175
  • Delinquent, 181
  • Safety, 180
  • Work, 179
• Glenn, John M., viii
• Grand Rapids, Michigan:
  • Case-work agencies, 283
• Greeks:
  • Organizations, 192
  • Postal Savings banks
    • Use of, 112
• Group life:
  • In old country, 175
  • In America, 175

H

• Hart, Hastings Hornell, 200
• Health:
  • Problems, 150-151
• Health Insurance Commission of Illinois:
  • Study of Chicago families' life insurance, 93-95
• Homes:
  • Ownership, 78-80, 105-111
  • Relation to
    • Child care, 149-186
    • American organizations, 222-276
    • Case-work organizations, 277-311
    • Immigrant organizations, 187-221
  • Studied, 6-14
• Home Economics:
  • Work, 254-263, 289-298
• Home Visitors:
  • International Institute, Y. W. C. A., 245
  • Training, 248-250
  • Work of, 247-248
• Hood, Laura, xvii
• Housing:
  • Immigrant problem, 23-32, 54-84
  • Play space, 158
• Housewives:
  • Duties, 43-47
  • Instruction, 234-235
  • Problems
    • Children, 149-186
    • Housing, 23-32, 58-84
    • Saving, 85-116
    • Spending, 117-148
• Hungarians:
  • Child care, 165
  • Home ownership, 105
  • Housekeeping problems, 80
  • Organization, 191, 317-318
  • Postal Savings banks, 112
  [349]

I

• Illinois:
  • Building and loan organization, 109
  • Child labor, 38
  • Council of Defense, 240-241
  • Co-operative stores, 8
  • Italians, 3, 11-12
  • Mining communities, 8
  • Mothers' Aid Law, 308
  • Pauper Act, 307
  • Public schools, 253
• Illinois Steel Company:
  • Employees' houses, 72
• Immigration:
  • "Old" and "New," 5
  • Stream of, 1
• Immigrants:
  • Adjustment, 1-2, 6, 193
  • Co-operatives, 143-145
  • Relation to community, 167-168, 180, 187-192, 223
• Immigrant Heritages, 1-186, 247-248
  • Importance to case worker, 298-301
• Immigrant Newspapers (see Separate Races)
• Immigrant Organizations:
  • Life and Health Insurance, 94-95
  • List of principal racial, 313-332
  • Relation to family problems, 187-221
• Immigrants' Protective League, 230, 268
  • Chicago, 8, 46, 51, 52, 203, 223-227, 240, 303
• Income:
  • Children, 170-171
  • Inadequacy, 35-39
  • Irregularity, 91-92
• Indianapolis, Indiana:
  • Cost of living, 129
• Industry:
  • Women in, 39-43
  • Workers, 34-35
• Infant mortality:
  • Study, 41, 64
• Insurance:
  • Life
    • Fraternal, 93-95
    • Industrial, 95-96
• Irish:
  • Life insurance, 94
• Italians:
  • Building and loan association, 77
  • Case work with, 298-299, 305-307
  • Child care, 163, 177-178
  • Family problems, 50
  • Home economics work in Arkansas, 258-259
  • Housekeeping problems, 57-58, 65, 80
  • In Illinois mining town, 253
  • Life insurance, 94
  • Medical Association, 218
  • Menus, 335-340
  • Organizations, 95, 217-218, 318
  • Postal Saving banks, 112
  • Saving problems, 92-93, 97, 105, 106[350]
  • Spending habits, 122, 124
    • Clothing, 137
    • Diet changes, 130
    • Neighborhood stores, 127
  • Studied, 11-12
• Italy:
  • Backgrounds, 57-58, 175, 298-299, 302
  • Houses, 57

J

• Japanese:
  • Postal Savings circular, 112
• Jewish:
  • Life insurance, 94
  • Organizations, 319-324
• Jewish Aid Society:
  • Case work, 281
• Jugoslav:
  • Child care, 178
  • Family relationships, 50
  • Organizations, 324-326
• Juvenile Court:
  • Case work, 277, 281
  • Child care, 181-186
• Juvenile Delinquency:
  • Children of foreign-born parentage, 156, 181-186

K

• Kemmerer, Edwin Walter, 102
• Kenosha, Wisconsin:
  • Case-work agencies, 283
• King, Clyde Lyndon, 148
• Kirkpatrick, V. G., 293
• Knights and Ladies of Security, 195

L

• Lake Village, Arkansas
  • Work with Italians, 258
• Language:
  • Barrier in case work, 280-286
• Legislation, Federal:
  • Agricultural, 76, 254, 256-257
  • Housing (proposed), 77
  • Mothers' Aid, 309
  • Pure Food Acts, 141
  • Restriction on Retail Trade, 141
• Legislation, Foreign countries:
  • Government Grants, 264-265
• Legislation, State:
  • Company stores, 120-121
  • Education, 159, 265-266
  • Home teacher, 236
  • Housing (proposed), 77
  • Mothers' Aid, 308
  • Pure Food Act, 141
  • Regulating banks, 113
  • Restriction on retail trade, 141
  • Wives' rights, 48-50
• Lithuanians:
  • Child care, 155
  • Family problems, 26, 39-43, 51
  • Home ownership, 105-106
  • Housekeeping problems, 56, 58-59, 80, 107
  • Life insurance, 94
  • National Alliance, 94[351]
  • Organizations, 191, 209-215, 326-327
  • Postal Savings circular, 112
  • Saving problem, 89-90
  • Spending habits
    • Clothing, 136
    • Diet changes, 130
    • Furniture, 135
  • Studied, 11
• Lithuania:
  • Employment in, 89
• Lithuanian Women's Alliance:
  • Organ, "Woman's Field," 212
  • Work, 209-214
• Living:
  • Cost
    • In United States, 129
  • Lowering through co-operatives, 142
  • Standards, 286-289
• Lodgers (see Boarders)
• Lowell, Massachusetts:
  • Classes for immigrant women, 259
• Lusk, Graham, 133

M

• Mahoney, John J., 267
• Massachusetts:
  • Housing project—study in
    • Lowell, 8
    • North Billerica, 8
  • Legislation
    • Education—immigrant, 265-266
    • Mothers' Aid Laws, 308
  • Social worker in, 132
• Massachusetts Bureau of Immigration, 267
• Massachusetts Homestead Commission:
  • Experiment at Lowell, 75
  • Limited dividend company, 75
• Massachusetts Immigration Commission, 223
• Men:
  • Family
    • Legislation controlling, 48-50
  • Shopping by, 124-125
  • Nonfamily, housing, 23-24, 27-29
• Menus, 333-341
• Merchants, 118-119
• Mexicans:
  • Boarders, 64
  • Civil status, 24
  • Study in Chicago, 11
• Milwaukee, Wisconsin:
  • Case-work agencies, 283
• Ministry of Reconstruction:
  • England
    • Housing recommendations, 68
• Minneapolis, Minnesota:
  • Cost of living, 129
• Money:
  • Immigrants' unfamiliarity, 88-91
  • Payment in lawful, 121-122
• Morgan Park, Minnesota:
  • Illinois Steel Company houses, 72
• Mothers, immigrant:
  • Aid law, 308[352]
  • Assistants, 268-270
  • Child care, 150-151, 164-165, 172-174, 178-180, 247
  • Relation to family, 39-47

N

• National Croatian Society:
  • Work of, 196-199
• National Conference of Social Work, 310
• Nebraska:
  • Rural community
    • Higher education in, 169
• New Hampshire:
  • Manchester, study of infant mortality, 41
• New Jersey:
  • Mothers' Aid Laws, 308
  • Yorkship Village (Study of Housing), 8
• New Mexico:
  • Child labor, 38
  • Study of several towns, 8
• New York City:
  • Case-work agencies, 283
    • Visiting housekeepers, 290, 295
  • Home Economics Bureau, 296
  • John Jay Dwellings, 70
  • Polish National Alliance, 202
  • Red Cross Chapters, 281
• New York State Industrial Commission:
  • Study of earnings, 36-37
• Norwegian:
  • Organizations, 327
  • Postal Savings circular, 112

O

• Occupation:
  • Change in, 34-35
• Ohio:
  • State University, 259
• Owen, Robert, 310

P

• Pana, Illinois:
  • Cost of living, 129
• Parent:
  • Problem with children, 149-186
• Paterson, New Jersey:
  • Case-work agencies, 283
• Pennsylvania:
  • Company stores, 120
  • Infant mortality, Johnstown, 41, 64
  • Italians, 12
  • Mining communities, 8
  • Mothers' Aid Laws, 308
• Philadelphia, Pennsylvania:
  • Case-work agencies, 283
  • Red Cross Chapter, 281
• Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania:
  • Case-work agencies, 283
    • Visiting housekeepers, 290
• Playground:
  • Inadequate provision, 158
• Poland:
  • House in, 55-56
  [353]
• Polish:
  • Building and loan associations, 77
  • Child care, 4, 162, 163, 183-184
  • Commercial co-operatives, 123
  • Family relationships, 21-23, 33, 34, 53
  • Home ownership, 105, 107
  • Housekeeping problems, 54, 59, 80
  • In Chicago, 11
    • Rolling Prairie, Indiana, 11
  • In industry, 40-41
  • Life insurance, 94
  • Newspaper
    • Dziennik Zwaizkowy, 204
  • Organizations, 201-209, 327-329
  • Postal Savings circular, 112
  • Recreation, 158
  • Saving problems, 93, 96, 102
  • Spending habits, 122-123
    • Clothing, 136
    • Diet changes, 130
  • Vocational Guidance, 299-300
• Polish National Alliance:
  • Organs, 204
  • Women's department, 203-207
  • Work, 94, 201-203
• Polish Women's Alliance, 201, 207-209
• Portuguese:
  • Postal Savings circular, 112
• Postal Savings banks, 111-115
• Postal Saving Law
  • (proposed) Amendment, 76, 113
• Pratt Institute, 290
• Punishment:
  • Methods, 155-156

R

• Ralph, Georgia G., 200
• Recreation:
  • Agencies, 272-276
  • Benefit societies, 197
  • Juvenile, 157-159, 176, 177
• Richmond, Mary Ellen, 281
• Rochester, New York:
  • Red Cross Chapter, 281
• Rolling Prairie, Indiana:
  • Child labor, 38-39
  • Co-operative county project, 261
  • School attendance, 162
• Roman Catholic Union of America (Polish), 201
• Roosevelt, Theodore, viii
• Rumanians:
  • Home ownership, 106
  • Organization, 191
• Russell Sage Foundation, 200
• Russian:
  • Child care, 163, 165, 172, 179
  • Family problems, 23, 38, 46-47
  • Home ownership, 106
  • Housekeeping problems, 59, 80
  • In Chicago, 3, 11[354]
  • Organization, 95, 191, 329-330
  • Postal Savings banks, 112
  • Saving problems, 103
  • Spending habits, 122
    • Diet changes, 130

S

• St. Paul, Minnesota:
  • Cost of living, 129
• Sanitation:
  • Instruction 80-84
• Saving:
  • Problem, 85-116
• Scandinavian:
  • Life insurance, 94
• Schools, private:
  • Selection by parents, 159-160
• Schools, public:
  • Elementary
    • Parents' relationship, 159-169, 180, 253
  • Immigrant
    • Relation to home, 230-238
    • Co-operation with agencies, 240-243
• Schools:
  • Rural
    • Attendance, 162
• Serbia:
  • Customs, 174
• Serbians:
  • Home ownership, 106
  • Spending habits, 122
• Serbo-Croatian:
  • Dvorak Park, 273-274
  • Housekeeping problems, 64
  • Postal Savings circular, 112
• Settlements:
  • Relation to homes, 50, 239-240, 273-276
• Sickness:
  • Incentive for saving, 86, 92
• Slingerland, R., 200
• Slovaks:
  • Child care, 164, 171, 176-177
  • Home ownership, 105, 107
  • Organizations, 330
  • Postal Savings circular, 112
  • Spending habits, 122
  • Studied, 11
• Slovenian:
  • Child care, 171
  • Family problems, 20
  • Home ownership, 106
  • Menus, 340-341
  • Postal Savings circular, 112
  • Spending habits, 122
  • Studied, 11
  • Women in industry, 40
• Smith-Hughes Act, 256-257
• Smith-Lever Act, 254
• Social Workers:
  • Relation to immigrant spending habits, 132, 140
• Society for Care of Croatian Orphans, 201
• South Chicago, Illinois:
  • Church, 97
• Spanish:
  • Postal Savings circular, 112
• Spending:
  • Immigrant problems, 117-148
  [355]
• Springfield, Illinois:
  • Case-work agencies
    • Visiting housekeepers, 290
• Staunton, Illinois:
  • Co-operative store, 145
• Stamford, Connecticut:
  • Case-work agencies, 282-283
    • Visiting housekeepers, 290
• State Immigration Commission, 267
• Steubenville, Ohio:
  • Cost of living, 129
• Stores:
  • Company, 67-69
  • Co-operative, 141-143
    • In Staunton, Illinois, 145
  • Immigrant, 122-123, 126, 144
• Syracuse Home Bureau:
  • Work
    • Projects, 260-261
• Swedish:
  • Organizations, 331
  • Postal Savings circular, 112

T

• Teacher Training:
  • Work with immigrant women, 248-254
• Teachers:
  • Home, in California, 236-237
• Thomas, W. I., 136
• Thomas and Znaniecki:
  • Letters from Polish Peasant, 21-22, 85-86, 161
• Thompson, Frank V., 231
• Thrift:
  • Government campaign, 87, 114
• Topeka, Kansas:
  • Social work agencies, 281
• Trade Union Label League, 141
• "Tribe of Ben Hur," 195

U

• Ukrainians:
  • Alliance, 122
  • Child care, 165
  • Family problems, 20, 33
  • In Chicago, 11, 50
    • Sun, West Virginia, 12
  • Organizations, 331-332
  • Postal Savings circular, 112
  • Savings problems, 90-92
  • Spending habits, 122-123
    • Diet changes, 130
  • Women in industry, 40
• Ukrainian Women's Alliance:
  • Organ, 216
  • Purpose, 215-216
• United Charities:
  • Case work, 281, 283
  • In Chicago, 8
• United States Housing Corporation:
  • Plan for copartnership ownership, 78
• United States Immigration Commission:
  • Reports studied, 6
    • Company stores, 120-121
    • Earning, 36
    • Housing, 60-61
• United States Steel Corporation:[356]
  • Houses, 80
• United States Treasury Department:
  • Thrift campaign, 87, 114
  • War Risk Bureau, 310
• Universities:
  • Ohio State, 259
  • Purdue, 261

V

• Veblen, Thorstein B., 136
• Visiting Dietitians:
  • Modifying diets, 133
  • Training, 248-252
• Virginia:
  • Hilton Village
    • Housing project, 8
• Visiting Housekeepers:
  • Agencies, 286, 289-298
  • Modifying diets, 133
• Voll, John A., viii

W

• War, 35, 36, 187-188, 202-203
• Waterbury, Connecticut:
  • Case-work agencies, 283
• Wedding customs, 99-100, 102-103
  • Dowry, 86
• West Virginia:
  • Legislation on company store, 121
  • Study of
    • Mining communities, 8
    • Ukrainians, 12
• Williams, Talcott, viii
• Wilmington, Delaware:
  • Cost of living, 129
• Women:
  • Croatian, 198
  • Education, 234-236, 240-243, 265-266
  • Employment, 65
  • Family relationships, 47-53
  • Lithuanian organizations, 209
  • Polish organizations, 201-209
  • Ukrainian organizations, 215-216
• Women's Co-operative Guild, 148
• Wood, E. E., 67, 75-77
• Woodmen of the World, 195
• Worcester, Massachusetts:
  • Case-work agencies
    • Visiting housekeepers, 290
• Wright, Helen R., xvii

Y

• Yiddish:
  • Postal Savings circular, 112
• Y. W. C. A.:
  • Health campaign, 140
  • International Institute, 7, 31, 230, 237, 243-248

THE END

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