The Delinquent Child and the Home
Chapter 9: The Child Without Play: The Problem of Neighborhood Neglect
Sophonisba Breckinridge and Edith Abbott
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IT became clear, as a result of the analysis of the economic status of the "delinquent family," that the great majority of delinquent children, boys and girls alike, came from homes of poverty. In homes of this class children are given fewer facilities for recreation than are the children of the well-to-do, and they are, therefore, more subject to neighborhood influences. For this reason it seemed important to ascertain from what districts of the city the delinquent children had come, in order to trace any possible connection that might exist between neighborhood conditions and the wrongdoing of the boys and girls. The one simple and direct method of determining how far any special neighborhood might be "feeding" the court was to locate quite accurately, by blocks, the homes of all the children brought into court as delinquent during the first ten years of its existence. In attempting to do this a map of the entire city proved so unwieldy that it was thought best to exclude the wide out-lying districts, which are so sparsely populated that few children have come from them. The first, or "delinquency," map shows, therefore, the location of the homes of all the delinquent children who became wards of the court from 1899 to 1909, except the few from the very remote parts of the city. A study of this map makes possible several conclusions with regard to "delinquent neighborhoods." It becomes clear, in the first place, that the region from which the children of the court chiefly come is the densely populated West Side, and that the most conspicuous centers of delinquency in this section have been the congested wards which lie along the river and the canals. It should be explained that the West Side is the most densely populated section of the city-a large tenement and
(151) lodging-house district lying between the two branches of the river and between wide and unsightly stretches of railroad tracks, and enclosed by a dense, semicircular belt-line of manufacturing and commercial plants.
The condition of these West Side wards will, however, be better understood after a study of the "congestion" map on the following page, which shows the relative density of population in the different wards as indicated by the population statistics from the Thirteenth Census.[1] These statistics show that for the entire city the average population per acre was 19.7. Six of the West Side wards, however, had more than 70 people per acre,[2] and, as one would expect, the largest numbers of delinquent children are found in the areas of greatest crowding. The Seventeenth Ward, a crowded Italian and Polish district, has a density of 97.36 per acre; the Nineteenth Ward, the crowded immigrant section in which Hull
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(153) House is situated, has 90.66 per acre; the Sixteenth Ward, a Polish neighborhood, has a population averaging 81.52 per acre; and the Ninth and Tenth Wards, which include the "Ghetto" and the poor district about the lumber yards, have a density of 8o.79 and 70 per acre. These are, with a single exception, the West Side wards that contain the largest numbers of delinquent children. The single exception to this seeming relation between delinquency and congestion on the West Side is the Fourteenth Ward, which contains the Negro quarter of the northwest side. Like the other large Negro districts of the city, this is not a district characterized by overcrowding, but it has all the other features of poor and neglected neighborhoods. In no wards are there found greater dilapidation and poorer sanitary conditions within the homes than in the wards where the houses are rented to Negro tenants. Moreover, it must not be forgotten that in Chicago as in many other cities the Negro quarters are located in sections of the city which have been relinquished by the white population as undesirable residence sections.
While the West Side furnished the largest quota of delinquents, there are, of course, other centers of delinquency across the river. These are chiefly the Italian quarter of the Twenty-second Ward on the North Side; the First and Second Wards which together include the district of segregated vice and a portion of the so-called "black belt" of the South Side; and such distinct industrial communities as the districts near the steel mills of South Chicago and near the stockyards.[3]
Attention has already been called to the fact that offenses against railroad companies bring a considerable number of boys into court each year; and such offenses take on new significance after a study of the first, or "delinquency," map, which shows how many "delinquent homes" are near the railroad tracks. The temptation that the tracks offer to the boy has already been explained. Not only grain for the chickens and coal are to be found in the "empties" and along the tracks, but pieces of iron and wire, which may be sold as "junk" and which mean, therefore, the price of an afternoon at the theater or some other longed-for treat. The tracks also offer to the more daring the chance for a bonfire or for
(154) "flipping" trains, an almost irresistible temptation in a crowded neighborhood where there is so little provision for sports or recreation.
It is, of course, especially characteristic of the poor and congested wards of the city that they have few parks or playgrounds; and in no other group of homes are the private facilities for recreation so slight as in these crowded tenement quarters. To test the extent to which the delinquent child was also a "child without play," a count was made of the number of boys in the special year 1903-04 who did not live within accessible distance, that is, within half a mile,[4] of any public place of recreation. The homes of 832 of these boys were located[5] and it was found that only 449 of them, or 54 per cent of the total number, had opportunities for recreation or play. In this year (1903-04) eight wards of the city (the 2nd, 4th, 8th, 9th, l0th, 11th, 22nd, 24th) had no park area; of these the Eighth is South Chicago, the Second is in the so-called "black belt" and is still without a park, and the others are all river wards.
The movement in Chicago towards the establishment of parks which are real recreation centers began with the appointment of a special park commission in 1 899, but it was not until the following year that the first appropriations from the general corporate funds of the city were made for its work. The children who were brought into the court during the early years of its history were, therefore, only too certainly children who had grown up without any suitable provision for play.
When the juvenile court was established in 1899, there were besides the six chief parks, some 15 small parks, squares, and triangles; these were for the most part, however, small green oases, with a few shaded benches, valuable indeed, but furnishing
(155) no recreation facilities. Indeed, it may be truthfully said that there was at this time neither a public playground nor a public bathing beach in all Chicago.
Moreover, such parks as existed were located chiefly in the well-to-do sections of the city, which furnish a comparatively small quota of children to the court. It has already been said that the largest numbers of these children come from the river wards of the West Side. Of these seven wards, three had no park area at all; in one there was a tract less than an acre in extent-a scrap of lawn with a few broken benches, known as "loafer's garden";[6] two others had each a little open space of four or six acres. In fact, only one of the seven wards had a real park.[7] These seven wards, therefore, with an area of more than 5,000 acres, with a population of nearly 400,000 people, were practically without any playground area, and it is from these seven wards that the delinquent children have chiefly come. Perhaps the meager recreation facilities in the past will be better understood in contrast with the improved conditions of the present. For it is of interest that the community has at last recognized the need of a "place to play" and has made great progress in the last ten years towards meeting this need. There are now, for example, four public bathing beaches and 37 recreation centers, 17 of which are equipped with attractive "field houses," in different parts of the city. [8]
( 156) These field houses might perhaps be described as the club houses of the people. They are provided with indoor gymnasiums and shower baths for both boys and girls, indoor playrooms for children, "branch" reading rooms and library stations of the public library, small rooms to be used as regular meeting places for clubs of all sorts, and large assembly halls for public dances and dramatic performances, festivals and wedding celebrations, and all sorts of public meetings. Outdoors there are playgrounds with pools for wading or swimming in summer, and for skating in winter. In 1899, when the court was established, none of these places of recreation existed. In 1903-04 only seven had been opened.
Two charges of neglect may be made against the community in the past. First, it failed to provide the children in its midst with opportunities for clean, well planned, and wholesome play; second, it failed to supervise the play with which they provided themselves, so that there should be reasonable safety from peril to life, limb, and morals. Play is now recognized as an essential element in the preparation for a vigorous physical and social maturity, and the demand for a rational amount of recreation should, perhaps, like the thirst for beauty, be satisfied through facilities provided by community effort instead of by individual earnings.
It was pointed out in a former chapter that the very terms of the charge on which the child is brought into court often indicate social effort, misdirected unfortunately, but still social. The "gang," which is frequently responsible for the offenses of its members, presents a social phenomenon of hopeful significance and promise when once understood and utilized. In the past, however, its members have had no other education in the fine duty of following a leader than seeking adventure on the tracks, in the streets at night, in the unguarded shop or house, and then finding themselves not heroes but delinquent boys in court and finally perhaps pitiful inmates of the John Worthy School.
The offenses committed by the girls suggest less clearly than
( 157) those of the boys the social interest or group activity, and yet the social claim is as imperative with the girl as with the boy and, if denied, avenges itself by sanctions more fearful. The girl, too, must seek and find her adventure; she must give notice that she is here.[9] There must be the time of veiled exhibit and subtle invitation; there must be opportunity for acquiring skill in management by managing the smaller or the larger social circle; the new desires and secret longings with reference to which she is given no dignified instruction find unlimited gratification in the paths opened before her by the commercialized recreation and the vice of the city. Nowhere, in workshop, theater, or city street, by day or night, has there been supplied to her the sense of friendly supervision, which while guarding and restraining yet leaves her free, because at the same time it guards and restrains those who might injure her.
The essentials of satisfying play suggest themselves at once; muscular effort, giving exercise to the growing body; associated effort, giving facility in social relationship; effort directed towards a purpose demanding preparation and planning, giving scope to the developing human need of consciously seeking an end; the presence of a certain degree of real or apparent risk, giving opportunity to the growing demand for a chance to show his prowess in the case of the boy, or a chance for service in the case of the girl. For all these claims the public playground or recreation center is now attempting to make careful provision; but the street, the narrow alley, the railroad tracks for too long offered a sorry substitute, and the commercial interests were not slow to seize the opportunity neglected by the city. We have had the perilous adventure found in the gang's undertaking to "beat the cop" who if he were present would surely "pinch" the crowd; the excitement provided by the "nickel theater ";[10] the stimulant supplied by the cigarette and alcohol.
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For the girl, everywhere unsupervised, there is unregulated play in early childhood. Later in life she has the cheap theater; the cheap but brilliantly lighted restaurant; the dance hall, connected with the saloon, where she and her escort pay 5 cents for the privilege of dancing a certain time within a charmed circle enclosed in ropes;[11] then, too frequently, the rooming house of low order with the companion of her choice; and then possibly the final step of promiscuous intercourse either in the house of prostitution or as the result of solicitation on the street.
In discussing the delinquency map, attention was not called to the large number of dots in the Eighteenth Ward-not a significant fact in discussing "delinquent homes" for this is not chiefly a region of homes, but one of low resorts and rooming houses. The children brought in from this ward are largely girls, and for the most part girls who have already had the experience of a life of commercialized vice. While comparatively few delinquent girls actually come from the segregated "west side levee," the number who are found in that debatable territory which hangs like a fringe on the so-called "levee" district and which is honeycombed with vice is so large as to be truly appalling. That such conditions can exist
(159) as fourteen-year-old children resorting either to rooming houses or to houses of prostitution, is an indictment of the community as frightful as the fact of their betrayal by the fathers and brothers is of unregulated family life.[12]
It has been pointed out that these children are poor, that many, especially of the girls, belong to the lowest economic group, and in perhaps the largest numbers to the degraded class. Both boys and girls, and especially girls, are the victims of neighborhood conditions. They have likewise been shown to be ignorant children. Their play would be lacking in all the ingenuity that might come as the result of hearing well-selected stories, or of constructive effort in the line of applying theories given in school. They are at the mercy of the environment to whose suggestion they are abandoned, and of their own impulses which are never so wayward, so irrational, so perilous, if not guided, as at this time of bewilderment and questioning.
"To fail to provide for the recreation of youth is not only to deprive all of them of their natural form of expression, but is certain to subject some of them to the overwhelming temptation of illicit and soul-destroying pleasures. To insist that young people shall forecast their rose-colored future only in a house of dreams is to deprive the real world of that warmth and reassurance which it so sorely needs and to which it is justly entitled." [13]
