Newspaper Page Text
6
"777E MOST USETUL MAN IN NEW YORK”
Jacob Riis, the Great Hearted Danish-America, is Charming and Ries sing Thousands During His Tour of the South.
T was at once a treat and an abid
ing inspiration to the editor of The
Golden Age to hear Jacob Riis for
the first time at Stetson University
last week. The great American
ized Dane who has loved and bless
ed the country of his adoption for
forty years, and whose book, “How
The Other Half Lives,” nearly
11 -
shook New York from its hinges and inaugur
ated humanitarian reforms that amounted to
revolutions, has been widely called “the most
useful man in New York” is a magnetic talker
—especially to those who love to consider
problems worth while. His love for children
—indeed for all who need love and help, which
is the passion of his life, has kept springtime
in his heart. He calls the boys and girls of
today,
“The Tomorrow of the Republic.”
Although Jacob Riis has been in America
forty years, his Scandanavian brogue yet marks
him well, but he often speaks with a fascina
tion that makes him almost an orator, while
that wonderful, soulful face of his is at once a
passport to your heart of hearts.
His more recent book “The Making of An
American” is a classic in the field of civic en
deavor, reaching the basic philosophy and
statesmanship of the man who is perhaps
America’s most notable example of a foreign
born, “home-made” Christian patriot.
An Inspiring Career.
Mr. Riis’ message before the Woman’s Club
in Jacksonville was in substance the same as
he delivered at DeLand, and a bright reporter
on the Times Union gave the following illum
inating sketch of the great philanthrophists re
markable and inspiring career:
Mr. Riis has had an interesting and useful
career. Born in Ribe, Denmark, he came to
this country and after a desperate struggle
with the hardships of life he became police re
porter on the New York Sun, afterwards serv
ing in the same capacity for the New York
Tribune and the Associated Press. It was
through this line of endeavor for over twenty
five years that he gained his vast knowledge of
the wretched conditions existing in the slums
and tenement settlements of New York City.
Friend of Roosevelt.
“I have a profound secret for boys. Grimy,
any length of time without bringing Theodore
T
HE philosophy of Elbert Hubbard
is full of crimps and kinks, and his
religion is unorthodox, but his in
tellect is so superior that we take
off our hat to him anyhow.
Who but a genius, could write
so thrillingly of commonplace ev
ery day affairs, and who but a
lover of mankind could apostro-
phize a gawky, unlovely boy.
Only those of us who sympathize with the
boy and study his curious moods and more cu
rious tenses can appreciate the beauty and
spontaneous comradery of the following prose
poem from the pen of this peerless Tolstoi of
America:
I have a profound respect for boys. Grimy,
ragged, towsled boys in the street often at-»
tract me strangely. A boy is a man in the
cocoon —you don’t know what’s going to come
—his life is big with many possibilities. He
may make or unmake kings, change boundary
lines between States, write books that will
mold characters, or invent a machine that will
revolve the commerce of the world*
The Golden Age for February 9, 1911.
Roosevelt into his talk, as he is a great ad
mirer of the former president because the man
“did things according to his notions” and as
sisted him in carrying out many of his own
cherished ideas and plans. His acquaintance
with Roosevelt dates back many years when
he worked side by side with the ex-president,
when the former was police commissioner of
New York and the two were successful in car
rying out many radical reforms.
Among the achievements monumental to Mr.
Riis' bull dog tenacity were to tear down the
4>»»4»»»»»»»»»»»»»»>
♦ ' fl ♦
> IwISMIF >
4 +
4 4
> JACOB RIIS, >
£ The Man Who Reformed New York. £
* >
>»4>4 4 4444 44 44 44- »»»»»»»»»
crowded tenement houses of New York and
put in their places small parks and flower gar
dens; to see that sensible tenement house laws
were passed and enforced; to do away with
police station lodging houses; to see that there
were enough public schools for all the children
of New York; to establish boys’ clubs and
girls’ cooking and sewing schools.
When he began work there was scarcely a
small park in all the great city of New York;
there was not schools for half the children;
there were lodging houses in which 4,000 ten-
_ _ $
THE ‘BOY
Wouldn’t you like to turn time backward,
and see Abraham Lincoln at twelve, and he
had never worn a pair of boots? The lank,
lean, yellow, hungry boy—hungry for love,
hungry for learning, tramping off through the
woods for twenty miles to borrow a book, and
spelling it out, crouched before the glare of
the burning logs.
Then there was that Corsican boy, one of a
goodly brood, who weighed only fifty pounds
when ten years old; who was thin and pale
and perverse, and had tantrums, and had to be
sent to bed, or locked in a dark closet because
he wouldn’t mind. Who would have thought
he would have mastered every phase of war
fare, at twenty-six; and, when told that the
exchequer of France was in dire confusion
would say, “The finances, I will manage them.’’
Very distinctly and vividly I remember a
slim, freckle-faced boy, who was born in the
“Patch” and used to pick up coal along the
railroad tracks in Buffalo. A few months ago
I had a motion to make before the Supreme
GoUrt, and that boy from the “Patch’' was the
ants were crowded in one block, many of them
living in rooms in which the sunlight never
shone and thousands of tramps and criminals
slept together nightly in the free police station
lodging houses. To reform and change all this
seems a Herculean task, but Riss did it.
He Pushed a Pencil.
His only lever when he began was the pencil
he pushed as a police reporter on various news
papers, but into every story that he wrote of
murder, of poverty, of starvation, of awful
misery, of abuse, neglect and suffering, he
graphically wove in his appeal for a better
ment of conditions existing in tenement houses,
parks, schools and all the rest. By persistent
perseverance and untiring devotion to the work
of relieving suffering humanity, the things that
he had worked for were brought to a success
ful conclusion.
The moment Mr. Riis grasps one firmly by
the arm, looks deep into his eyes and begins
to talk, one can readily understand why he
succeeds in all he undertakes. In every look
and word and act one can observe at a glance
his chief characteristics —his overflowing hu
manity scintillating with brotherly feeling.
Talk Carried Weight.
His talk was instructive and highly enter
taining throughout and was a most telling ex
position of the effect of environment on man.
His many little journeys into personal expe
riences and reminiscences carried weight in
every syllable, as it was not founded upon
hearsay or statistical reports, but from long
years of service, personal observation and devo
tion in his endeavors to bring sunshine and
happiness in the hearts and souls of the thou
sands who had drifted away and completely
lost the all-inspiring spirit of “helping thy
neighbor.”
Mr. Riis was one of the pioneers in the fight
on tuberculosis in New York City and paid
a glowing tribute to the ladies of the Woman’s
Club and the citizens of Jacksonville on their
crusade against the white plague, and com
mended the enthusiastic interest they are tak
ing to bring about ideal sanitary conditions.
Upon the conclusion of his address he was the
recipient of spontaneous and enthusiastic ap
plause, which was genuine, and his words will
linger long in the memory of those who were
fortunate enough to hear the distinguished
speaker.
judge who wrote the opinion granting my pe
tition. Yesterday I rode horseback past a field
where a boy was plowing.
The lad’s hair stuck out through the top of
his hat, his form was bony and awkward; one
suspender held his trousers in place; his bare
legs and arms were brown and sunburned and
briar-scratched. He swung his horse around
just as I passed by, and from under the flap
ing brim of his hat he cast a quick glance out
of dark, half-bashful eyes and modestly re
turned my salute. When his back was turn
ed, I took of my hat and sent a God bless you
down the furrow after him.
Who knows? I may go to that boy to bor
row money yet, or hear him preach or to beg
him to defend me in a lawsuit, or he may
stand with pulse unfastened, bare of arm, in a
white apron, ready to do his duty while the
cone is placed over my face, and night and
death come creeping into my veins.
Be patient with the boys—you are dealing
with soul stuff, Destiny awaits just around
the corner/'
