Decade of Civic Improvement I S.S SlutS
inni'ATCT rtevelnnment of civic
I improvement has been witnessed
! "V I K t tw t-at than nnv former dec
ade, and a more marked advance
than all the previous history of
the United 8tae ran show.
At the beginning of this period the most
Significant expression of civic Interest In
cities was to he foil nil In the first social
settlements of New York and Chicago, In
the beginning of the expansion of the pub
lic school system, in th?. first struggles to
transplant the merit system from federal
to municipal offices. In the preparation for
the World's fair. In the IsoIaUd examples
of village and town Improvement, and In
the development of municipal functions,
such as street paving and lighting, as well
as In the first attempts at administrative
reform, which found expression subse
quently In the metropolitan systems of Boa
ton. The evidences of the education of public
opinion are to be found in such facta as
these: The first American Improvement
association was that founded at Stock
bridge, Mass., in 1863, while the chief de
velopments of village improvement have
taken place In the last half-dozen years.
The first public baths were established at
Boston In IS, but outside of Milwaukee,
which established a nata tori urn In 1SS9, the
general movement for public baths in this
country dates from 1S9X Toie initial pro
posal for a vacation school was made in
Cambridge In 1872. but the first vacation
school was established In 18S6. The first
playground was inaugurated by town vote
in Urookline, Mass., in 1871 but the play
ground movement dates from the equip
ment of tho Charlesbank of Iloston In 1S92.
In 1S01 the first steps were taken In New
Tork to establish Central park, but tho
chief park extensions of most American
cilies have been made In the last decade.
The chief municipal gns and electric light
plants In American cities have been In
augurated since 1S33.
The movement for civic Improvement may
be said to have found a three-fold expres
sion In, first, the new civic spirit; second,
the training of the citizen, and third, the
making of the city.
At the close of the ninth decade of the
last century the new civic spirit was
finding its chief expression In the adoption
of certain important English social move
ments which had flourished for a number
of years across the water, chief among
which were social settlements, and univer
sity extension. The accumulation of wealth
during the 80s, the development of pop
ular education, and the Increase of leisure
gave an opportunity for the performance
of public dulies such ns had not seemed
to exist to the young American of tho
former generation, unfamiliar with the du
ties of citizenship and social service. The
altruistic individual of the 90s natur-
ally drifted into movements which had re
ceived the stamp of approval In the older
country. These movements have grown
stronger as the years have gone by. In spito
of or because of the multiplication of other
movements; but for a time they absorbed
the energy of the lovers of their kind who
wire not attracted by the familiar charlt
nLIe organizations or by politics. They
gave an opportunity also for the expression
of tho American interest in private and
voluntary organisations as distinguished
from public work, which was supposed to
Involve the odium attached to the politician.
iCopyrighted, 1903, by William Thorp.)
nNULAHD is generally heralded
I and regarded as a capable col-
I onizincr nutlriri Kuf nntra.ii,ai..a
a few countries over which the
Union Jack floats are bankrupt
and miserable. They are colonial failures,
almost as bad as any for which Spain was
responsible. They are the poor relations In
an exceptionally wealthy and prosperous
faciy. And, like other poor relations,
they are always wailing to be helped in
ste d of h?lplng themselves.
.-gland's worst colony is undiubtedly
1..-tir.'i Honduras, situated at America's
very doors. It is a Blice of Central Amer
ica, vviih a fine seaboard, fringing a large
i r.d wealthy country. It Is not utilized by
Gr.it Britain and has no regular com
xnur icitiou with the mother country. Its
tnly connection with the outside world is
by an occasional banana steamer from
New Orleans or a 'leaky logwood schooner
irfe t hI with cockroaches.
'."ha colonists are at community of h er
rs s so far as the great world is con
ctrr.eJ. They have no cable communication
with cny part of the globe and they gen
eral y h ar of a great event about six
tn n hi alfr it has happened.
' h y clerrated King Edward's corona
tii.n i :i the day originally appointed for It
ai.d "id ixt hear of his illness until weeks
la e. . n at last the king was crowned
li l;yal subjects In British Honduras
wcr; hoUIIng Intercession services to pray
for I li recovery. Probably they are now
rejoicing over the close of the Boer war.
and In a in nth or two they will be exciting
themselves over the Wiuzuelan blockade.
"I suppose," said a merchant of Bellas,
It was not long, however, before the
contact with working people and the real
facts of the life of the masses Impressed
upon the social servants the significance
of public activities. There consequently
followed Important movements for demo
cratic education and municipal reform,
which now constitute the chief actors in
the training of the citixen. The expansion
of the school curriculum, the multiplication
of faculties In the school house, the exten
sion of education to adults and to people
engaged in wage-earning occupations, are
all comprehended within the decade just
closing. Nature study, manual training, art
in the public schools in decoration and in
struction, gymnasiums, baths and play
griHindn, vacation schools, free lectures:
these are familiar terms, but they were
virtually unknown In 1SS2.
Along with the development of demo
cratic education there has taken place a
most marvelous transformsilon in the con
duct of municipal affairs. Corrupt as are
the American cities of today in contrast
with those of Great Britain, they would
be scarcely recognised by the spoilsmen
of the early nineties. The first conference
for good city government was held In lSiO,
followed two years later by the organiza
tion of the National Municipal league.
Subsequently there sprang Into existence
two organizations representing municipal
officials. The legislature of New York
granted to the metropolis the first elements
of the merit system in 1891. Chicago intro
duced civil service reform in tho spring
of IS',15. Many of the American cities now
hava police und tire departments strictly
controlled by civil service regulations, and
scores of them perform their work of street
cleaning and scavenging, some of them
even of street and sewer construction, by
the employes of the city. Tho new civic
spirit which first found expression, and
happily continues to find expression, in
the training of the citizen, finally promises
to crown its activities by setting the citi
zens to work In the making of the city.
Here, again, the contributions of the last
ten years sre as notable as all those which
havo preceded. During that time the chief
streets of most American cities have re
ceived their first good paving; street clean
ing has been made possible as a result of
tho pioneer efforts of Colonel Waring In
New York; telegraph and telephone wires
no longer disfigure the main streets of
New York, Chicago, Ean Francisco and a
few other cities; the overhead trolley has
been abolished in Manhattan and Washing
ton'; parks and boulevards have multiplied,
ns have beautiful public buildings, including
public schools and libraries.
Puiing the past decade, according to Mr.
Herbert Putnam, "there have been erected
or begun five library buildings costing over
ll.(i)O,00O each, whose aggregate cost will
have exceeded $15,000,CK)0 (library of con
gress, $8,400,000; Boston, $2,500,000; Chicago,
$2,000,000; New York, $2,500,000; Columbia,
$1,250,000; rittsburg, $1,200,000), and various
others, each of which will represent an
expenditure of from $100,000 to $700,000 each,
while buildings costing from $5,00 to $101,00)
now dot the country." The decoration of
public buildings on a scale comparable to
European accomplishment has been suc
cessfully undertaken in the Boston public
library, the library of congress, appellate
court building in New York, Baltimore
court house, Cincinnati city hall and else
where. Many other individual attempts
at the improvement and beautifying of
Colonial Failures
the only town in the colony, when he vis
ited Jamaica, -not long ago, "that nobody in
England knows anything of England's only
colony In Central America except, possibly,
a few stamp collectors and c'.erks in the
Colonial office. It Is Just as well they
don't, for we are no credit to them. Brit
ish Honduras Is a disgrace to the country
which owns it.
"There are about 30,000 of us there,
mostly black, and our principal pleasure
In life Is to dodge work. It is easy to do
that In a tropical country, where nourish
ing fruits ani vegetables grow almost with
out cultivation.
"A West Indian bishop once asked his
laziest parishioner: "Sam, how on earth
do you manage to pass timer Sam grinned
and answir.d: "I don't pass time, mtuta,
I sit in de is ha Jo an let time pass me.'
That is exactly our temperament.
"Down in British Honduras the man who
has a job Is an object of pity. The rest of
us pit around on soap boxes in our yam
patches and cocoanut walks watching him
with sympathetic wonder.
"Sometimes, if we feel exceptionally en
ergetic, we stroll down to the slimy creeks
near the town and throw clones at the alli
gators. We haven't energy enough to s:alk
them and t-hoot tltcm. een ihou:,h ly do
carry off a black ick i Intiy n; w n I th -n.
"As you may I in g , we ar fot a vr
prosperous hm . . A lc.lt, r: l. d :.-
try have Un,.IVmd !. ih ivt p lit
compatible l h e I teme. an I ilat is vr
low, indeed. in c u nr v. i i. us fer
tile as uny p-jrt tiio i.vi.ic. r'i:. ir is
cultivated to .i jsiu j: e.l n , T i: iie pr.n
clpal industry I, cuUlns an I cxport'itg log
wood and muUoauny, which arc hewn im
towns and cities contribute to the greatest
of recent civic achievements, the co
ordination of various efforts In a compre
hensive plan for the Improvement of mod
ern communities.
Once more we go back to the date 1S91 for
the first of these great accomplishments,
the Chicago Worlds fair. For the first
time In the history of universal exposition,
a comprehensive plan for buildings and
grounds on a single scale was projected
and happily accomplished by the co-operative
effort of the chief architects, land
scape architects and sculptors of America.
The contrast between the White City of
Chicago and the black city of Chicago was
no greater than teat between the old con
ception of the city beautiful and the new.
Colnehlent with this great architectural
triumph was the establishment of the met
ropolitan park system of Iloston, the most
notable municipal undertaking in the his
tory of American cities. Within eight yeim
what was the dream of one man was more
than realised for tho benefit of more than a
million people. The metropolitan park sys
tem of Boston, comprising playgrounds,
city parks, rural parks. Including forest,
hills, river banks and seashore reservations.
Is only a part of the great co-operative
scheme of metropolitan Boston. The dis
trict within eleven miles of the state house
in Boston united In four great metropolitan
commissions for the mutual advantage of
all the communities in the provision of
water, the disposition of sewage and for
rapid transit and recreation. The adminis
trative problems have not yet been en
tirely solved, but the conception of a com
prehensive plan has received an emphasis
even beyond that of the Chicago White
City.
Most recently this Idea has had confirma
tion In what are known ns the "Harrls
burg I'lan" and the "Improvement of
Washington." Tho Harrlsburg League
for Municipal Improvement projected a
plan fur the employment of expert advice
with regard to the city's water supply, tho
sewerage system, parks, boulevard, play
grounds and street paving. The society
provided the funds, amounting to over
$10,000, for the employment of these ex
perts and the conduct of the campaign,
which resulUd In the election of worthy
officials and the pnssage of a referendum
vote authorizing the Issue of over $1,000,000
In bonds. The "Harrlsburg Plan" Is a
model of scientific method and enthusi
astic citizenship, but It has a worthy rival
as a spectular accomplishment in the
Improvement plans of Washington. Tho
significant plant of L'Enfant, approved by
George Washington, Is responsible for the
capital city being one of the most beauti
ful cities In the world, but the failure to
take advantage of all the elements of that
plan, or to be consistent with Its begin
nings, makes necessary the commission of
today. IEnfant's plan, In brief, took,
into consideration the topography and the
supposed necessity of a water approach to
the city, and then located the streets on
the plan of two sets of wheel spokes laid
on a gridiron, with the capltol ns one hub
and the president's house as the other.
Along the axes of these two buildings
was projected a park to be connected di
rectly by a broad street, Pennsylvania av
enue. The other public buildings were also
to be grouped appropriately.
Even the fundamental features of this
scheme have not been held sacred by their
of Great Britain
the mountain forests and floated down to
the- seaports by the rivers.
"There is a small trade with the United
States in bananas and cocoanut. We
might have made a big business of it, but
we were too lazy. Americans had to come
down to cut the fruit as well as buy it.
"Beyond the timber cutting, which Is
mainly the work of the Ind ans In the for
ests, there is no business doing, although
the country has great latent resources and
the land is very rich.
"We Just sit down und vegetate. Our
town, Belize, Is about us lively as a mauso
leum. There are no railways, no roads, no
street cars, no telephones, no telegraphs
and no good roads. And, stranger still, no
body seems to want them.
"Although the area of the country Is only
about 7.5ft) square miles, a large part of It
is absolutely unexplored. No white man's
foot has ever trodden many of our forests
and mountains. No white man's canoe has
ever penetrated the upper reaches of some
or our rivers. There are not many un
known regions of the earth nowadays, and
it is strange that one of them should be
situated fn an English colony only a few
hundred miles from the United States.
"Some time ago a young American came
down fru-ii New fork anil organized an ex
pedition ' exp'oris part of the lnte:li: His
euers:y i:'5!uirJ everybody, arfd we :e
gardcil I in a.i a in: tl-n.m for wi Vinz so
hf-nt. If -v? lud h ;d a tun .il? '.ii q we
siieuid pi-i'.Iy lc;v' cij-rt'd tin ir.si.1.
. "There i- .a.nT'.y .vny cai It'! in the c l
ony, fill ih? labor is iuie-T.pl el of II
own free cliole?. There ure thousands of
acres of fertlla land which, can be taken u)
builders. The vlsti of the White House
long Pennsylvania imnw has Derm ob
scured by the Treasury and, State depart
ment buildings; curious and unsightly ed
ifices have been erected along the Mall;
the Washington monument, whkb should
have stood at the junction of the axes of
the two main buildings, occupies a sits un
pardonable in Its isolation. 10 feet south
of the axis of the capltol and several hun
dred feet east of the axis of the White
House; the IVnnsy Ivanian railway has
been allowed to cro," the Mall at grade;
and to mention but one other Incongruity,
last, but not leest, the library of congress
has been so located that Its dome diverts
attention from the all-important majrsty
of the capitol.
The recommendation of the American In
stitute of Architects, on the occasion of the
centennial celebration of the establishment
of the government at Washington, will tiro
the enthusiasm of all who read them. Tho
subject has since been exhaustively studied
by the new commission. They point out
possibilities still latent in Washington, and
that Influence which their realisation would
have on the other cities of the country is
Immeasurable. The. construction of tho
Houses of Parliament in Iondon on tho
Gothic model, though not an unqualified
Buccess, was the most Important archi
tectural event of the nineteenth century lit
Great Britain, and was led to the revival
of the minor nrts as well. Even greater
service will be rendered to tho cities of
the United States when tho nobln plan of
IEnfant, projected ut tho beginning of
the last century, shall bo reinci.rpor.ted
In the best expression of the new century,
happily now assured by the appointment
of the present excellent commission, Messrs,
Daniel H. Buruliam, Charles V. Mcltlm,
Frederick Imw Olmsted, Jr., and Augustus
St. Camlens. The proposed Improvements
of the luko front in Cleveland and Chicago,
the boulevard scheme for St. Iouls, tho
conception of n park system taking In tho
lakes about Kt. Paul and Minneapolis, all
testify to tho growing appreciation of com
prehensive schemes for Improvement. Tho
same tendencies uro in evidence In tho
plans for rural Improvement such as tuosa
of the Massachusetts trustees of puhlio
reservations, the Essex county (N. J.) parit
commission, tho stato control of tho
Palisades, the national parks In Wyoming,
Colorado, California, Minnesota, Wisconsin
and elsewhere.
The beginning of tho new century finds
Ideals und concrete accomplishments s far
advanced that for the first time tho
public is ready for a national organization,
to represent and co-operate thnse Interests.
Such an organization as tho American
League for Civic Improvement would have
been sadly premature in 1MKI. It is hardly
appreciated even in 1902, but the frlendlv
response from every state in the union and
from Canada, from city, town, village und
rural district, from men, women and chil
dren, from public officials and pr.vate citi
zens, from practical workers, writers nd
teachers, points clearly to tho necessity of
a unification of Improvement forces. A de
cade of civic progress has brought us to the
point where no city should be content with
anything less than a comprehensive plan
Incorporating the best accomplishments of
the last ten years, by applying to kn-al
necessities and natural advantages, ex
perience gathered from the great field or
civic improvement
Chicago, 111.
for nothing, or. at most, for a few shilling
an acre, if tlvey happen to be near a sea
port. The soil is adapted for the raising
of all kinds of tropical products, and there
is an excellent market the United States -at
our very doors. But the colony does not
progress; It does not erin live U rots!
British Honduras Is a colonial failure If
ever there was one.
"England Is forever struggling t gain
new possessions in China or Africa, even
at the risk of war. It U strange ttsit she
does not make the bst of the colonies
which she already possesses. Here Is a
fine, undeveloped estate In Central America
wklch she has allowed to go to rack and
ruin without lifting a finger. Of course, it
may be said, that the colonists have them
selves to blame. That is true, but why
doesn't England take some energetic Meps
to improve the colony, open up menus of
transportation and bring in a better breed
of colonists? She la disgraced by the fact
that one of her colonies la In a more back
ward slate than any of Its Iutin-Amn ican
neighbors." i
Several of England's West Indian I.1 mil
are also In a deplorable state. Only tlr.ee
of them-Jamaica. Trinhlad sad Grenidi
can be called fairly prosperout. These
beautiful and fertile gems of the CarrtLboan
were won for Great ikitaiu by tho geniUM
of l:r greatest r.ilzr.irals and the pluk of
1st le tkrt sailors, tut thy hive been al
lowid to go to rot through misgovern-nrut
and ne.. Hg Dee.
As h'e nuturat revu't. theie l a parly
In a I -cost every oi.e of these ialunda which,
clamors lor naexat o.t to the United fit a tea,
(Continued on Page Sixteen.)
