Cincinnati daily press. [volume] (Cincinnati [Ohio]) 1860-1862, 1862-02-04
The Industrial. school.

The exhibition last night of the Industrial
School and Children's Aid Society at the
Melodeon Hall was a scene pleasing and
gIatifyip ing to the greatest extent. The chill
dren of this institution are boys and girls of
poor parentage who have been rescued from
the pernicious influence OF degrading idle
ness and bad habits, instilled by the assoca-
uons with which they were subject because
of surrounding afHiction, misery and poverty.
Last night they presented smiling and clean
faces, with garments minus the customary
rents, tears and stains. They recited their
pieces and sang their childish songs with a
vivacity truly cheering and encouraging.
We annex o few abstracts of the Annual
Report of the School:
Our family was removed from Water street
to the Race. street School, February Is, 1861.
We have continued the course pursued last
year, TO make the school beneficial to those
who most needed it, by looking up, in streets
and alleys, children of destitute and afflicted
families, who, for various reasons, growing
out of destitution and depravity, were pre-
vented from attending the Public Schools.
We are but seldom called upon to extend
our invitation TO the little ones a second
time to enter our school ana partake of the
plain but wholesome dinner offered them
every school-day. He who visits the miser.
able dwelling places of the destitute and af-
hicted mother, and the abodes of dissi-
pated parents, he only can fully cOmpre-
bend the readiness of their offspring to avail
themselves of the limited comforts of our
school and home.
Preparations for the more permanent es-
tablishment of the Home Department com.
menced last year on limited scale, and re =
| ceived due attention in the early part of the
year. A few of our generous citizens fur
nished US with bedsteads and bedding suffi
| cient to lodge twenty-five children-two
well-ventiatcd rooms of good size were fitted
up for this purpose, one for boys, the other
| for girls; a convenient cooking apparatus
was also procured. Thus prepared, we en-
tered, with the CO operation OF the Superin-
tendent, upon the labor of looking up the
| destitute widows, and those worse off than
widows, and made known to them our desire
and ability to take immediate care of theiI
| children.
The immediate results of these efforts fol
| the past year are as follows:
Numler of children received in the house:
..
q
| Homes in the country procured for:
| Returned to parents or friends:
Boy yP...'',
O.
A family of six children, the younges
two, the oldest fifteen years of age, was founC
living in destitution and filth. Their mothe
not living, their father had enlisted in thu
army, the children depending upon charitie
from meal to meal. The Oldest, girl, wa
unwilling to enter our home, preferring II
do for herself. The other five, all boys, wer
received in our family. They are we'll
behaving children. Three of them hav
already been placed in good families, from
whom we have very favorable accounts
We hunted up their father in camp, ex
planned our efforts, and received his gratefu
thanks for the protection afforded his chill
diem. All would doubtless have becom
common street beggars, and possibly crim
inals, had your Society not been in exist
ence.
The statistics of our schools are as follows
Number of pupils enrolled, 533, of whom
23S are girls and 295 boys.
The arrangement of keeping the scholar
all day enables many mother TO leave ne
home when opportunities for labor offer els'
where.
Eight girls and eighteen boys have left th
school to fill situations in various avocation
! In some instances, when deprived of the
places, they have returned to school, to r.
main until other situations could be obtaine