The Irish standard. [volume] (Minneapolis, Minn. ;) 1886-1920, 1888-09-01
THE SLuNS OF CHICAGO.
A. sicken.25 Picture Of Woe, Want
and Degradation.
Descendants Of tise Noble Roman Who
Live Like human Rats-NIere Girls
Whose Faces Are Wr;.klod Like
Those of Old Women.

Clark street, from Taylor to Twelfth
street, is q continued story of poverty and
| crime. It is told in installments, chapters
and paragraphs. The poverty, says the
Chicago Meas, is so filthy that it becomes
almost a crime. With all the combinations
Of stencil and the limited supply of even i'm
pure air the Italians of this locality seem to
be brawny men. They are railroad labor
ers, street cleaners, organ grinders, bod
carriers and day laborers of all sorts Of
odd jobs. Their brown skin seems healthy
and their barred Threats and breasts show
powerful lung capacity. The women are
more haggard. AT twenty they begin to
wrinkle, and some of the faces of mere girls
are thin and pinched like those Of much
older women. The italian women are rag
pickers or swill-barrel operators; they and
the children pick up coal along the railroad
tracks, cigar stumps in the cutters, tin
cans and the like. They carry baskets Of
fruit about the Offices downtown, DO all
sorts Of peddling, and some hard work, as
scrnbbing and washing.
In s, room scarcely twelve feet square at
643 South Clark street were found two high,
narrow beds, cooking stove and utensils,
q wash-tub, three or four remains of chairs,
some wooden boxes which served as trunks,
basement, sul-celiar and attic, for the stor-
age purposes Of two families: two cradles
and Is clothes line were hung with the FAM
lily washing. On the beds, asleep, were two
men. Babies less than year old occupied
the cradles. A pleasant-faced man, smok-
ing pipe that won an occasional catch-as-
catcl,-can bout with the other smells, was
preparing for bed-that is, taking of his
Shoes. As the one window Of the room was
closed the visitors cut short their call, leav-
ing TWO surly-!colzing women to guess what
it all meant.
In the next building half a dozen sturdy
sleepers lay i'll q marrow hallway. The
lighted matches that served Diogsnes Back
us for lamp did not disturb the slumber~
ers. One of them was woman with q
mass of short curls about her head. A
rather pretty face, with q fine, clear, olive
skin, and long, heavy, black eyelashes, lay
on the greasy, black bag Of a pillow. The
wonan's night~dress was fitting bag
made of bed-ticking. She had drawn it
over her feet and fastened the open end
about her neck. Stepping over the sleepers
the ,,arty hurried to {, not too-clean alley
for q breath Of better aar. The pungent
smell Of a stable is boon in this riotous
stencil.
Shutting along a narrow passage-way
made slippery by leaking sewer, watching
for holes in the broken boards by the light
Of q match, q descent was made on 539 South
Clark street. The passage was an incline
descending two or three feet below the
ordinary street level toward the rear of q
Zo5y wooden building. III rear room,
whose floor was resting on the ground, or
very near it, lived two Or three families
All the occupants were asleep. The room
had been built for a kitchen to {. poor
cottage III the first place, aud was about
l0x12 feet. 1t was stuffed with beds, boxes
and family goods The beds were filed
with half-dressed people On the floor lay
man, his wife and young child. The wom-
ans dress, open at the neck and pulled
down over her shoulders, was the only
preparation Tor the nights rest. In the
clothes worn during the day lay the father
and child. a short distance in the rear,
stretched in the open air, slept six more
people--four men and two women. a she'd
like roof covered them.
Across the street from the Harrison
street police station, at 134 Harrison street,
is frayed and saded-oEt story-and a. half
wooden building, in which live Chinese,
Polish Jews and co!ored people. Two doors
east is an Italian boardin g-house III a two
story rat trap. The italians live in it like
rats in q straW-stack. Russian Jews occupy
1873 Harrison street, the little grocery store
on the first floor being also used as q living
room. Upstairs are two or three stutfy
rooms Overlooking with dirt and people. On
tho corner three-story frame building
spreads itself over a saloon and ten or a
dozen families.
The Polish or Russian JeWs are but little
Of an improvement in the matter Of cleanli-
ness over the poorest Italians. They live in
the same broods and their social atmos-
phere smells even louder. The low Jewish
quarter begins at Harrison street on Pacific
avenue and extends to Taylor street, occU-
PIES the cross streets to Clark, and fills in 2
large portion of Clark street between Van
Buren, and Twelfth streets.
On Pacific avenue the old wooden build
ings are rotten, rat burrowed, and without
any convenjences. Many lots have two
houses on them-one behind the other. The
houses arc set five or six feet below the
street level and are damp and unl1ealthful.
The rooms are often occupied by two Or
three families and the filth and vermin are
not subjects for minute description. In this
district live three hundred Chinese. They
occupy Easements as a rule, and their un-
cleanliness is a matter Of common notoriety.
But the Chinese have no monopoly on base
ments, as the Italians and Polish Jews make
large claim on them.
The Health Department. has sought to
drive the refugee Jews and Italians out Of
these novels, but the dislodgment Of one
gang simply made room for another.
Wealthy men, some Of them non-residents,