The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1897-12-29
NEW YoBK's TRUANT-CHAsER

be given III eastern Asia.
NEW YoBK's TRUANT-CHAsER
Description of an Officer Dreaded by the
Boys Who Play Hockey.
New York, Dec 23.-The attendance
officer in this city is a well known and
well feared parsonage in his school dis
trict. Patrolling the street with the au-
thority to challenge, and if necessary to
arrest, and child of school age caught
| lettering or laboring during school hours,
| the sight Of him sends the truants flying
! into hiding, and brings even the young
apprentice armed with the proper health
board papers 20 attention, while the mere
| fact of his existence keeps many boy
| from playing hockey" VINO would other
wise find the temptation irresistible.
Even within the schools the wholesome
dread of him is an active influence, for
! disorderly or bad children are equally an
swerable 20 him with the truants, and
! his entrance into a classroom makes ev-
cry young back straighten and every
young face look alert.
Were the general bugaboo." said one
OF these officers cheerfully. 1--WE have to
make the young rascals think we are
more dreadful than we really are to help
keep them in order" To the boy with a
truant conscience it must be rather
dreadful to be hailed with the stern de-
mand, backed by the bigness Of grown
up authority, Here, you why aren't you
| IN SCHOOL,"
Yet the truant Is often defiant, for he
/ L. i,ly Ia
I'm a." he'll reply.
'fHave you got your papers?"
mo-
"Well, then, you go straight TO school
or I'll put you away; do you underi
stand?" Whereupon the truant receives
card with the officers address stamped
upon it which the principal Of his school
has TO sign and mail as a proof Of his
obedience. He knows well enough what
the alternative is-the being put away"
| two months in the Truant School, and
after that, if ne is still obdurate, the Ju-
venilc Asylum or the Catholic Protect
DRY.
ST never send a boy up there unless
have to-" said Officer E. Morris OF the
| Thirty-second district; "for that's just
making a criminal out of him out and
out. 1 always give a boy three chances
| before sending him even to the truant
school First / send him back to school
| then take him and hand him over per
sonally to the superintendent; then 1 go
| 10 see his parents. If that fails TO set
him straight, then Of course 1 have 10
commit him. 1t isn't any FUN arresting
them, either. They slip through your fin
gers like eels-hear you coming and run
through the house and out a back win
dow or down the fire escape before you
know it. Some of them that are born to
it are really dangerous characters. L
served through the war, but I never was
SO near death as when arresting a mis-
cradle little 11-year-old cripple. He was
such poor specinent that L didn't have
my hand on him; was just walking on
one side of him, with the officer that
! helped me take him on the other. All Of
a sudden 1 saw this man draw off and
| hit the little rascal a clip that sent him
| tumbling in heap in the gutter. What
do you mean said 1, hitting little fell
low like that% He'd a done for you If
1 hadn't said he, and showed me five
inch dirk that the rascal was about to
plunge into my stomach
| Truancy is often the first step in crime.
Stealing lead pipe and ''pinching' the
corner grocery are the next stages, and
then follow the bigger crimes that make
| the full-aedged feion. In fact, the incor-
rigible truant is really the criminal born
| and bears in his face the strongest testi-
mony against hinlself-the criminal con-
| formation.
At the Truant School in East Twenty
| first street this fact becomes plainly ap-
parent, though it's pupils are probation
ers only, not tried and tested incorrigi-
bles by any means. About so per cent Of
them, however, become so. The other 80
per cent are. discharged back into the
| common schools or. life as cured. At
present there are eighty-six boys in this
establishment, which was opened last
May. New York's first truant school,
though Brooklyn had one etaoinnnn !
| though Brooklyn. had one twenty years
| ago. Il Is a cross. between a correctional
institution and al ungraded school
Most of the pupils ara detained in mild
|
and some of these come long distances
to attend the ungraded classes. The tru-
ant. however. is great traveller, so this
part OF his punishment is not a punish
;nent at all. The Boys who live in the
house do the house work and a certain
amount of class work is done by all; read
ing, writing. drawing, and the like. and
Sewing,too. for the manual training that
il gives. These boys are markedly awk-
ward in anything that requires delicate
o. complicated mental or muscular &C
ton. They are primitives, inapt and
laggard behind the race, dull pupils al
ways averse TO. and incapable OF. mental
effort, and always far behind the aver
age common school child in the matter
Of mental attainments. To be sure the
tru9nt's truancy may account in part
for this. but then, on the other hand. it
is more often due 20 il, - The ridicule
which his dull wits bring down upon him
from his more intelligent schoolmates,
till he is driven out Of sCslool. For this
reason. Mr.. Locke, who has charge Of
the Truant Snhool. favors the establish
ment in every school district % ungrad-
ed classes. where the merely dull truant
could be sent to receive the special az
tenden which his case requires, and
which the common school esnno; give
him. and where he would not yet be de-
prived OF his liberty, made a sani-prison-
er %. hence enc % mis- associations a
semi-crimiual AZ once. Confinement IN
the truant school is moi, however. always
an objection 70 a t-uant himself. \ good