The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1898-01-10


Johnny Brady was New York gut
ter gamin in the dirtiest, dingiest part
of Roosevelt street
Now he is Hon. John Green Brady,
governor of the richest territorial pos
sessions of the United States, the en-
ticing lands of Alaska.
From the narrow thoroughfares called
Roosevelt street, where the two walls
are so close to each other that two
teams may barely pass, to the great
snow breadths and uninterrupted Alas
kan mountains is many thousand
miles.
But Johnny Brady, New Yorks street
Arab made the running.
once more it has been proved that
in this land of the free all BOYS are
born free and equal.
Beyond that proposition were two
elements responsible for Brady's ca
reer One was the well known prlncl-
pie of the Children's Aid society, that
the best way to do good is to help
children help themselves, and that only
by removing them from the wretched
environments of city life and giving
them chance to grow up on farms can
the problem ofthe surplus boy ana girl
/ of the Sums to be dealt with
The other factor was BradyS own
I grit and his simple refusal TO be turned
from the course he had laid out Tor
himself.
Somewhere down near the East river
/ there was born, 40 years ago, in one OF
! the squalid old houses, a boy In a
I Brady family. Roosevelt street WASH
as black as it's painted now. AS 1t
dipped toward the East river, where
the ships tied up to the wharves, It's
inhabitants descended steadily IN the
social scale. At the very foot OF the
street it was accounted slum. That
is where Johnny Brady came to the
earth.
AS soon as he could toddle he was
! turned loose to fall into the river, drain
the dregs OF stray beer casks and pun
dirty robins" of cigars.
Superintendent of the Children's AID
schools, MIR. Moore Dupuy. has oIten
heard Brady tell the story OF ms
wretchedness TO the boys III Tue ~, Cn,s-
dren's Aid lodging houses and schools.
Brady is a hero in the eyes of all the
small newsboys and ragamuffins who
listen to him.
When he tells of his troubles and
triumphs they believe; they absorb
every word, and then no Melba mas
ever had such storms OF applause as
the boys throw at Brady
Brady tells how, when he found MINI
self launched on his own resources,
without the prospect of place to sleep
or a mouthful to eat, he tried every
thing an S-year-old boy could torty
wears ago there was only one neWsDoys
lodging house. Forty boys could get
places to turn in nights over an OLD
newspaper office.
Brady tried being a newSboy- Papers
didn't circulate as they do now. Brady
didn't ACQUIRE a bank account by that
business. He ran errandS. He dld oud
tricks that sometimes made penny,
often nothing. He was ragged at the
start. Nobody mended his clothes, ana
they went the usual round OF such gar
ments.
Then Johnny, so he always confesses,
found he could get some food and a
bed now and athen by abstractlng lead
nine from empty houses, or even occu-
pied ones where he could get INTO the
basement. The pipe, of course, went 70
Junk dealers. But even the LEAD pipe |
business failed. a..
Chatham square beat was held up by |
the raggedest bundle of humanity he'd |
met.
SAY. I'm hungry, and L want ter go |
where yer take tn kick.
The policeman knew where that was;
Johnny told the policeman he had
reached the end of his fight. His rags
didn't cover him any longer; they were
falling off For days at a time ne was
famished and he was cold and wet
very often. =,
Then. too, he was only years old,
and now he was ready to lay down I
Then Mr.. Brady tells of his next two
years in the city's hands
It was on Aug q, 1859. that q boys
and girls started west with an agent OF
the Childrep's. Aid society. Johnny
Brady was one of these boys. Another
boy was named Burke. Nobody i'm
agined for an instant that two COVER
nors- to-be were among the u II is
fair TO saw that Brady's innocent face
gave no Indication of coming greatness.
He was only one of a lot OF gamlns
rescued from the dirt and moral filth
to be transplanted into the clean, open
air of the country.
When Brady was converted ana Sc
cured the beginning of an education
he had an idea that the ministry must
be his profession. John Green, the
lawyer with whom Brady lived, didn't
agree with Brady about the ministry
Green thought his charge was cut out
for a member of the legal profession
There was a conflict of opinions. Green
stuck to his determination that ne
wouldn't furnish any education for use
in the pulpit. Brady adhered religious
~ to his determination that Whatever
he acquired should go Tor
law. but must be dedicated to God
Neither would give in, and Brady took
his own way.
He rang school bells, chopped wood,
made fires, swept school houses
country academies and finally
into Yale The boys at Yale went to
chapel when Brady pulled the bell. No
matter if he was poor. Brady was pop
ular with Yale men.
Union Theological college was his
next achievement. Again he made his
own way.
At this time Brady revived his New
York recollections. The eX-gamin
talked to the gamins who had taken
his place He didn't brag Of his Roose-
Welt street origin, but he never neg
lected to use it to stimulate other boys.
When Brady had secured all the edu
cation he wanted he was determined
to help other boys who had been as
wretched as himself. To the older boys
who drift into the Children's Aid So
ciety's cares few avenues Of escape
into responsibility open. Nobody wants
them and they are always a problem.
They are harder to reclaim and there
are fewer chances. Brady believed his
mission was to aid that class. He went