The record-union. [volume] (Sacramento, Calif.) 1891-1903, 1899-08-14


Aventine of Glasgow. 1t contains
museum, a picture gallery and a large
winter garden under glass. well stocked
with palms and tropical plants. The
museum presents the usual array OF
curiosities and scientific objects in glass
cases. The gallery is occupied at pres
ent with loan collection of l3S Oil
paintings. The winter garden is closed
during warm weather, but Is open from
October until May as concert hall and
assembly room. Twice a week during
the winter there are concerts with or
chestral and vocal music, and every
night it is a warm, comfortable and
brilliantly lighted lounging place, to
which the public is admitted without
charge library and a reading-room
are also to be opened at the Peoples
Palace.
NO MORE A PALACE OF PLEAS
URE.
Sir Walter Besants ideal Peoples
Palace was pre- minently a place OF
recreation for the poor. The great
structure erected in the Whitechapel
Mile End Road, London, has been
gradually transformed into technical
it's original character as a palace of
pleasure and recreation. To the large
assembly hall have been added class
rooms, libraries, winter garden,
gymnasium and swimming baths, but
it has never become social center in
the East End of London. There are
flower shows, are collections and indus
trial exhibitions, but the Peoples Pal
ace invariably impreSses visitors as a
dull place where there is little enter
tainment for the masses. The chill
dren of trades people are drawn into
the classrooms, and there is a constant
development of the educational work;
but the exhibitions and concerts have
not attracted the characteristic work
ers and idlers of the East End. AS a
technical school the Peoples Palace is
doing a useful work, although it falls
far below the level of the Cooper Union
and the Pratt Institute in New York
and Brooklyn. AS a house of recrea-
ton for the poor of East London it has
not fulfilled the expectations of the
founders. 1t has not taken a firm
hold upon the affections and sympa-
thies of the East End.
The Peoples Palace in Glasgow Green
seems to have been similar failure on
the recreative side. When it was open
ed curiosity impelled large crowds of
working people to visit it, but in the
course of few weeks it ceased to at
tract the masses. Last winter there
were concerts twice a week, with a
moderate attendance of visitors, but on
other nights the winter garden was
nearly empty. The museum and art
gallery are not we'll attended either in
summer or winter. The Peoples Pal
ace is free institution under munich
pal control, erected at cost of $780,
600. 1t was opened for the benefit of
working people, but it has not appealed
strongly to their sympathies and tastes.
Smoking is prohibited in the spacious
garden; there are no recreation rooms;
there are neither card tables nor box
ing rings nor Fairgrounds; refresh
ments are not served, and there is a
lack of occupation and pleasurable eX-
element. The Palace belongs to the
people, but they do not appear to find
much pleasure in it. The inspection of
minerals and second rate pictures is
not an exhilarating exercise for toilers
wearied by the labors of the day. The
winter garden is warm and we'll lighted,
and the tropical foliage under glass is
refreshing to the eyes; but it is at best
an unsociable and dull place, even
when an orchestra is playing medley
of popular airs.
There is a project for building a sec
ond Peoples Palace in another work.
ing center of the city; but critics of
the enterprise urge with great force
that before this is done an effort ought
to be made to enlarge the resources of
the present institution as a palace of
entertainment, and in this way to JUS
tify the municipal policy. 1t would be
unreasonable to expect that a winter
garden under municipal control can be
converted into so popular a place of
amusement as the Tivoli Garden in
Copenhagen, where there is a nightly
carnival of innocent recreation which
serves to keep the Danish capital in a
continuous flow of good spirits; yet it
is surely practicable to make a closer
approach to Sir Walter Besant's ideal
of a Palace of Pleasure than has yet
been witnessed on Glasgow Green. The
Peoples Palace is not in any sense a
workingmen's clubhouse, where they
can disport themselves without re-
straint and find congenial recreation.
1t is not a natural center of local life
adapted to their tastes and require
ments Too little is done for their
pleasure to justify the claim of the mu-
nicipal reformers that they are pro-
noting rational recreation among the
working poor and diminishing the
temptations of the saloons. There
to he fur of ha fair
F. in N. Y. Tribune.