New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1904-12-05
UGLINESS OF CITIES.

transportation
dren into the country.
UGLINEss OF CITIES.
We could not live If we realized The absolute
meanness and ugness Of nineteEths OF civic
environment. Do realize the hideousness Of our
streets overhung with these railroads, these Sixth
and Fulton SITS Of ours? We never realize
how impossible IT * FOR such a street 10 have any
dignity, any beauty anything but Grass ugliness.
We modified 10 il that think OF
it. except as some sudden vision Of the contrasting
beauty Of some European city floats
minds, or some ideal painted by some one like
a few days ago had occasion to ride many
miles through Brooklyn streets. and / 50 de
to myself 'FIcl7 can We endure il 2: But we are
mesnnes Win whc saG tne S9
the city Commercialsm is me base Of it all. The
veop and to be happy IN: it IS not regarded as a
place IN which to educate children into good citi-
we, cant take step without being .tormented
these hideoDs advertisements out of the subway.
ly. seriously argued that the advertisements lend
interest TO the travelling public that the drawing
getting better and better. There is not a place
buy Even on the beautiful Hackensaci5 Meadows
which / cross every day the eye is assaulted and
what we need in our civilization, corresponding
TO that in the Greek an element that regards the
being OF the citizens: not merely place for
other.
SOCIAL AND CIVIC HABITS
But ali aesthetic considerations must yield IN
Importance to the moral environment created by
the city. Woe the parent or the city that relies
only hygiene and beauty for the creation Of
character A great teacher in mean schoolhouse
is superior to a mean teacher in great school
house. The factor that counts most in all de-
velopment is the personal
The personal factor in the civic environment ts
splendid civic buildings satisfy if it is known
that they are the shelter of corruption If We rely
must be kept in absolute ignorance Of It If his
ton of public and private life daily advertised
in the newspapers. particularly the yellow press.
tries and that is that evervtbtng t is shown here
tries and the worst of Us is on the surface.
temperance advocate when he was asked to oppose
the placing of saloon next TO a CHURCH He sad:
under the very nose of the church. they can sea
%nat : gong on " h4t rghL nave you 10 lolce
cannot resist? Don't get these things out Of sight
s sssn forget 'he" Put them right where they'll be
What are we going to do about it? We can onl,
ton of our beaches. the multiplication Of parks.
the Improvement of the tenem mt house area either
the function of properly housing their own cit-
zens. why is it not a proper function?
But all these efforts are going TO be enormously
expensive and enormously difficult, because or
vested interests, and after they are all made the
,id s bl, n@s Ge tG PE%Pf PGe 10 2g gp
telligent movement to promote suburban life; 70
masses Of people into the suburbs, and to see
that these settlements are started under the right
ali those things lacking in the rst While Tetain
which has been created near London. 1t made
church. theatre. the village store. And there
was around II all sufficient margin to give that
the only thing that can give dignity TO life"