The News-Herald. [volume] (Hillsboro, Highland Co., Ohio) 1886-1973, 1904-12-22
FREE MEALS TO POOR
RECOMMENDATION OF A MIL
wAUKEE EDUCATOR.
Says Warm Breakfasts for Needy
Scholars Would Eventually Make
Better Citizens of Them--Plan
Practiced Abroad.

Superintendent Carroll G. Pearse, OF
the Milwaukee public schools, who sees
great possibilities in the plan to give
warm breakfasts to poor schooi chii-
dren, has made study OF the WORK
which has been done on this line In
Europe AS far as the United states
10 concerned Superintendent Pearse
has been unable to find city that has
adopted the plan.
$50 far as information is at hand,
Milwaukee Is the first American city
TO take up In a systematic way the sup
plying of warm breakfasts to public
school children who need them" said
Superintendent Pearse. Many child
dren In Milwaukee, as well as in other
American cities, grow up to be less
efficient citizens and less well disposed
citizens than they would be II they had
proper food while they were growing
children. Anyone who will visit the
schools in those parts of large cities
where the poorest people live Will see
that the children are understood and
do not look strong and robust. 1t is
partly due to the unwholesome homes
in which many of them live. but 1t Is
also true in a large part to the lack OF
food. or to food that is not good for
them.
Abroad this plan of supplying break
fasts to school children is not new. The
city Of Paris provides each year for
children in its schools several millions
of meals at an annual cost. which is
In the neighborhood of $350,000 part
of this sum comes from private contri-
buttons and part of 1t from city funds.
"a leading member of the English
parliament. who Is also secretary of the
National Union of Teachers of Eng
land and Wales, urges that the plan be
adopted in London. where he estimates
that the cost would be the sum Of $780,
600 per year, cost which would add
TO the school tax of the city of Lon
don about one-twentieth of the amount
which is already paid. He argues that
within a few years this expense would
be saved many times over in the de-
creased cost for prisons and aims
houses
Germany also does something in
this direction. In the city of Chariot
tenburg, for instance. private efforts,
supplemented by some public funds,
has been supplying breakfasts to sew
eral hundred children. In Charlotten-
burg the breakfast consists of a bowl
of warm milk and two slices of bread
These breakfasts are given first to
those children whose parents are too
poor to buy food; afterward, so far as
the need can be met, children are at
tended to who come from homes
where they are not properly fed
"The plan in the German city Is as
follows: At 7:15 o'clock in the morn
ing a club or organization of public
spirited women cause to be delivered
to the various schools the milk and
the bread or rolls. The wife of the jan
itor, or some one else with whom ar
rangement has been made, boils the
milk and the distribution of the food
begins at 7:45. The beneficial effects
of this plan upon the health Of the
children supplied is so marked that all
those who are connected with II OF
have knowledge of the workings of the
plan heartily approve Of 1t.
"In Milwaukee 1t is not proposed tc
draw in any way upon the public fund:
for putting into effect the project
There is no doubt however, when the
plan is put into operation the teachers
will find that many children in thei
schools who are now nervous, o.
troublesome, or listless, or unable t
learn. will become normal and well dis
posed and will be able to receive tn
benefits the school has intended to con
FER"