Los Angeles herald., 1905-09-18
MATR0N OF M'KlNLEY HOME
TELLS OF NEEDS
INSTITUTION is INADEQUATE
Many Friendless Children Turned
Away Because Of Lack Of Accom-.
modations-Another Cottage
Is Necessary

Angeles if they knew the number of
homeless boys there are in the city,"
said Mrs. j. c. Robinson, matron of the
| Mckinley Industrial home at Avery,
fourteen miles from Los Angeles on the
San Pedro electric line.
Nearly every day in the week and
often two or three times day we re-
ceive appeals from some quarter to
take care of homeless boy Behind
every case is pitiful story of distress.
But the heartrending part of it is we
have to refuse them. The home Is
crowded and has been for months past
The sixty-tive boys we have are all we
can accommodate, and there are enough
names on the list of applicants to fi,l
another cottage.
THE other day I had to turn away
two boys aged and 6, whose mother
brought them. Her cotton dress was
old, but it was clean as pin. She ap-
peared to be half dead with trouble.
When 1 told her the home was full
and 1 could not take her boys she broke
down and cried. She held out 25-
cent piece and sobbed That's all there
is between me and my God; what shall
1 do? What shall do?'
Husband Deserted Her
"She told me her husband had de-
serted her and left her to look out as
best she could for herself and two
children.
What was she to do? She went with
her boys back to the city-to what?
Twenty-Five cents between them AMI
starvation. A woman ignorant of the
world, without a profession or trade,
two boys depending upon her. 1 inves-
tigated her story; it was true and she
was deserving of help. but we couldn't
give it. She got work in cannerv
and her boys are running the streets.
"Pitiful? Yes, but that is only one.
you must remember, of the many cases
brought to our notice every week, AMI
we cannot help them. We can only
tell them to wait until another cottage
is built"
"The new cottage so badly needed
must be built" said valentine Peyton,
president of the board of directors, the
other members of which are Gail Bor'
den, Lyman Stewart, Richard Greea
and Arthur Let's. I'VE believe it viii
be, as have been the three at the home,
ehy the voluntary subscriptions of the
&c fta1if0rnia M
more worthy object of philanthropy
can be found. visit to the home any
day will prove that.
There are sixty-five boys from t.
IA years of age being given the best
Industrial, mental, moral and spiritua!
training. All the boys have to help the
farmer who has charge of the eighty
acre ranch. They have their hours for
play after school, with an acre field for
football, baseball and other games
They make their own beds in the dor
mitories and help about the dining
room and kitchen A sloyd teacher has
Just been engaged to take charge of
the manual training work, for which
sixteen complete carpenters outfits
have been purchased.
Need Another Cottage
with another cottage the force of
attendants at the home could as easily
take care of 1876 boys as the present
number sixty-five.
I'VE are trying to get five people to
give $3.50 apiece to build Los An
geles cottage, which ought to cost
about $4,000 to correspond with the two
built by Santa Barbara and Ventura.
"It is the plan to get each of the
counties of Southern California to build
cottage, each one to accommodate
twenty-five boys. Everyone will mean
twenty-five good citizens saved to the
state.
Another pressing need of the homa
is money to remodel small cottage
on the grounds to serve as hospital
in time of epidemics. This will cost
$500 and is badly needed. There is no
place now to isolate the patients.
1.-The home receives state support to
the amount of one-fifth of the cost of
running the institution.
1.-Two years ago a Los Angeles paper
made charges of irregularities in the
management of the home The late
Walter S. Melick, then secretary of the
state board of examiners, made an iu-
vestigation and completely exonerated
DIR. Uriah Gregory, the founder, who