Barbour County index. [volume] (Medicine Lodge, Kan.) 1880-current, 1905-10-11
PANAMA's MORAL HEALTH.
Plans Are Afoot to Make Life and
Happiness Possible on the
Isthmus.

The Pittsburg Chronicle says canal
construction is not a mere matter of
engineering, excavation and sanitation.
The physical health of the men at work
upon it are two large and important
items, but there is something else not
second in Importance to be considered
and provided for-the mental and moral
health of the tens of thousands of per-
sons who will be employed in uniting
the oceans by splitting a continent. The
canal commission, or its chairman,
which amounts to the same thing. is
graphing with the problem, and has
made good start toward conquering a
condition which has been too little
thought of by the American people. Mr..
Shonts has made only brief statement,
but an unofficial publication more fully
discloses the purposes of the commits
sion.
The unofficial publication to which we
refer says the canal commission has en-
ployed "a physical director, a graduate
of one of the eastern colleges who
will probably accompany Chief Engi-
neer Stevens to the isthmus. 1t will be
his business to see that time does not
hang heavy on the hands of the men
Wnen they are not at work, and that
they are provided with means to make
it pass pleasantly and profitably The
right man in such position will be one
of the most useful men in the govern
ment service. The need is best indi-
Gated in recent article by IAN official
of the canal commission" whose identity
is not otherwise disclosed. This writer.
when he wrote, did not believe that the
work at Panama would move along sat
isfactorily until tse strip should be
thrown wide open,'' until there were
diversions within striking distance"
akin to some of the social features Of
the great mining camps of the west
He believed that there was a certain
demand, and that in time the supply
would be provided in answer to it, 'un-
less there be an outcry from the moral
sentiment here at home, that does not
appreciate the necessity of meeting
human nature on its own ground when
confronted by conditions such as stare
us in the face on the isthmus.''
There would soon be IAN outcry from
the moral sentiment here at home" if
the dance hall and gambling hell and
other social features of western min
ing camps were let flourish in a wide
open canal strip. But the president of
the United States, moral and a sane
man, is responsible for conditions on the
isthmus and feels his responsibility.
Therefore, it may be considered settled
in advance that the canal strip will not
be permitted to become comparable to
the region least of Suez, where there
amt no Ten Commandments.
1t is said that the duties of the phys
ical director chosen by Chairman
Shonts will be to lay out playing fields
for the employees, to act as general SUI
pervisor of games, to provide for the in
stallation of reading rooms at various
points along the works, to make it his
business to organize the men into ath-
letlc teams and social clubs, and to do
everything else that he can think of to
make life tolerable and keep it pure.
There will be great field at Panama
in which our Y. M. c. A. and similar Or
CARNATIONS may find it well and profit.
able to cooperate.