The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1907-02-10
WHAT It COSTS TO
REFORM A BAD BOY
At One Asylum the Expense is
$2O6 a Year
SEVEN MILLIONS INVESTED
That Amount Spent to Build Up Good
Citizenship In the Past Fifty
Years-Reform Going Up
in Price.
SEVEN MILLIONS INVESTED

New York-It costs $206 year to turn a
bad boy into a good citizen. At least this
is the latest figure reported by the New
York Juvenile asylum which, for more
than half a century has been engaged in
the work of transforming street urchins
of the metropolis into self-respecting
men.
The price of reformation like the price
OF almost everything else, is going up. A
few years ago the young vagrant or petty
thief or all-round rogue who was sent
to the asylum cost $3.50 annually for cloth
ing. food, lodging and the education by
which he was polished up mentally and
morally But times have changed. REFORM
was cheaper then because METHODS were
different and less efficient. Not many
years ago juvenile delinduents were hud-
died together like troops in barracks.
That was under the congregate idea. At
one time when the asylum occupied
building in the city 100 lads were sheltered
under one roof. Now only twenty boys
and boys all about the same age, live in
one of the fifteen cottages or tanllles that
comprise the little village on the heights
between Chauncey and Dobbs Ferry
some twenty miles out in the country,
This is the segregate idea which Of
fers better opportunities for the constant
study of each individual case, and winch
is as different from the old method as
the comfortable home is from the white
washed county jail The number Of chill
dren at Chauncey Is now 80.
On Business Basis.
Reformation in these days is conduct
ed on business basis. The authorities
OF the Juvenile asylum can tell almost to
a cent what it costs to make boy into
a good citizen. OF the $206 the boy costs
the ASYLUM each year, $145 is contributed
bv the city. for with few exceptions the
asylum boys are committed by city au-
thorities acting through the children
court The balance of the cost OF making
an honest man is contributed by the oil
rectors of the asylum and other irlends
and champions of the bad boy who, So
biologists have discovered, is more slnhed
against than SHINING. Since the asylum
was founded, the city of New York has
invested in this work of reformation about
81 132, 900, q sum many times less than the
city has paid out in the same period Tor
policemen, court officers and Jail war
dens In the same half century, private
contributions to this work in the promo
tion of good citizenship have aggregated
81 100000 Thus nearly 100000 has been
spent on bad boys in one city in fifty
years, and In the past few years the an
nual cost per boy has increased about $40.
Work Is Profitable.
Does it pay? The Juvenile asylum peo-
pie, who conduct the work of reforma-
ton on business principles, have figures
to show that the work is profitable The
BOYS who graduate from the asylum are
generally sent to homes In the west, and
it is known that IS per cent of these boys
turn out well. A visitor now In the field
has recently reported favorably on 80 per
cent of the children visited but this is
little better than the average. The ques-
ton, Does it pay? finds its answer in
numerous life histories which are brought
to the attention of the asylum authorities.
A few days ago they received a letter
from a business man in an Iowa town
who announced his election to the office
of county recorder. He wrote that he
hoped the asylum officers would be inter-
ested to hear about him because they had
sent him to Iowa in 1887. Most of ALL" he
write, ~ remember those words of Abb
raham Lincoln, which greeted me in the
assembly room, Tell the boys of the New
York Juvenile asylum that they must
value justice, truth and humanity If they
wish to become useful and honorable
men, | have often thought of those
words. have tried to live up to them
as Lincoln wished us to do. / wish the
boys who leave the asylum would never
forget them. Tell them to come west"
Like all other business mne, the au-
thorities of the Juvenile asylum study
carefully the raw material from which
they make the finished product, that of
good citizenship Close study OF the bad
boy problem reveals the fact that the de-
linquent hailed to the children's court is
largely the victim Of circumstances--in
this country sometimes very young vic
tim for American courts ca nbrand
child criminal at the age of s. In Ger
many the criminal age begins between
the twelfth and thirteenth yeras: in Aus
tria at the end of the fourteenth year,
and in England at the en- dof the six
tenth. In this city only boys under 16
are sent to reformatories. boy day
over IS may be sent to jail for stealing
a street railway transfer check, while a
boy a day under IS may commit grand