The Birmingham age-herald., 1908-08-09

huiidi GUS OI DdDltS dlld CIll1uTeH III tllt tenement districts had been made i'll dur ing the first hot spell by drinking milk which had stood for hours in a warm place and was teeming with bacteria In many cases lack of ice boxes was direct ly responsible for the illness of these children.
 Determined to do away with at least one cause of summer sickness among children, the association then decided to introduce a cheap ice box into the tene- ments. Dr. Alfred F. Hess of the de- partment of health had been experi- menting with homemade ice box which he had invented himself. and as it had proved to be practical, the association adopted it.
 This box. which is now in use in hun dreds of East Side tenements, is made from an ordinary soap box, two tin pals, which fit one inside the other, and a bucket of sawdust or a package of news papers. The larger pail is placed inside the box and the intervening space packed tightly with either sawdust or newspa- pers The smaller pail Is then placed in- side the big one. All that remains to be done to complete the ice box Is to place a 5-cent piece of ice in the inner pail fill 1t half full of water and place a heavy newspaper-covered top on the box. A bottle of milk placed in the inner pail will remain at temperature of 50 degrees for "A hours. At such a temper ature bacteria cannot multiply, and the milk will remain sweet.
 The eagerness with which poor parents have come to the milk depots of the as- sociation to have the making of this homemade ice box explained to them and the faithfulness with which they have copied it in their own homes, show, &C., cording to one of the officers of the as- sociation, that the box is filling a long felt want. Moreover the nurses in the milk depots state that in the districts where the cheap ice boxes have been in- troduced, there are now less cases of stomach trouble among the children than formerly. Before the introduction of the cheap ice boxes they found that even when they supplied mothers with the very best kind of modified milk for their babies, it either went to waste because there was no place In the hot tenement rooms to keep it cool, or that in some cases mothers, driven to desperation fed their babies milk which the heat had spoiled, with the result that the little ones were made seriously i'll.
 sanitary homemade crib, costing but a few cents. has also been devised by lut dSSOtitllOI lOI lilt uSS Ol ltutIlleHC mothers This crib, however, while cheap enough for the poor, is equally recom- mended for the millionaire babies. as the hospital staff believes it is IS good a crib as can be made, from the point of view of keeping the baby well. The crib was invented by MT. F. D. Greene of the as- sociation and was first installed for ex- permental purposes in the Junior Set Breeze hospital. Last year the hospital was equipped Tsth regular iron baby cribs with ordinary mattresses. It was found that these mattresses, in addition to being warm, were not easily kept ab- soutely clean. As most of the cases in the hospital are those of summer com plaint, this was a serious objection
 This year, however all the mattresses were thrown out, and at a cost of but a few cents per bed the 60 cribs in the hospital were equipped with the new ap- pliance. which was made in the follow ing manner:
 Eight-inch boards. 30 inches long. were fitted at the head and foot of each cot. A strip of canvas with a 3-inch hem on each side takes the place of a mattress, and is held in position by two poles or broom sticks, which run through the hemmed sides and into holes bored at the upper corners of the head and foot boards, thus locking them into a solid frame. Over the canvas were placed rubber sheet quilted pad. and regular sheet, and the bed was ready.
 The advantage of the canvas Is that the air circulating beneath it makes it cooler than the usual mattress, and when it becomes soiled. the canvas. can be sterilized or washed like ordinary bed clothing. At the end of the summer, if the parent wishes to return to the ordl- nary mattress. the frame can simply be lifted out of the crib, as the iron frame work is not damaged in the least. The new cribs have had a thorough test this summer at Junior Sea Breeze. as the many hot spells have taxed this babies hospital to its full capacity.
 The same canvas idea employed in the new crib is excellent for camping or TOT sleeping on the roof, as the crib can be made by boring holes in two grocery boxes or pocling cases, or ordinary car penters' horses, and running the poles through them instead of the head-board and foot-board of the regulation crib.
 The cost for transforming a crib lnto sanitary summer sleeping place IS about % cents for canvas and cents apiece for broomhandles or curtain poles. Any sort of board longer than the larger scale makes an excellent bed for adults In camp.
 News travels fast in the tenement dis- tricts. and the fact that social worK- CT gave little child a refreshing shower hath bv means of a casual sprinkling pot