The Dawson news. (Dawson, Ga.) 1889-current, 1908-01-22
THE LURE OF THE ROAD
HOW THE RANKS OF THE "HOBO
ARMY ARE FILLED.
Many and Strange Are the Denizens
of ''HOboland," Where Is Always
Much of Suffering, Misery
and Sudden Death.


and Sudden Death.
In New York city the other da,
DR.. Benjamin Reitman of Chicago
gave a dinner to about 500 younl
vagabonds, the majority of whom
were regulation knights of tn
Road" Reitman is known as thu
king of Tramps." In Chicago HI
is a teacher in a medical college
He is a graduate of Harvard Col
lege, but a number of years of his
life has been spent as a hobo Fol
sociological reasons he has trampeC
with tramps and has come to know
the misery and woe which is the lot
of the homeless wanderer, the dan
gers they face and the pleasure which
comes from sense of the wild free
dom of the road.
Reforming the Hobo.
DR.. Reitman, together with num-
Der of other sociologists, are making
a well-directed and intelligent effort
to lift hundreds of the younger ele-
ment of trampdom from the vicious
state into which they have fallen.
To this end he gives dinners, first
filling their empty stomachs and then
talking to them in their lingo on
their mistaken careers, and pointing
out to them the dark, hopeless future
which will be theirs. He knows their
language, the patois of hoboland, as
he knows their lives, habits and the
conditions surrounding them. He
talks to them as one of their own
number would talk were he about
to forsake the road and reform. And
the tramps seeing their own lives
pictured before them are interested.
1t is not a pretty picture which
DR.. Reitman draws of tramp life.
Unlike some writer's who have played
at being tramps, he does not clothe
the vicious, lazy life 70 the under
world with a glamor of romance.
He draws the naked repulsive picture
of the hobo true to life, and it not
only possesses the merit of being
genuine, but it is interesting because
it is drawn by a man who has
known and been and suffered.
The ''HObo Army"
Many are the miseries of the
''road. It's travellers are pariahs,
with every mans hand against them.
Sinking to back doors in the day
light and stealthily stealing upon
barns at night The travellers upon
this road are of all kinds, conditions
and ages. Some are old and crippled,
some still in their prime and others
just beginning the life. To watch in
thought the long and motley process
sion passing along is to see a piano.
rama of all the sins, sorrows and ac-
cidents known to human experience.
Year after year this army of pitiful
derelicts trudge on and on seeking
a goal which they never seem to find.
Occasionally they halt for a while
at some halfway place, which they
think is a resting place, of their de-
sire, but invariably it proves disap-
pointing and the tramp, tramp, be.
gins afresh. Young and old, man
and boy, all go on together, and as
one dies or wearies of the march
another steps into mis- tracks and the
ranks close up solidly as ever.
There are many and evil ways by
which recruits are won to the ranks
of the tramp army. Many are driven
into it, some are enticed into it and
others go into it voluntarily, this lat
ter class being the regulation weary
"willies. Laziness is, perhaps, one
of the best recruiting sergeants for
the tramp army. To the lazy man
the care-free life of the hobo seems
ideal But the lazy man finds when
he strikes the road that it is not all
"beer and skittles." He must rustic
for his HANDOUTS" and he must do
his share of the work in a tramp
camp.
The Lure of the Road.
The most pitiful feature of the
tramp life in the United States is the
number of young men who, through
misfortune, want of work or pure
laziness, take to the road. There
are, today tramping about the coun-
try thousands of young fellows, al
of whom possess, at least, the aver
age intelligence of the young Ameri-
can. The lure of the road seems
year after year, to draw from the
ranks of responsibility young men
and boys of all conditions and posi-
tions, nearly, in life. OF course they
are disillusioned when they come tC
know the real life of a hobo, but the
stigma of class is already upon then
and they can not turn back. Before
them lie years of exile, of homeless
wanderings, of suffering and priva
lions, but they cannot turn back
There seems to be no discharge from
the tramp army.
Although there are thousands ant
thousands of tramps in this countr,
little or nothing is really known 0
their lives They are drifting no
MAIDS, hating and being in turf
hated, and but few people hav,
stopped to study their real lives anC
habits. Like the robins, the roat
tramp fits from the north befor
the coming of the snow; while tn
city tramp gets himself into tn
county jail, there to await the da.
1,r,+1