The Richmond palladium and sun-telegram. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1907-1939, 1908-07-05

wrongdoing, COLE. c. Barber of New
York by his methods has awakened
wide interest in Illinois among those
working for the reform of youthful Of
tenders.
Walking slowly down a line of boys,
Col. Barber picks out one OF them. ac-
cuses him of being a thief and says:
Give me the goods
Il have never known him TO make
mistake" says one of the officials in
the house of refuge.
Col Barber is acting assistant SUI
perintendent and disciplinarian of the
house of refuge on Randall's Island,
which is the New York state reform
atory for youths between the ages of
10 and 81.
There are at present GAO boys.
These boys are of mixed nationalities.
They represent many types of physi-
cal and moral degeneracy, typifying
many kinds of perverted morality.
Few of the boys look their real age.
They are mostly srunted growth,
with countenances plainly bearing the
marks of vice. which even the very
young so quickly show. and in general
may be said to depict the "crooked'
side of youthful humanity.
Most of them have grown up on the
east side of New York city; many
have served periods of training under
the crime experts of the slums and
are as skillful in the art of conceaIing
/ their i'll deeds as they are in conceiv-
| ing the means wherewith to execute
| them.
Boys Yield to Strange Power.
The writer has made something of
a study of prison and refOrmatory
systems both here and abroad and
was particularly interested during a
recent visit TO Randalls Island in the
methods of Col. Barber in handling
the boys now under supervision and
training in the institution.
An offense has been committed, let
us say, the burglary of an officers
quart ers, or the theft of some small
property of the institution. Col. Bar
Der knows that such offense can only
have been committed by some of the
boys of a certain division of the re-
| = avn
| the Offense was committed.
He Darades the whole division, has
| them uD in line and walks down the
ranks scanning the countenance of
each boy. He will select twenty of
them to stand forward from the rest
| and go down the line again. Then he
| tells ten to stand out, then five or six
then four. then two, and to one of the
two bows left his word is Give me
| the goods" or Where are they?"
| And he seldom if ever is mistaken.
The boy hands over the stolen prop.
erty or tells where it can be found
If not the actual thief the one selected
always knows something about the of
Tense and the confederates are discov
cred and punished.
And Col. Barber attributes this tC
intuitive powers. He allows, of course
for the help experience gives, for the
fact that he has been twelve years
engaged in the work. that he knows
the boys and all about them and OBJ
serves the particular criminal tenden
cies of each
But he cannot explain the eXact
power which enables him so conf
IDENTIFY to say to the last boy picked
out from the crowd. Give me the
goods" save by accrediting it to some
strange intuition of the moment.
Expert at Reading Faces.
Experience and study have made
him expert at reading faces, and he
has become more or less of a crimino
logist in the scientific sense. but it i.
intuition that finally enables him t
detect guilt in the face of the boy who
has committed the offense.
Many of those faces appear to the
average spectator to be perfectly braz
en- and hardened enough to stand an,
examination. but they are not inscru
table to Col. Barber 1t is not that tn,
boys fear him. They have the kindes
word for their disciplinarian and nat
urally, a very solid respect for him
They simply cannot keep their gull
from him.
He sees through the eyes, dee,
down, as if even their hearts wer
bare to him, and finally they confess
They have been known to try t
trick him by conspiring to have tn
wrong boy confess. so implike ar
many of them in the peculiar JOY the
find in doing i'll deeds, but they wer
not successful.
; 'Oh, no." said Col. Barber. you ar
not the boy
And when he selected the guilty on
the trickster was punished for wilfu
attempt to deceive. and his felloy
conspirators with him.
What moral perversion can attai
to in misguided youth may be discov
cred and realized by visiting such a
institution as that at Randall's island
One would imagine. on hearing tn
records of some of the lads. that
\ took some special kind of genius /
think out the wrong deeds of whic
they have been capable. and no matte
how much one may be prepared fC
| things. the extent of the mental an
| moral depravity prevailing anon
| such early youth can but shock tn
| visitor
| Can't Take Eyes OF Him.
The writer visited the disciplin
| ward, where half a dozen boys WEI
| doing penance for offenses committe