The Montgomery advertiser., 1908-07-26

| to any one who has never used 1t ans | will give it fair trial,
  the visitor brings the doctor or nurse l Id make inc diagnosis. Then there ts | no waiting The trained nurse gets on | the job in the stuffy back tenerf ent l does what she can in the way of smer- l gency relief, helpA the mother pack | un her clothing, and within half an | hour. a trolley car Is whisking MT :. | baby to a cool crib and perfect diet and | medical treatment at the seashore | Mother goes along. and if there are l other children who cannot be left, they | go along. too. or else are sent to some | other summer home or seaside camp | If necessary, day worker is sent to \ the deserted tenement to clean 1t up | and do the leftover wash. That is, I this is done as long as there is room | at the seaside homes and money In the societies treasuries to do the work. During the recent hot spell in this city, howeevr. cases came In so rapidly | that every baby,s home was crowded, | every mothers rest damned, every chill | dren's home overfiowing. Money, too. | was short. But the charities began to | take more than their normal number | of people, and one at leastt the Chil- dren's Aid Society at its Health Home. began to put them two In q crib and | two in a bed. and then to appeal for more cribs rather than send them
 back to certain death In street tenn perHture of ninety-three degrees Fah- renheit.
 In some cases this society found it necessary to aid six people, a mother and five other children just to set at that one baby. The mother and chil- dren under six went along with baby to the Health Home. ThA girls over six went to the Childrens Home at
 Bath Beach; the boys over six went
 either to the little boys hotel at Val- halla, or to the seaside camp at stam-
 ford. All this to get that one baby
 to a place where there was pure air
 and food. And eight sick ehildren's
 missions with medical corps and train
 ed nurses are busy all the time hunt
 ing out the babies and older children
 who must go or die"
 The Association for Improving the
 Condition of the Poor this summer has
 become one of the leaders of tho
 breast feeding e campaign and is us-
 ing the seemingly contra dtrkorv device
 of having pure baby milk depots. prin"
 cipally to induce mothers not to use q
 bottle at all If they can help 1t. If
 they can't help it, then the milk de.
 pots furnish at a nominal price or
 without charge, the purest raw milk
 obtainable, modified to meet the doc
 tors orders and furnished not in .
 can ordinarily used for beers but in
 sterilized nursing bottle ready for the
 nipple, Tie mothers come Co get the milk, but they don't get 1t if they can
 do their avn nursing. And all who come are given demonstrations and plain talks about "baby" by nurses and volunteer physicians. And the price they pay Is that the baby must be brought once week to be weighed and looked over. This gives the medi- cal people chance to detect summer complaints or Inalnutrition in many babies, and the cause discovered is commonly that the baby has shared In the family meals as we'll as the pure milk, or that the mother. after getting pure milk, has let it get warm. Then there Is a bad half hour for some one. and possibly a baby rushed down to Sea Breeze Home, or hurried up to Junior Sea Breeze, on the banks of the East River. where. in cots surrounded by wire netting, but open to all the curative breezes. the babies lives are fought for by 6 medical stan and a doEen nurses and a special baby's milk laboratory Junior Sea Breeze, with ita doctrine of fresh air, has done moro to encourage ventIlization for babies than any other known agency in the neighborhood. For. nanifestly, if Q baby gets well practically out of doors. just sheltered from the storms and rain and direct sun, two or three inches of open air tenement window and plenty of fresh water will not Kill him. And tenement windows cautiously open for the baby, and some of his bundlings are taken off in sweltering weather.
 But the milk is not so simple as it seems. Sometimes a nursing Baby is sick just because its mother is so tired out with heavy work or is herself half starved. and cannot supply proper nourishment to her child. Then to get at the child. the A. T. c. P. calls on its relief department. Day workers go in. and with trained house. keeping ability. get the wash done and leave the place like a new pin. Food Is provided for the mother. But If these are not enough the mother goes out of town for a complete rest, the other children being looked after in other homes. And if the baby Is a very new one, the mother Is sent to Caroline Rest. the maternity rest home, until she is strong enough to take care of her regular duties.
 The association even found it neces- sary to teach the moth CTS how to make a cheap ice box out of old pails and sawdust or papers, so that they could keep the milk furnished to them in proper conditions.
 But whatever the size of the problem, these agencies get at the babies and the little children One rather Irrevsr- ent soul defined 1t as the Whole darn family system," for to help those babies they will even find work for the father. The results are beginning to tell. Healthy babies. snatched from death and brought back to life, not by drugs. but by proper diet and sanitation, have begun to be the advertisements on many tenement stoops for the ''system."
 Of an evening. Mrs. MacCarthy tells how little Mike was spared to her 'tust by fixin' his milk roight and givin' him l bath ivry biessid day. rain or shoine." Mrs. Rabinsky has the same tale to tell of Rebecca, and Mrs. Spinneill, with many gestures and calls for the blessings of the saints, spreads the rea- 'en for Tony's continued and unusually 'hubby appearance in Mulberry Bend. And already there Is an indication that when baby is out of condition, moth- ITS are beginning to recognize the .act that there is a reason. and, aban- 1 ioning fatalism and historic nursing l 'ystems at tn same time, now come to | I.n