The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1909-09-04
SHERMAN c. KINGSLEY,

SHERMAN c. KINGSLEY,
 Superintendent, United Charities of
 Chicago.
 Exclusive Service The Survey Press 9 Bureau.)
 If you wish to know whether or not your city is right, get a map and an lndelible pencil and ask your health commissioner to put a black dot on the map for every baby under two who dies in the month of August. sest summer. Seven hundred and aineteen black dots-deaths from diar- sheal diseases aIone-were the start fng result. July and September were S.Hlost as bad. The babies got sick In late May and June, fretted, cried, suffered, wilted and died in July. Au- gust and September. The 719 ugly dots did not tell the whole story. Other hundreds of babies managed to live with constitutions blasted. Later they will be found among the under nourished and backward school chil- 6ren; then as delinquents: finally on the books of charity organizations among the dependents ito be cared for by society. You cannot make an eff ficient citizen out of a blighted baby.
 Taking the back trail of these path etic little dots we are led straight to the beaten paths of visiting nurses, truant and probation officers and charity workers into the region of the three-room homes where live widowed and deserted women and others whose income will not permit higher rent. Here unsanitary plumbing and lack of health conveniences do their deadly work. It is the destination of the poorest milk sold in the city. It is where streets are cleaned least often or not at all; where stalest bread and oldest meat are sold. To it in the dusk of evening, little children with shawls over their heads and market baskets on their arms return with their prizes from the city dumps and the garbage barrels of the market streets. Visiting commercial organi- Eations are not escorted to this part of the town. The dignitaries from other lands are not taken here as visit ors The ninety and nine of the city,s business men have never seen and know little about the conditions which prevail. It is left to the ward polite ian, the policeman, the insurance so- dcitor. the instaHment man. the under taker, the poor and their children. No matter what the adverse condition which prevails, whether simple pow erty, or poverty plus ignorance, plus lnten1perance and vicfousness-down at the bottom of it all are the little children and in particular the babies.
 For five years the Chicago Relief and Aid Society carried on a special work in summer for the babies of such districts. Fresh air tentS su- Eerintended by nurses from the Visit ing Nurse Association and directed by staff Of expert physicians, who vol-4 Enteered their services, were set up The mother of the sick baby was care fully instructed, the work at the tent being upp1en4enteda by visits from the nurses to the home. Mothers meet ing were held and groups of women, themselves children in all but burdens and years and the marks of sacrifice, would gather about the nurse and doc tor and listen to lessons, simple, direct and practical, on the care and feeding of babies. The simplicity of the tents, their proximity to these hum ble homes, drew to them hundreds of suffering babies. The most super etitious and shrinking, the poorest clad mothers would come. There was no formidable building; no door opening into a corridor with corridor after that with the cries of babies coming as the doors opened. There was no losing the baby from sight. You could see all that went on in the tents.
 ss This experience served to reveal a Widespread condition. There were many efforts to cope with it but they were scattered and unrelated. The