The Farmington times. (Farmington, St. Francois County, Mo.) 1905-1926, 1914-03-27
AN APPEAL FOR THE BOYS
Some Suggestions for Providing En-
ployment for the Boys During the
Yacation-Would Not Something
of this Kind BE of Interest in Far
mington.

Just as the schools close later in the
season the boys of the schools will
have nothing to do. Some one at De-
Soto is urging n plan to provide for
that vacation period. Could such n
plan. be worked in Pennington The
thoughts Of the following article are
worth considering:
Why not an open-air gymnasium
with Prof. E. w. Rau in charge? The
DcSoto Press, in last weeks issue,
asked for a solution of the problem of
what to do with the boys in DeSoto
this summer.
The Press article brought up one
of the most vital questions which
confront the people of DcSoto today.
Perhaps many do not realize the i'm
portance Of this question, but the fact
that school will soon be out and then
about six hundred boys of all ages
will be without means of having their
minds directed in channel of charac-
ter building should bring even the
most blind to realization of the sit
uaton.
The article told Of some cities hav-
ing municipal play grounds. Realizing
the impossibility of such n thing in
DeSoto we began working along the
same line in another way, and as a re-
suit we put before the people Of De-
Soto the opening question Of this ar
ticle. We talked over this plan with
several other people, among them be
ing Prof. W. N. Sellman, superinten-
dent of city schools, and Prof. Rau
himself They believe this plan can be
worked and have outlined some things
that could be done for the boys with
the carrying out Of the suggestion.
There are approximately 300 boys
now in the schools between the ages
Of { and Is years. The majority of
these boys will have nothing to do
this summer unless something is pro-
vided If nothing is done they will be
around on the streets all day learning
how to smoke cigarettes, chew tobac-
co, cuss, and few other such sharac-
ter building CD things. The cost of
establishing an outdoor gymnasium
and keeping Coach Rau here for three
months this summer would be about
$4,000. Will the people Of DeSoto be
willing to invest this much in the flu
ture manhood of this city?
Some of the things that Coach Rau
suggests could be done this summer is
to have organized classes in calisthen-
les, outdoor gymnasium work, games,
hikes and home gardening. Under cal
isthenics would come such things as
drills in free arm movement, wands,
dumb bells, Indian Clubs, tumbling
and pyramid building wrestling and
boxing. Under outdoor games, swing
ing and giant strides, horizontal bars,
horse bars, high and broad jump, vaul
ting sprinting and many other such
things. Under games there would be
t"nnlS. long bali, baseball, basket ball,
soccer, rugby, valley ball. hand ball,
etc On the hikes the boys would have
such things as studies in bird life and
elementary agriculture, physical ge-
ography, camp life and swimming
The home gardening feature could be
enlarged upon and if the ground could
be secured the boys could raise gar
den "sass and sell it, using the money
to buy equipment for the gymnasium.
All this time the boys would be receiv
ing instruction in soil preparation,
seed selection, planting, cultivation,
harvesting and marketing.
Profs. Selman and Rau think that
the grounds ut the High School could
he used for The outdoor gymnasium
and that shower baths could be install
ed in the basement of the building so
that the boys could have place to
wash after their work. The city would
probably be willing to donate the wa
ter for the baths.
If sixty or seventy-five people of
DeSoto, whether they have boys or
not, are willing to invest $500 in the
boys this can be put across. The prop
osition is positively for all the boys Of
the town that are large enough to en-
ter the classes, and only for the boys
of the parents are not able to at"nd
this expense, yet are anxious to see
something done to develop their boys
during the summer vacation.
The time to do something is now.
Jefferson Republican.
aN