Evening journal., 1915-06-07

age to stand under them. In one school
rot long ago, large piece OF the
ceiling fell down. fortunately in the
night, and the authorities replaced il
with a metal ceiling. Yet in the same
school. in one OF the other rooms, the
plaster is cracked in the same way
and IS likely TO fall at any time.
Are the authorities counting upon
having II, too. fall in the night?
Floors.
The most interesting thing about
the floor is the great difference in
quality in the wood of the irst, sec
ond and third stories of the build
ings. Splinters on the FIRST floor are
numerous enough, but those on the
floors above are so numerous that the
wonder is there are not more IN
stances of splinters penetrating the
children's shoes.
ClOakrOOmS.
When it comes to cloakrooms you
find that only eighteen schools, lit
Tie more than half. have separate
rooms for wraps and closks. seven
more have closets and some psrti-
tions at the back Of the rooms, and
Eve have no oloakroom facilities other
than the halls.
In one of these latter schools on a
wet November day. with tho air hot
and close, one might justly have con-
sidered the steaming odor from coats
and sweaters sufficient reason for
dismissing the school.
Assembly Halls.
Statistics show that only eleven out
of the thirty schools Lave assembly
halls. and of these eleven, four are
Obliged to use the rooms all the time
for classes. In the three story build
ines the assembly halls are on the
third floor. and this brings us to the
question recently brought before TIE
public of fire protection in the schools.
! Fire Protection.
Only four of the nine three-story
buildings have regular fire escapes
into the yard. The other ive with
twenty of the twenty-one two story
buildings. rely entirely on exits and
inside stairways. These exits vary
from comfortably wide Railways and
doors to narrow alley-way entrances
into the yards. close between the
school buildings and those next to
them. The stairways vary in width
from feet inches TO feet. In more
than half go per cent? they are only
four feet wide OF less. Compare this
with the requirement Of the Indiana
state Board of Health--viz.. No stair
way in the school building shall bt
less than 5 feet in width in the clear
All the stairways in our Wilmington
schools save those in the two las
built schools are wooden. These TIVE
are iron.
The recent incident Of a slight hr
in No. 4 school, which brought Z
light some OF the conditions IN re
gard to fire protection gave rise
the defence by the school authoritie
of the present lack of extinguisher'
on the ground that the importan
thing is to get the children out an
not to have anything that would temp
the teacher to hesitate in this dut
i'm order TO put out the fire. This eN
PLANTATION is made plausible because
the good fire drills which are cor
Quoted i'm all the schools; but wha
would happen IL a smouldering fir
should suddenly break out in such
way as to shut off one or two Of tn
Inadequate exits and stairways. SUI
pose for example. that after this plau'
ible defence, limited to the one poir
? OF extinguishers and intended to max
J the city feel no concern about fir
fire should occur, and children
/ trapped in a three-stOry buildin
with narrow wooden stairs and will
} out fire escapes. Is not this matte
= worthy of serious consideration.