The Jeffersonian. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1907-1917, 1916-01-27
Are the Movies" Any Improvement
on the 'Dime Novel?'
N RECENTLY REFORMED train

Scr1pC1OnS OF MS FORMER calllnS, IL is doubtful
IF there will be as beneficial effects from his
lectures as the small boys mother would
desire
From the movie thrillers to the lectures Of
the reformed train-robber isn't such a far
cry, and it makes one wonder just what has
come over our civilization, that we can devise
so little In the way of amusement for our chill
dren, that does not deal with sensation, and
putting almost a premium on crime, by the
sensational way in which it is deliniated in
The average moving picture theatre.
It seems that fads are as much part of
civilization as its clothes dancing, gambling
under any of the various names-card play
ang, horse racing, lotteries or whatever, has
broken out almost over the entire civilized
world, at various times have run their course,
and left the devOtees as eager to grasp the
successor of their favorite vice as they were to
take up the favorite at the time of it's popu-
1arity.
The pity of it is, children have almost lost
the time and the initiative for play of the
Old-tlme sort;- you don't see little gangs" Of
boys now, preparing to raid onion and potato
patches, under the guise of "1n juns."
The running away trombone craze doesn't
break out now in communities of boys as it
did-say fifteen Or twenty years ago There
is de luxe edition of this on record in a small
Southern town, where two youths decided to
run away after one of them had received the
proceeds of his fathers cotton, and the
schum" who was to 90 with him was to
Sswipe" his fathers automobile; they got up
the road few miles, and were overhauled by
indignant parents-who doubtless smiled
when their anger cooled at the recollection of
their own running away days.
Given the choice, is it likely the average,
Intelligent parent would choose the average
thriller" Of the moving picture play, in which
battle, theft, murder and sudden death are
depicted In the most theatrical form, as
against the old thriller in dime novel form?
A father living in Southern city, talking
of this change in the ways and manners of
children, spoke of the boys as "undersized
men in understood mems Clothes" and in look
ing for some Of his old favorites of the dime
novel days, he said:
II was rummaging around in a book store
The other day and something reminded me Of
my boyhood. SO I began to look for the
counter full of what we used to call 'lbraries.'
Nou remember them 'Beadle's Dime Library
and 'Deadwood Dick and old Cap Collier,'
and the series about LATTE the Terror of the
Spanish Main But couldn't find them and
when / asked the manager he said they hadn't
been published in years. The boys didn't seem
TO want them any MOI he said"
Maybe the boys don't want them, but it is
almost certain that they don't want any other
books to take the place of them.
Fortunately, in the larger cities, there are
any number of movements on foot to take up
the surplus energy of the boys who need the
draining and guidance of older hands. If the
Boy Scout movement is properly carried out,
1T is one of the most beneficial movements ever
devised for the development of the manly
traits in boy
There isn't any use in our pretending that