Newark leader. ([Newark, Ohio]) 1917-1946, 1918-06-21
A GREAT LONDON MERCHANT
ON THE SALOON

was interviewed while visiting this
country a few months ago, by the
New York Evening Mail. He stated
at considerable length the views of
the big men of England, who have
taken a constructive interest in the
saloon, and through whose efforts
steps are being taken to improve it
along national lines.
That the results achieved, and the
lesson they hold for all those who
approach the subject of the saloon
in an analytical rather than hyster-
ical manner, impressed this progress
sive newspaper is to be seen from the
following editorial from its columns;
In an interview in today's Evening
Mail, Gordon Selfridge the great
London merchant, says some splendid
things with regard to the manner in
which sensible men in England are
preparing to combat the drink evil.
These men recognize that the public
house. which corresponds with Our
saloon, can not be abolished. 1t must
be replaced by a substitute. Nobody
can provide a substitute for the Sa-
loon until he knows the part the
saloon PLAYS in the life of the masses
of men. Here in America the saloon
is the poor mans club. He has
greater need for a club than the rich
man, for the poor mans home is often
marrow and lacking in social contacts.
When the man returns to such condl-
tions after a hard days work, he is
going to find some avenue Of escape.
The saloon is the avenue that is open
to him.
In it he finds warmth and life and
companionship, human fellowship.
Here the man is dressed like other
men. He treats his friends; he talks
with a freedom that surprises HIM
self; he learns the news Of the day.
He goes home feeling warm and COM
Portable and steeled against the facts
Of reality there Three-quarters Of
his motives for visiting the saloon
were something deeper than the de
sire to drink If this were the main
thing, we should have no saloons.
Every corner grocery would sell
liquor; men would telephone for it or
carry it home to drink.
It can not be denied that men crave
alcohol also. 1t is a stimulant which
erasos the harsh lines and angles Of
life. So long as life for the majority
Of people remains the dull grind
which it is today, just so long will
they seek alcohol, or if it is denied
them. a substitute that will do them
far more harm. We can not at one
blow refashion the lot of mankind.
We can not change the human nature
which seeks escape from the severity
of that lot. But what we can do is to
work in harmony with these given
facts Of human nature, and of the
world, not at cross purposes with
them.
This is precisely what Mr. Selfridge
and fellow members of a committee
are attempting to do in England.
They are working for a new form of
public house, or saloon. They want
it primarily recreational; secOndarily
"a drinking place. Games, moving
pictures. the taking Of food, the op-
portunity for human cOmpanionsh1p,
are to be it's first purposes. Men can
90 there whether they drink or not
They can buy drinks, but only Of the
lighter alcoholic type, such as beer
and light wines. The founders of
these reformed public houses are will
ing to finance the first few of them,
but they believe that they will be
self-supporting They want the gov
ernment to aid the new institution by
granting it a less expensive liquor
license than must be bought by the
od-style drinking place.
Does not this point out to US the
line of procedure in this country:
About the saloon, because it is today
mainly a drinking place, great evils
have accumulated. Let us have CON
structive policy to supplant the sa-
loon by something that really takes
it's place. The abolition Of the sale
of whiskey and other heavy intoXi-
cants-from which the saloonkeeper
now makes most Of his mOney-Would
tend to force men who sell beer and
wines to combine that occupation with
some other business, probably the
serving of foood. A conscious private
and governmental policy could do
much to lead the saloon into new lines
The progress Of he human race
has been the history Of the approprla-
ton of the forces of nature to the use
of man. The wind in itself, is a force
of destruction at sea. Yet man learned
to catch it in his sails and run before
it. freed of the labor Of the oars.
When he had invented the keel, he
could sail, quartering, against the
wind. Fire is the most destructive of
all natural forces, yet mans life upon
earth is founded upon the intelligent
use of fire. The craving Of the masses
of men for human fellowship with
their own kind and for a moderate
stimulus that takes the edge off the
sharpness of experience these, too,
are not evil things. Even if we con-
slider them as wicked and destructive
forces, they are nevertheless funda-
!, mental and ineradicable. We shall
get on much further by turning them
to our uses than by attempting to
defy them.-New York Evening Mail.