Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1922-06-08

the highest terms. They have pro-
nounced it not simply a remarkably
successful thing in itself, but model
to the rest of the country in sound
education.
The idea of Mooseheart occurred to
me when | was a worker in the iron
mills of Pittsburgh. There | saw
heads of families die and leave their
dependents totally helpless, the chill
dren with little or no education and
driven to work without the slightest
training. Often they were dispersed
so that brothers grew up apart and
unknown to each other throughout
their lives.
What MOOseheart Is.
Mooseheart is not an institution. 1t
is not a sectarian retreat. 1t is not a
reformatory. 1t has no officialdom to
rule it. From the first it has been a
free and untrammeled experiment. In
the first place, Mooseheart is home.
Mothers are there, SO that they need
not be separated from their children
Babies have been born there, of ex
pectant mothers left without aid by
less fortunate members of our Order.
This home at Mooseheart is a COM
Portable little town of homes, cottages,
Offices, school buildings, work shops,
a hospital, an auditorium and every
thing that belongs to a home COM
munity. The tract consists of more
than 1000 acres, and the farm that
supplies it with milk and other foods
agriculture. In the midst of the place
is a lake for water sports and the
wholesome exercise they promote.
And we have not forgotten a football
field, baseball diamond, and a play
ing space for all. We have an or
chestra, and a band of more than 100
pieces. The students who form these
bodies do not simply scrape and toot
and make noise they are under the
training of a skilled and inspired in
structor, and they play the best of
music and play it well. Some of the
houses and buildings were designed by
Mooseheart students, from materials
shaped in the schools and shops
While the students were about it, they
fashioned ornaments for these build
ings, as we'll as blocks and lath.
School Is Gaining
Even now barely well begun, Nose
heart has grown in the eight years of
it's life so that 1,034 children, from
babyhood to young man-and woman
hood, enjoy it's advantages. 1t is dis
tinctly on the make. We are now
building village for babies under
school age They receive, in baby
hood, care that is scientific and prac-
teal but yet sympathetic and home
like. At every stage all institutional
ism is carefully avoided. No uniform
has been adopted The children wear
Individual clothing and when they ar
rive at suitable age they select their
own. At still later age, they make
their own At all times they ronp to-
gether as a huge happy family, as
much as possible, out of doors in the
country air and subject to the influ
ences of the natural loneliness about
them. At Mooseheart the rod is
spared We find it an effective pun
ishment to deprive the misbehaving
of the privilege of going swimming, or
seeing the baseball and football games,
or the movies. For we regularly ex-
hibit motion pictures in the auditor
iunn, and we are favored with the lat
est and best.
Trades Are Taught.
Where We do go far beyond the
public school is in the vocational
training that we make compulsory.
The utmost skill is applied in fitting
each child to the trade for which ma
ture and his own tastes have adapted
him. The boys learn carpentry, farm
ing, moulding, machine-work, metal
work, and work in concrete, and the
like. The girls are taught homework
Istenography, secretarial work, and
kindred pursuits They know dress
making and domestic science. Wheth-
| er as wives, as wage-earners, or as
destined for a career, girls who leave
Mooseheart are equipped for master
ing life, for understanding life, and
enjoying it. So are the boys.
But the point of this, the everlast-
ing point of it, is that while these
young people leave Mooseheart to
take up life, and while they are
trained to make the most of life and
its fine things, to the playing of music
and the painting of pictures where
II I'll