Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1922-05-08

There Must De Some Good In the
Settlement Idea or Il Would NOT
Endure Despite Handleaps
BY SARAH ID. LOWRIE
THE difference between the successful

BY SARAH ID. LOWRIE
THE difference between the successful man
i and the failure is that the one refuses
to accept the hundred chances to call MS Jog
an impossible one and accepts the hundrea
and first as his turning point to succeed,
while the other looks at his first obstacle as
a sign from heaven to give up trying.
There was time early this winter when
the Welfare Federation could have closed Its
''"iS "Phiiadelphia lad @ evidently does not like to
federate it's charities, for. barring some
minor mistakes, we've given 1t royal
chance to give, and the response has been
less than half what It should have been, so
ceived on a percentage basis and letting 60
our hold !'-if 1t had published that bit OF
news many Of us would have felt sorry,
chaErined even, but not critical
confess that I thought II had failed one
day when viewed the situation up in a
sky -parlor Of the Bellevue Stratford! when
some Of us were asked to take cards and 60
at it again, and most Of us faded away down
the elevators shaking our heads over the
sorry ending Of good idea. g.
But thanks to Judge Martin and Mr.. Ar:
thur Sewall, and Mr.. Clarance Warden and
Mr.. Elkins and sundry other ''never- say
die men, the enterprise refused to be a
has been or a present failure or future
warning. 1t struggled to its feet, stumbled
once or twice, concluded 1t was alive and
wanted to live and has sent out word that
next October 1t will be back at its old stand,
hat in hand with everything to show that
ciaries feel it to have been worth doing and
to be worth repeating
| A ND the general public, especially the
"A Philadelphia public, which always likes
| thing the second time better than the first,
will acknowledge its right to live and -four
ish and their responsibility to keep it alive
Having refused to die. it will now not be
permitted to die. It's chief difficulty soon
will be to keep from growing too big and
to be on its Board of Managers.
DUT again remark that II It had not
- been for the disciplined determination
parent failure, Philadelphia would have had
no Welfare Federation by now. But after
| oil, these men have only had to work one
| year to prove their point.
| am always impressed by the idea.ism
| of the people who accept temporary failure
| rs part of their lot and plOd along with an
| undying enthusiasm year after year for
future that recedes as they progress. There
| was q time, for instance, when the sett le-
mcnt idea was believed to be about to solve
the problem of the ills the poor are born
to, especially the immigrant poor. That IS,
it was thought that If enough well.informed
and well disciplined and well -nurtured per-
sons would consent to live in the neighbor.
hoods where the ignorant and the undis-
ciplined and the poorly nurtured citizens
lived the neighbors would find a common
ground Of citizenship and break down social
barriers and make common cause OF good
government, good streets, good schools and
good housing. The educated conner to the
sums was supposed to get as well as give
by his So journ there. 1t was calculated that
il there could only be enough settlements
there would eventually be no slums.
7NIlE so called college settlements sprans
L up in New England and Chicago and
here almost simultaneously, and they were
followed by religious or church settlements
and later by university settlements for the
study Of sociology and the practice Of philan-
thropy in the form of neighboriness, That
was twenty-five years ago, and only this
year have the settlements grown to such
proportions that they have felt justified In
federating here. Until now they have been
small oases in great center Of humanity
humanity, too, for the most part unaware
of their existence and unaffected by their ac-
tivities. Hull House in Chicago was known
because of Miss Addams; the Lighthouse
Settlement up in kcnsingtOn was known be-
cause Of the Bradfords; st. Martha's House
in South Philadelphia was known because
OF Deaconess Colesbury but all these or
ganizations depended on the personality Of
the persons who had invented them.
The settlement idea of neighborliness has
existed, but has barely held its own here
for a quarter Of a century. Settlements have
not done away with slums nor changed even
their immediate neighborhoods In way to
be apparent to the ordinary passerby. About
the College Settlement when ] knew 1t first
was dense Negro quarter mixed with very
poor whites. That quarter has moved west
and the original site has been made into q
playground That change is apparent. but
the College Settlement itself moved south
| many years ago, and the streets about it
Catharine and Christian streets near Fourth
swarm with the same tide of cultural
foreigners and the cutters still accommodate
refuse and children. dogs and curb venders
picturesque, sociablc neighborhoOd, but
outwardly nm untouched one by the more
restrained habits of civilization.
The Lighthouse Settlement belongs to a
different type of sociological experiment far
removed from the slum. Yet even Kensing-
ton is the same respectable, rather dour, un-
responsive. looking quarter 1t always was to
the outward eye.
The Lighthouse has changed many in
dividual lives. but not the character of the
| mill district in its relation to the employer
class. or the relation OF the employer class
| to it.
| : As individuals the residents of the Light.
| house are greatly trusted, but as rcpresen-
tatives of a class they always seemed to me
| to be discounted by the dwclers about them.
| rs though they were neither fish, flesh nor
| fowl.
| A DMIRABLE neighbors, ideal citizens,
| n very logical Christians, but not to be
| found anywhere else, would be Keusington' s
| verdict.
| TO be sure Deaconess Colcsbury. at St.
/ Martha's House, is the mother and sister
and friend of the whole district. but She
does not represent class or even church
to her ncighbors. try as she will to point that
| way; she just stands for herself
So when go back to the College Settle.
ment. as did the other day, and find some
twenty women Of all ages from sixty to
twenty engineering children in and out of
| and comforting with like minded workers as
| to methods and practice and cases and
theories, am amazed that the idea of that