Fitzgerald leader enterprise and press. (Fitzgerald, Ben Hill County, Ga.) 1921-1964, 1924-03-13
THOUSANDS OF CHILDREN
MISS SCHOOL IN CALL
FORNIA FOR CROPS

SACRAMENTO, Cal.,- CALIFORNIA;
sunshine has betrayed an army Of
children into crop bondage.
The year around these tiny work
criss-crossing their own paths.
Unattached to any city or town,
they know no permanent homes
save the autos and auto camps in
which they live.
There are some 10000 of them
And the majority receive little or no
education because the crops demand
too much of their time to permit at
tendance at school.
The age of these children who go
into the fields is from a few weeks
to 18 years. Babies can be found
swaddled in bundles on the ground
while their parents gather the
crops. Children of 5 and e labor be-
side their parents.
These Youngsters who have forgot
ten how to play speak language of
their own.
"Where are you from?" asked one
II year old girl of a new arrival.
From cotton" answers the other
I've been in asparagus" states the
first.
This is their country and their life
cotton, asparagus, cherries and so on
through the states twenty-four crops.
They have forgotten how to play
because playtime vitality is consum-
ed in the fields. They stoop and
gather until their backs ache and their
whole being cries for rest
With the days work finished, they
are only too glad to throw themselves
down to sleep on beds consisting of
quilts or blankets of uninviting appear
anceS.
Hectic Aim
Within the state runs this hectic
aimless whirlpool of secondhand
cars, auto trucks, farm wagons, any
thing which will carry man and his
family. The father drives, the moth
er sits beside him, the luggage is pill
ed up into the car or strapped to run
ming boards. The children perch wher-
ever they can find hold.
The whirlpool extends through 38
of CALIFORNIA; So counties. The crops
mature at different times. The convey
ances follow.
Outside the state two great feed
ing streams supply whatever workers
are needed.
Down through Washington apples
and Oregon hops they come from
home left far behind in the plains sta
ties and even the Great Lakes regions.
Up through Southern California
comes second stream, the cotton
workers. Many families in this cur
rent have worked in cotton from the
Old South through state after state un-
til they have reached the cotton fields
of Southern California. Here they
strike the whirlpool and are absorbed
among the $4,000.
All nations except the Japanese and
Chinese are represented in this child
labor problem There are Italians, Am
orleans, Mexicans, negroes, Russians,
and all the heterogeny that makes up
California.
But nationality is rapidly lost in the
new race into which they are being
builded-the race of children who don't
fit in.
Many of them seem to sense that
they are different and feel great anxi-
ETY. to conform"
"The migratory child of today re-
sents the situation because he had
known better times and different con-
ditions," says Miss Georgianna Gar
den of the state department of educa-
ton who has made extensive inquiry
into the situation.
Difficult
"But the problem is more difficult
when we consider the future cropper
The child born in the crops knowing
nothing else will not care. He will
adjust himself to conditions and be-
come habitual drifter, -a~spendthrift
and man or woman of no ties to
make him or her better citizen"
In one camp a girl who had passed
through the first six grades had es
tablished school. 1t was free, and at
tended by every child i'll the camp vol
unfairly. The teacher was Is years old.
Instances are not infrequent where
child has asked the teacher of
school to lay out a course of study,
because I'm going to citrus where
there amt no school, or some other
crop:
In 1921 the state department of ed
ucation introduced into the legislature
migratory school law An appropria-
ton of $4,000 was made to establish
temporary school, where the little no.
MAIDS gathered. Also penalties were
provided for parents who did not enroll
their children in the new district to
which they moved
But later it was found more practi-
cable to place emergency teachers in
the regular district schools and to alb
sorb the influx there.
1--WE have made great progress in
overcoming illiteracy among child Ia
borers in rural districts through these
provisions" says Will c. Wood, state
superintendent of education