Evening star., 1939-11-06
Christ Child Farm
Nurses Youngsters
Back 10 Health
Goal Of Chest Agency
Is Attainment of
Average Weight

Out of the hospitals and the
clinics each day come youngsters
with Affections that require months
Of slow, painstaking care to be
healed.
Among them are children with
heart trouble, anemia, st. Vitus
dance, children painfully mall
nourished, children so underWeight
that their skin is blue-veined,
stretched tightly across their bones.
If they go back into their homes,
Into the conditions that brought on
their diseases, or nurtured them,
their return to the hospital is almost
certain.
The hospitals can't keep them in
definitely. The clinics can only
diagnose the disease and recon-
mend home treatment Many times
mothers can't understand what is
expected of them Sometimes
families can't afford the special
foods, the routine of care necessary
for a convalescent child. Some
homes are barren of light and SUM-
shine Whole families are crowded
into single. noisy rooms-certainly
not the place for sick child.
Details of Other Gases.
Then there are other cases. Take
the little girl We'll call JOAN Her
mother and father were separated
and Joan was a nuisance to her
mothers new boy friend. Joan came
to school one day with bruises that
blackened her small face and
streaked across her body. So serious
was the shock that accompanied the
beating she'd gotten that Joan was
sent to the hospital. The bruises
healed. but Joan couldn't so back
into a home like that, especially
since she still suffered from shock.
She had to go some place to be
thoroughly healed, some place where
she was wanted until new home
could be found for her.
Or take the case of Dick. The
youngest child in a house full Of
children, Dick had been i'll for a
year at home. He couldn't gain
weight and his disease was progress
Ing to the danger point.
For children like Joan and Dick,
for all the children that need fresh
air and sunshine, three well-planned
meals a day and recreation to make
them forget their ills. the Christ
Child Farm for Convalescent Chill
dren exists.
The service of this Community
Chest agency is spelled on a simple
little chart that tells the story OF
each child within its doors. That
chart is really just a graph with
two lines on it. One is in red
crayon, a straight line very grad
ually moving upward across the
blocked sheet. The other line is
struggling and crooked, invariably
beginning far below the red line.
Average Weight Is Goal.
The goal of the farm is to make
those two lines come together and
the ideal is for the black line to
move up and beyond the red one
For the red line is the average
weight, the weight the child should
be for its healths sake. The other
line is the actual weight. Children
don't leave the farm until the black
line has a protective edge over the
other one.
Sometimes it takes many months
The average stay is just about three
months - three months to make
round-faced, pink children
out of the pale. peaked youngsters
who 60 to the farm.
At first the children have to stay
in bed. their food brought to them
on trays. Then they're allowed tt
go downstairs for meals And pretty
soon they're out on the swings OF
playing football or gathering around
a campfire for picnic suppers.
Sometimes they stage programs
with songs and minuets and play.
lets. One of the star performers
is the lad whose song ends:
Those two eyes of blue keer
smiling through at me-"
And because he's almost vel
again, almost ready to go back int
a world where he can be like othel
children, there's an expression IL
his eyes not easily forgotten, tn,
look of child given the right Il