West Side Studies: Boyhood and Lawlessness; The Neglected Girl

PREFACE TO WEST SIDE STUDIES

IN the summer of 1912 the field work was completed for the West Side studies published in these volumes. They are part of a wider survey of the neighborhood which it was proposed to make under the Bureau of Social Research of the New York School of Philanthropy with funds supplied by the Russell Sage Foundation. Dr. Samuel McCune Lindsay, director of the School, and I were in charge of the Bureau and together planned the scope and nature of the inquiry. To his inspiriting influence was due in large measure the enthusiasm and harmonious work of our staff.

The investigators in the Bureau were men and women who had been awarded fellowships by the School of Philanthropy. There were junior fellowships, given for one year only, and intended to provide training in social research for students without much previous experience, who were required to give part of their time to class work and special reading. There were also senior fellowships given to more advanced students who devoted full time to investigation. After two years’ work it was felt that to carry out the original plan satisfactorily would require the employment of a permanent staff of investigators who were well trained and equipped. The School, therefore, decided not to carry the survey further and reorganized the Bureau on a different basis.

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This brief account of the Bureau is needed to explain the special topics dealt with in these volumes. The personal qualifications of the investigators as well as the available opportunities for investigation necessarily determined the choice of subjects.

A word must be said, too, as to the selection of this particular West Side district of New York City. These 80 blocks which border upon the Hudson River, between Thirty-fourth and Fifty-fourth Streets, contrast sharply with almost all other tenement neighborhoods of the city. They have as nearly homogeneous and stable a population as can be found in any part of New York. The original stock was Irish and German. In each generation the bolder spirits moved away to more prosperous parts of the city. This left behind the less ambitious and in many cases the wrecks of the population. Hence in this “backset” from the main current of the city’s life may be seen some of the most acute social problems of modern urban life—not the readjustment and amalgamation of sturdy immigrant groups, but the discouragement and deterioration of an indigenous American community.

The quarter which we studied is strangely detached from the rest of the city. Only occasionally an outbreak of lawlessness brings it to public notice. Its old reputation for violence and crime dates back many generations and persists to the present day. So true is this that we considered it essential at the beginning of our undertaking to ascertain the main facts of the district’s development. To Otho G. Cartwright was assigned the task of collecting this material. He did not make an exhaustive inquiry, but obtained from reliable sources sufficient information to give the historical 


background of life in the district today. His work serves as a general introduction to the more intensive studies which follow.

The study of juvenile delinquency, Boyhood and Lawlessness, shows clearly the need of special intimate knowledge of social phenomena if their underlying causes are to be understood. It describes the inadequacies of the present system: the innumerable arrests for petty offenses or for playing in the streets, and the failure of the police to bring the ringleaders into court. All this seems so unreasonable to the neighborhood and has so often aroused its antagonism that the influence of the Children’s Court is seriously undermined. In fact, the fathers and mothers of its charges look upon it only as a hostile authority in league with the police, while its real purpose is entirely hidden from them. The evidence is clear, too, that both parents and community have failed to understand and provide for the most elementary physical needs of the boys.

The same tragic lack of opportunity and care characterizes the lives of the girls. Ruth S. True’s portrayal of these lives in The Neglected Girl rests upon close personal acquaintance with a special group of girls who, though they were not brought up on charges in the Children’s Court, yet were without question in grave need of probationary care.

In neither of these two studies was it possible to suggest adequate remedies for the evils described. It is true that steps have already been taken by the Children’s Court to make its probation staff more effective. But the more fundamental need for modification of the conditions of the child’s life and environment 


has still to be pondered. Clearly it is not the child alone who needs reformation.

Similarly, Katharine Anthony’s report, Mothers Who Must Earn, reveals much more than isolated cases of hardship and suffering due to accident or death. She has studied the social and economic causes which compel the mother of a family to become a wage-earner, and the consequences of such employment for her home and family. The occupations where her services are in demand were carefully examined. The underpayment of many of the husbands, which drives their already overburdened wives into wage-earning, is perhaps the most significant fact disclosed. To relieve such severe economic pressure there is certainly need of more radical and far-reaching readjustments than can be effected by any one remedial measure. Relief giving is at best only a temporary stop-gap. This is rather a labor problem of the utmost gravity, affecting whole classes of underpaid laborers.

Indeed, if there is any one truth which emerges from these studies, it is the futility of dealing with social maladjustments as single isolated problems. They are all closely interrelated, and the first step in getting order out of our complexities must be knowledge of what exists. To such knowledge these studies aim to make a contribution. They are not intended to prove preconceived ideas nor to test the efficacy of any special remedies. They aim to describe with sympathy and insight some of the real needs of a neglected quarter of our city—“to hold, as it were, the mirror up to nature.”

The various investigators who took part in the inquiry are given herewith: Edward M. Barrows, Clinton 


S. Childs, Eleanor H. Adler, Beatrice Sheets, and Ruth S. True contributed to the study of the West Side boy, here published under the title Boyhood and Lawlessness. Thomas D. Eliot, a junior fellow, also assisted. Associated with Ruth S. True in the study of the neglected girl, were Ann Campion and Dorothy Kirchwey. All three shared the responsibility of conducting the Tenth Avenue club for the observation of the girls described in their report. The volume Mothers Who Must Earn is the result of work done by Katharine Anthony, who was assisted in her field work by Ruth S. Waldo, a junior fellow.1

In the fall of 1912 practically the whole staff at that time employed devoted two months’ time to inspection of the industrial establishments of the district, under authority of the New York State Factory Investigating Commission. The results were published as Appendix V, to Volume I, of the Commission’s Preliminary Report, 1912.

Thanks are due to many persons who gave unstintedly of their time to the various investigators. Our indebtedness is especially great to the staff of the Clinton District office of the Charity Organization Society, who brought us in touch with many families in their care, and through their varied experience helped us in interpreting many aspects of neighborhood life. Among 


other agencies, Hartley House was particularly generous in making us acquainted with its Italian neighbors and in giving us the opportunity to visit them in their homes. The teachers of various local schools should also be mentioned with appreciation for the help they gave us in many ways.

Pauline Goldmark.