CORROBORATIVE TESTIMONY

"Skilled employment must be taught to boys and girls alike, at the earliest age consistent with educational claims. Labor must, however, never be drudgery, but a delight to the young workers; and to insure this, not only must the most effective teachers be secured, but the tastes and capacity of each child must be carefully studied, so that the industry chosen shall in each case be congenial, and not repugnant.

"Religion must occupy no secondary position in such a Home. Its principles must be taught and its precepts practiced with that deep and loving enthusiasm which shall secure for it ever after a sacred place and a mighty influence in the hearts and lives of the children."—Thomas J. Barnardo, F.R.C.S., Ed., Founder "Dr. Barnardo Homes," London.

CORROBORATIVE TESTIMONY

OHIO STATE BOARD OF CHARITIES.

Asa S. Bushnell, Governor, Prest., Ex-officio.

Roeliff Brinkerhoff, Mansfield.

William Howand Neff, Cincinnati.

W. A. Hale, Dayton.

Charles Parrott, Columbus.

M. D. Follett, Marietta.

Henry C. Ranney, Cleveland.

Joseph P. Byers, Clerk.

Mansfield, Ohio, August 17, 1898.

Mr. Horace Fletcher, Chicago, Ill.

My Dear Sir: Yours of the 15th inst. received; also proof sheets of your forthcoming publication, which I have read with great pleasure.

I heartily agree with you in the opinion that the children must first be cared for if we are to make any great progress in reducing crime.

In nearly all that I have written or spoken during the past twenty years upon this subject I have taken this position.

Five years ago, when I was in San Francisco and spent some days with Mrs. Sarah B. Cooper, with whom I had had correspondence for several years, and with Mr. Crowley, Chief of Police, I was profoundly impressed with the power for good of the kindergartens as there administered.

The only way to make good character and good habits a foundation in the lives of growing children, which is the aim of the kindergarten, universal, is to make the training a part of our common school system, and I think that accomplishment must be our objective point.

You quote what I said about the results of kindergarten work in San Francisco, and in the main, correctly, but just what Mrs. Cooper and Chief Crowley said you will find in Warden Hale's address, at Saint Paul, Minn., in 1894, which you will find in the Annual Report of the Saint Paul National Prison Congress.

Mrs. Cooper said that in fourteen years, out of about 16,000 kindergarten children, they had the history of about 9,000, and of these not one had been arrested for crime. Chief Crowley said that out of 8,000 children arrested in San Francisco, but one had been trained in a kindergarten.

Warden Hale for many years has been in charge of the great prison at San Quentin, near San Francisco, and his testimony is valuable.

Your book is timely and will be a valuable aid in educating a healthy public sentiment. In the hasty reading I have been able to give it I see nothing to criticise. Personally I believe that the religious element in teaching should, at least, have equal prominence with the industrial and intellectual. Instead of the three R's of first importance in old-time teaching, I am in favor of three H's, in the following order: The Heart, the Hand, and the Head.

I give you God-speed in your good work, and if I can at any time give you a helping hand please command me. Very sincerely yours,

R. Brinkerhoff.