Back to the soil or, From tenement house to farm colony : a circular solution of an angular problem

Dedication

I dedicate this book, first, to the Ward VT. Conference of Associated Charities, in Boston; and, secondly, to the memory of the youthful Saul, son of Kish.

The Author.

Introduction

The publishers of this important book have asked me to write a few lines of introduction, if only to beg readers to take the book most seriously, as an important contribution to one of the great central questions of the time. They have asked an old man to say this, who has had to fight the worst tendencies of city life in most of his man's work, in the daily routine of a working minister. They have thought that his word might carry enough weight with it, to persuade serious readers to take the book, not as another Utopia, but as a real contribution to the scientific sociological work of this new century.

Mr. Frederick Law Olmsted, that eminent improver of cities, who has done so much for the beauty and health of American towns, once said to me that, while he was greatly praised for his work in the ruralising of the cities, he considered the complementary work of the urbanising of the country to be an enterprise far more important in the life of America.

This careful opinion of a leader like him will be shared by all men who will diligently study the most difficult problems of our social order.

X INTRODUCTION.

It must be observed that whatever is done must be done in accord, — by a considerable number of people, who are, from the beginning, to bear one another's burdens, and whose success depends, as most success depends, on the victory of — together.

The prejudice, natural enough, which keeps George Hammer, the blacksmith, in a crowded tenement-house, where his next neighbours are Will Penman, the teller in the Commercial Bank, and Henry Jalap, the apothecary at the corner, springs from an effort which Frank Question-mark made eleven years ago, when the Prospect Hill speculators advertised their lots for sale. Trains went out one day to Prospect Hill, and no one had to buy tickets. This was the day when lots were sold at auction. There was a pretty pavilion on Everett Square, which was an oval space in the middle of the lots. There was a nice free lunch, — oysters and salad, yes, — with a little champagne. The view was exquisite. Even the birds sang, — and the visitors gathered long-stemmed violets for their wives. The lots were put up for sale, and they sold with spirit, so that when ISTos. 23 and 24 were sold, Erank was able to purchase, at exactly the price he had dreamed of. He and Eanny did not mean to build, that year ; but, next year, — " Oh, it would be lovely ! "

Yes ! But when Fanny was well enough to ride

INTRODUCTION. XI

out, and they took her on her first ride with the nurse and the baby, things did not look so attractive. The grass was now very high, and it even grew in the roadway as well as in the house-lots. There were awful gulches in the roads, where the water had run riot in a summer storm a few days before. A deserted shanty had a door swinging open, on which was a sign that the agent would be found at No. 4 Mammon Block, in town. Frank told Fanny that all would be quite different in the next year ; and they rode home, but rather silent, and they did not go to the nursery to buy plants for their garden.

Before long the tax-bill came in for the new house-lots. Frank paid the tax-bill, but found, a little to his disgust, that no other purchaser had materialised, and that he was the only " householder " on Prospect Hill.

He holds the deed of his two lots still. But he has never built his home there. He still lives in a tenement house, and tries to solace his wife by calling their home a suite in an " apartment house." Their children live, and move, and have a being ; but they are sallow and pale, and not one of them knows a violet from a China aster, or a bobolink from an English sparrow. Such is the experience which most dwellers in crowded towns have, in their efforts to retire into the country.

What Mr. Gilman proposes, my friends, in this xii INTRODUCTION.

book, is that earnest men and women shall combine in a noble enterprise, in which all of them shall walk with God, and shall work with God. I will not anticipate the reader's pleasure by stepping one pace forward on the pleasant path where Mr. Gilman invites us to walk with him.

So far as that path opens before us, I will only say that the book offers a practical method for removing, at once, in one joint enterprise, people who are freezing or sweltering in the life of one of our crowded towns, into that life of nature, — of oxygen and ozone, of hope and of the joy which belongs to hope, — which is indicated where the Scripture S2ijs that the Lord God planted a garden, and placed in it the first man and woman, that they might be fellow workers with him, in conquering the world and subduing it.

The book is written and published in Massachusetts. Massachusetts is commonly spoken of among the crowded States of the world. The average population of Rhode Island, of Connecticut, of Belgium, is larger than that of Massachusetts. But Massachusetts is more densely peopled than the island of Ireland, generally called crowded. For, three million people, in Massachusetts, inhabit rather more than eight thousand square miles, — say roughly, five million and a half acres. It is easy to see that every household in Massachusetts — if there be ten persons in

INTRODUCTION". Xlll

a household — might have and control sixteen acres of land, if men wanted really to bring up their children to work with God, to walk with him, under his open heaven, and to see Him as the pure in heart see Him.

And larger opportunities than these present themselves, in those American States which are not "densely peopled."

Such are some of the simple considerations, which ought to persuade the intelligent reader of this book, not merely to " run his eye " over it, as an amusing fancy of a wide-awake author, but to study it, as an important suggestion for the social order of the days before us.

Edward E. Hale.

Preface

This book aims at setting forth the hopeful possibilities of country life, in contrast with the forlorn and desperate actualities of the crowded life of our larger cities. It depicts, in fiction form, the concrete conditions under which country life should be undertaken ; and it points out many of the resources and opportunities of the country, which thus far have been overlooked. If the author had believed that he was merely adding one more to the long list of books which vainly deplore existing conditions among the city poor, he would not have set pen to paper ; but, because he has been convinced, by study and experience, that the city cannot remedy the ills it generates, and that the country districts — if properly developed — can, in large measure, remedy those ills, he has ventured to portray, and

XVI PREFACE.

even to minutely describe, his ideal of a rural community of working-people.

He is not ignorant of the many failures which have resulted, in the past, from schemes of community and farm-colony life. He simply affirms that those failures were due to violations of social law, which, in the plan here offered, are avoided ; and he further asserts that his plan comprises certain vitally important features, which have not before been utilised, or even clearly recognised.

The one great barrier to farm life, for city-bred poor, — solitude, — is overcome, in this plan, by a unique method of grouping the homes as closely as possible, and by various other methods less novel. The addition of " minor industries," or " small handicrafts," to the usual round of farm duties can give wholesome variety of work and increased sources of income.

The book distinctly rejects and condemns " Socialism," or " Communism," as a basis for united action, and urges a free cooperative "Individualism," by which many enterprises

PKEFACE. Xvii

are possible, which have been impossible, heretofore, in farm life, as commonly understood.

Such persons as have kept informed upon the problems of city pauperism, and means for its relief, must have noted how close many writers have come to the remedy offered by the farm-colony. This striking contrast, between crowded city and sparsely settled country, led Carlyle to exclaim, in his essay, "Chartism," "Our terrestrial planet — ninetenths of it yet vacant, or tenanted by nomads — is still crying, 'Come and till me, come and reap me ! ' "

Again, Mrs. S. A. Barnett, of Toynbee Hall, London, in an essay, says : " To get the young of our vast cities interested in country life, is no slight good, now, when migration or emigration seems the only solution to the great problem of city overpopulation."

Hardly a writer or thinker or worker, in the philanthropic field, but has cast his eyes longingly, but rather hopelessly, at the broad untenanted tracts of the country ; but so many

XVU1 PKEFACE.

glittering Utopias have dissolved into damp fog, that few persons have dared hope for successful colonisation. This book, however, dares to reopen the subject ; it ventures to exploit hitherto undeveloped resources for happiness, offered by country life ; and it indicates some of the fruitful lines of industry, which there could be entered upon, in conjunction with the tilling of the soil.

The amount of money required to launch such a colony as is here outlined would be easily forthcoming, if people were convinced of the soundness of the plan. In these days of magnificent fortunes, and munificent gifts, a hundred dollars or a hundred thousand dollars are often equally available for sound public reforms and wise philanthropies.

The author cannot rationally expect that his new theories of farm colonisation will be found impregnable at all points, and workable in all particulars ; he simply believes that, in the main, this book opens a path of hope for the city's poor ; and he welcomes corrections and amendments from any, who, like himself,

PREFACE. XIX

feel deeply concerned for an improvement in the social and industrial condition of the worthy but unhappy poor, now swarming in our large cities.

Bradley Gilman\

Contents

PAGE

CHAPTER

Introduction ix

Chapter I. The Problem Introduced

IF my memory serves me aright, the problem with which this little book concerns itself first faced me as long ago as when I was a boy, and a hungry tramp came to the door, asking food. Then, for the first time, I realised that there really were people in the world, who did not find a bountiful table set for them, three times a day. From that time on, at intervals, in various ways, I had intimations of the distress and need which exist in many hearts and homes, throughout the world. Sometimes it was a beggar asking alms on the street, or it was a collection for "the poor," taken in church, or a paragraph in

A BACK TO THE SOIL.

the newspaper, recounting the horror of an accident and the destitution of a family.

The full magnitude of the problem, however, did not come to me until many years later, after I had completed my studies at school and college, had passed through my ordination service, and been installed over a parish. Those incidents of childhood, already named, were certainly the more remote phases of my experience, which led up to the careful consideration and attempted solution here given. But the series of incidents, which led more directly to it, began, as nearly as I can recollect, with a certain evening in October, when I came home, weary and despondent, from my parish round of duties, and took my seat at the tea-table.

My wife, who is always quick to discern my moods, asked no questions, but ran cheerily on in a little chit-chat of reminiscences about the sewing-circle, which had met that afternoon. Twelve aprons had been made up, for the North End Children's Home, and a barrel of second-hand clothing had been packed and sent to the Ockmulgee Coloured School, in Georgia.

When I had finished my tea, I felt somewhat refreshed, and more inclined to talk. This change of mood did not escape my watchful wife's notice, and she casually inquired, as she led the way into the library, " What has happened, to make you so depressed ? Nothing serious, I hope." And she sat down with her sewing, at the table, and I threw myself on the lounge.

" Oh, nothing unusual," I replied, gloomily ; " it's only the same old story, a man out of work, and his wife and five children hungry and cold."

"What family is it?" inquired my wife. " Do I know them ? "

"It's that family on the east side," I answered. "Follen is the name. I think you carried some clothing and dainties there, once, when the oldest child had a fever."

"Certainly, I recall them. What is the trouble with them? Is Mr. Follen out of employment?"

"Yes. He is a printer by trade, and a fairly good workman, I'm told. But they have introduced two of those new type-setting machines into the office where he works, and he and a dozen other men have been discharged. The new machines, with one man at each, can do the work of six or eight men."

I spoke with a little bitterness, and I was conscious of a slight sense of anger toward Howland and Stetson, for having made this new departure in their business. My wife had the same thought, for she looked up from her work and said : " That seems very unlike Mr. Howland. I have met him once or twice, and I have often seen his name on lists of contributions to various charities. Probably it is Mr. Stetson's doing. I have heard — "

" Oh, no, my dear," I interrupted ; " you are on the wrong tack, if you will pardon me for saying so. Howland is a good man, and so is Stetson. I have met them several times, and their reputation in the city is high. I fear that you don't understand the ins and outs of the matter. They mean well by their employes, but they are driven to this step by competition. You see, they publish, among other papers, the Weekly Gazette. Now, that periodical is much like the Family Assistant, to which you subscribe. If I remember aright, you said that the annual subscription to the Assistant was a half dollar less, this year. I don't know the facts, but I surmise that the publishers of the Assistant have introduced these new machines, and have thereby lessened the cost of printing; they can therefore afford to offer it at a lower rate of subscription. The Weekly Gazette is a paper very similar to the Assistant, and must also lower its subscription, or the people who now take the Gazette will soon take the Assistant, instead."

" So that is what you mean by ' competition,' " remarked my wife, nervously biting off a needleful of thread as she spoke.

" Yes, that is one example, out of hundreds which could be given, of the harsh, inexorable working of the economic principle of competition."

"Well, I don't like it," ejaculated my wife, looking at me as reproachfully as though I had instituted it, and was responsible for its harmful doings. Despite my depression, I laughed at the dear woman, so quick to feel for all unfortunate souls, and I said : " I'm sure I don't like it any better than you do; or, at least, I don't enjoy seeing the suffering and misfortune it often causes. But I didn't create the laws of political economy, and I protest against your looking upon me as if I were responsible for them. Moreover, there are many things which we don't like, which we cannot eliminate from the world ; for instance, earthquakes, and early frosts, and zero weather, and pneumonia, and other ills too numerous to mention."

My wife was silent. I knew she was thinking, not about the working of hard general laws of political economy, but about a very concrete case, — Follen's family, and how she could arrange her work, the next day, so as to go and visit them. I was on the point of going on with my subject, far enough to convince her that, because of this very introduction of a labour-saving printing machine, she had paid a half dollar less for her subscription ; but, at that moment, the door-bell rang, and, in a few moments, our maid, Bridget, announced our neighbour and intimate friend, Doctor Barton.

We greeted him with pleasure. Every one did that, for he was a kindly, sympathetic man, who entered immediately into everybody's cares and troubles. He was hardly what you would call " genial," not being quite lethargic enough for that soothing term of description ; but he was alert, interesting, sympathetic, encouraging; and those are qualities upon which most people, whether they know it or not, base their choice of a physician.

" I remembered your oft-given invitation to come in and finish my cigar at your fireside," remarked the doctor, " and here I am." And he drew up a chair, like the privileged friend he was, and asked me, in his merry, quizzical way, if I had been a good pastor all day, and asked my wife what she really thought of me, as an investment.

Margaret made some reply, in the same light vein, and then there was silence for a few moments ; it was that kind of easy, comfortable silence which can be indulged in only among intimate friends. Presently I took up the idea which my wife and I had been discussing, and briefly restated it for Doctor Barton's benefit. " Margaret thinks the law of competition a great blot on our civilisation," I said ; " but you and I know, that, despite all the merciless changes which it brings, it brings also many benefits. I was on the point of showing her, as you came in, that the same type-setting machine, which throws five fellows like Follen out of work, gives her a lower subscription rate for her magazine or newspaper."

The doctor puffed out one or two clouds of smoke, in his nervous way ; then he replied : " Yes, that is true ; but I, personally, would rather pay the larger price for the paper, and have those poor fellows kept at their work. That isn't good political economy, perhaps, but I have recently seen several cases of distress, coming from just those causes, — labour-saving inventions, — and I don't call them unmitigated blessings."

That was the good doctor's way. His feelings were quick, and he nearly always took sides with poverty and distress, without much regard for the logic of the situation.

I shook my head, in disapproval. I believe that I am as deeply touched by pain and sorrow as he is ; but I have a tolerably strong sense of the inexorable working of law, social as well as physical ; and I felt the futility of sweeping back the ocean from one's dooryard. " You can't hold back the progressive spirit of man," I said. "He will search out new ideas, new and short ways of doing things ; and, in the long run, I believe this benefits the race. You say you would gladly pay a half-dollar more, and keep Foil en in his place ; but you can afford to do that. Not so can hundreds of other individuals, who have less income than you, and now can afford to take this periodical."

" Is this worthy gentleman the paid canvasser for the Family Assistant?" queried the doctor, facetiously. Then he added, seriously : " I have heard that point urged before ; and I suppose that, in the main, it is correct. But I sometimes think I would like to look through the books of one of those business houses, after they have taken on such an invention, and turned away workmen, and reduced the cost of production, and lowered the price of their manufactured goods. I would like to see if the amount by which they lower their selling price corresponds exactly with the amount they save in their production. Or do they make a little margin, off that reduced cost of production, for their own pockets? I suspect that they make a little for themselves, and save a little for the buyers of their goods, but the workman is the loser in the transaction. The transferred workman, who is put at the

THE PROBLEM INTRODUCED. ll

machine, becomes a good deal of a machine himself ; and the discharged workmen are pushed out to face starvation and death, yes, and crime, before they can get a foothold again."

The hot little man was growing more and more excited, as he spoke. He ran his hand nervously up through his iron-gray hair, and his cigar nearly went out.

" You may be correct in your surmises," I said, reluctantly, "but what are you going to do about it ? The employers have the advantage of ' position,' as the military strategists say ; and the workmen have to fight on open, exposed ground."

"There, there, Walter!" interrupted my wife, rising, " I shall not stay any longer, to hear you two wrangle over those dry subjects. I must go and look over the purchases I made this afternoon, at Gcrham's, and be sure they are ready for use."

She was putting up her sewing, as she spoke. Doctor Barton, at the mention of " Gorham's," turned and looked at her.

"What did you buy at Gorham's?" he asked, sharply.

Margaret regarded him for a moment in silence. She knew him too well to think his question one of idle curiosity, but she sometimes loved to tease the irascible little man. " I bought a dozen stoves, and a load of hay, and four new sewing-machines, and — " She was mischievously keeping tally on her fingers as she announced these impossible purchases. (Gorham's was a dry-goods store, I may add, by way of explanation.)

" No, I'm serious," interrupted Doctor Barton. "What did you buy?" And he arose and looked sharply at her with his penetrating little gray eyes.

Margaret ceased her fun, and replied, " Why, I bought some blankets, and some cotton cloth, and then I picked up some very good bargains in children's underwear. I — "

" Just as I thought, " ejaculated the doctor. " That is what I was after ; that purchase of underwear. The garments were cheap, too, I'll venture to say."

" Yes," said Margaret, somewhat puzzled, " they were."

" Dirt cheap, I've no doubt," continued the doctor ; " and dirt is cheap — sometimes ; but when dirt turns out to be disease, it isn't so cheap. Now, what I am driving at is this. Wash those undergarments thoroughly, in boiling water, before you put them on the children. Unless," he added, grimly, "you want me here, in an official capacity."

I saw the drift of his remark. " You mean — ' sweat-shop,' I suppose," said I.

" Yes, I do ; just that. I happen to know that Gorham has the larger part of his work done in sweat-shops, at the lower end of the city. And when I've said that, I've said enough to explain my remark about boiling those garments."

My wife still looked incredulous. "Why, they are perfectly clean," she began to explain. " They are white, and fairly well made, and nicely folded up, and — and — why, anybody would think I had brought home clothing from a second-hand shop on Flint Street."

The doctor shrugged his shoulders, and sat down, as if throwing off all responsibility. " I would rather trust some of that Flint Street clothing, than underwear from a sweat-shop. Why, see here ! Do you, either of you, know the horrors of a real sweat-shop? I'll tell you." And the energetic little man was on his feet again, his eyes glowing, and his cigar now quite forgotten.

" Those garments were probably made," said he, " in some such place as this. I tell you now what I saw myself, last week, when I went, with a member of the Board of Health, and visited several of those dens. First, a room about twice as large as this library (the ceiling considerably lower, and therefore the cubic feet of air much less). In that room picture ten or twenty men, women, and children, working at sewing-machines, or with the needle ! The place hot, close, damp with the perspiration of those heated, unwashed human bodies. Pale, diseased creatures, bent over their work, coughing, spitting, swearing. Hands and faces grimy with dirt. Unmentionable filth in some parts of the room, two or three little children, scrofulous in appearance, lying on piles of garments, or playing among them. The odours were almost unendurable ; and — "

"There, there!" exclaimed my wife, putting out her hands in protest. " That is enough. I don't wish to hear any more. I'll — I'll go and give orders to Bridget to boil those garments ; if, indeed, I keep them. I really think I would better give them away."

" Well," said Doctor Barton, sententiously, "boil them, just the same. Don't take the responsibility of spreading disease, even among your dependent families. Walter, give me a match ! My cigar has gone out."

Margaret presently left us, and we two fell into a further conversation about the sweat-shops. " There are hundreds of them, in each of our larger cities," said Doctor Barton, speaking more calmly. " They must be a prolific source of disease." And he told me, more in detail, some of the forms of disease which were probably engendered in these dens, and sent out from them into better classes of families.

I listened to him rather gloomily, for I knew, more or less distinctly, the dreadful character of such places. I partly listened and partly conjectured, as to the possible remedy for this crying evil. When Doctor Barton finished his chapter of horrors, I said to him : " All this is the exact, awful truth ; I know you don't exaggerate one point. But the remedy ! What is the way to prevent the existence of such cesspools of distress and disease ?"

The sympathetic physician's answer was prompt. " I would have laws regulating the size and character of all buildings and apartments used for labour ; " he said, firmly. " And, what is more, I would have such laws enforced, no matter who owns the building ! No matter if it is a clergyman, or a rich parish. Some of our churches actually hold property, tenement-houses, used as sweat-shops ; and, I'm told, they are hard landlords to deal with."

" I'm not responsible for them ; " I said, smiling, for the angry little doctor was looking at me in a threatening manner. " I am sure that my church has no such investments. But, even if you could regulate the sanitary conditions of these poor creatures, you have not helped them much toward keeping above the starvation level. What were the prices paid them? I have read, but have forgotten."

" I talked with several of them, and they told me that they got only forty and sixty cents for making a garment which retailed for three and five dollars ; and twenty cents on one that sold, retail, for seventy-five cents. Several of them declared that, though they worked ten hours and more each day, they could not earn much above four dollars a week. Shameful ! Isn't it ? I think we ought to have a law that would forbid any employer paying less than a dollar and a half a day."

"But that wouldn't do," I remonstrated. " The employer might at once discharge his work-people. Then they would be worse off than before ; nothing a week is certainly worse than four dollars a week."

" I don't know about that," growled the irate doctor, shaking his round, gray, curly head. " I'm not so sure that quick starvation isn't better than the prolonged kind."

" In some of our cities," I continued, " an attempt has been made to arouse public opinion, and boycott stores which sell these sweat-shop garments. I recently — "

" Good idea ! " interrupted the doctor. " Excellent ! That ought to bring the storekeepers and contractors to their senses."

" I was about to say," I went on, " that I recently received a letter from a friend of mine, in a Western city, and she told me that where she lived there was much public indignation upon the subject, and many people had signed a pledge, promising not to buy garments, which they knew, from the prices., must have been made in sweat-shops."

" I only hope they'll stick to it," exclaimed the doctor, promptly. " Those movements often start out bravely, but soon fade and vanish."

" You are right," said I. " I often think that, while the new and much used word ' initiative ' is a good one, there is a better, and that is * continuance.' I have often observed that the well-worn maxim, l It is the first step that costs,' breaks down in actual practice ; and the first step often costs least, and the subsequent steps are the difficult and decisive ones. However, there is one point connected with that sale of sweat-shop garments, which offers difficulties. If a hundred or a thousand women pledge themselves to refrain from buying such goods, and keep to their pledge, they may succeed in driving those goods out of the market; but, in doing so, they have put them out of the reach of many people, possessed of less wealth than themselves, who cannot afford to pay larger prices, and must go without."