ADVERTISING DEPARTMENT. High Class Talent A PARTIAL LIST FOR 1911-12 MR. WILL CARLETON Editor, Orator, and Poet: author of "Farm Ballads," "Farm Festivals," etc., etc. His magnetic presence and wonderful diction have won him the highest place on the platform. REV. CHARLES EDWARD STOWE Son of Harriet Beecher Stowe, a world-renowned traveler and lecturer. His famous lecture, "How Uncle Tom's Cabin Was Written," is illustrated by more than a hundred pictures. MR. EDGAR JUDSON EBBELLS Reader, Impersonator and Interpreter. Shakespeare, Browning, Kipling, etc., etc. especially to cultured people. REV. ISAAC M. FOSTER For years the best known reader of Endorsed by all classes, and appeals Minister, Lecturer and Orator. Past-Chaplain-in-chief of the G. A. R. Captured and imprisoned by the Confederates. His "Life in Confederate Prisons" makes him the legitimate successor of Bishop McCabe. MR. LYMAN BEECHER STOWE Author and lecturer. A contributor to leading magazines and one of the most forceful of the present day writers. Subjects now ready: "School Republics," "Judge Ben. B. Lindsey and His Children's Court," "The Immigrant at Ellis Island," "The Public Service Commission of New York." REV. WM. JAY PECK, D. D. Is one of the most popular and interesting lecturers on the platform. His discourse abounds in fact, wit, humor, and pathos. Dr. Peck has travelled extensively the world over, and is prepared to give lectures on all lands, with illustrations if desired. We shall be pleased to send you full particulars, together with circulars, on request. This is only a partial list. If you want ANY first class talent, write us, and we will give you terms and dates. GLOBE LITERARY BUREAU 150 NASSAU STREET, NEW YORK CITY Readers will oblige both the advertiser and us by referring to EVERY WHERE. 195 இருக Block Reconstruction. BY BERNARD J. NEWMAN. IN any comprehensive plan for the betterment of the city, the character of the homes of the people must be given careful consideration. The only excuse a city has for being is that it may serve the convenience of man. All schemes for beautifying its streets, parks or buildings, or plans for rapid transit of the people, or of goods, are for the benefit of its residents. The aim of city planning is that a more habitable place of living may be made for the multitudes that crowd together; but the best-developed scheme within the vision of the city planner would fail if it did not include the homes of the people. Here the health of a city centers, and, without health or healthful conditions, naught else avails much; for where is the gain if a city has the most beautiful parks and boulevards while her people, to the number of several hundred thousands, live in or in the neighborhood of hovels, rear dwellings, poorly-constructed or dilapidated buildings, dead-end alleys, or amid bad sanitation, with foul cesspools, surface drainage and stagnant puddles, with an inadequate water supply, six, eight and ten houses to one hydrant, or drawing water for washing, cooking and drinking from hydrants a half mile distant? Where is the gain in radial streets if the death rate is high-twentyfour, twentyfive and twentyeight per thousand people, in congested wardsand the sick list outstrips it beyond accurate reckoning? City planning, to be comprehensive, must take in the congested areas and transform them so that they cannot start waves of conta gious diseases and cannot weaken the vitality or lower the morality of the people. The Philadelphia Housing Commission, interested in a better Philadelphia, where every family shall have a wholesome home, advocates block reconstruction as an essential feature of all city planning, and one that should receive first consideration whenever money for comprehensive city improvement is to be appropriated. To demonstrate the need and its feasibility, the Commission has taken an average block in the congested area as an example. The particular block selected is not the worst one nor is it the best that could be found, there are many blocks infinitely worse and many much better. It is an average congested block similar to one hundred and fifty others in the city that is exacting its price in ill health, bad morals and unhappiness from its people. Several investigators, familiar with the technicalities of a housing investigation, took a census of the block; an expert plumber was assigned to the drainage system, cesspools, water-closets and sewer connections; the work was carefully and accurately done, and the results obtained are thoroughly reliable. Numerous photographs were taken and a model was made representing the conditions as they appear on the surface. In all, one hundred and fiftyfive houses were visited. Only two of these are licensed tenements; two others, not licensed, have three families doing their own cooking in their own kitchens. Twentytwo houses have two |