CLEVELAND--THE CRIME OF NEGLECT
"_A servant grafted in my serious trust And therefore negligent._"
--SHAKESPEARE.
The midnight bell was striking. The great city of Cleveland was going
to rest as I rode to my hotel. I, too, was soon resting,--but not
sleeping. I was forming a resolution to become _absolutely indigent_
for an extended time. My assumed destitution previously had been of
very brief periods, always having money at my hotel or in my pockets
for my immediate needs. "What," I reasoned, "does the man who at any
moment can place his hand in his pocket and secure relief know of the
real struggle of the penniless and homeless worker?"
I looked myself over. I was healthy, comparatively strong. I had no
trade, yet was clever at many things. I was honest, sober, willing,
industrious. So I entered, with an iron-clad resolve, into a mental
contract, signing and sealing it, that I would go penniless to Memphis,
Tenn., with a determination to secure work on the government works on
the Mississippi river for the winter. For I had discovered in my study
from New York to Cleveland many moneyless men striving to reach these
government works.
I would not steal, nor beat a railroad train, nor beg, but if forced
to do so, I would ask succor from those institutions which stand,
ostensibly, ready to help the needy. My itinerary, briefly given, would
be, Cleveland to Cincinnati, Cincinnati to Louisville, Louisville to
Memphis.
The next morning, after sending my baggage on to Memphis and paying my
hotel bill, I was completely broke, and found myself on the streets of
Cleveland, destitute, looking for work. I strolled up to the Public
Square while I was considering the best course to pursue. I had pulled
on my blue jeans over a pretty good business suit, for my investigation
was to be of that class of toilers who must work with their hands as
well as of the class that does those things we faultily regard as more
polite work. Destitute, homeless, friendless, I must honorably reach
the government works,--that was the point I had to keep ever in mind.
My first thought was as a hopeful medium to find work,--the newspapers.
Stepping up to a news-stand I asked for a paper, and thrust my hand
deep down in my pocket for the price. Thus it was that it came to
me forcibly for the first time that I was broke. I looked at the
news-vender as he handed me the paper and said, "Never mind, old man,
I have left my pocketbook at home." Then I remembered I had a postage
stamp and thought of offering that in exchange; but I remembered a
long delayed letter which must be sent home, and so I kept the stamp.
I thought of the many places where the newspapers were on file and the
newspaper offices.
Just as I entered the Square, a man sitting on a bench reading a
morning paper left abruptly, leaving the paper behind. I made a dash
for it with a half dozen other jobless men. I was the lucky one,
however. Hurriedly I sought the want columns. I scanned them carefully
and made note of those things I knew I could do. I also made note of
an "ad" reading: "Wanted, fifty supers at the Opera House. Apply at 10
A. M." Handing the paper to the other boys, I left quickly
on my mission for work. The super's job I kept as a last resort, if
all others failed. All others did fail. There were a great many idle
men and boys in Cleveland at that time. I saw the importance of being
early, for the answer invariably was, "The place is filled long ago."
So ten o'clock found me at the stage door of the Opera House with
several hundred others, hanging onto the hope of being a favored chosen
one. I knew that if successful I could work here nights, and that they
would probably pay the same price offered in Pittsburg. Through the day
I could do something else. I would therefore earn quickly enough to buy
a six-dollar ticket to Cincinnati and be well on my journey to the
government works, where, from all I had heard, I would be comfortably
located for the winter, and in line for making a stake.
The manager soon appeared and began rapidly to choose his men. We
discovered we were to be millionaire senators in a great political
play. I noticed I was being intentionally shunned, and fearful of not
being chosen, I remembered my good front beneath my workingman's garb.
I stepped up to the man and said, "I have better clothes than these.
I can make an appearance for the part," whereupon he immediately took
me. Our pay was to be three dollars and a half for eight performances,
covering a week,--a little less than forty-four cents a performance.
Although I had landed a job I was no better off so far as the immediate
needs for existence went. So I saw that I must be active in order to
cover the vacancy in some way. Already I was growing very hungry.
The first thing I did was to ask a man with a star for the Municipal
Emergency Home. He looked at me with a contemptuous smile, and seemed
to regard me as one just dropped out of Russia, China, or some other
heathen country. At last he said: "There is nothing like that here. I
never heard of such a thing. Did you?"
No one will ever know what it means to be really hungry until he is
broke. There seemed no other way for me to win a dinner other than
to ask the various restaurants the privilege of working for it. Of
the great number to which I applied, the answer was, "Nothing doing."
At last the proprietress of one restaurant told me she wanted some
one very badly for the noon hour rush to wipe dishes, and in return
for the work would gladly give me my dinner. I readily accepted the
offer, and was soon installed in the small kitchen of a very large,
cheap restaurant. I was obliged to stand near the dishwasher and his
tubs, hemmed in by a very narrow space. In an instant the rush was on.
Everything that was not nailed down or stuck to the wall was in the
air. The busy boys would come in with a San Juan charge, literally
firing the dishes into the big wash tub, and every time they did so I
received a shower-bath. Now, I would not have objected to a sprinkle or
two, but an immersion was a crime, and in my position I could neither
retreat nor advance. The old lady appearing, I demanded a release,
declaring our agreement was that I was to work for a meal and not a
bath. She declared the hour was now nearly up, and then, too, I did
not object as strenuously as I might have done, if, through the rain
and the mist, I had not caught sight of rows of pies, cake, ice-cream
and pudding. Also, perhaps as a panacea to my hurt feelings, the old
lady (who had a bass voice and weighed about three hundred pounds)
threatened to put a few of the reckless flunkies out of commission if
they did not exercise more caution.
True to her word, the moment the hour was spent, I was asked to sit
down to a banquet on the end of the cook's table, and the order issued
to give me all the corned beef, cabbage and boiled potatoes I wanted.
The pie, cake, ice-cream and pudding were not on the dishwiper's menu,
at least not that day, but I was to have all I wanted of what was given
me, and that meant a great deal. Regaining the street, I felt a strong
desire for a bath, clothes and all. Again approaching another appendix
to the correctional laws of Cleveland, I asked for the free public
baths. "Gad," he said, as he eyed me closely, "how many baths do you
take a day?" He then referred me to Cleveland's two public baths, which
were so far out that he advised me decidedly to take a street car.
"And are they absolutely free?" I demanded.
"No, one will cost you five cents and the other two."
I went to the lake.
In my little bundle I carried a small mirror, a hairbrush, a piece of
soap, a couple of white collars and a towel. Ye gods, what a bath that
was! The water was four degrees below freezing. However, I soon had on
the expression of the United States Senator whom I was to impersonate
at the Opera House that night, who wouldn't buy a vote, no, not if he
died for it, who could sit in the four o'clock Y. M. C. A. Sunday
afternoon meeting with a face as long as a fiddle, and an expression
that to the thought of a jackpot would prove fatal. Not one of the
elite in the great audience that night ever dreamed of the battle I had
gone through that day in Cleveland for the privilege of sitting in that
honored seat!
We were an exceedingly interesting group of millionaire senators,
for three-fourths of us were broke. After our great act, I timidly
approached the manager, and asked him if he would please advance me a
quarter as I had no place to sleep nor the money to buy a place. No, he
could not think of doing so. It was not their custom to pay until the
last performance. An old "senator" of sixty-eight years who sat next to
me, one of the many in the same plight I was in, was waiting to learn
the result of my plea.
We then began to try to find a place to rest, for that we must have.
Our act was not over until nearly ten-thirty o'clock, compelling us to
be out late. My brother senator knew Cleveland better than I did and
proposed going to the "charity" free lodging house where we could pay
by sawing wood an hour or more the next morning. We made our way to the
old rookery, which was in a hole down under the hill, but when we got
there it was closed and dark.
I then proposed the police station or the jail. He looked at me in
astonishment and said, "Do you think I would go there? I'll tell you
where we can go. I slept there the other night, and--well, it might
have been worse. It is on the floor of the High Ball Saloon on St.
Clair Street. There is no use to hurry, as we can't lie down until
twelve o'clock." He then continued, "Let us find some newspapers to
lie on." So as we walked towards our destination we searched the
rubbish boxes on the street corners for paper with which to make a bed.
Reaching the saloon, we stood about until midnight, at which time the
lights were turned low and the side doors locked. Then we were allowed
to lie down. We each had two newspapers which we spread under us.
After a moment I raised up and counted the little army of bedless men
who were obliged to seek shelter there that night. There were just an
even sixty lying upon the floor, and this number was augmented now
and then by a late arrival drifting in. A number of men stood at the
bar, or lunch stand, and caroused all night. One, verging on delirium
tremens, had a prize fight with a stone post. While the place seemed
clean and the floor clean for a great, cheap saloon, roaches by the
hundred were scampering all about us, and the odor from a near-by
toilet could scarcely be endured. In a calm moment of the revelers,
just as I felt that I might drop into a doze (my poor, weary, old
senator was sleeping through it all), a big Dutchman, whose bones
probably ached from coming in contact with the hard floor, raised
up and turned over. As he did so, he came down on a little Irishman.
Jumping up, he slapped the Dutchman in the face and a rough house was
in order for an extended time. Occasionally a "cop" or a plain-clothes
man came in and looked us over. For me to try to sleep was useless, and
promptly at five o'clock the order was given "Every man up."
My political colleague and I strolled confidentially up an alley to
the Public Square. Here was located a beautiful example of Cleveland's
humanity to man in a small, yet seemingly perfect public lavatory.
Every man, no matter how soiled or wretched, was given a towel and a
piece of soap to cleanse himself, and often I heard someone say, "Tom
Johnson's gift."
Food was the next essential to our good behavior and well-being. My
associate member proposed we try the "Charity" Lodging House again,
which we did. Yes, we could have breakfast if we would saw and split
wood for an hour or more first. We would certainly do so. Imagine the
state we were in from lack of food and sleep. And yet this homeless
old gentleman--and he was a gentleman--was eager and willing. After
splitting curly birch for over an hour, we were told to come to
breakfast. They gave us weak barley soup, poor bread, and the same
old "charity coffee." The staying qualities of that breakfast were
extremely fleeting, for by the time we had climbed the hill we were no
better off in regard to having our hunger appeased than when we went
in. As we came out we noticed a sign which read, as I remember it, to
this effect: "Persons coming here a second time must be expected to
take orders from the city." Not a very encouraging hope for the man who
was broke and who was only earning three-fifty per week, which he would
not get for six days.
Every day while in this city I found (aside from us senators) many men
who had secured work or would have gone to work, but who could find no
one to trust them. The boarding-house keepers had been imposed upon so
many times by penniless people that they were cautious. The contractor
or employer will never pay in advance, only at a stated time,--once
a week, once in two weeks, or once a month. While there may be
exceptions, through all my investigations in the larger cities of our
country, I have never found any relief for the penniless worker in this
time of need, either in public or private works. If he proves he is a
fine worker he is valuable to his employer and he wants to keep him.
But he does not know him. He may have unconquerable habits. It would
never do to pay him his wage when the day is done. He might not return,
so the employer hopes to hold him by offering him nothing, not even a
word of inquiry as to his needs, or of encouragement. He forgets that
he is an asset to the community, that whether working for the city or
the individual, every laborer is just as worthy of respect and esteem
as is the privileged owner of Forest Hill.
What an appeal for Cleveland's Emergency Home to fill this place of
need!
Reader, I want you to keep steadily in mind that you are looking at
_the man I describe_, not at me. I had multi-millionaire acquaintances
in Cleveland who would have granted me any request I might have made.
I held credentials on which any bank in that city would have honored
my check without question. I could have stepped into the home of the
exceedingly prominent lodge of which I was a member in good standing,
and could have had my every wish granted. I knew if I fell ill or met
with accident, to reveal my identity meant every care and comfort, the
speedy coming of a loving wife, kind relatives and friends. And so,
after all, while I might endure, I could only assume.
My aged "senator" friend left me, to walk a long way in search of
someone he knew, who perhaps would make his burden light. I did not
need to be told the feelings of the old gentleman as he wearily took
his departure. I had started for the Public Square to rest, though
momentarily, for there was a dinner which must be battled for. I passed
a fruit store. There was an array of delicious fruit in front,--many
baskets of rich, purple grapes, marked ten cents. I was sure I could
have eaten at least one basket. They were not directly in front of the
window. It would have been so easy to pick up a basket unseen and be
quickly lost in the crowd. After all it _was_ true, then, that starving
men and boys filched bottles of milk from doorsteps, a loaf of bread
from the bakery, or a pie from a wagon!
I stepped directly in front of the window and looked at the apples
and oranges. A woman inside seemed to have her eye on me,--I fancied
suspiciously. Instantly she stepped out and picking up one each of the
fairest of the apples and oranges offered them to me. I hesitatingly
regarded her gift. "Take them," she said, "God made them to be eaten."
I had had nothing to eat for eighteen hours except my "charity" bowl
of barley soup and with it the warning not to come back. The city of
Cleveland had nothing to offer. It remained for a poor woman to give me
a portion of her small possessions.
I reached the Square. Broken, I dropped into a seat and was immediately
lost in sleep, from which I was suddenly awakened by a sharp blow on
the bottom of my feet, which, through the thin half-wornout soles, left
a burning sting. Lifting my head, I saw a burly policeman who growled,
"Keep your eyes open. This Square is for wide-awake people."
"It certainly is not for the city of Cleveland, then, in its care for
its homeless," I remarked.
Remembering I was in a "Golden Rule" city, I felt that I could safely
reply to this august hint of the law, without fear of being "run in" or
beaten into insensibility, as I had seen helpless men treated in other
cities for such presumption. He simply gave me a half comprehending
look as he passed on. Now this officer was not the Chief of Police
in that city. He was simply a subordinate, and a city of six hundred
thousand people requires a large police force. Notwithstanding the
spirit of the Chief of Police, or his high ideal of what a police
department really stands for, his good aim and end will be miscarried
continually by his hirelings, until the required qualifications of a
policeman are based upon intelligence, good-will, good morals, good
deeds, and not upon the fact that he helped carry his ward.
I saw, however, during my short stay in this city evidences of
advancement in the character of their police system, which spoke
volumes for Cleveland, even though the homeless and temporarily
moneyless toiler, seeking work, found no help in the many
considerations for labor.
With the feeling that closing one's eyes in the public park in
Cleveland might mean life imprisonment or at least, for the second
offense, a rap on the head instead of the feet, which might disqualify
me for my seat in the "senate" that night, I forced myself to keep
awake, and in order to do that I had to keep moving.
The agreement with myself was not to beg or steal. I was to be always
"on the square." I decided to continue to look for work. The day
before, in search of work, I had climbed many stairs, entered stores,
hotels, factories, even tried the City, all without success. I began to
feel that perhaps I was too old, yet several of them had said, "Come
again. There are always chances. We may be able to use you in a few
days."
I realized I was weak from lack of sleep and nourishment. I must eat
first. Just then I overheard one starving man say to another (the park
was full of "wide-awake," starving men), "Jack, I have ten cents, let's
have a couple of beers."
"Honest, Bill, I'd rather have a loaf of bread for my share."
"But you see," returned Bill, "you can get a scoop of beer as big as a
toy balloon and a free lunch like a Christmas dinner for the price of a
loaf of bread."
"All right, I'm with you," said Jack who then continued, "Another week
like the one gone by, and want will have me in a home for incurables."
'Tis true I had forty-four cents due me for one day's "session" in the
"senate." But what of that? It was not due until Saturday night at
twelve o'clock. By that time hunger might drive a man to wreck, rob,
murder or suicide, and there is no telling what a politician will do,
even on a full stomach.
I then remembered hearing one "senator" telling another of a Catholic
institution where he had received a hand-out for some work. I
remembered the name of the place. I also remembered hearing another
say he had earned fifty cents that day beating carpets,--a job he
secured from the Associated Charities.
I first made my way to the Romanist institution. A Sister with a sweet
face framed in folds of black and white met me at the door. She looked
kind enough to give me the institution, but she didn't. If she had,
Cleveland would have had, from the way I was feeling just then, a
Municipal Emergency Home about as quickly as one could change the sign.
What she did give me was a job cleaning windows, for which I received a
bowl of cold coffee and a piece of bread. As I waited I caught glimpses
of delicious dishes of chicken, steaks, and other wholesome and dainty
edibles. To the cook, a bright young Irish woman who had received
orders to give me only what was before me, I said, as I looked at the
bowl and bread, "Do these people believe in multiplying anything around
here?"
"Yes."
"What?"
"Working hours."
"What do you do for something to eat when you get really hungry?"
"Well, you see, this is an institution what believes in fasting." We
both laughed and this brought forth a Mother Superior followed by
a Mother Inferior, whose faces were sour enough to start a pickle
factory. I felt that I had committed some unpardonable offense and
abbreviated my call by taking a speedy departure.
Scarcely were we seated that night in the "senate" before the old
"senator" told of the square meal he had that day and of a fine
place he had found in a stable where we could sleep with the comfort
befitting our distinguished station. He had not seen it, but knew where
it was and how to find it. So after the session adjourned, we started
for our newly-found shelter. It was now late in October. The nights
were unusually cold in Cleveland for that time of year. After walking
what seemed an interminable distance, the warm, bright street cars
passing us frequently (the fare only three cents), we finally reached
our shelter. It was not as we fancied it would be,--a large, fine barn,
half filled with new-mown hay. It was an old, closed-in, empty shed,
with two stalls and two mangers. We entered. By striking a few matches,
we could see to gather up enough of the refuse in the stalls to lie on,
by placing it in the narrow mangers. The "senator" took one and I the
other. He suggested that I take off my coat and place it over my head
and shoulders, saying that by so doing I would be much warmer than if
I kept it on. I found this to be true. So exhausted and weary had we
become that we were soon lost in profound sleep, from which I awoke at
three o'clock, perishing with the cold. I crept over and felt of the
old man. He was alive and sleeping soundly. I slipped out and walked
the streets for an hour. By the time I was thoroughly warmed the day
had begun to break. Very soon I found myself again in "wide-awake"
Square. I wasn't in the most amiable mood in the world. Far from it.
I began to feel that I would like to stand on their city hall steps
and tell the people of Cleveland what I thought of them. I slipped
into that ideal little lavatory, and with the warm water, soap and
clean towel, cleansed my hands and face until I felt refreshed. Then I
thought of Tom Johnson, and the bitterness left my heart. I actually
forgot for the moment that I was starving and fell to wondering whither
God had taken him and what great work he was doing in that land to
which he had gone.
I then left for the Labor Bureau of the Associated Charities. Perhaps I
could get work with enough pay in advance for a breakfast. On reaching
there I found twenty men and boys standing outside, and after waiting
an hour there seemed to be very little work to be had. Only a few were
supplied. During my stay in Cleveland, as a test, I went every day
to this place but never succeeded in getting work. This was the only
place I had been able to find in Cleveland which even offered work to
a man without money. I then tried for an hour to do something for a
meal, but was unsuccessful. Going back to the Square I sat down and
considered my contract and my feelings. I had agreed with myself to do
nothing that would make me lose my self-respect, yet I must eat or
forfeit my contract. I glanced down at my hand. There was the golden
circle of love,--my wedding ring. Other starving men had been forced to
pawn this priceless emblem of sweet memories. I remembered a penniless
man whom I met in San Francisco, weak from the suffering caused by
extreme want. He was an engraver by trade. Hoping against fate that
each day would bring him an opportunity, he walked and searched for
the place which he knew he could so ably fill. As we talked he told me
a story from the book of his life; of a girl wife and a baby boy whom
the Angel had taken. While he talked he glanced down and turned upon
his finger a slender thread of gold. I saw that to this man, there lay
in that circle of love, a sacred memory,--the blossoming of an honest
workingman's home, attributes of which were truth, love, honor and
eternal fidelity. The workingman's home,--without the intrusion of
poverty--is the stronghold of a great and good citizen, _the steadfast
guiding star of a great government_.
Speaking to me with that freedom born of the sympathy which binds
one homeless man to another (and he was a man, ambitious, free from
the bondage of any bad habit), he said, "I will have to pawn my ring
to-day, but," with determined emphasis, "I will never lose it. Yet I am
a little afraid of the pawnshop. Their rate of interest is theft, and
the time for redemption limited to one month."
We then talked of New York City's Provident Loan Association, which
is simply the poor man's depository, the interest only one per cent,
a month, and the time one year. The city that is without this social
good is the city that does not belong to the present day progress, and
must savor of betrayal, of artifice, of ill-gotten gains. As I left
him, I said, "Should you have to pawn your ring, look the matter up. Of
course, San Francisco must have so worthy an organization."
Leaving the Square I found a pawnshop. Unlike the man in actual
poverty, I had not the dread fear of losing the cherished momento. The
pawnshop man scratched it, weighed it, raised his hand, shrugged his
shoulders, and said, "I giff you vun dollar."
"But it cost ten," I said.
"Vell, all right, I giff you vun dollar."
There was no other way, I was helpless. So I replied, "All right, take
it." He gave me the dollar and a pawn certificate demanding for the
redemption of my ring a dollar and twenty-five cents if redeemed inside
of thirty days. If redeemed within an hour, it made no difference.
I had already tested the institutions, religious and otherwise, which
existed in Cleveland supposedly to shelter the destitute, and had been
either locked out or turned back into the street. How big that dollar
felt in my hand! I fancied it was a twenty-dollar gold piece. I did not
dare let go of it. With my old "senator" friend in mind, I saw a sign
which read, "Dinner twenty-five cents." I could not get into the place
quickly enough. I left greatly refreshed, but only half satisfied. I
found the old "senator," with whom I shared my fortune. He had been
unsuccessful in finding a job. He did as I did, spent twenty-five cents
for a meal and saved the other quarter for a bed. We were fixed for
that night, at least.
The next morning I saw a prosperous looking young man, standing on a
street corner. I don't know what prompted me to do so, but I stepped up
to him and inquired, "Do you know where a fellow can get a job?"
"Yes," he replied. "Do what I am doing. I am taking subscriptions for
a magazine and I am making two and three dollars a day, and it's dead
easy."
He handed me a card on which was the address of the office. The
agent told me he thought he had canvassers enough, but said, "You're
an intelligent looking cuss, I think I will try you." He made the
following proposition: "We offer five of our leading periodicals for
twenty-five cents, providing the person will subscribe for four of
them. These will come to him through the mail at twenty cents a month
for one year. A collector comes every month for the twenty cents."
The twenty-five cents paid down for the five magazines was to be my
commission. That night I had just two dollars, and I think I was the
happiest man in Cleveland. I had landed a job, and I fully realized
that I could have done twice as much if I had not been weakened by lack
of nourishment and exposure while seeking work. After drawing my salary
as "senator" and working like a Trojan through the day, the next Sunday
found me at the Big Four Station with just six dollars in my pocket.
Five dollars and twenty-five cents I paid for a ticket to Cincinnati.
Spending the balance for food while on the road, I landed in that city
at midnight, _broke_. I had no money, but I possessed a wealth of
knowledge in regard to the city of high standards on the shore of the
Erie inland sea.