SURVEY AND EXHIBIT SERIES
EDITED BY SHELBY M. HARRISON
TRAVELING PUBLICITY
CAMPAIGNS
EDUCATIONAL TOURS OF
RAILROAD TRAINS AND
MOTOR VEHICLES
BY
MARY SWAIN ROUTZAHN
DEPARTMENT OF SURVEYS AND EXHIBITS
RUSSELL SAGE FOUNDATION
[Illustration]
NEW YORK
RUSSELL SAGE FOUNDATION
Copyright, 1920, by
THE RUSSELL SAGE FOUNDATION
WM. F. FELL CO·PRINTERS
PHILADELPHIA
[Illustration]
EDITOR’S PREFACE
In the endeavor to spread information widely and well a multitude
of ventures have been carried on in recent years. Interesting among
these has been the combining of educational material and activities
on the one hand with modern facilities for transportation on the
other--the putting of exhibits, demonstrations, motion pictures, and
other campaigning equipment on railroad trains, trolley cars, and
motor trucks so that they may tour a whole city, a county, or cross a
continent.
A glance at the appendix to this volume will show how extensive this
form of educational effort has become. Beginning a dozen or more years
ago with trains which showed improved methods of farming the list
includes trains for teaching health, sanitation, safety, and food
saving; trolley cars carrying exhibits on child welfare; and automobile
trucks equipped to give motion picture shows on health and other
subjects. Recently some of the trucks have also carried equipment for
demonstrating methods of food canning, or for dispensary service. While
the traveling campaign centering in the railroad car has had the longer
history, developments in the educational use of the motor truck have
been of such number and variety as to indicate, if one may venture in
probabilities, relatively greater future activity for it.
The extensive use of this method of disseminating knowledge in the
past, and the probable continuation and extension of it in some form,
have made it seem desirable to bring together as much as possible of
the working knowledge which has been gained in planning and conducting
these campaigns, and to put it at the disposal of those interested in
popular forms of educational work. The material here presented is thus
not so much an evaluation of the traveling campaign method of spreading
information as a review, or perhaps better, an anthology of practical
experience thus far formulated, plus the observations of the author of
the volume. The practice of those who have had first-hand contact with
the problems and possibilities involved will undoubtedly have value for
future planning. It is hoped, however, that the experience here set
down, instead of forming a sole reliance or boundary to effort, may
become a stimulus to the play of fresh ingenuity in creating new forms
of illustrative material.
But as to the question of evaluation, until more data on these
campaigns are recorded, that will still need to be done by those
responsible for each particular tour and conversant with the particular
conditions and requirements of the case. It is a familiar and not
unnatural tendency, in selecting an avenue by which to reach the
public, to adopt a method already used by someone else without waiting
to get full information on its advantages and limitations. This happens
in large part no doubt because the information desired is often hard
to get without extensive inquiry. A second purpose of this volume is
to bring together in brief compass the available data on traveling
campaigns and thus to lessen the burden of extended inquiry for those
who will need to make practical decisions.
In addition to a pooling of the facts gained through the practical
conduct of traveling publicity campaigns it is further hoped that the
material here assembled may provide a sort of nucleus or center of
gravity which will attract criticisms and further data. The criticisms,
in the course of time, may lead to a fuller treatment of the subject,
and afford a better basis for determining whether the advantages
of campaigns set upon wheels outweigh their inherent disadvantages
when viewed in relation to particular projects or other campaign
possibilities.
In the meantime grateful acknowledgment is made to the many who have
already been generous in answering inquiries and furnishing information
gained from their daily contact with traveling campaigns, and to those
who have furnished photographs and offered many helpful suggestions.
SHELBY M. HARRISON.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
PAGE
EDITOR’S PREFACE iii
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS xi
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTORY 1