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Show ! AND JETSAM OF HUMANITY V AS SEEN AT THE POLICE STATION ng the winter months, enacted In Salt Lake Clty iwerful human Interest: a pn of which never roaches (jcars of the general pub-fwnn pub-fwnn of Its taking place Phere the trials and suf-iflotsam suf-iflotsam and jetsam Is the ay occurrence. Tho place cupled by (he desk ser-Bllce ser-Bllce station, tho time Is nt from S o'clock until fmornlng and the actors fcart are men whose hands Kd knotted from years of ifyfaces are weather-worn and seamed They are dressed in the garb, common to tho laborer of our great cities, and they give as their homes, cities, towns and hamlets in every section of the world. One common com-mon characteristic, the hopeless, helpless look In their eyes, sets them apart and marks them as members of tho great family of "men who have missed it." Singly and In groups they enter the door of the station and ask for a place to sleep. ' 1'ndcr the adroit questioning of the desk sergeant their story comes out, first haltingly from those who are new to tho place and sometimes flippantly from those Inured to making the same request nightly. These latter are tho ones the solution of -whose problem Is cngnglng the mind of Chief Barlow at the present time. For the chler is attempting to work out the same problem met with by all of the chiefs In the larger cities of the world the problem of tho submerged tenth. When tho men of this city who were unable to find work first started to visit the police station nightly and ask for quarters they were turned away. No place had been provided, and as the nights became colder and men camo In greater numbers, Chief Barlow took up the solution of the problem which was nightly becoming more complex. A large room In tho basement of the station was cleared of debris which had collected for years and men were put to work plastering the walls and the celling. Steam pipes were led In to heat the room to a comfortable temperature and methods of ventilation were provided. Tho first night that the room was thrown open to those seeking a place to sleep It accommodated forty-seven, which number Jumped on the following night to eighty-five, and has now Increased In-creased to 150 men nightly. To prevent the common vagrant and saloon bum from taking advantage of what was provided pro-vided for those worthy of help, a system was Inaugurated by which the men were forced to go to the desk sergeant and register each night, after which they are taken to the room by the patrol driver. It Is when being questioned by tho desk sergeant and roquostcd to sign tho register that the various stories of suffering suf-fering endured by the great malorlty come to the surface, some of -which arc poignant with pathos and others of which are truly grotesque In comedy. John Gunn said that he had been away from his homo in Finland for the past eight years, that he was 28 years of age and was a laborer. He spoke of his happv life in Finland and of the ambition which lured him to America, where fortune supposedly sup-posedly awaits those who were willing to work faithfully and save their monov. His hopes of gaining enough monev to some dny go back to his home In stvle were keyed to the highest point, when he. with a number of others, paid a portion of his remaining money to an employment agency in tho east for transportation to the Golden West, where a Job awaited him. Then came the story of his arrival at the railroad camp and the first knowledge that there was no Job. Tho contractors had asked for sixty men and that tho agency had shipped out 150. Then followed tho wandering for eight years and his light to make himself understood In the now strnngc tongue as he went from place to place, sometimes working a brief period, at which time hope surged strong within him and the day of his return to tho fatherland seemed to be drawing nearer, only to 112 snatched away again when he, through no fault of his. was again thrown out of employment. Mastering his emotion he brushed aside his tears Willi a gnarled hand and became again the stolid Flnlandor as he scrawled his name on tho register and followed tho others to the sleeping room. Edward Druney. who said that he was nlnctcon years of age and had been away from his homOffor nine months, brought a smile to the faco of Desk Sergeant Lenzl by his story. "I don't know how to do anything, but work nt laboring and my home Is In Indiana. In-diana. I guess that I did not know What was best for mo when 1 was working back there on dad's farm;' didn't soom to realize what real happiness was. But you bet your life, that I do now. And don't think that I am going to stay here cither, I am going back. I just kept reading read-ing hooks and papers of the wonderful west and tho fortunes mndc by lucky prospectors who were willing to work hard. You know I dreamed of coming out here In this western country and getting a mine and when I got rich, going go-ing back and buying tho liest farm In Indiana In-diana and handing It over to dad with a M-don't-carc-for-inonoy" air. j "Dad told mo when I talked about It that he had had that samo fever one time ond he called It tho Klondicltls. That was when lie wont to Alaska and was going go-ing to bring back homo enough gold dust lo paint the farmhouse, I kept at him to let mo try my luck and ho kept telling tell-ing me that I was not fitted for that life, so ono night I Just sneaked out of the house and came out here. If I ever get enough together to get as good a suit of clothes as I had when I loft I am Just naturally going to sneak back. When I think of that good old kitchen table piled full of milk, butter, honey, meat, fried chicken on Sunday and all the rest of It. I Just go around In some alley by iY,vKnlf and trv to kick some sense Into myself. You bet your life I am going back and maybe 1 won't wait for the suit of clothes." John Walker said that he had been away from his homo In New Orleans for eighteen years and thnt he was 40 years of age. He was a laborer and had traveled trav-eled all over the United States. South America, Australia and parts of South Africa. Ho was somewhat of a philosopher. philoso-pher. "1 have given up that Idea of making a fortune long ago. Seems to mo the host thing for a man to do is to take things as they come and try to dodge the bad ones. Of course, you can't dodge all of the bad things, as I learned when I fell off a building In New York City and was laid up in the Bellevue hospital for seven months, and again when I was In Cripple Creek during the strike of the Western Federation men. Those soldiers Just grabbed me off the street and after leading me with a lot of other fellows Into a box car. dumped tho whole works Into tho middle of Kansas. But even that experience had its good points, for don't you know that I had been trying to got out of that town for three weeks before that, and had been kicked off all of tho freight trains by tho brakemcn. I had to laugh when I thought of those soldiers mistaking me for a miner. "Well, this is not gotting any sleep. 1 nm going down stairs and 'Hop ' See you later." he added as he reached Into a gunny sack and took out two blankets with about half a dozen nowspapers, preparatory pre-paratory to going down stairs and making mak-ing up his bed for the night. With a view of providing work for tho men Desk Sergeant Lenzl telephoned to a number of places during tho pa3t few months and succeeded In finding work for about 20 per cent of 1 1 in men who are termed lodgers at the station Without one exception tho men satisfied those who had employed thorn, botli parties sending send-ing their appreciation to tho desk sergeant ser-geant later. Seventy per cent of the men who come to the station are laborers labor-ers who have been unable to rind work in tlio city, while the oilier thirty per cent are drawn from all of the trades. Any number of laborers can be had by applying apply-ing to the station on any night, the majority ma-jority of the men being eager to work, and Chief Barlow staled thaf he hoped contractors needing laborers would make application at the station for the men thoy need and thus help to care for the worthy ones. |