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Show Provide Means for Using ;! Boy's Spare Time : BrRFV. ROY L. SMITH, Paitorof St. PauTi ' y Malhodiit Epiicopal Church, Chicago J Many boys tire lost to r good citizenship every year because parents think their children arc safely in the care of the school or church. ' A hoy may be completely lost to his parents, yet sit at the family table daily. How sorrowfully the city of Chicago is seeking for its lost boy today. She has just realized the fact that he has escaped the church, the school and barely escaped the law. Unfortunately, we do not find him in the company of teachers and thinkers in any considerable number. Instead we find him in the vicious poolroom, or in secret "athletic" clubs, etc., meeting over barns or in basements. base-ments. Here the boy with nothing to do proves himself an adept in knavery tinder the tutelage of those already initiated into crime. The "baby bandit," ban-dit," the gangster and the boy thug are the inevitable fruits of a policy , of indifference to the use of a boy's idle time. V ' The secret of the boy problem in large measure is a parent problem. In a city of flats and paved streets the boy has been a tardy consideration. There is no room for his shop in the apartment and less room for his ball ground in the crowded street. In all the West side, where St. Paul's church is located, there is not one desirable playground and only three small, inadequate parks. Such agencies as the Y. M. C. A., the Chicago Boys' club and the Boys' republic go farther toward saving the boy through supervised play than several hundred "cops." A large part of the solution of the boy problem lies, in my judgment, in providing some attractive and profitable means for using a boy's spare time. The boy who is turned loose on the street will move in the line of least resistance for his amusement The average boy needs guidance more than court sentence. |