The Brooklyn Daily Eagle from Brooklyn, New York • Page 19

THE BROOKLYN DAILY EAGLE MAGAZINE SECTION. MAGAZINE SECTION. NEW YORK CITY. SUNDAY. AUGUST" 10.

1913. THREE CENTS. mil Special Assessment Plan Could Establish Fine Recreation Parks in Brooklyn mi mi? lowing to the building of rapid transit a nil to plau for better government. Browns-ville has more (hail population and tills population, including uiort than od.iHX) school children, will hnvt access to the new playgrounds. Here, then, is a lamer population than many of the Western cities which have expended for playgrounds many times the amount to be expended iu Brow ns-vllle.

Betsey Head bad the rifrlit idea. Sho thought ahead of her time. AVhen she died she left her niouey for the establishment of a living memorial tc ber appreciation of the needs of crowded community. To the people ol hand concerts, to hear addresses 'If. 4tm MAP SHOWING PLAYGROUNDS IN BROOKLYN.

Portion of a Municipal Playground in the Heart of Dayton; Ohio. Open Air Swimnting and fading Pools. Bamberger Park Playground. WW ma railways, has the lirst claim upon the city's IsiiTowiug capacity, it will lie some years before I he city ran supply enough playgrounds to keep the children out of mischief in the streets. "Last year nearly 4,000 boys and 7-10 girls were taken before the Courts of Special Sessions.

Most of the offeuscK charged were for things which would not have occurred at all If the children had had an opportunity for abundant outdoor play. Street gangs grow up because boys have no other avenue for tho expression of their natural activity. What the street gang leads to we see iu the Hrooklyn gang murders and assaults. Now, the playground is the natural enemy of the gang because It attracts the boy before the gang does and It furnishes him an outlet for his vitality and enthusiasm through wholesome channels. The boy must have a place to play and a pool where he can swim.

We have no river baths in my community. We have only a mediocre Interior shower bath which accommodates J' at a time, and if a boy in lirownsvilln wants to really swim the only place he can go Is to Fresh Creek Basin, which Is a misnomer and where he will sland a chance of being drowned iu the sou age. "Then there is the danger from accidents If Hie children play in tho streets. Prasldent John Finley of the City College prepared a little pamphlet, in which il was stated that between June 11 and July Kl, 1012-thIrty-nvo days one or more children were Injured by automobiles in each of cities in the United States. K.ich day during this period there was an average of six children killed or injured in the streets by automobiles.

ThU 11 Km if ywr4. W0t Brooklyn, but in other boroughs, dial this splendid playground is to be. establi-hcd in Brownsville. The Public Recreation Commission of the City of New York gave its hearty co-operation to this project. Such men as lames 1C.

Sulilvnn, president of the Commission. George W. W'ingate, the vice president, who for years has been a leader li. just this sort of movements, and the other members George l. Tratt, Charles B.

Stover, -Mrs. V. G. Sinikboviteh, Gustavus X. Kirby and ltobbins Gilmau worked long and earnestly to bring the plan to the point where it will be suocess- KIB6IH LOTS PUYGPOUND "i fully consiiniated.

Among those who took an active part in bringing about the practical menus for securing this particular playground for Brownsville aud awakening public sentiment for it to the extent of obtaining the consent of the property owners of the district to he assessed for the purchase of the land, were Simon II. Kiwi, chairman of the Brownsville Playground Advisory Committee, former Alderuiiiu Alexander S. Kieschcr, tin secretary, and the other members, Iv. Charles S. Berulieluier, superintendent of the Hebrew Education.

il Society; Jacob Goell. 1'r. Michael A. Cohen and lr. Saul Associated wuh these men were George Tonkonoiry, William It.

Both. linbb: S. lTnkelstein. David Shapiro ami many others. Former Alderman Alexander S.

Dresclier, whose home Is iu Brownsville and who was one of the urns! energetic and persistent In the endeavors to establish the playgrounds in his district, snld to me the other day In speaking of the need of similar grounds in nil pails of Brooklyn: "The subject of acquiring more playgrounds for Brooklyn hns been imitated by civic associations, the Brooklyn Committee of Parks ami Playgrounds nni the newspapers generally, all maintaining that thoj ugosiljj; i great, lai all agreeing Uiat In Ring-a-Rosy I I If ft A MDH00H a BJWROUNJ, I if i If bules of men nnd women. And this idea is lo be worked out in Brownsville. Other cities hive carried out thl plan and there is no reason why II cannot be carried out in Brooklyn. In the City of Tacoma. Washington, from to of the citiens cnthei llSwimming Pool, 50x88 feet, in Armour Square Playground, Chi- 111.

OCVCIIICCU iUV-U HI uivflgw iw 600,000 times a year. This playground is conducted by tho South Side Park Commission. By FREDERICK BOYD STEVENSON IvmjJWISNJRS rAS.IS GROUND I 21 5 0 4M Brownsville it has remained to apply a piautical means of adapting this fund to the general pond. There is no reason why other districts in Brooklyn should not follow this wise lead and establish playgrounds In parts of Hie boroimh where they are most needed. It was dm? the public spirit and PI mi, is wm '1 7 171 i 4 iFIatbush I should appeal to the artistic seue and 'display something of the beautiful, for it is an established fact of psychology that tlie beautiful and Hie artistic are always uplifting.

A child's environment is powerful factor in his mental, moral and physical development: and the same Is true as KOWNSVlI.l.K lias shown lie way for the establishment of real pi a -grounds in Brooklyn, Hy the act ion of energetic citizens in Unit dis trict and with the co-operation of the Public Itecieatn.n Commission, the Hoard of Ksliniate and Apportionment and city ulhclaK IJrownsvillo will have the best playground in Greater New York, and one of the finest iu the Tultcd States. This was made possible by the decision of the property owners of that dlslnct to assess $10 on each lot within a radius of a mile of tho laud secured for the purpose, thus receiving for the equipment of the grounds the Sl.s7.7tn bequest of Mrs. Hetsy Head, which has remained in the city treasury for many years. Brownsville is the onlv section of the city which has evinced a willingness that any part of tho cost of establishing a playground should be assessed upon the locality for the benefit of the children residing in It. Therefore, Brownsville has solved the problem of creating playgrounds in other parts of Hrooklyn which are sadly in need of them.

There are eight playgrounds Iu Girls Under the Brooklyn Bridge" win, lim mm mm $0 St olavgroui'ds cannot be established in all pans of Brooklyn on the same plan. 11- More Playgrounds Should Be Established ow In Brooklyn. I he project lor a plnvground in Brownsville had the heariv support of tile Association of America for the reason that it is the first real attempt to give to the City of New ork a plnvground which will be equipped and maintained In a manner comparable with the great play grounds In hicago, Denver, Oakland, Seattle and other cities. Gustavus I. Mrby, a member of tho Public lEecreation Commission anil lieasurer of the Playground Association of America, visited nearly all tho principal playgrounds of the United States In the spring of and he savs the mistaken idea has generally prevailed that a playground is place where only small children go to pl.iv, or athletes go to exercise or compete for records and prizes.

The playground should be so properly equipped and maintained as to be a meeting place for the entire community, a place where the citizens In that community can gather and discuss their iocal problems ns well ns to enjoy the play of the children and the athletic is that the playground should have on it a suitable house where such neighborhood gatherings could be held in the Inclement months of the whiter. Its athletic field should be not only for athletes, but a place where the neighborhood could guther, listen to music, sen the exhibitions, hear speeches and discuss and decide the needs and betterment of the locality. This is to be exactly the plan of the new playgrounds in Brownsville. And it should be exactly the plan of play grounds In various localities of Brooklyn, such playgrounds nnd such galherings would arouse neighborhood pride and, ns a natural result, arouse civic pride, and tend toward the making of a better city and better citizens. But a playground should not be Just a barren plot of land with few hijjs and a baseball diamond, it Brooklyn at present.

There should belaud recreational exhibit inns. The Idea lakes no account of other street accidents to children." i Chicago Playground The Advanced Type Should Establish. Chicago unquestionably leads all other ciiics in the 1'niled States th? establihment and maintenance of playgrounds. As an illustration m.iy be cited, one of its playgrounds, knonu as Recreation Center No. 'J.

It was secured a( a cost of 1 1 for tho ground, hich consists of three a'Te-. and for the biilldin-js ami swimming pool Fifty-seven houses which were upon the old site wept destroyed. On nu average o.Hihi men and boys use the swimming pool on a summer day. The value of the property adjacent to West Side Recreation Center Nj. 1.

iu a similar con-uested district, advanced I'S to 00 per cent, atlcr the leorcatioii center was After had been expended by the West. Side Park Commission upon lecreation centers, ihe popular vole was per cent. In favor of a loan for establishing others. flowers bordering a playground where Ihcie ere otherwise no flowers were disturbed, aud the police u- Ithorities of Chicago say that many Continued oa Pa, at least twice as many. The Increase of automobiles and general tralllc on the streets lias greatly augmented the danger to children playing on the public- thoroughfares and rendered it an Imperative necessity that suitable places for recreation should be allotted to them.

The city authorities have decided that no more money can be expended by the city to secure suitable playground sites and the result has been that New York has fallen lamentably behind other cities in this respect. The liiuh cost of land in the thickly settled parts of Manhattan has made the acquisition of piny- grounds iroiiiiutive. iu urooKiyn the I same situation is rapidly approaching, nnd men who have given this subject careful study are convinced that the time to net in this borough Is the present. Now that Brownsville has taken the laid there ii uu rwdja why i.t,'iuiswu ol jUc bcij. atAAi-iiu it JiuuUstlui stadium listen tctfJitcii'Jia o2 ataajr dtueu uut uaJ 1 It Tfr Ti' T'T.