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The day book. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1911-1917, October 12, 1914, LAST EDITION, Image 11

Image and text provided by University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Library, Urbana, IL

Persistent link: https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83045487/1914-10-12/ed-1/seq-11/

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FATHER OF FIVE CHILDREN IS SENT TO BRIDEWELL
ORGANIZED CHARITIES FOR COMPETITIVE BEGGING
BY
Racked with dry, hard sobs, a lit
tle wisp of a woman pressed to her
side a girl of 9 years, who was hys
terically crying: "Won't I see my
daddy again? Can't I see my daddy
again?"
It was the aftermath of a tragedy
staged in the Court of Domestic Re
lations, in which the actors had been
five well-dressed, well-fed represen
tatives of organized charities-and op
posite them a gaunt man, whose eyes
were sunken and whose cheek bones
stood out prominently in his very
white cheeks, the little girl of 9, and
the tiny wisp of a woman, mother
of five children, the oldest 9, the
youngest less than a year, and two of
the children crippled.
The theme of the tragedy was the
fight of authorized beggars against
unauthorized beggars. The repre
sentatives of organized charities,
who were well fed and well dressed
out of alms gained by exploiting the
suffering of the poor, had charged
Stephen Zemanck and his wife Anna,
and even the little girl, with begging.
The United Charities was repre
sented by a bulky man named Web
ster, who assumed the leading role.
Prom his voluminous mass of statis
tics he drew a neatly typewritten list
of twenty-five churches that he
claimed had complained to the Unit
ed Charities that Stephen had asked
for bread made of wheat instead of
spiritual food.
In addition, he had a letter from
the Christian Industrial League,
which pays men almost nothing for
fixing up donated furniture so that it
can be sold, declaring that they had
given Stephen a couple of matresses
and other odds and ends of furniture
, and he 'had refused to work in re
turn. jflJL
"ThisK has been begging for
over a HHpsaid Webster in a voice
as wannis an Arctic iceberg.- "He
has also been knocking the United
Charities every chance he got. We
offered him work and he wouldn't
take it"
"I offered him work, also," said
Miss Wellman, representing the
Northwestern Settlement. We would
have paid him $1 a day to do janitor
work, but he wouldn't work."
"I was sick," said Stephen through
an interpreter, as he does not speak
English and therefore did not know
the exact nature of the charges be
ing made against him until the ques
tion was asked by the judge. "I am
willing to work when I cap get it.
I was sick when the United Charities
offered me work. Please give me a
chance and I will never beg again."
The judge was called from the
bench and a Day Book reporter ad
dressed Miss Wellman.
"If you send this man to the
Bridewell, what will become of his
family?"
Miss Wellman smiled sweetly. "We
want to send the mother to the Bride
well as well as the father, then the
'Juvenile Court can take the children.
The woman is as lazy as the man.
She is a seamstress and could have
gotten work, but she just wouldrft
work."
"How could she go out and work if
she has five children?"
The smile left Miss Wellman's face
to be replaced by a look of suspicion.
"Oh, she could work all right. She
could have gotten work in the same
street she lives. The man doesn't
work, so he could take care of the
children."
"But you want to send the man to
the Bridewell, so he will be out of it."
"Well other women with children
work. We do not support families
when the woman is able to do her
share. We do not aim to support
them. We aim to rehabilitate."
"How do you expect to rehabilitate
a family by sending the father and
mother to the Bridewell and the chil
dren to the Juvenile Court?" the re
porter asked.

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