The morning of April 19, 1910, found me in Minnehaha Park, Minneapolis,
resting on the green moss below the "laughing waters" of Minnehaha
Falls. This wonderful spot of nature took possession of my imagination
until I was in one of God's factories, where a thousand creations
were coming into life and beauty. The sparkling translucent falls,
touched with a silver light, became a marvelous lace-weaving loom. I
caught, white and shining, the actual resemblance to the hand-made
Irish, the Duchess and Rose-point. Over all this great workshop of the
Diety was joy, peace and happiness. For the first time real lace to me
was beautiful, for it was of God's creation. The vision of eyes made
sightless, the stooped shoulders of the aged, the little, starving
children overworked for the mere pittance to exist, these were not in
the weaving. To the thoughtful, any adornment, the price of which is
paid by the blood of human lives, is no longer beautiful. Here I saw
that every bird and bee, all insect life, even the smallest and most
abject about me, either were building or had built homes.
I then remembered my mission to Minneapolis. "Surely," I said to
myself, "with this temple of worship to which the good folks of
Minneapolis may come, thoughtlessness and selfishness will not be found
here."
Yet I wondered if I should find it. I had come to continue my battle
for my homeless brothers. The approach of late afternoon and night
found me wandering about the streets a jobless, moneyless man looking
for work and shelter. I found Minneapolis not in advance of other
cities, and much behind many in its care for its homeless toilers.
I first went to a private employment office. There seemed plenty of
work to do, work for everybody, but I could find no private office
where they would give me work and trust me until pay day.
I visited the city free employment bureau where I counted fifty men
looking for work. There were chairs for fourteen. The rest seemed
quite willing to stand as long as their feet held out, in the hope
of securing something. As I scanned their faces I thought a large
percentage of them seemed of the type driven to such a condition by
lack of opportunity to make an honest living. Later I learned that many
of these men came day after day, hungry and cold, after having spent
the night huddled up somewhere in the open air.
Next I became a beggar. I began looking for a public institution which
would give me a bed, since I was unable to pay for one. I first tried
the Associated Charities. The attendant took me into a little side room
where as in other places, all sorts of rubbish was stored, and asked me
the usual list of humiliating questions. Finally he told me they could
do nothing for me, as it was too near their closing time.
Doubtless this institution does many worthy things, but providing
shelter for the homeless man without money is not among them.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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