The Child's Book of American BiographyStimpson, Mary Stoyell
History
The Child's Book of American Biography
Stimpson, Mary Stoyell
United States -- Biography
Jane Addams made the house so cheerful and pretty that it was a joy to
peep into it. Miss Addams and her friend asked the people about there
to come in and have coffee and cocoa, read books aloud to them, taught
the poor children to sew and cook, visited the sick, and made them
understand--all these poor, tired, discouraged people--that at Hull
House there were friends who wanted to help them in every way.
By and by there were clubs for boys at Hull House, kindergartens for
children, parties for old folks, and Halstead Street began to look
cleaner, for Miss Addams went up and down those thirty-two miles of
street and made it understood that she was there to help people grow
healthy and clean. All the time, she was helping to nurse the sick and
urging the rich people at their end of the city to come down to Halstead
Street to see how the poor lived. At Hull House an idiot child or a
drunken woman was helped as quickly and willingly as if they had been a
clean member of the royal family.
The more Miss Addams found out about what goes on in big cities, the
harder she worked. She remembered what her father said about every one
in this world deserving an equal chance, and she tried to help factory
workers, mill hands, girls and boys who had done wrong, ignorant mothers
who did not know how to keep house and take care of their children, men
who were out of work, and the blind and crippled.
Miss Addams's work set other people to thinking, and to-day there is
hardly a large city but has built a handsome house down in the slums
which offers help and comfort to the poor. But Hull House is the leading
settlement house in the United States.
Jane Addams still dresses simply. She does not care to have the best
clothes in the neighborhood, or jewels, or luxuries for herself. She
does not believe in talking a great deal about what she intends to do
later on. She has found that the world needs busy workers more than
ready talkers. She is a busy, good woman who has done noble work in
America. She is still getting up very early in the morning, and I fancy
that when she is asked why she rests so little, she gives the same
polite answer that her father heard: "Because I have so much to do!"
LUTHER BURBANK
A few years ago every one who went to California tried to see Luther
Burbank, for the newspapers and magazines were filled with stories of
the wonderful things he was doing. Plenty of men make houses,
automobiles, ships to go on the water, and ships that sail through the
air, clothing, and toys, but this man makes new fruits and flowers. It
is not an easy thing to do, and Mr. Burbank has found that he needs all
his strength and time for his work. So now, at his small farm at Santa
Rosa and at his big farm at Sebastopol, strangers find a sign like this:
+-----------------------------+
| ALL VISITORS ARE LIMITED |
| TO FIVE MINUTES EACH UNLESS |
| BY SPECIAL APPOINTMENT |
+-----------------------------+
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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