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plan at all times to keep the average standard of morality among our boys sufficiently high so that a good boy will not be injured, and a bad boy will surely be benefited by contact with those about him. When a boy has determined to become a good boy, and is making an honest effort in that direction he at once becomes an active and helpful agency in the work of bringing his associates into a condition of right thinking and right acting. With a large corps of helpers composed of those of our inmates who have started in the right direction, and who are still remaining with us on probation, proving by their persistence in well doing that they are strong enough to walk alone, we are constantly aided in the discipline of the institution and are able to have the predominant sentiment at all times toward the right. Moreover, a boy who is ambitious to "owe no man,' sees in the good work he is enabled to do for other unfortunates who have been intrusted to the care of the institution, an opportunity to compensate the State to some extent for the good work previously wrought upon himself.

As for years past, our boys devote four and a half hours each day to work, and four and a half hours to study, leaving five hours for meals and recreation and ten hours for sleep.

In our school-room we attempt nothing outside of or beyond the common English branches, but do endeavor to have all that we do of a thorough and practical character. The enthusiasm of our boys in their school-room duties and their very rapid advancement in their studies indicate, not that our schools are better than others, but that enforced attention to any duty soon makes that a pleasure which was before an irksome task. The same holds true with reference to all the work of the institution in which the boys engage. Especially noticeable is this in all those industries which appear to the boys to be helplul in preparing them for gaining a livelihood after leaving us. The most willing and enthusiastic work is always noticed among those boys who are employed in the tailor shop, shoe shop, bake shop, the engine room and on the farm. I wish that we might increase our facilities in the way of educating industries, and am sure that our Legislature needs only to have its attention called to our wan ts in this direction to insure such an appropriation as will enable us to prepare for successful wage earning, many more than we are doing at present. Most of our boys upon leaving the institution are obliged at once to attempt self-support. We can materially enhance the probability of their success in this attempt and at the same time greatly lessen the probability that they will again become a source of expense to the State, by giving them such a training as will enable them to take rank as skilled laborers. As a business proposition, the State should feel that it cannot afford to allow these boys to go out from us without the ability to earn an honest living from the start.

While the past two seasons have not been as good for profitable farming as some which have preceded, we have nevertheless, raised an amount of produce which has materially assisted in the support of the institution. We have moreover greatly enhanced the value of our farm by clearing, fencing and draining, thus putting it in shape for greater profit hereafter. We have also done a large amount of necessary grading upon our grounds with our teams and the assistance of the boys, which has saved to the State an expenditure of several thousand dollars which would otherwise have been necessary.

Our farm is a constant and great assistance to the real work of the institution in preparing a large number of boys each year to accept homes with farmers to the mutual advantage of both parties. As most of our boys come from large towns, and have an established taste for town life, this work of placing

boys with farmers will always be somewhat limited. There are, however, very many of our inmates who have a taste for this work, and for whom we can do nothing better than to help them to homes in the country.

It is a matter of gratification to une that I can look over the two years that have just closed and believe that the work of the school for those committed to its care has been reasonably productive of good results. Notwithstanding the fact that some who have gone out from our care have not shown by their subsequent career that we were successful in permanently turning them from their downward course, it still remains true that the great majority of those released from this institution have, by their honesty and industry, shown that they were anxious and determined to become good citizens. Through correspondence with the boys and from reports made by county agents, we learn of a very large number who are honoring themselves, and proving the wisdom of the effort that is being made in behalf of the juvenile offenders" of the State.

There is no phase of the work we have in hand in which I have taken a livelier interest than that which pertains to the returning of our inmates to the outside world with the least possible of habits of thinking and acting which are purely institutional; but rather with such habits as will the most surely serve to fortify them against temptations to wrong-doing in after life, and fit them for grappling successfully with its stern realities.

While in any large institution it is necessary to have much of system in its management, and the individual, in many particulars, must be merged into and become an unnoticed part of the grand whole, it is, I believe, important to the individual that this merging process be reduced to the minimum, and that strong counter-influences be established, which shall bring out and strengthen the individuality of each boy. We have been making a persistent effort in this direction with results which have, I am sure, convinced all who have been conversant with our work, that much more of individual liberty could be given, and of individual responsibility demanded than had formerly been supposed feasible or possible even.

In furtherance of this idea we have endeavored to remove from our schemes for restraint, discipline and education, all those which differ from what are found in every good home, and to introduce just such as the good home finds necessary and adequate.

It is a fact well known to every person who has been engaged in reformatory work for any length of time, that it is seldom that a child becomes an inmate of such an institution who has had good home training. It is, I believe, equally true that the great majority of those who come under our care will be saved to themselves and to the State, if they can have good home influences brought to bear upon them. Toward this end we have been aiming. The most important departure we have made from the established customs of juvenile reformatories has been in abolishing entirely everything in the way of grades and honors in our school, and in their stead inculcating the idea that good conduct should be aimed at because it is right, and that good scholarship and faithfulness and skill in work are desirable, because they are necessary to an honorable and happy career in after life. The system of grades and honors may and probably does show more immediate results, but such as are, I am sure, but temporary and most unsatisfactory in their character. Good conduct that is bought with a price, carries with it no assurance that it will be continued, but rather argues that wrong-doing is likely to follow a withdrawal of the incentive which determined the action. We cannot, in the institution, any more than in the home,

afford to delude a boy into thinking that he is worthy of confidence and respect, on account of any good deed he has performed from other than a noble motive. It was with much hesitancy that we decided to abandon the system of grades which prevailed for years in this institution, and which is, in some form, in vogue in nearly every similar institution in the country; but having throughly tested what we believe to be the better way, we are fully convinced that very much was gained and very little lost by the change. In this, as in every other plan for the betterment of our work, I have received the hearty and intelligent coöperation of the very best corps of officers and employés which can be found in any reformatory in the United States.

We are under great obligations to the many friends of the institution for the pleasant reminders, which come to us almost daily, of the deep interest which is felt in the success of our work. Governor Alger, with that generous bounty which has endeared him to the inmates of all our State institutions, gave to each of our boys, last Christmas, a pair of mittens, beside other valuable presents.

Not less appreciated are the words of encouragement and cheer which are given to our inmates by those who visit the institution. It is a most powerful stimulus to good conduct, on the part of any boy, for him to feel that, in the opinion of those whose judgment he respects, there is no question as to his ability to make an honorable and worthy man.

The following is a list of newspapers which have been furnished to the school gratuitously, and which are highly appreciated by our boys, who are always eager for home news:

Owosso Weekly Press; Kalamazoo Weekly Telegraph; The Union Index, Gettysburg, D. T.; Pentwater News; Hillsdale Standard; The Weekly Courier, Jackson; Lansing Sentinel; Lansing Journal; State Republican; Saginaw Morning Herald; Ludington Record; Rockford Register; Milford Times; Ingham County Democrat, Mason; The Center, Detroit; Howard Times, Sockanosset, R. I.; Grange Visitor, Schoolcraft; The Summary, Elmira, N. Y.; The Church Helper; Cheboygan Tribune; Charlevoix Journal; Coldwater Republican; Bay City Tribune; Albion Recorder; Alpena Pioneer; City and Country, Columbus, Ohio.

With grateful acknow elgment of the wise counsels and constant support which I have always received from you, gentlemen of the Board of Control, this report is

Respectfully submitted,

C. A. GOWER,
Superintendent.

STATE PUBLIC SCHOOL FOR DEPENDENT

CHILDREN.

REPORT OF THE BOARD OF CONTROL.*

TWELVE YEARS OF CHILD-SAVING WORK.

This is no longer an experimental institution, as it may have been in 1874 when Michigan was a pioneer in the inauguration of a new system for the care and education of dependent, not criminal, children. There have been 2,138 dependent children cared for here, the larger part of whom have gone into good family homes. Those who are no longer wards of the Board are the 150 adopted by proceedings in the probate courts, 253 returned to their counties -generally for mental or chronic physical disability, 128 have become of age, 28 girls have married, 72 have died in homes or at the school, 162 have been declared self-supporting, 233 have been returned to their parents who became able to support them, and 317 are either in the school or are in homes on trial. The present wards of the school are 1,112, of which 795 are subject to visitation in homes. For over twelve years these young dependent children have been coming from the county poor-houses or from broken homes into this school. While here they have been kindly cared for without over-indulgence. They have been educated here in the common English branches as others are in the district schools. They have been taught how to labor, so far as their ages and conditions permitted. And when they were fitted for a good home they have been placed there by indenture or adoption. In these homes the continuation of their education and kindly treatment as members of the family has been secured. The State has by visits and correspondence kept up a careful supervision of its wards and protected their interests as well as parents might do. Many of these children have already become self-supporting, respectable citizens. Those who turn out well will compare favorably with the same number in our common schools. These results are not reached without effort. Many of these children are in a fit condition physically and mentally to place in homes the day they enter here. But there are many others who have never before been under the influences of a true home. Their life has been on the streets, in tenement houses of the lowest order and in resorts where virtue and honor were unknown. They have only known cruelty, hunger, cold and wretchedness. The law of kindness was unknown to them, and when they entered this school they learned for the first time

The annual report to the Superintendent of Public Instruction, required by section 2, Act No. 206 Laws of 1881, not having been received the report here given has been compiled in this office from the last biennial report of the Board of Control to the Governor.-SUPT. PUB. ÎNST'N.

that men and women can be pure and temperate and can speak without foul jest or oath. They are children who have been rescued from nurseries of crime and placed where they may become good citizens. For many of them there must be and is patient, loving and continued labor. Here in this home. school all these classes are gathered where they are surrounded by moral and mental influences which elevate them to a higher level where they may become as strong and pure men and women as their more fortunate brothers and sisTo save these children from chronic pauperisn and possible crime, for its own safety as well as for humanity, the State is doing this work. As Gov. Bagley said, "What a noble work for the State to engage in, reaching out a hand not heavy and restraining, clothed in iron mail, but gentle and with a tender clasp folding in its arms these innocents; taking the place of their fathers and mothers and holding them out to its citizens as their brothers and sisters."

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PRESENT AND FUTURE SIZE OF THE SCHOOL.

In 1883 the legislature authorized the construction of a new hospital, and the conversion of the building then used for that purpose into a cottage for children, by which the capacity was increased from 300 to 330. In his report for 1882, the superintendent said: "This room and much more is greatly needed for the accommodation of all the children, for whose admission applications have urgently been made. In fact, three more cottages would not more than supply the pressing demand." For the previous five years the average number in the school, including those on trial, had been 309. The institution was overcrowded, and the pressure was great for admissions. The average yearly indentures for five years have been 115, including re-indentures, the actual gain being about 100 yearly. In the main this success was fairly satisfactory to the Board in the absence of demonstration that better work could be done. But the ideal of the law, in the opinion of the Board had not been reached. That was that the school should care for all the dependent children without increase of buildings. So, in 1883 and 1884, a special effort was made to determine whether it was not possible to provide for all admissible dependent children without increasing the capacity of the school. It was evident that unless more than 100 per year could be received and indentured that many must remain in the counties as public charges. New zeal and confidence increased the indentures, in 1884, to 216, and the numbers received to 290, nearly double the number received in any previous year. The counties were soon relieved of all dependent children. In 1884 notice was given that, thereafter, all would be received. That notice has not been recalled and probably will not be, though our population rapidly increases, as well as the number of children received. Further, in 1885, the Board requested authority to receive children two years of age-a class not before admitted. The amendment to the law was made and still there was room. In the last two years 466 have been received, and 407 indentured. This late experience has demonstrated that the institution can meet all demands upon it, and probably will for many years. The work of the State Agent in the school, and visiting the children in families, has contributed much to this result. Under the improved conditions the Board was confident that the time had come when, with safety and profit, there might be a reörganization of the work of the school, including a more suitable adaptation of the buildings for the purposes of the institution. The time had come, in the

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