From the Rotarian Magazine, April, 1920, Vol. XVI, No. 4 Lancaster Solves a Problem By Thad. G. Helm, RCL President 1918-1919
The Rotary Home is still standing and is now The Station House Tavern
"ROTARY HOME” – Such is the inscription on a large Rotary emblem which may be seen at the entrance to an old country house just on the outskirts of the city of Lancaster, Pa.
As the passerby observes more closely the stately old mansion, set in a spacious lawn amidst evergreens and maples, arbors and shrubbery, he is likely to remark "What a beautiful place the Lancaster Rotarians have chosen for their club house. '
But this is not the club house of the Lancaster Rotary Club. It is that club's solution for the very important problem of the care and correction of juvenile delinquents.
The larger cities of the country have had for some time detention homes and homes for the correction of juvenile offenders, while many of the smaller cities have not been treating the problem satisfactorily or at all.
The Lancaster Rotary Club in its study of the boy problem found that the methods used with juvenile delinquents were not really corrective. Boys arrested and brought before the Juvenile Court were being returned to their homes where conditions were bad or sent to some institution where the severe discipline and the heartless treatment failed to correct. Such boys would often come back hardened by their experiences only to frequent their old haunts and perhaps begin a life of crime.
Now, boys in only a few cases, unless mentally defective, are inherently bad. Incorrigibility, truancy and even petty thieving are usually the product of a boy's environment. These things are due chiefly to the lack of training and of wholesome home conditions. Homes with care less indifferent, immoral and ofttimes drunken parents are responsible for most of our delinquency.
If the absence of proper home conditions is the cause which brings so many boys before our Juvenile Courts, then the solution of the problem must lie in supplying in such boys' lives an environment as nearly that of a good home as possible. With this thought in mind the Lancaster Rotary Club after knowing that they would have the cooperation of the Juvenile Court, undertook to supply that kind of an environment.
In the securing of a proper building and in all the details of operation, everything was planned with the one end in view of surrounding the boys who came to live in the home with good influences.
There was a studied effort to eliminate everything and anything of an institutional character and no officer of the Jaw is supposed to come to the home.
The old mansion has readily been adopted to the purpose for which it is now used. There is a large and attractive living room where the boys study and, when studies are finished, where they play games. Here is also being assembled a boys' library.
The bed rooms are neatly fitted up with individual bed, chairs and dressing bureaus. There is an infirmary where a sick boy can be isolated from the rest of the boys. In the basement are shower baths. The dining room is large and pleasant. Here "Dad" and "Mother" Martzal take their meals with the boys as one big family.
That boys love play is not overlooked. A gymnasium has been provided where the boys can play basketball and volley ball. Provision is made for tennis and other outdoor games.
When a boy enters the home be receives a thorough physical examination and any defects are treated and corrected during his stay in the home.
The boys attend the public schools in the city, and a gratifying feature of the club s plan and one indication of its success is the high degree of results attained by the boys in school. Many of the boys' previous school records were poor, and their conduct bad, efforts indifferent and attendance irregular.
This has all been changed and improved. The boys' school records in every respect have been good, many of them very good.
All of the boys, with one exception, have past the midyear examinations and have been promoted A daily record is kept of each boy's attendance, conduct and effort. He carries a card to and from school to be signed by the teacher and by the superintendent of the home.
The change is readily accounted for. The boys now are happy and contented. Good fresh air, good food, regular habits, pleasing surroundings and wholesome influences have affected the change.
The success of such a home necessarily depends largely upon the persons directly in charge. From the start the club secured just the right man and woman. "Dad" and "Mother" Martzal, as the boys call them, have in each of these boys a fatherly and motherly interest. Superintendent Martzal is firm but kind in his treatment of the boys.
The boys are placed on their honor. They are free to go to and come from the public school, Sunday school and church, and if their conduct record is good they are given permission occasionally to visit parents or friends and even to attend the “movies.”
The boys must help at the work of the home. They assist "Mother” Martzal in the kitchen, dining room and laundry. "Dad” Martzal finds work for them on the lawn and in the garden, and also in caring for the pigs, chickens and rabbits. A few of the older boys attend the continuation school and are employed during their free time in some industrial plant. Out of their wages they pay their board and the balance is placed to their credit in the bank.
This brief account of the Lancaster Rotary Home has been written with the thought that it may interest Rotary Clubs in other communities confronted with similar conditions. The Lancaster Club's work began as an experiment and with the hope that when its value and worth were proven the work would be taken over by the county commissioners. But the work has been so successful and the interest of the club in it has been so great that the present disposition of the club is to maintain it as a distinctively Rotary movement. The property has been purchased by and is now held in the of the Rotary Club.
-Thad G. Helm is Past President of the Rotary Club of Lancaster, Pa. The Rotarian Magazine April, 1920, Vol. XVI, No. 4
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