USA > Massachusetts > Middlesex County > Somerville > Report of the city of Somerville 1931 > Part 14
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26
No entirely new branches of the Municipal recreation pro- gram have been launched within the calendar year of 1931. As the foregoing section of this report shows, the energies and funds of the Commission and its organization have been de- voted to building within the existing program.
Increased Developments in Branches Already Established
Developments during the year 1931 in the already well- established branches of the Recreation work are summarized as follows :
Summer Plagrounds
Length of season increased by 9% .
Notable development of child leadership under a carefully planned procedure.
Addition of new activities and events to the program for the Summer season.
Variation of program in Handwork and its correlation with other activities.
Increase in attendance, average weekly and aggregate season.
Enlistment and employment of volunteer leadership, with some training.
Evening Recreation Centers
Substitution of four-nights-a-week program for three- nights-a-week program in each of the four Centers.
251
RECREATION COMMISSION
Season of 23 weeks as against season of 8 weeks in 1930. Increase of attendance.
Greater frequency of attendance by the average frequenter. Very great increase in degree of organization and preci- sion in the management and leadership of the Centers.
Acquisition of important, valuable equipment and acces- sories in the Centers.
Evening Gymnasium for Adults
Substitution of six-nights-a-week program for five nights a week as in 1930.
Great increase (more than double) in attendance by wo- men.
Acquisition of important and valuable equipment in the gymnasium.
After-School Supervised Athletics
Increase from two to three units for girls.
Amplifying program of activities for boys by employment of additional Assistants to the Supervisors.
Saturday Plagrounds
Addition of one new unit.
Twilight Out-of-Doors Recreation for Men Longer season Greater attendance. Improved organization.
Community Drama
General progressive development explained below.
General
Acquisition of improved equipment including playground accessories, motion picture equipment for recording and exhibiting playground and other recreation activities.
Administration
Employment, for full year, of a Secretary-Stenographer in the office of the Commission.
Acquisition of important supplies : mimeograph machine, etc.
252
ANNUAL REPORTS
LONGER SEASON. The longer season SUMMER PLAYGROUNDS was made possible because of the increas- ed funds available, and this increased length of season represents one of the larger items of expenditure to which has been applied a por- tion of the increased funds.
CHILDREN AS LEADERS. Outstanding in the Summer season's results is the accomplishment by the workers directly in contact with children on the playgrounds, whereby qual- ities, habits, and practices of leadership have been carefully developed in certain children, with advantage to these child leaders themselves, to the effectiveness of the supervised play program, to the children as a whole, and to economy.
It has long been the theory under your Commission that supervised play can and should develop such leadership qual- ties in children, and also that the practice of child leadership makes the playground more attractive to all the children. It has been further assumed in the administration of playground activities that the wisest method of exercising adult leader- ship over playground children is the indirect method which employs this child leadership. In the Summer of 1930 this theory and this objective have been realized to a far greater degree than ever before. Previous to the opening of the Sum- mer season, a committee of Play Leaders appointed by the Di- rector, prepared and recommended to the leaders as a whole, the committee's plan of procedure in the matter of child lead- ership. This committee, displaying keen insight and skill, found its recommendations cordially and enthusiastically re- ceived by the corps ; and the corps in turn, has been thorough, faithful, alert, co-operative, and effective in applying these rec- ommendations to the work of the Summer. The results obtain- ed have been the subject of comment by professional observers outside of Somerville. The Somerville plan is also being used as a guide in Recreation systems outside of Somerville. The committee's plan as recommended is contained in "Appendix C" to this Report of the Director; and attention is respectful- ly called to this appended report of the Committee.
NEW ACTIVITIES AND EVENTS. Three playground circuses, each involving several hundred child participants, and each involving five or six playgrounds, were conducted near the middle of the Summer season. The three performances were given, at Lincoln Park, Dilboy Field and Richard Trum Field, on Monday, Wednesday, Friday of the fifth week in the season. At each circus the playgrounds participating were those nearest to the area on which the performance was given.
253:
RECREATION COMMISSION
Not only the performances in themselves proved highly enter- taining, helpful, and encouraging forms of play, but the same is also true of the children's activities for some days in ad- vance while they were preparing for the performances; and it is certain that hundreds of adult citizens were furnished rec- reation by the opportunity to join with the children in witness- ing the colorful and enjoyable performances. Still further, the three circus parades preceding the three performances, with all the participating children parading through the main streets, brought the playground to the citizens ; and by this process a great gain in adult public interest in the playground was accomplished. The parades themselves were colorful, clev- er and truly illustrative of the spirit in which Somerville- children take advantage of supervised play opportunities.
Among the most notable of all developments in the line- of new activities may be listed the series of "Mothers' Days." Scores of parents and adults were present to witness the more spectacular and more "set" activities which the children had worked into semi-formal programs to entertain their elders. The greatest impetus of this development came from the en -- deavors of Miss Katherine D. Crotty, Master at the Kent Street Plaground, through whose leadership the first "Moth- ers' Day" was promoted at the Kent Street Plaground during the second week of the season. The results were so notable- that other playgrounds carried out the idea with similar suc- cess.
Playground Handwork during the past Summer was so con- ducted as to bring about correlation with other play activities. A notable illustration is the preparation of "home-made" cos- tumes and accessories for the Playground Circus performances and parades.
A great development in the popularity of the game of volley ball took place during the Summer of 1931. Similar- developments were noticeable in quoits among older boys, and paddle tennis among children of all ages and both sexes. These developments in volley ball, paddle tennis, and quoits, are in a large measure traceable to the successful endeavors of the Special Leader assigned to promote these activities :- Mr. Francis C. Crotty.
Inter-playground baseball was so organized this past Sum- mer that the number of league baseball games were scheduled and played in the three inter-playground leagues. The teams this past season included larger personnels than previously, giving greater opportunity to substitute players. The leagues were better organized than ever before.
254
ANNUAL REPORTS
The inter-playground Athletic Meet at Lincoln Park dur- ing the closing week of the season was quite as successful as that of the previous season and even better organized and more spectacular. It attracted a throng of adult citizens.
The notable progressive developments in the inter-play- ground Track and Field Athletics and inter-playground Base- ball bespeak the conscientious, thorough and experienced work of Mr. Joseph B. McCabe, who has been employed as Special Leader for Inter-Playground Athletics since 1926, and who, during the Summer of 1930, impressed all his co-workers and many citizens with the highest calibre of leadership and the efficiency that results from experience.
The final inter-playground tournament in paddle tennis was more impressive and better organized, and a more success- ful event than in any previous season. Several thousand adults were present at twilight. Thirty-five courts were in operation simultaneously, with 150 boys and girls participating in com- petition for the championships and trophies. The competitors included senior boys, senior girls, junior boys and junior girls, and a special class for fifteen-year old boys. This event was conducted with precision and excellent organization, illustrat- ing the thoroughness and efficiency of the corps of workers who have been trained under the Commission and who have served so faithfully.
The Twilight Play Festival, which annually serves as a demonstration of the season's typical play activities, was at- tended by about twelve thousand spectators; with upwards of four thousand playground children participating. It furnished another striking illustration of the alertness, co-operative ac- tion and faithful service of the large group of Play Leaders, Supervisiors, etc. concerning whose excellent and self-sacrific- ing service the Director has so frequently been privileged to comment.
ATTENDANCE. There has been an appreciable increase in the attendance at all of the playgrounds, excepting that at the Grimmons School Playground, where the area is so unat- tractive. Most noticeable and highly important is the fact that there has been a greater frequency of attendance by the aver- age child, and a longer stay on the playground for the in- divdual child.
VOLUNTEER LEADERS. An entirely new venture un- der the Recreation Commission-combining its previous ex- periences in training paid leaders with its other experiences
255
RECREATION COMMISSION
with children and adolescents being led-gives well-defined conclusions upon which recommendations are to be based. In the Director's judgment, this experience and the conclusions obtained from it, are outstanding developments of the whole Municipal program for the year.
A kind of playground leadership to be classed as distinct from the regular leadership by paid workers and also distinct from the child leadership practiced by certain children of play- ground age-and to be regarded as intermediate between these two kinds of leadership-has been carefully promoted, ob- served, and encouraged. A group of sixteen volunteer leaders, formerly active as children in playground activities but now of an age intermediate between that of the children and the paid leaders, was enlisted and partially trained. The members of this group were of ages varying from fifteen to twenty-one years ; but the greater number were between fifteen and eight- een years.
EVENING RECREATION CENTERS
INNOVATIONS. In the four public even- ing Recreation Centers the developments during the year 1931 have been the out- standing feature of the entire commun- ity program under your Commission.
MORE FREQUENT SESSIONS. As indicated above, there has been a substitution of a four-nights-a-week program for the three-nights-a-week program previously established in the four Centers. This extra night each week, began with the Fall season of 1931. As a general rule, the additional night is used for "special" events of a musical, dramatic or social- recreational nature, or of a nature which combines two or more of these types of program.
It should be noted here that this additional night each week in the program of each of the four Centers accounts for the second of the major items of financial expenditure to which has been appied a portion of the additional funds available for 1931. Still additional expenditure results from the longer sea- son for these Centers than was observed in the previous year, as explained in the next paragraph.
LONGER SEASON. As against eight weeks in the year 1930 there were twenty-three weeks of the season for the Even- ing Recreation Centers in the year 1931. This fact is explained as follows: The Evening Centers were first launched in the first week of November, 1930. Thus they were conducted only for eight weeks of that year; and had to be financed only for eight weeks. With the termination of the calendar and fiscal
256
ANNUAL REPORTS
year 1930, however, there was no termination of the season for the Evening Centers. Accordingly, the greater part of the first season (from January 1 to April 1, 1931) falls within the calendar year which is the subject of this Report, and also by far the greater part of the expenditures for the first season were made from the appropriation for this year. The second season began in the second week of October, 1931, three weeks earlier than the beginning of the previous season. This length of season, representing an increase of nearly 200 % accounts for the third and largest item of financial expenditure to which has been applied a portion of the increased appropriation for the year 1931.
ATTENDANCE. Attendance figures in the Evening Rec- reation Centers show a consistent growth over the previous season. The same figures show also a greater frequency of at- tendance by the individual frequenter. By a method which is explained below, it has been ascertained that the recreational activities of the persons attending the Centers are more pur- poseful than during the first season.
EXPANDED PROGRAM. Activities additional to those developed in the four Centers in the previous season should be noted. Because the Evening Recreation Centers are still in the early stages of their development, with only one full year having elapsed since their initiation, it seems wise to list here both the activities established in the first season and those which have been added; and also to point out important re- cent development and growth in the activities established dur- ing the first season. Among the activities carried on during the first season (1930-1931) were
Handcraft Dramatic Clubs Basket Ball Quiet Games
Parties for special days (New Year's, Thanksgiving, etc.) Tournaments in Chess
Tournaments in Checkers
Social Games & Square Dances
Men's Whist Club (Bingham) Glee Clubs Debating Women's Bridge Club
Men's Clubs
Social Dancing Orchestras Young Women's Social Clubs
Harmonica activities
Instruction in Bridge Drama Tournament
Half Hour Talks by prominent athletes and on Current Events. Tap Dancing Community Singing
Among the additional activities developed during the pres- ent (1931-1932) season should be listed :
257
RECREATION COMMISSION
Ping Pong
Musical Skits
Instruction in Social Danc- ing General Assemblies
Stunt and Vaudeville Nights Center Magazines
Sketching Clubs
Special Night Exhibitions and Demonstrations
Inter-Center Concert Or- chestra
Inter-Center Harmonica Band
Inter-Center Community Con- ference Neighborhood Councils Ministrel Shows
Quartette Singing
Civic Christmas Observance.
Among those activities that had been successfully launch- ed during the first season, the greatest progressive develop- ments during the present season are to be noted among the fol- lowing :
Social Games Men's Clubs
Tap Dancing Special Parties
Orchestras
Special Day Observances
Instructions in social dancing
Harmonica Activities Bridge Clubs
Dramatics
Choral Music
IMPROVED ORGANIZATION. As a result of the ex- periences gained during the first season of the Evening Rec- reation Centers, there has been a notable improvement in the organization of the work as a whole; and in the skill of the- management and leadership of the Centers and their activ- ities. The present developments indicate that in the near fu- ture even greater results may confidently be expected.
Added to the organization at each of the four Recreation Centers is the position of "Registrar." This term is hardly an accurate one to explain the position. These "registrars" have- had the duty of reporting and studying attendance data. It is also their duty to introduce persons to the plan and system of organization under which the Centers are conducted; to cat- alogue the interests of respective persons and to aid the Man- ager in classifying the groups. By the employment of these officials a more definite method of checking attendance has been adopted and more systematic way of inducing participa- tion by all persons attending has been effected. A filling sys- tem covering data relating to membership, attendance, activ- ities, etc. is being carried out, through these registrars and it is certain to be a valuable basis for more highly organized development in the future.
Attendant upon the work of these registrars, membership cards and registration cards at the Centers have been used.
:258
ANNUAL REPORTS
The organization of workers in the four Recreation Cen- ters numbers, at the end of December, seventeen regular or per-week employes, exclusive of the Director, and four others employed on per-session basis for leadership and promotion of special kinds of recreational activities. These leaders, in ac- cordance with your Commission's appointments are assigned to duties partly with regard to their general qualifications for general leadership and partly because of their special aptitudes for leading special activities; e. g., music, dramatics, hand- craft, organizing duties, etc. One worker at each Center is a Manager to whom all other workers for the same Center are subordinate in rank. In supervision of the entire Evening Center program as assistant to the Director, one young man is employed as Supervior. His duties are full-time. A more concise tabulation explaining the organization is given sub- sequently in this Report.
It is a pleasure for the Director to report satisfaction and gratification with the results accomplished by the Supervisor, the Managers and the other workers in the Evening Recrea- tion Centers ; the enthusiasm and energy developed in their service, and the high degree of intelligent co-operation which seems, to the Director, to constitute the greatest asset for fu- ture development of the work.
In pointing out an important step forward in connection with the Evening Recreation Centers, it may be appropriate to quote first from the Director's Annual Report to the Com- mission one year ago. At that time the following statment was made: "In statement of what tasks ought, in the Director's judgment, to be faced immediately by the leadership organiza- tion, I mention the need of still further study of community groups, leaders, etc., with a view of raising the average age of persons in attendance. Urgent efforts are being made at pres- ent to attract more mothers and fathers of families, and to in- crease in each community the public knowledge of the Centers and their opportunities. It can be readily appreciated that time and patient effort are required for any high degree of realization in these directions."
It may now be said that there has been realized a consider- able accomplishment along the lines called for in the foregoing quotation. There has been a well-defined response by the corps of workers to the definition of the "Functions of The Evening Center Worker" previously laid down for them, particularly that part of the definition which is again quoted here: To em- phasize the community rather than the Center (building) and to regard the community in its Recreation interests, etc."
259
RECREATION COMMISSION
In general it may be said that the Evening Center Man- agers and Leaders are being carefully and successfully trained in their response to that analysis of their task which was set forth in the Director's Report for 1930 in the following pas- sage : "The Director submits that this task demands thorough and thoughtful study of the respective communities in which the Centers are located (no two communities are alike) ; re- peated interviews with individuals and small groups; selec- tion and encouragement of leaders in recreational activities ; clerical work; and a variety of other local contacts. In brief, the greater part of the business of conducting Adult Recrea- tion Centers must, for success, be carried on not at the actual sessions of recreation hours nor in the Recreation Center it- self, but rather all through the week and the year (especially between sessions and previous to the beginning of the season by way of preparation) and throughout the whole Commun- ities served."
ADDED EQUIPMENT. The work of the Evening Centers is still further improved as a result of the acquisition of im- portant and valuable equipment and accessories in the Centers. Substantial Bulletin Boards are examples.
PUBLIC DEMONSTRATION. In public demonstration of the work of the Evening Recreation Centers a public pro- gram of typical activities was presented in the High School Gymnasium on the evening of March 27. In illustration of this event, a section of the printed program is quoted below.
Program
1. CALISTHENICS Women's Gymnasium Group
2. FOLK DANCING Women's Gymnasium Group
3. BASKET BALL
4. KNAPP CENTER QUARTET
5. SOCIAL GAMES Morse Center Frequently played at Recreation Centers
6. FUN IN ODD MOMENTS 5 Western Center
1 Knapp Center
7. CALISTHENICS Men's Gymnasium Group
8. TUMBLING Men's Gymnasium Group VERY SHORT INTERMISSION
(Please do not leave your seat unless requested.)
260
ANNUAL REPORTS
9. RECREATION ORCHESTRA
Composed of Center folks
10 "THE TRYSTING PLACE" Knapp Dramatic Club A typical one-act play at the Recreation Centers
11. TAP DANCING Bingham Tap Club
12. FEELING FRISKY j Western Center Knapp Center
13. BINGHAM CENTER QUARTET
14. MINSTRELS
Repeating a section of recent Knapp Center Minstrel Show
In the program of Gymnasium activities EVENING GYMNASIUM for men and women the public response during the closing weeks of 1930, when this program was first launched, made necessary the addition of a sixth night each week to the pro- gram. The six-nights-a-week program has been maintained for twenty-three weeks during the present year, with steadily growing attendance. It is to be noted that this increased length of season (twenty-three weeks for 1931 as against eight weeks for 1930, an increase of nearly 200% ) and the additional ses- sion each week, involving additional cost, account for the fourth major item of expenditure to which has been applied a portion of the increased appropriation of funds for the year 1931.
At the present time the weekly program at the Gymnasium is as follows: Three nights each week (Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays) for general activities for men; two nights each week (Mondays and Wednesdays) for women's activities ; and Friday nights for games played in the Municipal Basket Ball League, sponsored by this Commission.
It is in the women's Gymnasium activities that the great- est growth has been made. From the beginning of the season until the present time the average weekly attendance has been nearly twice as high as the average for the corresponding part of the previous season.
One unit in the After-School Supervised AFTER-SCHOOL SUPERVISED ATHLETICS Athletics for girls has been added. The present organization includes four units for boys and three for girls. As in the prev- ious season each boys' unit is under lead- ership four afternoons each week for twenty weeks in the Spring and Fall; and each girls' unit for three afternoons
261
RECREATION COMMISSION
each week. The activities are for older boys and girls-those of High and Junior High School age.
Because of the increased attendance and the opportunities for varying and intensifying the program. Assistants to three of the Supervisiors of the boys' units have been added during the year 1930. At the present time each boys' unit has one Supervisor and one Assistant.
This addition to the organization and personnel of the After-School Supervised Athletics accounts for one more line of expenditure of funds to which has been applied a portion of the increased appropriation of funds for the year.
At the grounds of the Baxter School, one SATURDAY PLAYGROUNDS unit in the organization of Saturday Morning Neighborhood Playgrounds, with activities for the younger children, has been added. This unit employes one man and one woman lead- er. This addition illustrates again the type of expenditure to which have been applied portions of the increased appropria- tion of funds for the year.
In the twilight out-of-doors activities for TWILIGHT RECREATION men during the four months' period May to August inclusive-a feature of your Commission's program which was launch- ed for the first time in 1930-there has been an appreciable development. The development consists in increased attend- ance, geater skill in the leadership resulting from experience, and the availability of funds for slightly increased season. As the season of 1931 advanced twilight Recreation Centers continued to grow in popularity. Quoits, horseshoes, paddle tennis, and playground ball, continued this season to be the most popular activities. Inter-center tournaments in quoits and horseshoes were popular. On several evenings of the sea- son there were as many as seventy-five men engaged, either participating or witnessing with great interest, games of quoits and horseshoes, at Richard Trum Field and Lincoln Park. Sim- ilar interest, with not so large numbers, was observed at Dil- boy Field and the other Centers. A tabluation later in this Report gives a more complete statement of this phase of the program.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.