# received all the light they had, and it was admitted so as to strike their books immediately over the right shoulder. When the door was opened it led immediately into the playground, and the watercloset was in close proximity to it, so that the effluvium could not help but enter with all its freshness into the school room. This was all the ventilation and light provided. I went into the upper rooms of the primary department, and there I found the teachers in one of the middle rooms, and the children seated as close as they could be packed, and I was informed by the principal that the gloom was so great on a dark day that the little ones could not see the figures on the blackboard. Yet this is one of the recently erected school edifices, "erected at great expense," because of the "modern improvements," by the great city of New York. I went up into the top or highest floor, the male department, and there I found, with but one exception, that the benches were placed in a position where the light entered in a manner not according to the laws of hygieneand there was a defect in the sight of the children. And to add to the insalubrious state of affairs, the waterclosets used by the teachers were placed in close proximity to the class room, and communicated with it by an open window! And I have been informed # # that there is a new school-house on the west side which there is the same arrangement throughout.1 * * * * in The report of the Board of Health of the City of Boston for 1875 (pp. 43-51 and 76, 79, and 80) contains the results of the inspection of 111 schools in 10 school-houses of that city, "representing, so far as possible, every variety of distinguishing quality:" The time chosen in each instance was the last hour of the morning or of the afternoon session, when the room had been occupied at least an hour, and when the air would probably be found at its worst. A specimen of the air was obtained from the middle of the room, the jar being filled at the level of the scholars' heads. At the same time, the temperature of the room was taken at the floor level and at the level of the pupils' heads. Finally the condition of the window sashes and of the ventilating registers, whether open or shut, was noted; and a note was also taken of the state of the atmosphere to the sense of smell, with the number of desks in the room and the number of children present. Parkes, the eminent English authority on has found that the organic products of respiration begin to be manifest when the carbonic acid in the air of an inhabited room reaches the proportion of .6 per 1,000. Pettenkofer, who is at the head of German sanitarians, makes the limit of purity .7 of carbonic acid in a thousand volumes of air, beyond which an unwholesome degree of vitiation begins. hygiene, * * * The smallest amount of carbonic acid found in any of the 111 rooms examined was .57, the greatest 3, and the average of all the rooms was 1.18. Concerning the temperature of the rooms, it is said: Some notion of the probable effect upon health of a continued exposure to a superheated atmosphere which is at the same time vitiated by respiration may be obtained by entering almost any of our school rooms at the latter part of a half day's session in midwinter. To a sensitive person leaving the outer air and coming at once into such a room, the impression is one not easily forgotten. The blast of hot foul air is sickening. The marvel is that children do not more frequently succumb to the inevitably depressing influence of such unwholesome conditions. It may be set down as a safe standard rule that the temperature of school rooms should range between 65° and 68° Fahrenheit (18.50 and 20 centigrade). It need hardly be stated here that the ordinary temperature of school rooms is above 68°, and that a point in excess of 70° is very commonly found. If anything is worse than an excessive degree of artificial heat, it is the quick transition to the opposite extreme. a frequent thing in school room experience that the teacher, becoming suddenly aware that the air is too warm for comfort, directs that the window sashes be opened at the top to effect a speedy relief. The consequence is that the inevitable wave of cold outside air sweeps over the uncovered heads of the children, and a fresh accession of cases * It is In the New York Times of May 29, 1878, we find the following: "At the meeting of the board of health yesterday a report was presented by Dr. Janes and Sanitary Engineer Nealis in relation to the condition of grammar school No. 48, in West Twenty-eighth street, between Sixth and Seventh avenues. The report set forth that they found the gratings intended for supplying fresh air to the cellar tightly covered, preventing the circulation that should keep the air pure. In one of the class rooms there was a leakage of gas from a defective pipe, and it was stated that the leakage had existed since the last vacation. In another of the class rooms on the third floor, used for instruction in writing, the light is inadequate, and its continued use for that purpose will tend to seriously impair the sight of the pupils. The ventilating shafts from the sinks in the yard terminate at the windows of the class rooms on the second floor, and discharge foul and deleterious odors into the class rooms when the windows are open. A copy of the report was ordered to be sent to the board of education." of bronchitis or of more serious pulmonary affections is the result. An instance of this thing was observed in the inspection of the Chapman School. A room showed at the desk level a temperature of 77°; three-quarters of an hour later the same room was revisited, when the thermometer indicated 61.7°, a fall of 15.30! Between the two visits the teacher had "aired" the room to some purpose; the air was pure enough, surely, and the coughing and sneezing of the children gave warning that it was cold enough also. If such a sudden change should occur in the outer atmosphere it would be considered a fruitful cause of increased sickness in the community. # # The universal testimony of the teachers in the course of the investigation was to the effect that they could not rely on the special means provided for the ventilation of their rooms. The system of flues and shafts as at present disposed in schoolhouse construction must be supplemented by opened doors and windows. # This report, in conclusion, says: It is sometimes said that the matter of school-house ventilation is discussed and agitated more than its real importance warrants. The need is not of less but of more agitation, not in the direction of impracticable sanitary speculations, but to promote the realization of feasible, indisputable sanitary principles. In 1876, the health department of Cincinnati1 ordered a chemical examination to be made of the air in some of the public schools in that city and the results are embodied in their report for that year. A table is given showing "the number of volumes of carbonic acid in 100,000 volumes of the air of several rooms in each of the twenty-six schools examined." Concerning this table, Professor Hough, who made the examination, says: "The foregoing figures indicate most conclusively that in a large majority of cases the ventilation of our school-rooms is injuriously defective. A very large majority of the pupils of our public schools are breathing, for several hours each day, an atmosphere containing more than one-tenth per cent. of carbonic acid. In many cases the degree of vitiation reaches nearly if not quite double that amount." Measurements were made of 265 rooms with a view of ascertaining the amount of air space allowed to each pupil. Professor Hough estimates "from 200 to 300 cubic feet as the smallest allowable air space for each pupil under the present methods of ventilation." Of the 265 rooms measured it was found that "only 29 afford 300 cubic feet or more per pupil; 236 afford less than 300 cubic feet per pupil; 166 afford less than 200 cubic feet per pupil; 22 afford less than 108.5 cubic feet per pupil; and 14 afford less than 100 cubic feet per pupil." Of these 14, several gave less than 90 cubic feet per pupil, and one only 56.7. "The relation of these magnitudes to the necessary conditions of respiration is fearful." Attention is also called to the imperfect lighting of many of the rooms as calculated to permanently injure the eyesight of the pupils. The report of the public schools of the District of Columbia for 1876-77 (pp. 11, 12) contains the results of an inspection by the health officer of the District of some of the public school buildings of the city of Washington, concerning which he says: The whole story of the condition of the rooms inspected may be epitomized in a very few words, viz: Altogether insufficient air space; practically no ventilation, except by windows; unequal distribution of heat; coal gases from sheet iron and cast iron stoves, and generally unsuitable character of the buildings. The average air space to each occupant of the rooms inspected is approximately 170 cubic feet, the air displaced by the bodies, desks, &c., not deducted (twenty of the buildings averaging much below those figures, three being below 100 cubic feet), and had the average of the rooms been taken, it would quite likely have been found to be, in some instances, even below that of the lowest building. With no other than the exhalations of the occupants, therefore, to vitiate the air, taking the above average, viz, 170 cubic feet, the whole atmospheric contents of the rooms should be changed every sixteen and a half minutes. In the absence of definite analysis, we may estimate approximately that, by the window and door method, the relative quantity of the deadly poisonous property, carbonic acid gas, constantly present in most of these rooms when occupied, is not less than from eight hundredths to fifteen hundredths per cent. An admixture of 1 per cent. in respired air is sufficient to produce death in a short time, and no person can safely remain any long time in an atmos phere having more than seven hundredths per cent. of this gas. 1 Report of the Board of Health of Cincinnati, 1876, pp. 148–159. Dr. Edward R. Cogswell, in his report on the sanitary condition of Cambridge, Mass., p. 353, says of the school-houses of that city: * In nearly all of them, however, improper hygienic conditions are found. In some, a prominent defect is in the method of warming; in others, the trouble arises from the location and condition of the privies and urinals; while adequate means of ventilation It too often happens * * are wanting in nearly all. that, owing to the frequent changes in the members of the city government, the experience gained by one board in the building of school-houses is lost to the city when the erection of others becomes necessary. The school committee, who have the exclusive charge of the schools, have no authority in the matter of the construction of schoolhouses. At the meeting of the New York Medico-Legal Society, February 7, 1877, a paper on "The influence of vitiated air on the eyes" was presented by Dr. Edward G. Loring, of Boston, in which he says:1 I have no doubt in my own mind, and I believe it is universally admitted, that vitiated air has a direct irritating effect on all mucous membranes; and I feel convinced, from my own observation, that the mucous membrane of the eye is peculiarly susceptible to its influence. This is shown by the fact that repeated attacks of inflammation of the mucous membrane of the eye which have occurred in a vitiated atmosphere and which have resisted all curative means, are often cured at once and prevented from recurring when a wholesome supply of air is obtained, all other conditions remaining the same. I have, then, no doubt in my own mind that bad air alone, acting as the primal cause, may set in train a series of morbid processes which may, and often do, affect not only the working capacity and integrity of the organ, but which may lead even to its total destruction. At a meeting of this society January 3, 1877, the results were presented of an examination of the eyes of 1,440 school children in Cincinnati, New York, and Brooklyn : In Cincinnati, in the district school, in 209 pupils examined, the rate of near-sightedness was 10 per cent. In the intermediate schools, in 210 pupils, 14 per cent. were near-sighted. In the normal and high schools, in 211 scholars, 16 per cent. were nearsighted. In the introductory class of the New York College, 29 per cent. were nearsighted; in the freshman class, 40 per cent.; in the sophomore class, 34.75 per cent.; in the junior class, 53 per cent. In the Polytechnic Institute in Brooklyn, 10 per cent. of the students in the academic department were found to be near-sighted; and in the collegiate department, of 158 students examined, 28.5 per cent. were nearsighted. There is a striking correspondence between these results and those obtained in Germany; both showing that near-sightedness increases in the advanced grades of the public schools.3 EDUCATION VS. POLICE. The expenditure for police in our cities brought into comparison with the expenditure for education presents many interesting contrasts. It would naturally be thought that all the items necessary for such a comparison could be furnished from the records of every city annually; unfortunately this is not so. It is universally admitted that education which develops aright the whole man must bear a close relation to the evils in human condition, and among them to crime. The most enthusiastic would hardly claim that education at its best could perfect human condition; they believe, however, in its power to modify and improve. From the present imperfect condition of records and statistics a fair mind can hardly reach a different conclusion; but a thorough investigator will scarcely be satisfied until the data before him shall include a fair statement of all the conditions involved in the statement. The police expenditure is but a single item in the cost of crime; there is also the destruction of life and property, with the evils arising from their constant peril, to which must be added the cost of courts, of jails, of penitentiaries, and all other expenditure on account of crime. The Sanitarian, May, 1877, p. 204. E-V Ibid., pp. 122, 123. Ibid., p. 120. a Total, including expenditure for buildings, $226,666. The reduction of more than one-half since 1874 has been accomplished by cutting down salaries. In Albany, out of 6,840 arrests, 1,250 were of persons between 10 and 20 years of age. In Cleveland, out of 7,845 arrests, 59 were of children under 10 years of age, 419 from 10 to 15, and 935 from 15 to 20; a total of 1,413 under 20 years of age. In Brooklyn, out of 26,857 arrests, 86 were of children under 8 years of age, 1,347 from 8 to 14, and 4,247 from 14 to 21; a total of 5,680 minors. In St. Louis, out of 19,427 persons arrested, 2,344 were under 20 years of age. In Boston, out of 26,683 arrests, 4,915 were of minors; that these were principally youth with no homes would seem to be indicated by the fact that 4,711 minors had applied for lodging at station houses. In Cincinnati, out of 10,647 arrests, 1,696 were of persons between the ages of 10 and 20. Of the whole number arrested, 10,647, only 355 were found unable to read and write. In Detroit, the whole number of arrests for the year was 4,657. Of these, 701 could neither read nor write, and 107 others could read only. The number of arrests under 20 years of age was 850. The superintendent of police says: "While there is abundant provision made for boys who commit offenses cognizable by the State statutes and institutions have been erected for their detention, schooling, and employment, there is only one for the reception of females, viz, the house of correction; and the courts have no other alternative but to send them thither. Some better provision than that now existing should be made for them." In Buffalo, in 1877, the whole number of arrests was 8,126. Of these, 89 were of children under 10 years of age, 543 from 10 to 15, and 1,221 from 15 to 20; making 1,853 arrests of persons under 20 years of age. JANITORS' WAGES. The following statement respecting the wages paid to janitors of school buildings in certain cities was prepared last year. It illustrates the sort of work often done by this Office in response to requests made by school officers. In this case the information was desired by General C. E. Hovey, one of the school trustees of the District of Columbia, and, having been found useful in many places, it is inserted here for the use of a larger constituency. In the following replies, the number before each indicates the city to which the corresponding number is attached in the list below, viz: 1. Albany, N. Y. 2. Allegheny, Pa. 3. Baltimore, Md. 4. Chicago, Ill. 5. Cincinnati, Ohio. 6. Columbus, Ohio. 7. Covington, Ky. 8. Davenport, Iowa. 9. Denver, Colo. 10. Des Moines, Iowa. 11. Detroit, Mich. 18. Pittsburgh, Pa. 19. Providence, R. I. 21. Rochester, N. Y. 28. Worcester, Mass. Question 1.-What amount is paid per month or per annum for janitor's labor in the care of a single isolated school room heated by a stove? No. Answers.-Nos. 1, 2, 5, 7, 12, 13, 20, 22, and 25 have no isolated school rooms. 3, pay regulated by number of classes in a room; for 3 classes or less, $8 per month; 4 classes, $9; 5 classes, $10, &c.; 50 cents per month for each fire. No. 4, $4 per week. No. 6, $8 per month, $80 per annum. No. 8, $100. No. 9, $5 per month (rented rooms). No. 10, $6 per month, when janitor does not live in the building. No. 11, $8.25 per month. No. 14, $50. No. 15, $15 per month. No. 16, $290 per annum. No. 17, $5 per month (10 months to the year). No. 18, $48 to $96; local committees fix salaries in their districts. No. 19, room of 50 scholars, 50 cents per week; larger rooms, 75 cents; and 50 cents for each fire. No. 21, $8 per month, $96 per annum. No. 23, $10 per month, $120 per annum. No. 24, $29 to $50 per annum. Nos. 26 and 27, $48 per annum. No. 28, $1 per week, October 1 to May 1; 50 cents, May 1 to October 1. Question 2.-What amount is paid per month or per annum for janitor's labor in the care of two or more school rooms heated by stoves? Answers.-No. 1, two rooms, $65 per annum. No. 2, school buildings contain ten to twenty rooms each, salaries average $500 to $1,000. No. 3, ten rooms, $17.50 per month in winter; in summer, deduction of 50 cents for each stove. No. 4, less than eight rooms, $5 to $6 per week each. No. 5, ten rooms, $1.40 per diem, and living rooms; twenty rooms, $2.05 per diem, and living rooms (furnish their own materials). No. 6, two rooms, $160 per annum; four rooms, $416; eight rooms, $624. No. 7, twelve rooms, $40 per month, $480 per annum. No. 8, five rooms, $300; eight rooms, $550; ten rooms, $600; twelve rooms, $650. Nos. 9 and 25, no rooms heated by stoves. No. 10, ten rooms, $40 per month, lodging, fuel, and light. No. 11, two rooms, $10.50 per month. No. 12, three rooms, $15 per month; five rooms, $25; six rooms, $30; eight rooms, $35; twenty-two rooms, $55. No. 13, two rooms, $180 per annum; three rooms, $240; four rooms, $300; five rooms, $360. No. 14, two rooms, $90. No. 15, six to twelve rooms, $11 per month and lodging. No. 16, two rooms, $320 per annum. No. 17, $50 per month, $500 per annum, for twelve rooms. No. 18, two rooms, $108 per annum; three rooms, $120 to $300; four rooms, $140 and $240; six rooms, $240 and $600; ten rooms, $480; twelve rooms, $720; seventeen rooms, with rent (salaries in each district fixed by local committee). No. 19, 50 to 75 cents per week for each room, and 50 cents per week for each stove. No. 20, two or more rooms, $3 per month each. No. 21, two rooms, $8 per month; four rooms, $12; six rooms, $18; ten rooms, $30; fourteen rooms, $35 to $40, twelve months to the year; salaries varied by amount of sidewalk and height of building. No. 22, two rooms, $15 to $20 per month; four to six rooms, $30; eight rooms, $55; twelve rooms, $75; sixteen rooms, $95; eighteen rooms, $100. No. 23, two rooms, $15 per month, $180 per annum; buildings with number of rooms, $5 No. 24, two rooms, $132; three rooms, $212; five rooms, $230. No. 26, $36 per annum for each room. No. 27, six rooms, stoves, $125 per annum. No. 28, 30 cents per week for each room, and 30 cents for each fire; in large buildings, $1 per week extra for work about yards, &c. per room. |