wholesome for all time and maintain these sports as one of the powerful sources of our nation's strength and our national character.

That is why this monument is here. That is why the schools and colleges of the country rejoice today in having shared the privilege of building this memorial.

And that is the reason, Walter Camp, that I am here today. I come not primarily as your old friend to tell you what our life-long friendship means to me, but I come, fortified as you may see with eloquent credentials carved in stone, representing the boys of the schools and colleges of America, publicly to express for them their affection and their gratitude.

You dedicated your life to the American boy. The boys of America today join in dedicating this monument to your memory in recognition of your service to them. You put romance, chivalry and idealism into their sports. As long as boys shall gather to play their games on lot, on playground or athletic field, may that idealism endure in all its beauty, its vigor and its virility.

A Plea for More

Playgrounds

The Annual Report of the Public Welfare, Park and Recreation Departments, Waltham, Mass., contains a recommendation that Waltham secure more play space.

"Children under twelve," says the report, "should receive more consideration than has been accorded them in the past, and the Board recommends securing small lots of 20,000 square feet each, at locations where no child would have to travel over three blocks to reach one. The ideal layout is one playground for small children in each city block, in order that the children need not cross a street to reach it, but Waltham is so closely congested in certain localities that this would entail a great expense.

"The practice of setting aside space for permanent playgrounds in new real estate developments has been spreading rapidly. The progressive realtors realize that the only way to insure future recreation spaces, which are becoming so increasingly necessary for health and child safety, is to dedicate suitable areas of land for this purpose, as neighborhoods build up. This innovation not only shows public spirit, but also has proved a

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sound business proposition. The neighborhood playground attracts home seekers and facilitates the sale of lots. It need not entail a financial loss to the subdivider. The value of the land reserved may be returned in enhanced prices, or by actual distribution of this cost to the individual building lots.

"In city additions of ten acres or more, ten percent should be the minimum of area to be set aside for recreation."

Five Principles to Guide Selection of Recreation Areas*

Emphasis should be put upon the right principles in the selection of land for parks, parkways, playgrounds and athletic fields. Five principles may be stated as being especially important:

1. To acquire those easily accessible small tracts in different parts of a city which may most cheaply be adapted to serve as local playgrounds or recreation centers

2. To seek also some moderately large tracts, even though less accessible for the present generation, provided they are capable of conversion at relatively small cost into parks which will have the beauty of natural scenery

3. To acquire property for large parks in advance of general settlement of the neighborhood 4. To select generally, though not always, lands which are not well adapted for streets and buildings

5. To distribute the lands over the city in such a way as to give the maximum of use to the people who will be called upon to pay for their acquisition, development, and maintenance.

Notwithstanding the tremendous advance which has been made in recent years, it may still be said that recreation, in proportion to its importance, is the most backward and neglected phase of American life. Compare it for a moment with the attention that is given to work or education. Adequate provision for play and recreation is dependent in the last analysis upon city planning and regional planning, and especially in the laying-out of new suburbs and new towns to meet the requirements of modern life.-John Nolen, City Planner.

*Courtesy of The American City.

By

I visited the other day in Chicago a gentleman who worked in the planning of those wartime towns for munition and ship workers. He took me out to his home in the evening. When he went in the door with me, he said, "Mary, I have brought Henry Wright home with me. He has been telling me a great fairy-tale about a town they are building in the East, and they are doing all the things we used to talk about during the war."

The City Housing Corporation started five years ago to build a community known as "Sunnyside" in Long Island City, in some of the worst surroundings we have in the entire New York region. That is now a little oasis in a desert of a terrible mixture of apartments and houses, about as bad as we have anywhere in New York. It is a beautiful place. It is practically a finished community. The lessons which have been learned at Sunnyside are now being put into effect in a very much larger venture in a new town which is to be called Radburn, which is already under way. And tonight I am going to try to tell you our problems and our accomplishments in building these two communities, and in building them around the opportunities for community life and recreation.

In New York City plots are rather narrow and back yards are not so deep as in some other cities. In this depth there is really quite a lot of room, but by the time we get through with cluttering up with alleys, garages, backyard fences and sheds, there is very little room.

Joseph Lee wrote in the Survey Graphic for November: "The problem of adequate playgrounds will remain unsolved until the inside playground in the center of each inhabited block— perhaps the inside primary school also-has been established."

It so happened that some of our blocks were quite long. Those blocks were divided into three

*Illustrated talk given at Recreation Congress, Atlantic City, October 3, 1928.

groups of houses and a common garden space provided. Now, that garden space was acquired in two ways. In the first place, the company decided to keep all garages out of the back yards. They never should be there. in a small city back yard. In the next place, they decided to design the houses efficiently, only two rooms' depth, to occupy but a very small part of the front of the lot. That left plenty of back yard space. Each person has a back yard. And then the back thirty feet of the lots were set off as common play and garden space-making a 60-foot wide garden space running all through this development.

This is a community where the people are of very modest means, and they have made use of these playgrounds, they have enjoyed them and take great pride in them and keep them up. The total length of those playgrounds in Sunnyside of the private playground kind is nearly a mile.

We found that all of these playgrounds-there are six acres of them were not enough; they didn't give a place for the large children to play or for the people who wanted tennis. So we set off a three-acre park for play at the end of the development. That park was set off out of the limited profits. (This company is allowed to distribute but six per cent. on its stock.) And this was set off for the community without cost, actually representing a cost of $125,000.

Now, there were two lessons learned at Sunnyside, which I think are going to be copied all over the United States. We know of some places where they are already copied. One is the value of this internal block playground. And I have a formula by which you could get endless interior block playgrounds, and the man who sells the land can make more money and everybody will be happier and absolutely for nothing. In fact, if we get the technique of this right we shall have so many playgrounds in America we shall have to call them off. That is not a fairy-tale. I am ready to prove it.

There was another thing we learned at Sunny

side. This was quite an experiment, a bold experiment. We found that we could introduce groups of houses which did not face the street. One group of houses, in which twenty-two families live, runs back in from the street nearly 200 feet. The people approach the houses by a sidewalk which goes up steps into a little garden court. That would be very easy to build and rent. The question was: Would people buy it? Well, people have bought it, which is certainly gratifying, and there is really a very strong tendency toward this type of development. People seem to enjoy the quiet.

Now, this particular lesson or experiment, and the other one of the interior block playground, have been carried over into the new town of which I shall tell you.

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In all Sunnyside, in which there are now 5,000 people living, there isn't a single light court. There isn't a single room in the whole of Sunnyside that looks out upon its neighbor in a narrow side yard anything less than twenty-five feet wide. That has been done on very expensive New York land, and consequently it will be done in every other part of the country when they understand it. That experiment, which took four years to put into effect, was merely an introduction, or rather an experiment, giving us more knowledge in the methods of planning and more knowledge as to how people will act.

In the City of Radburn, N. J., where 1200 acres have been bought for this new town we have an immense block, fifteen times as large as an ordinary city block.

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AVENUE

B.

PRINCIPLE OF LAND SUBDIVISION

DIAGRAMS.

Henry Wright 11.29.28.

And that block is to have a park right down through the middle. That park, instead of being sixty feet wide, will be a hundred and fifty to two hundred and fifty feet wide. One block contains, with the school playground, about six acres; another block, about four acres of park land. The houses are all placed on little lanes which run back into the block but not across it. The lane runs in and the houses all enter from that lane by motor car. But foot passengers never go up and down this lane, that is, theoretically. Mr. Lee says that is where all the children will play, and that has yet to be seen. At any rate, this is only for motor cars. The garages are only on this side.

The other side of the house looks out upon a garden which is really part of the park, so that every family in the whole community is really living on the park. They live on their own private

little share of it.

But this is all a great connected

park system all over the whole town.

This isn't something we are going to talk about or wish we could do. This is something that is actually being done. These parks have all been laid out and pretty soon we are going to put the shrubs and trees in them. We are going to put in games and everything else that we can think of that properly belongs in those parks.

And we are having a great discussion now as to whether we shall put any sidewalks on the main street. The idea is that everyone shall walk back into the park and through the park to the station and to the shopping center, to the school and to the playground. But, at any rate, whether or not practice proves our theory, everyone will be able to walk down his own little path to his tennis court, to his playground and every child to the school. And we have added, we think, to the other two points of comfort and quiet and parks, the third point, and that is safety-especially safety for the child.

Now, this isn't as easy as it sounds. It is really a great step. And we are going to lean terribly heavily upon the Playground and Recreation Association of America to back up its president in the idea that real internal block parks are possible. I have been proposing them for years, because I read about them in England. But everybody said, "You can't maintain them. You can't police them. You won't know what will be going on in those parks."

The point is this—that even in a new town you couldn't afford half as many parks. These parks come to us for almost nothing-merely the price

of the virgin land-because those parks do not have to be served by sewers, water, gas and all sorts of things, as they would have to be if the street ran along in front of them. Consequently, we are getting from ten to fifteen acres of park lands distributed over the entire city of Radburn -a continuous system of parkways, at really a surprisingly small cost-something that every real estate man could do and probably will do when he sees that it can be done. And we are a proving ground to show that it can be done.

Twelve Commandments for Playground Construction

BY

CARL DIEM

Director of the Deutsche Hochschule fur
Leibesuebungen

1. Playground construction is the duty; playground culture the pride of a municipality.

2. Three square meters of suitable playground surface per inhabitant is the minimum essential, five the rule.

3. First build playgrounds, then stadiums; playgrounds nearer the dwellings than stadiums. 4. Playgrounds and gymnasiums without showers are a cultural disgrace.

5. Separate children, women and men in sport, but give each equal and sufficient equipment.

6. Fees for gymnasiums, pools and playgrounds should be collected from those who do not attend.

7. A playground should be an attractive place. Be liberal with decorative green, sparing no space for spectators, and away with all wooden fences.

8. A playground is not worthy of that name without a swimming pool. Give it a place in the main arena; if not, at least in the open, available at all times.

9. Dissect large play areas into respective playfields so that they form a park in their entirety.

10. Let a stadium represent a definite building plan. Aim for the horseshoe shape, and avoid the dish shape.

11. Ask playground experts for advice before making old mistakes over again.

12. A playground without a teacher is a man without a head. The stadium without a sports training school is dead.

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CHILDREN'S PLAY ROOF, PRINCE GEORGE HOTEL, NEW YORK CITY

Another Place to Play

The Prince George Hotel, in the heart of New York City, has a children's play roof which deserves a moment's attention.

When you step off the elevator, you leave the grown-up, practical world behind you and enter a land of play. In the hall, leading to the roof, there are window curtains-blue with pictures of children and witches and yellow dogs. On the walls are paintings illustrating Mother Goose rhymes and near the door hangs the shining steel armor of Prince George, the children's knight.

Then you come to the roof. Over the gate, a small boy holds a sign, "Hello!" There are plants, hanging vines, shrubbery and flowers of many kinds in blue and yellow flower pots. There are lovely bits of statuary, gaily painted birds, lanterns and wind mills. In the distance, the chimes of the Metropolitan Tower ring out the time.

The place is well equipped-a real Indian tent for the boys, a doll house for the girls, a sand box with tools, a fish pond with boats and water wheels, kiddie cars, swings, hobby horses, ring

toss and other games. In one corner, shut off by a gate, is

"A little spot

For a tiny tot."

There is also a shady place under an awning which has tables and comfortable chairs for mothers or nurses.

The roof is open from 8:30 to 5:30 and from May to November. A surprisingly large number of children are guests at the hotel each summer and they make good use of this outdoor play space. "I did not know," writes one lady, "that there could be such a delightful spot for children in any big city."

Want a Community
Hall?

This is how Landenberg, Penna., did it. Landenberg has a population of 600. A group of women united in desiring a community hall. Then they went to work.

They bought an old store building. Then they called a mass meeting to give the idea a chance to grow. From this meeting a board of nine trustees were appointed to have charge of the property.

But most important was the announcement that everybody was to have a part in making the dream

come true.

The women served the dinner. The men worked in squads. Some tore out shelves, counters and partitions. Others painted and plastered and one squad repaired the foundation.

The women made the stage curtains and even helped with the painting.

Afternoons and evenings for two weeks there were from three to seven men (volunteers) at work. It was completed in two weeks, just in time for a Chautauqua Festival.

The building cost $800. The material, at cost from a local dealer, amounted to $339. One woman contributed 125 chairs.

Community enterprise made this hall possible. Community enterprise will make many things possible.

Do you need a community hall?

Do you need anything else that will make your town a better place in which to live?

What you want you can get. Try it. THE SWARTHMORE CHAUTAUQUA ASSOCIATION, Swarthmore, Penna.