licated next winter, and on a larger scale, in Lincoln Park. And if
we show that we appreciate this, other features will be added.

Perhaps I should stop here, but I can not lose the opportunity of saying
just a word to connect this topic with the great playground movement,
and therefore in behalf of providing facilities for winter and summer
sports alike, for our boys and girls--our young people.

Do you realize fully that the boys and girls of to-day--yours and mine,
yes, and just as truly those less favored--those into whose lives there
comes but little cheer, into whose stomachs there goes but little
nourishing food, and into whose lungs, but little oxygen--do you
realize, I ask, that these boys and girls are to be the men and women of
to-morrow, with all the responsibilities of the world resting upon their
shoulders? Do we want them to enter upon the duties of life
stoop-shouldered, flat-chested, spectacle-eyed? Do we want them to be
anaemic, pessimistic, nervous wrecks? Do we want them to be mental
weaklings and moral cowards? Do we want them even to approximate these
conditions? No? Then, with all our provisions for their wants and their
needs, let us be sure to develop those things which minister so largely
to the development of the opposite characteristics. Prevention is not
only cheaper than cure, it is also better. Let us see that our parks are
developed with provisions for our boys and girls as well as for the
adults. Let us see that playgrounds are scattered over our city and
provision made for both winter and summer sports.

In addition to the Riverside Park skating rink, I wish the City Council
or the Board of Education would establish one on the grounds of the
Winship school, another at the Central building, and still a third on
the Belmont grounds. This could be done at nominal cost. What a splendid
opportunity it would give to all the children of the city to engage in
this most healthful and invigorating sport! It would give them their
needed entertainment and relaxation in the pure, invigorating,
out-of-door air. It would surround them with an emotional atmosphere
that is at once normal, natural, and spiritually health-giving. Instead
of these conditions, what do we find? Many of our young boys and girls
and very many of those a little older--those just entering upon manhood
and womanhood, when both emotional and physical atmosphere count for so
much in the forming of habits and the choosing of ideal