Evening Republican, Volume 15, Number 94, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 20 April 1911 — HOW TO PREVENT ACCIDENTS [ARTICLE]

HOW TO PREVENT ACCIDENTS

Grade School Children of Des Moines to Be Taught the Art of Self-Preservation. Des Moines. lowa. —Des * Moines" grade school children will be taught how to prevent accidents to themselves while in the city streets, if the Greater Des Moines school board decides to adopt a plan which will soon be proposed by Dan Finch, claim agent for the Des Moines City Railway company. Mr. Finch stated that he expects to go before the board and suggest a course of study which he believes, if followed by the children, will cut down accidents to the people of Des Moines in the future. The plan Mr, Finch has mapped out embodies numerous suggestions which, if told the children by their school teachers, will cause them to exercise much greater care while in the streets. "Adults can not be taught to exercise care,” said Mr. Finch. “They wiH continue- to be careless and get hurt. There is no need, however, of allowing the children to grow up in the same rut their fathers and mothers have lived in. Teach the child that danger lurks in the crowded 6treet and how to avoid it, and the death and injury rate will be cut down 90 per cent in a few years. Parents seldom give the child any more than a parting warning. The only sure way to impress on a child's mind that it should be careful in the streets is to have it taught In the schools. "The children should be taught how to get on and off street cars. They should also be taught to stop, look and listen at crossings. When in the busiest streets they should have It

deeply im_ ressed on their minds that the utmost caution should be taken in crossing. Not only would such a plan save the children from injury, but the lessons learned in childhood are never forgotten. In Portland, Ore., and several other western cities, I am told, the study of self-preservation is one of the regular courses of study in the grade schools. Des Moines should keep abreast of the times, and I hope that the people board will become deeply Interested in the movement."