Evening Republican, Volume 16, Number 32, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 6 February 1912 — Dances Planned for City Buildings [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Dances Planned for City Buildings

BOSTON. —Public dances In municipal buildings, with proper restrictions and chaperonage, is the suggestion advanced by Miss Alice P. Vanston of the Social Service House, as a remedy for the conditions in the dance halls. “I want to say first of all” Miss Vanston replied, when asked her opln. ion on the dance problem, “that there should be some place where the girls and boys can dance. It may be that the chief injury done by the public dance halls comes from the fact that very young children are admitted to them. “Boys and girls get their first and only idea of dancing from what they see in these h&lls. The remedy fdr this has been suggested in the raising of the age limit from seventeen to twenty-one years. This would cut out from the enjoyment of a very Innocent recreation a very large number of young people. The enforcement of proper conditions dhd careful supervision would be better, it seems to me, than this discipline by ellminar tion. - “When a girl is shut up in a factory all day she must have some other exercise, and dancing gives her a good general exercise, which she can enjoy with music and among her equals. “Every neighborhood should have a building where the men who pay taxes and their wives and children

may enjoy the things that are perfectly legitimate and healthful, under municipal direction. It Is not paternalism. It is just ordinary common decency. “The girls would be glad to go to good places If there were such. They enjoy Intensely the dances arranged by the various social settlements. Those places are always overcrowded, and are always crying for more room. “Why may not the public school buildings be used for the public? in most of them there are excellent halls, which would make most desirable dance halls. People are willing to* trust their daughters in a public school. building. Behind such buildings stands the honor of the city; nothing harmful could be allowed: there, and to the Immigrants the honor of the American city means everything that is fine and beautiful and helpful. “If there were properly supervised municipal dance halls there would be a decided gain in the mental, moral and physical equipment of the boys and girls.