Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 36, Number 81, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 3 June 1904 — A CRUSADE AGAINST DIRT. [ARTICLE]

A CRUSADE AGAINST DIRT.

Chicago Women Teaching the City gn Important Duty. The street cleaning campaign now being fought by the citizens of Chicago is without j. rallel in the history of crusades by dwellers in American cities. Plain, commercial principles have been applied. Chicago has declared she will be clean nnd that declaration is being fulfilled. Self-improvement societies ore doing the work the municipality neglected. It may astound the country to learn that it lias been the rule in Chicago to clean the streets only once in twelve mouths. The city appropriates annually $1,100,000 for the care of streets and that includes garbage removal, snow removal and maintenance of dumps. The Chicago Woman's Club determined that the filth must go. They began the crusade nnd others joined it, so that to-day a joint committee cares for a district nine and a half miles long and one mile wide. More than 100 miles of streets are being cleaned. Uniformed employes patrol the pavements and even vacant lots are being cared for. These are graded and seeded. Trees receive attention, weeds are attacked wherever they show themselves, and unsightly bill boards are torn down. It is expected that the outgrowth of this movement will be the establishment of an adequate street cleaning department.