It is needless to say that several years' work in the midst of such surroundings gives one a hopeless outlook for that kind of work. In 1891 a movement to establish a municipal lodging house was organized, and I became part of it. A committee composed largely of business men met in the office of Killaen Van Ransellaer, 56 Wall Street. In discussing the plan of a municipal lodging house, the "Wayfarers Lodge" in Boston, an institution of the character under discussion, was pointed out as a model, and it was decided to send a representative to Boston to investigate and make a report on it.
I was suspicious of the printed report of the Boston place. It spoke of the men getting clean bedding, clean sheets and good meals; and experience was teaching me that that kind of catering for the tramp would swamp any institution. Then, I knew something about the padding of charitable reports. I did not care to offer any objection to the sending of a representative, but I determined to go myself; so, dressed in an old cotton shirt with collar attached, a ragged coat, a battered hat and with exactly the railroad fare in my pocket, I went to Boston. I stopped a policeman on the street, told him I was homeless and hungry. "Go to the Police Station," he said, and knowing that at each Police Station tickets of admission were served, I presented myself to the Sergeant at the desk.
Furnished with a ticket, I went to No. 30 Hawkins Street, and there fell in line with a crowd of the same kind of people I was working with and for on the Bowery. We had about an hour to wait. When it came my turn for examination, I was rather disturbed to find the representative of the committee sitting beside the superintendent, investigating the tramps as they passed. I knew he could not recognize me by my clothes, but I was not so certain about my voice, so I spoke in a low tone.
"Open your mouth," the superintendent said. "Where are you from?"
I kept my eyes on the ground and answered a little louder, "Ireland."
"You are lying," the superintendent said. "Where are you from?"
"Ireland," I answered again in the same tone.
Two kinds of checks lay on the table in front of him—one pile green, the other red. After answering the rest of the questions, I was given a red check and taken to a cell where a black man stripped me to the skin.
"Why did I get a red card while most of the others got a green card?" I asked.