A week later I met one of the “pals.” He told me the food down on the government works was good, for coarse food, and there was plenty of it, but the sleeping accommodations were extremely bad. “I would have stayed,” he said, “although the work was such that I wore out clothes faster than my wages would replace them, but the water made me ill. Then, too, I saw a man drowned. After that I didn’t care to stay.”
Explaining the tragedy, he said, “You see it was this way. We were working with the willows from a barge in the river. The boy lost his balance and fell into the stream. The treacherous current instantly swept him from the barge. He tried to swim back. God! I never saw such a trial of strength for life. With the strong Indian overstroke, the muscles stood out on his arms and neck like cords of rope, wrought to such a tension it seemed as if the slightest blow would have snapped them like glass. But the look of anguish on his face! If I could only forget that! Almost exhausted, and seeing that his efforts to reach the barge were in vain, he turned to swim down stream and toward the shore, but a whirlpool caught him. For an instant he raised his calloused hands above his head, and then—all was over. No sooner had he disappeared than the boss demanded, with a violent oath, ‘Bring on the willows.’”
"Were there no means of rescue provided for such an emergency?" I asked in horror.
His answer was nothing but the mention of the existence of so much red tape that a boat could not be provided which might possibly have saved that young man’s life.
The man was so visibly affected while relating the incident that I was led to inquire the cause. He replied, as he abruptly left me,
“He was our pal that night in the jungles—my pal.”
After hearing of this tragedy, I definitely decided not to go at all to the government works.
So filled was I with the obvious neglect by the city of Memphis of its toilers, I decided to tell the people of that city something of their thoughtlessness towards their homeless and needy workers, for whom they failed to provide food and shelter. So I called on the mayor and other influential citizens, telling them of my experiences and appealing to them to make a Municipal Emergency Home possible. All were in hearty sympathy with me. On invitation I met the City Club, an organization made up of the progressive business men of the city. Following my appeal to them, a Municipal Emergency Home Committee was appointed.
Leaving Memphis I went on to Birmingham, Alabama, that wonderfully active city, which because of its industries calls thousands of workingmen annually within its gate. My first effort here for the worker without the dime was to try to get medical treatment. Finding the dispensary closed at nine A. M., I was told it was open only one hour in the day, from twelve to one o’clock. The same conditions existed here in regard to the private charities as existed in other cities. Late in the afternoon I met a bricklayer, who told me in a casual way that a few weeks before, he had reached Birmingham, broke, and had been taken care of in a “speak easy” near the Louisville and Nashville Depot, which is filled with evil men and women. I had given him the impression that I was down and out. “They’ll treat you right there,” he said. “It is the only place I know of. Go there.” Then he added, “I’ll bet you’re hungry,” and as he left he offered me a quarter.
Later in the evening, while I stood on a downtown corner, a well-dressed, intelligent-looking man slapped me on the shoulder and said,