"Broke," The Man Without the Dime

by Edwin A. Brown

I heard one boy say to another, “I tell you, I’m hungry. I could eat a mule and chase the rider up hill. Did you have any supper to-night?” And the other boy replied, “A policeman gave me a dime. What do you think of that? And I got two scoops of beer and the biggest free lunch you ever saw, and I feel fine.”

I heard a man say to the one next to him, “Do you think this place will be pulled to-night?” and the other answered, “Why, no; what makes you think so?” The first one said, “They pulled the Union Mission one night for vags, but I don’t think they will pull this place, because it’s a city lodging house.” Comforted by that thought, they both fell asleep.

During the night a frail boy, with no clothing except the thin nightshirt, went to the toilet, down the long cold halls and stairways, into the still more cold woodyard. When he returned he had a chill, and as he lay down I heard him groan. I said, “What is the matter, boy?” and he replied, “I have such a pain in my side.”

Just at daylight we were called, went down into a cheerless room, and were given our clothes, then on down to the cramped dining-room, with scarcely any fire, where we were huddled together, thirty of us, whites and blacks. Here we waited one hour for breakfast, and then we were driven out into the woodyard for some reason we could not find out, and waited another half-hour until breakfast was called. During that long wait almost the entire conversation was about work and where it could be found.

We went in to breakfast and sat down to a stew of turnips and carrots, in which there was a little meat. In mine there were three pieces of meat about as big as the end of one’s thumb. There was some colored sweetened water called “coffee,” and some bread. I did not care for mine, but the other men and boys ate ravenously. When the boy on my right had finished his, I said, “Ask for some more.” He replied, “It wouldn’t do no good; they only allow one dish.” Then a hollow-eyed, thin-handed man on my left said, “Are you going to eat yours?” I said, “No,” and he eagerly asked if he could have it. I said, “You most certainly can,” and then he asked me if I was not well. It was the first word of kindness I had received. He took the dish and emptied it all into his, but glancing up I caught the appealing look of the boy opposite. He took the boy’s empty dish, putting part of it into his dish, and the boy ate as though he had had nothing before.

Having finished breakfast, and while we were waiting to be assigned to our work, the door between our room and the inner room was left open for a moment, and we saw the Superintendent seated at a well-appointed table with flowers upon it, a colored man waiting upon him. One of the boys looking in said, “Oh, gee, look at the beefsteak,” and then another boy looked at me, and said, “You see how Washington treats the out-of-work, and this place is self-supporting, or more than half-supporting.” And then a boy who had come early and worked his two hours for that bed and that breakfast, gave us a cheerful good-bye and started off to walk seven miles to begin work on a farm, a place he had secured the day before.

We waited to be assigned to our work. I wanted to saw wood, the wood looked so clean and inviting, and, too, I had sawed wood when I was a boy on the farm, and knew how; but I was not allowed to do so, and was given the task of making the beds. It was rather repellant to me at first, but I thought of those far down through the years of the past, a great deal more worthy than I, who had done things much more humble for humanity’s sake. I can assure the honest man and boy who slept beneath those coverings that night that I had tried my best to make them comfortable, although the linen was not changed, nor the blankets aired.

Some of the men scrubbed, and some swept the floors and stairs; some worked about the dining-room; others sawed wood.

While waiting in the woodyard for breakfast, I jokingly said, as we looked at the wood, “What’s the matter of getting out of here? Then we won’t have to work.” And one replied, “We can’t, we are locked in.” To prove if this was true I stepped to the door and found it as he said. We were locked in and could not have escaped in case of fire or accident if we had tried.

There is a sign, sometimes seen to-day in the dance halls of our Western camps, “Don’t shoot the pianist, he is doing the best he can,” and so with the Superintendent of Washington’s Municipal Lodging House, under the conditions he may be doing the best he can. Work is always a grand thing. The floors and stairs were clean, also our food and dishes. He impressed me as being the right man in the right kind of a place. But the Washington Federal Lodging House is only a suggestion of such an institution. As the house now stands it is the lodger, the workless man and boy, who keeps the floors and stairs and windows clean. They do it willingly, but they should be treated fairly for their labor. Not one should be allowed to go to bed hungry. He should be given a clean, warm bed to sleep in, and a good wholesome breakfast, and all he can eat. He should be given a pleasant welcome, an encouraging word, and a cheerful farewell,—it means so much, and costs nothing.