"Broke," The Man Without the Dime

by Edwin A. Brown

I entered and found myself in the presence, except for the policemen, of the first white man I had seen on Lombard Street. A kindly appearing gentleman asked me a number of questions, and among them if I was sick. My answer apparently satisfactory, he said,

“You will have to work for your lodging here.”

I asked, “How long?”

He replied, “Three or four hours.”

I was then ordered to take a bath, which was compulsory, and was perfectly right and a good thing. Water, however, does not cost much. After the bath I was shown into a large dormitory, thoroughly ventilated and immaculately clean (made and kept so by homeless workers) containing fifty beds, of which thirty were occupied that night. The beds were very clean and comfortable, except the pillows, which were pretty thin and hard. I judged they were stuffed with cotton, and cotton gets into a lump sometimes. Some of the men coughed all night. At four o’clock, for some reason, one-half of the men were called, and why they were called at that hour I could not learn. At five o’clock the rest of us were called. I had slept in a clean ten-cent bed for six hours, and was then driven out. For the spirit to drive is also evident there. When we went into breakfast there was some bread and spoons on the table. We had no need of a knife and fork, as we had nothing to use them for. We were then given a plate of bean soup and a cup of stuff called coffee. The soup had a nasty taste, like rancid lard or strong butter, and the material called coffee was luke-warm, and nauseating. It had not the slightest flavor, taste, or strength, and we were not given sugar or milk. This was our breakfast. I could not eat or drink a mouthful, and I was not the only one, for there were others of the half-starved boys and men at that table who ate nothing, and those who did eat forced it down, and made faces while doing so.

Now, this was not because I was used to Bellevue-Stratford fare, for I have roughed it throughout the West in mining and cow camps, and know good coarse food from nasty coarse food.

We then went down in the reading-room, a sort of chapel, where there was a rostrum with an organ and a pulpit on which was a carved cross. The room was filled with chairs. At one end was a large table covered with old magazines and papers. Did you ever notice how charity people think old magazines are good enough for a poor man no matter how bright mentally he may be, or how much he loves to keep up with the times?

We were told we would have to wait until half-past six before going to work. I almost fainted from hunger, and was suffering terribly with a headache. I went down to the door and asked if I could go out, saying I would return. I was told, no, I could not. In this chapel I was virtually imprisoned, to be kept there and turned loose at the will of its superintendent. There were two big well-fed policemen sleeping on the chairs, and I fell to wondering what they were there for, and what they had had for breakfast. I wondered if they were there to watch us, and I said to one boy in a tentative way, “What’s the matter of us making a sneak?”

He replied, “No, I won’t, for I promised I would work, and if they catch you trying to make a sneak, they’ll throw you in jail.”

Then I wondered what the large kindly man at the desk, who did not have to wash or scrub floors or saw wood, had had for breakfast, and what the other big good-natured attendant had had, whose only business was to boss the “under dog.” I also wondered what the other members of the society of organized charities had had for breakfast, and if they were driven out of bed at four or five o’clock in the morning to eat it.