The Boy and His Gang

by Joseph Adams Puffer

AN INADEQUATE PLAYGROUND

The outdoor gymnasium is not enough

A MODEL PLAYGROUND

Boys at the gang age need room for the group games

During the warmer months of the year, the city boy, for whom naturally the boys’ club is designed, will spend his time out of doors. Playing field and swimming place, trips into the country on foot, with longer journeys by rail and trolley, keep the gang actively engaged in ways which are for the most part wholesome. Even the least desirable of them serve to work off the boy’s abounding energy, and keep him from worse things.

The peril of the city gang comes with the cooler weather of fall, when the early darkness hides its doings, and any meeting place becomes attractive if it is warm. This is the time for the boys’ club to capture the gang. The game is to keep the boys off the streets, and out of worse places, between the hours of four in the afternoon and ten in the evening. If at this critical time a boy can explode his energy in wholesome ways and amid good surroundings, the rest of the day will largely take care of itself. The gang demands a place to meet and to do things. This place will either be the home, the boys’ club—or elsewhere.

The Gang and the Playground

In certain of its aspects the problem of the playground is not unlike that of the boys’ club. Each exists primarily to give the boy opportunity of activity, spontaneous and largely self-directed, yet under supervision, adequate but not meddlesome.