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Foreword

I have been living for some months in The Village of Happiness. These stories of its life have been written in its atmosphere. Daily contacts with the children and those in charge have made me feel that I, too, "belong." To be made one of themselves by these children, to be taken in as one who "belongs," is no mean honor.

The attempt to interpret them, their possibilities, their accomplishments, their values, their everyday lives, is a privilege. It is my hope that the stories may contribute to a better understanding of them and bring comfort to the homes where there are children-who-never-grow-up.

-- Joseph P. Byers

TABLE OF CONTENTS

ITS SOUL 1
HISTORY 6
HOW IT STARTED 11
THE VILLAGE SCHOOL 16
ASSEMBLY 28
THE VILLAGE STORE 30
CHRISTMAS AT THE VILLAGE OF HAPPINESS 36
THE PAIDOLOGICAL STAFF 39
THE SUMMER SCHOOL FOR TEACHERS 45
THE COLONY 53
THE RESEARCH LABORATORY 66
COMMITTEE ON PROVISION AND EXTENSION DEPARTMENT 75V

The Village of Happiness

ITS SOUL

I got the story as we sat -- three intimate friends -- in the light and warmth and confidence of a camp fire.

When Mary, good to look at, better to hear, and best of all to know, had finished, the fire somehow seemed blurred, shining through a mist. I wiped my eyes. Then I told her I must have the story just as she had told it; and that I should like to read the letter from her sister. She sent me the letter which is the story. Here it is:

-I am indebted to Miss Helen T. Keeves, of Bridgeton, N. J., for the spirit and substance of this, the first of the stories.-

The Village of Happiness
June 15, 19 --

Dear Sister:

Yes, I am actually in The Village of Happiness. You'll be surprised at the new name I've given it for ever since the day you left little Roger here I've fervently declared to myself that this is the one place on earth I would never have courage to visit.

I've kept to myself just what Roger meant to me, for, being the first one, he seemed to have a place in my heart that none of the others could ever hope to fill.

What ambitions I had for him! In my dreams I followed him through school and college. Roger would be such an alert, charming lad, I thought, finding at last some sphere of endeavor that would spell success and fame. And then the slow, terrible conviction that this could never be.

You'll remember that I was the only one of the family who thought you were doing right in placing him in a school. I can say now what I couldn't then -- that I was glad the child would be where I'd be spared the sight of him. It seemed as if all my love had soured into a sort of heart-sick loathing, not only toward him but also toward any form of abnormality that would even remotely remind me of the poor little Roger-that-is, as contrasted with the brilliant, glorious Roger-that-should-have-been.

Yet here I am -- 'led by the Spirit,' I suppose -- in this instance my Principal, Miss Preston. She is mightily interested in special education and engineered this visit for a group of her teachers. She insisted that I come along. I didn't want to. Roger was the reason but I could not tell her that; so I came. Besides, I knew you would be glad to have a report as to Roger's life here which would be all the more worth while since I didn't intend to let a soul know I was especially interested.

I have seen Roger several times so far. I'll tell you all about that when I see you. Will merely say now that you couldn't imagine a busier, happier little boy. What I am most eager to tell you concerns an incident of today's happening.

We were all listening to the Director lecture on certain types of handicapped children. He had several brought in to illustrate what he had to say. It seemed, then, a shameful thing to parade their pitiful afflictions in anyone's sight. Then I began to realize that my feelings about the affair weren't justified. As he talked you could see that each child was proud of having been chosen to be present and, somehow, in the pleasantest, most natural way, deformities were shown to be distinctions, and limitations assets; so that the children left the room glowing with happiness at being allowed to show how they differ from the rest of us. I was interested in spite of everything, though my mind was wrestling with all sorts of revolutionary thoughts.

"Finally," I heard him say, "I want you to see one of a rather numerous and interesting type of children." And there, coming across the floor, was our little Roger!

I'll admit I was torn between anger and dismay. It was different with our boy. And what if the child should recognize me?

I heard little of what was said until one of our party plunged into the discussion. She was a thin, overbearing woman with a mouth like a poorly sewed buttonhole. Earlier I had heard her talking volubly about "social efficiency" and it seemed the idea was still worrying her. She maintained the argument that it was a sheer waste of time and effort on the part of intelligent people to devote their lives to the care of such unfortunate individuals, and, looking at the proposition scientifically, wouldn't it be the part of wisdom to employ a lethal chamber to erase these biological mistakes of nature?

The lady's precise, metallic utterances met a profound silence. I was appalled not only at the blatant crudity of the woman but also by the recollection that I, too, had entertained such ideas on occasion.

Did Roger sense the import of this? I'm sure he didn't, though the way he snuggled closer to the Director, rubbing his little cheek against a kindly coatsleeve, led me to think he knew something serious was under discussion.

The Director stood meditatively regarding us. "Would you really like to know what my own thoughts are in this matter?" he finally asked. There was a sort of shy hesitation about him as he spoke. Roger, who still clung to his hand, he seemed to have forgotten for the moment.

"What I have in mind is without scientific value, of course," he went on. "And it's not the easiest thing to put into words, but -- , well -- , I like to think that in the far, transcendental glory of Heaven the Father of All sits brooding over humanity as it struggles on its upward way. Certain deep, significant principles of eternal truth must be brought to the earth-children. So the Father's voice is heard through the bright corridors of Heaven and the glorious host of shining spirits comes crowding to listen.

"'There is a great task to be done upon earth,' He says. 'A special lesson which the race of men must learn.

"'Little earth-babies are about to be born who will be different from the others. They will grow up in body but never in mind. Yet, they, too, must have souls. It is our business, this furnishing of souls for our earth-children.

"'For these different children brave souls are needed -- souls that can endure. Endure to sit in darkness, unseen, perhaps unknown. You will be unable to look out from their eyes; or think or plan through their minds; or speak by their lips; or shed the warmth of love from their hearts; or guide their hands and feet. You will dwell with weakness and suffering, with grief and shame, with ignorance and uncleanness, with neglect and cruelty.

"'You, who may choose to carry My message, must be content to be less than the least of all the children of men. You will be looked upon with sorrow and aversion, even disgust. Scorn and derision will follow you all your days but, in this humble guise and in no other can My message be carried to My earth-children.

"'Who among you will put yourselves to this task and go as My messengers?'

"Then," said the Director, "I can see the finest, brightest souls in all God's Heaven come crowding to the Throne -- 'Here am I, Lord!' 'And I!' 'And I!' "

Again there was silence. The Director looked down at Roger as if just realizing the child was still there. "That's all for today, little boy; and thank you for coming, Roger, you've helped us a lot."

I'm not going to try to describe my feelings; but, as the youngster passed near my chair I called to him. He stopped, confused and mystified. "Don't you know me, Roger -- boy?" I asked. Then you should have seen the beatific grin of recognition that spread over his face and heard his "It's my Aunt Abbie! MY Aunt Abbie!!" And deep in his blue eyes I saw that the wonderful Roger-that-should-have-been and the precious Roger-that-is are absolutely one and the same.

I'm staying here a day longer for Roger and I are planning a party for this evening. We will have it down at his cottage and all of the little boys of his group are invited.

Such fun! I was never happier in all my life.

Your loving sister Abigail

The Director, Edward R. Johnstone, whose heart, head and hands have guided The Training School for the past thirty-five years, is still here. He still believes that these different children have souls. He still believes that their souls are sent to them just as told in his story. So do I. It's a comforting belief to me. Perhaps it will be so to you.

HISTORY

Human history, written in pictures, words or monuments, has been brilliantly splashed in vivid colors with the names and deeds of those who have achieved fame as rulers, good or bad, warriors, scientists, inventors, teachers, patriots, saints or great sinners. The lives of the common and less than common people of their times have been painted as a drab, indistinct and inadequate background.

The true history of a nation is the history of its people, all of its people, on the march for self-expression or in retreat toward annihilation. The "Simple Annals of the Poor" may have greater historical significance than the debauchery of a Nero. The lessons to be drawn from the lives of "The Submerged Tenth" may be of greater value than those learned from "The Lives of the Saints."

The salvage and study of the imperfect product of the machine we call "civilization" will do two things; discover latent and unknown possibilities of usefulness in the imperfect output and suggest improvements in the machine itself that will reduce its wastage.

Forty-five years ago The Village of Happiness began its work as a self-constituted rear-guard to gather up a certain class of fragments cast aside by society in its progress, left behind and vainly struggling to rejoin the procession. The history of those forty-five years concerns itself with one of the most numerous and humblest groups of society. The salvage work of the Village has discovered, developed and utilized the latent possibilities in this group for useful and happy lives. Its scientific work with delayed and halting minds, carried on in laboratory, school, shop, field, playground and home, has been a major influence in the readjustment of our public school system to underprivileged, backward, and difficult children. Its Psychological Research Laboratory, Summer School for Teachers, and Extension Department have given a world-wide stimulus to thought and action in the identification, care, treatment and possibilities of the mentally retarded. It is continuing its scientific study of possible causes, still unrecognized and obscure, of such retardation.

The lives of those who live in this Village of Happiness reveal that being understood is in itself creative of the spirit of happiness which presides over and animates alike its citizens and its children.

After all is said, it is the advance of the whole mass that must be taken into account in the progress of civilization. Leaders may go so far in the van as to separate themselves and their influence from their people. Groups of stragglers, clinging to the skirts of society, retard its progress. If there is no concern for their weakness and inefficiency they must be cut off and forgotten. Yet even so, the causes that made them weak and inefficient, disregarded, may drag down the whole social structure.

We are beginning to be wise in that we are increasing our efforts to learn the causes for the rising stream of the socially incompetent.

SALVAGE

When John More was a boy he was very unhappy. No one seemed to care much about him. His people didn't understand him. His companions made fun of him, imposed upon him, encouraged him in evil. He got into trouble and was sent away to a school where boys who do bad things are sent. John was different but the school, like his parents and playmates didn't know why.

Sending him away didn't make him any better. He ran away from the school. They brought him back. He tried it again and again; same result each time. His unhappiness grew. Unhappiness is catching. John's made everybody else unhappy. They wanted to get rid of him.

A happy thought was born in that school every once in a while. The headmaster had one. It occurred to him that John and himself would be better off if The Village of Happiness would let John come to live in one of its cottages.

Well, that's the way it turned out. More than forty years ago John came to the Village. He brought his unhappiness with him and of course he was discontented. The two things go together.

John was big and strong by this time so he was given the job of driving a team and hauling coal for the Village. It was a dirty job and hard work. He didn't mind and for a while he hung on. Then, lo and behold, he ran away from the Village.

Now, the King of The Village, -- (Oh yes, it has a sort of King, although no one ever thinks of him in that light, for his only title among the children is " -- 'fessor"; but he is the Head of the Village), -- was sorry for John, so he sent after him and brought him back. He ran away again and again but every time the good King brought him back.

About this time there were two little crippled and helpless boys in The Village of Happiness. So it occurred to the King that maybe, if he should give one of these little fellows to John to be a big brother to; John, in caring for and trying to make the helpless boy happy, would grow less unhappy himself.

Well, it worked out, almost I mean, that way. John became a "big brother" in addition to his other work.

One crippled boy, however, wasn't enough to cure John More. For a while he hung on again, -- then seemed to grow worse than ever. At any rate the King saw he was getting ready to run away again, so he sent for him.

"John," he said, "that boy I gave you likes you a lot. You've been awfully good to him. You've carried him in your arms and wheeled him in his chair so much that he'd miss you horribly if you left him. I'm afraid he wouldn't be looked after so well by anyone else."

John's face was one big smile by this time but the King went right on. "You know that other little crippled fellow?"

"Yes," said John, "I know him. Ain't nobody lookin' after him like I do my boy." John's chest swelled out when he said it.

That King was wise. He knew the time to load a fellow up with a hard job is when he's got one already and all puffed up with it. So he took advantage of John right there.

He said, "John, this other little chap needs a big brother, too." Then, in a sort of doubtful way went on, "I'm wondering -- I'm just wondering -- if you could manage two boys."

John didn't know it but he was a "goner" right then. But the King knew he had him when he saw John's chest swell out some more and heard his "Sure. I'll take him. I'd like to have another. Two's better'n one, anyway."

From that day, more than thirty years ago, John never ran away again. Every minute off the coal wagon he gave to his two boys. He called them proudly "my boys" and all the villagers called them "John's boys."

That was the day John's unhappiness ceased for good and uncovered all the goodness in him. He got up earlier than the others in the morning to wash and dress his boys for breakfast. He hurried home at noon and night to look after them. Sundays and holidays he devoted wholly to them. They filled his whole horizon. "Limited" you say? "Because his mind had been 'marking time' since he was seven years old?"

Listen. I am writing this within two stone-throws of the cottage in which John now spends most of his time. I see him every day at the window and get a smile and wave of the hand. At fifty-four he is getting feeble. His eyes are failing. His working days are over.

His two boys, now long grown but still helpless, are with him in the cottage. So, too, is the spirit of happiness which has been his for lo, these many years.

I meet "A Little Maid" every morning on the sidewalk in front of her home. The cottage, shaded by oaks, is surrounded by ample lawns. There is no fence except a low hedge of box.

She is a little, grey-haired maiden of about forty years but with the joyous activity of a child of five.

My morning salutation is "How is the flag?" Her reply is given as she flies past me, for she is running and less mindful of me than of the small American flag which her speed keeps fluttering on the stick she holds upright in front of her. "It's fine! Ain't it pretty? Don't you like it?" I stand at salute as the flag goes by.

An old maid of forty, running up and down the pavement, with a flag and unconscious of anything odd about it!

Nobody in the Village seems to mind or take notice. She is greeted with smiles, cheery words, and replies in kind. Her artlessness is not disturbed by unkind comments. Everybody seems to take her for granted. That's one of the reasons why I have called it The Village of Happiness.

It's a real place where everybody, young and old, works and plays, goes to school and church, sings, dances, is understood, smiles. It's a Village where everybody 'belongs.'

It has a funny countersign; a badge; worn on the face. Can you guess it? If you can, you too, 'belong.'

HOW IT STARTED

The setting was quite simple. A rainy day -- a porch -- three rockingchairs -sic- -- two half-grown children -- a man. The boy and girl were rocking to the accompaniment of their own ceaseless laughing. The man sat quietly in the third chair, his eyes and thoughts wholly occupied with the restless children.

While his eyes followed their apparently aimless rocking his mind was busy with the riddle of their slowed-up minds. How was it; why was it that at the age of two or three years their intelligence had begun to 'mark time' while their growth in body continued unchecked, creating a gap of ten years, still widening?

Then he thought of his own profession, that of an ordained minister, and one of the special charges laid upon him, -- "Let not one of these little ones perish." Were not these the humblest, most helpless of all 'little ones?' What was his duty? What could he do?

While his mind was thus lost in speculation, groping for a solution of the riddle, his eyes continued to follow the children as they laughed and rocked. Presently, his mind and eyes began to focus. An idea began to dawn. The rhythm of the chairs changed from time to time. They were not in unison. There was frequent acceleration of the rocking. It became as furious at times as rockingchairs -sic-, under the circumstances, can become. The baby minds were enjoying it; that was evident.

Then the idea began to take shape. It suggested itself by a question. Were those two hopeless children trying to outdo each other in the speed of their rocking? He continued to watch. Yes, there was no doubt of it. They were doing just that.

Then the idea was born. These two mentally low-grade children were playing a game. Games mean competition. They were competitors in their self-taught game of rocking; trying, striving in their feeble way to excel.

With this came the inspiration. If in rocking, why not in other games; useful ones perhaps? Could training possibly give to even these feeble minds some measure of control and direction of their growing and maturing bodies? Training? Where? How? Why not a school, -- a special school for them -- one where patience and kindness and understanding should be the dominating factors?

That was the beginning of The Training School. Born on a rainy afternoon, on a porch where Rev. Stephen Olin Garrison watched two feeble-minded children in their rockingchairs -sic-. He reached a decision that afternoon. He, an ordained minister of the Methodist Church, heard the call -- "Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these" -- "Let not one of these little ones perish." He was not a man to delay. Lacking other facilities and means, his own home should provide for at least the beginning of such a School.

The date of the opening of this School was September 1, 1887; the place, Millville, New Jersey. Immediately the demands made upon Professor Garrison for admission to the School greatly exceeded his ability to receive. Before the year closed, applications greatly exceeded its capacity. His own resources were insufficient for any increase. He went ajourneying, not afar, but to his neighbors. He had all of the essentials of a great prophet, -- vision, eloquence, fervor, belief, unselfishness, faith. He inspired sympathy, created action, and got results wherever he went.

Early in his crusade, only a few miles from Millville, he came to Vineland. Here he found the sympathy and spirit of generosity that enabled him to make provision for an enlarged School. Previous to this visit he had secured from friends the promise of $2,000. Mr. B. D. Maxham, a citizen of Vineland, offered his own home, the Scarborough mansion, and forty acres of land on exceptionally favorable terms to be used for the purposes of the School. Professor Garrison appealed to the Vineland Board of Trade for $2,000, pledging the location of the School there if that amount were contributed. It was raised; the pledge was kept.

On March 1, 1888, the Garrison family, with the School's seven pupils, five boys and two girls, took possession of the Maxham property. The Vineland Training School was "off the ways," finally launched. The following years were to see the waves of its progress lap every shore of the earth.

The trials and triumphs of those years are briefly written in the chronology of the School. Its real history has been written in the lives of the children who are living or have lived in The Village of Happiness.

In the founding and management of the School, Professor Garrison had at all times the sympathy and wise counsel of his brother, Rev. Charles Garrison. The brothers had an inherited interest in the feeble-minded. In 1845, their father, Stephen Garrison, a member of the New Jersey State Legislature, had attempted to secure the establishment by the State of an institution for the care of this unfortunate group. The attempt failed but it was not entirely without results. Subsequently provision was made by the legislature of New Jersey for the care of a limited number of such children at Elwyn, Pennsylvania. This policy was continued for more than fifty years although, in the meantime, The Training School had been opened and another institution for mentally deficient girls and women established by the State, also at Vineland. Professor Garrison's interest and influence contributed largely to the establishment of the latter institution in 1889.

Professor Garrison's wise guidance of The Training School continued until his death in 1900. "In a little more than ten years he had surrounded himself by a coterie of philanthropic persons, elicited the sympathy of the best physicians, widely affected the public, and at the time of his death the Institution which he founded had acquired property consisting of 170 acres of land, on which are ten buildings, all of them valuable and adapted to their purposes and some of them really worthy of being spoken of as magnificent, representing an expenditure of about $200,000. His entire theory was based upon his motto for The Training School, 'The true education and training for boys and girls of backward or feeble minds is to teach them what they ought to know and can make use of when they become men and women in years.' "

Two years previous to Professor Garrison's death, Edward R. Johnstone had been called from the Indiana State School to become his assistant as Vice-Principal. He succeeded Professor Garrison. The mantle fell upon worthy shoulders. Inspired by "the vision" his genius has guided the work and controlled the policies of The Training School during the past thirty-two years.

No legacy left to The Village of Happiness by Professor Garrison transcends in beauty or expresses more clearly the simplicity and faith of his own soul than his "Good Night Song."

Every night in every cottage it is sung at bedtime. All evening assemblies, parties, plays, movies, close with it. It is a ceremony: the children rise; there is perfect quiet; then, in unison, they sing the poem to its simple tune; at the third verse, every head is bowed and, with lowered voices, "Now I lay me down to sleep" closes the day.

Good Night Song

Up to Thee my thanks would rise,
Thou Lord of earth and sea and skies;
Thou Lord my father and my guide,
Where'er I roam where'er abide.

Here within this dear retreat,
Thy helpful blessing I entreat;
Oh see my weakness, make me strong
And bless me in my evening song.

Now I lay me down to sleep,
I pray the Lord my soul to keep;
If I should die before I wake,
I pray the Lord my soul to take. -- Amen!

Who shall doubt that the souls of fathers and mothers waiting in the Beyond have been comforted and gladdened as they, too, hear their children's voices raised in thankfulness from "Here within this dear retreat"? These are no idle fancies -- just a little faith makes them real.

THE VILLAGE SCHOOL

The training of mentally deficient children was from the beginning the purpose of the Village. There was no thought that these children could be thus prepared for self-sustaining and self-directing lives in the great world. It was patent that they could not compete on equal terms with the economic and social forces of a complex civilization. Therefore it was necessary that a different but complete world should be created for them -- one in which their limitations would be recognized, their capacities for usefulness developed, and facilities provided for utilizing their productive and creative powers.

It was becoming more and more evident that the public school systems, with respect to these children, were floundering about, more and more conscious of failure and calling for help. There were various reasons for this: lack of facilities; oversized classes; teachers under-trained and inexperienced in the handling of backward and difficult children forced upon them by "the system;" the absence of any approved scientific method of individual classification in regard to mental levels of children, with consequent mass grouping on the basis of chronological age.

The Village school was destined to furnish help in generous measure. It had recognized these difficulties from the first; had realized the essential need of understanding its children, not en masse but individually. It knew that this understanding must be reached through patient, persevering study of each child by specially trained teachers, cottage and other employees; that every possible facility in the way of equipment for school and manual instruction, for recreation, physical development, useful and directed work adjusted to their capacity, scientific research, diet, habit training, any and everything to supply their needs, must be utilized.

There were nearly two hundred and fifty of these different, difficult, and misunderstood children in the village by 1900. The first important step for them had been taken when they were rescued from homes and schools where they had been compelled to compete with, or at least were judged by the standards of normal children. The Village had received these boys and girls voluntarily. Therefore its responsibility to and for them was all the greater.

During the early years of the Village its methods of training, adjusted to the individual needs and capacities of its slowed-up children, were drawing it into the educational spot-light. Educators, teachers and others, were asking questions from a distance or coming to learn at first hand. This outside interest moved the Superintendent, now Director of The Training School, Professor E. R. Johnstone, to establish in 1903, a summer school for teachers, which still continues. Out of this, in 1906, came the present Research Laboratory. Both of them grew out of the creation, in 1901, of a Paidological Staff, composed of scientists and educators, unpaid and serving in an advisory and consultant capacity. Each of these has its own place in the stories, as will appear.

The work of The Training School's Research Laboratory, first of its kind, beginning in 1906, early confirmed the necessity of conforming the life of the individual child to a level adjusted to his capacity to occupy continuously without undue effort. Apparently light responsibilities placed upon them, though seemingly well within their physical and mental powers and carried for a while without apparent strain, resulted in breakdowns if continued too long. Here was clear evidence that the level of life for such children in their own little world must not be too high.

Susie, for example, had done well in her school classes, in bedmaking, dishwashing, laundry work. Because she was apt, neat, ambitious, she was placed in the officer's diningroom as a waitress. For many months there was no evidence that the finer and more exacting responsibilities and the new atmosphere in which she worked for three hours a day, were beyond the normal use of her powers. Presently, however, she showed signs of fatigue, lost weight, spilled food, dropped dishes. Susie was getting nervous. She was making every effort to force herself to keep up the pace. The harder she tried, the more mistakes she made. She was unhappy. The hill had been too steep for her -- yet she had climbed it and reached the higher plane. She had succeeded. For many months she had lived joyously and worked happily on this higher plane; but it was too high -- the atmosphere too rare to sustain her much longer. She didn't realize that she was already stumbling toward the precipice. Her stumbles were spilled coffee, dropped dishes, inattention, over-anxiousness, hurry and consequent mistakes. She was using the last of her nerve to keep up with the other girls. The going was too hard. Fear -- fear of failure, held her.

What would have happened to Susie if she had been working outside for her living? She'd have lost her job. And then? The answer to that is found in the lives of the hundreds of thousands of Susies who are all about us, striving just to live; struggling blindly with their own incapacity against callous indifference and misunderstanding. If only society could see what it looks at -- and understand!

What did happen to this Susie? Well, there were seeing and understanding eyes in that diningroom. At the weekly meeting of the "Children's Committee," (The Director, School Principal, Superintendent, heads of Research and other departments of the School), there was a consultation over Susie. Beyond question something must be done. It was. Susie got a few days of quietness and rest in the hospital. Then her readjustment was placed in the hands of the School Principal, Alice M. Nash.

Mrs. Nash has organized and directed the school and industrial training of all of the children for many years. It was her eyes which saw the beginning of Susie's difficulties; her knowledge and experience that correctly diagnosed the real trouble. She didn't take Susie from the diningroom -- the sense of failure that would have been Susie's if that had happened would have completed her downfall. No, Susie was promoted from the diningroom to the domestic science classroom. Domestic science is a part of the school curriculum; therefore in Mrs. Nash's own department. The domestic science teacher, (how beautifully it all seemed to happen!) wanted a girl helper. She wanted Susie, who could do many of the simpler tasks, even aiding with the younger and less competent girls, and all without carrying too heavy a load of responsibility. Susie's fear subsided; the going was easier. Her happiness returned.

The Village school is different from other schools. It does many commonsense things that are not common in other schools, public and other. First of all it adjusts the school to each child instead of making each child adjust itself to an inflexible system. It recognizes the fact that every boy and girl has individual aptitudes, capacities, tastes, physical and mental possibilities and habits. It undertakes the teaching, training and molding of the children as it studies and learns what these are. In this study of each child the school has the help of the research laboratory, the physician and hospital, its family history, conduct and habit reports from cottage officers, and, best of all, the years of accumulated experience and wisdom of Mrs. Nash. Then, with all of these things as a foundation, it patiently and persistently, day after day, month after month, and year after year, teaches to that child just those things it is able to learn and can make use of when it is grown up. The result of this system is seen all over the Village and at the Colony. Under experienced supervision the boys and girls are doing or assisting to do all of the work of the Village. It can be seen too, in the public and other schools of our own and other countries, where Vineland Training School methods have been adopted.

All of the activities of the Village center around the school. It is in the school the children are taught and trained for future citizenship in the Village. It is here that, through habit and character training, nature studies, music, games and plays, elemental instruction in the "3 R's," physical education, domestic science, industrial arts and manual trades, and personal hygiene, they are led through paths of happiness to fields of usefulness.

Billy came to the School when he was seven and a half years old. He was born of unmarried parents. His mother, a drunkard, died in childbirth. He had never gone to school; could not read, write, or spell. The Psychological Laboratory found his mental age to be five and a half years and reported him trainable in academic and industrial work. He used bad language but otherwise his personal habits were clean. His cottage matron reported him obedient, selfish, imaginative, and liking attention. A year later her reports contained "takes part in entertainments frequently," "much improved," "no trouble in cottage," "helps dress two boys every morning."

His school reports, beginning a month after his admission, threw further light on Billy. The first: "Good handwork in kindergarten; uses initiative and judgement in play; has a good singing voice." Six months later: "Handwork improving; likes to show off; is making an express wagon in woodwork class; can write from copy." Three months later: "Reads 12 or 15 words; has sung several solos; reactions seem normal; good memory." Three months later: "Reads about 28 words and spells them; a leader in games; work about the same; cannot write; behavior good." Six months later: "Grasps ideas quickly; can print name poorly and copy printed words; learned brush-making quickly." Fifteen months later: "Reads five pages of primer and knows several number combinations; good work in physical education class." During the next three years: "Writing improved; poor conduct in physical education class; improved in basketry and brush class; is learning to set a table and iron in domestic science class; has made a birdhouse; much interested in nature study; can name twelve trees and recognize six insects; knows interesting facts about twelve birds; spelling and writing improved; learning to print; uses tools well."

Billy was now fourteen years old and had been at the School six and one half years. His mental age had marched with slower step; it had progressed from 5.5 to 8.8, an advance of 3.3, while his physical growth covered 6 years and 6 months.

Billy's mental horsepower had reached its limit. The load it must carry would be increased, inevitably, by his physical growth during the next six or seven years. His machine was not built for the outer lanes of travel for there it would impede traffic and be a source of danger to himself and others. Slow moving machines must keep near the curb or, too slow even for that, be taken off the highway.

There are no speedways at The Training School. Its roads are broad and smooth; most of them for one-way traffic; and there are many watchful and experienced traffic officers to regulate and control it. Speed on its roads is not a synonym for progress. So far as human experience and science could determine Billy's physical machine might be a ten-ton truck eventually, but both had agreed that his intellectual motor had reached its utmost development. It was already requiring help, which only The Training School could give, to keep it from going off the road and getting stalled in the sand.

Long ago the Village discovered that low gears can move heavy loads if there is a master mechanic to adjust the mechanism and direct the operation. The study of the mental, physical and spiritual qualities of these human machines is the work of and begins in the school of the Village. To what practical ends the results of that study have been applied is seen in the every day life of the Village and its colony, Menantico.

Billy's history is that of every child who comes to the Village and can receive a moiety of benefit in the school. There are few, indeed, who cannot be strengthened and helped. His story, however, is not finished. Every day but adds to the sum total of his usefulness, to his contributions to the activities of the Village, and to the villagers' and his own happiness. His training still goes on. Part of his time is spent in the woodworking department where he makes things used in the cottages; much of it is given over to music, for he is a member of the thirty-piece band whose music is a never-ending delight to the entire Village. He is a useful and competent worker in his cottage. He is a leader among the boys. He has made himself a place in the Village world.

The big outer world needs many such readjustments as were made for Susie and Billy. Still a pupil, it has lessons to learn. Some of these are being taught by The Village of Happiness; but this big-world scholar is indifferent, lethargic, dull of perception and slow of comprehension. For every Billy and Susie in the Village there are tens and hundreds of thousands of them outside groping blindly for the road and struggling frantically to keep on it. The hurrying traffic of civilization crowds it and, weaving in and out, there are many human machines driven by infants. The highway is strewn with the wreckage they cause. They impede traffic. No one is safe.

These unskilled, inept infants are not responsible for being on the road. Society placed them there and Society prods them on with its "keep going," "get out of the way." They are trying their best to do both but they are confused by their own incapacity, terrified by the rush and roar of the highway. Society curses, blows its horn, and speeds by, unheeding if it does so safely; more thoughtful perhaps, when its own car goes into the ditch.

Society has established a few safety zones for these children. The Village of Happiness is one of them. They are all full, most of them over-crowded, yet so few of the great mass have reached these shelters. Nevertheless, as experiment and demonstration stations they have proved that these weaker, imperfect human machines have a definite place in the world. Their very presence in it and their great number are positive proof that they belong to the present order of things; the inevitable result of civilization's progress. But they do not belong on the crowded, for them and for everybody, dangerous highway on which civilization marches. It is a one-way, rapid transit thorofare. Slow moving machines have no business on it. It can be widened. Broad and safe lanes for slow moving traffic can be established.

The Training School has taken hundreds of these children off the road. In a sense it has taken them apart in its own school, research laboratory, hospital, cottages and shops. It has learned many of the reasons for their deficiencies; discovered many ways in which, properly adjusted, they can be made useful. Its methods, equipment and experience have suggested a definite program for society in the handling of the great multitude which never can hope to reach the few safety zones it has provided. It offers society the tools with which it can widen its highway to accommodate these slow-moving travelers and keep them in the right direction in comparative safety.

These tools are:

1. Social consciousness of and responsibility for the presence of these "children" on its highway.

2. Recognition of the fact that they have all of the rights of other children: to be understood; to be given a real chance for usefulness and happiness within the environment of their own homes and communities. Those who fail, after such a chance, to be taken off the road.

3. The utilization of the psychiatrist, the psychologist, the physician, special classes with capably trained teachers, all of the welfare agencies of the modern community, working together for a common purpose, viz., the identification, treatment, training, occupation suited to their abilities, wise and continued supervision, sympathetic regulation of the lives of all of those who need guiding hands along the road and at the steering wheels.

Two hundred of the Village children attend its school. Nearly three hundred, the older boys and girls, after eight to ten years of training, have entered into one or more of the numerous Village activities. Although the school period of those remaining in the Village covers an average of from eight to ten years the great majority do not pass beyond the fourth grade. A very few, whose capacity for learning has been too limited for any possible profit to them, are cared for in the cottages where at least nursery training is carried on. There are also a few who have reached comparative old age. Their physical powers are waning, but the sunset of their old age is made beautiful for them in their Village of Happiness.

The curriculum is a simplified one. It covers cultural, physical, manual and industrial training. Cultural training includes English, reading, spelling, writing, and numbers; nature study; music -- band, voice and piano; and kindergarten. Physical training includes calisthenics, drills, apparatus work, games and sports. Manual training includes basketry, needlework, woodwork and loomwork. Industrial training includes shoe repairing, brushmaking, broommaking, printing and presswork, farming and gardening and domestic science.

This program of educational training is designed to give to the children only those things which they can use with benefit to themselves and others; to develop, as far as may be, their capacity for usefulness; to envelop them in an atmosphere of happiness; to teach them courtesy, kindness, cheerfulness and obedience.

The school classes are small, seldom above ten pupils, boys or girls, never mixed. Their school life continues as long as they benefit from it. At its close a place, suited to their abilities however great or small, is found for them in the Village or at the Colony. Here, under continued direction, they are made to feel that they are of importance in the scheme of things. And so they are, for each, according to his or her ability, contributes to the general welfare and to the spirit of happiness that pervades the Village.

In an intellectual sense the children of the Village, no matter what their age, always retain the qualities of childhood and youth, babyhood to early adolescense. They like to sing, to dance, to play, to make-believe. They have talents which they like to display. They have sensitive souls which wilt under censure, bloom under praise. They have a charming lack of self-consciousness. The spirit of competition is strong among them. They, like all children, are affectionate, acquisitive, generous, selfish, impulsive, inconsistent. They yield to patient, persistent, intelligent and kindly leading. They are like other children but they are different. It is wonderful to see how much a three or four up to ten or twelve year-old mind is able to do with a twenty or thirty or fifty year old body. It is equally wonderful to see how their mature bodies have been adjusted to the world of childhood in which they live.

The school of the Village is the mechanism by which these qualities have been reconciled. Its influence is not confined to the classroom and manual training shops. The singing it teaches is heard in the cottages, at the frequent assemblies and parties. Cottage life is brightened by its games. The competition it inspires encourages effort, stirs imagination. Monthly birthday parties for all of the children born in that particular month; Tuesday, Friday and Sunday assemblies; holiday celebrations; pageants; costumed plays and operettas; contests in skill, prowess and ingenuity; any and everything in which children find enjoyment, profit and happiness, all of these give opportunities for the school to utilize its training in a practical way and to broaden its field of usefulness.

There is one note-worthy feature of the children's assemblies seldom if ever, seen elsewhere in any assembly of children. It is inevitable that occasionally someone forgets, makes a mistake, gets stalled, has to start over or leave the stage, the 'piece' unfinished. When this happens there is never any giggling or nudging or derisive smiles in the audience. Rather unusual courtesy, that!

The outstanding event of the year for the entire Village is the Christmas Play. Sometimes it is an opera, "Pinafore," "Mikado," "Chimes of Normandy," "Pirates of Penzance," or at least a play with plenty of music and dancing. The theatre seats all of the children. It has everything needed in the way of scenery and lighting effects. There are always two performances, one for the children, the other for the grown-ups and guests. Preparations begin weeks prior to Christmas. After the play has been determined the selection of the cast and chorus is made and rehearsals begin. Wardrobes and other properties are overhauled. New scenery, costumes and furniture needed to give the play its proper setting and periods are made in the school shops and classrooms. A new department of dramatic and musical art flourishes for about two months, directed by Mrs. Nash and engaging the activities of nearly half of the pupils. Rehearsals continue until the cast, chorus, dancers and 'supers' (if any) are letter perfect in their parts and action. There must be no slips or faults in the Christmas play. As a matter of fact there are none.

Self-consciousness is a great stumbling block to many people. The lack of it in these children gives to their performances a simple naturalness and freedom from stumbling that makes them a joy to their audiences.

The 1932 Christmas play was "Briar Rose." Of course there was the beautiful Briar Rose herself, almost carried off by a medieval villain assisted by a fearsome witch. Almost too late the medieval hero foiled the witch, who fled screaming away into outer darkness, defeated the medieval villain, and rescued the leading lady. There were three acts, with plenty of music, singing, dancing, action and scenery, all as medieval as need be. Ninety children took part (grown-ups do not appear in the Village plays) and the performances went off without a break or jar, -- "amidst frequent and loud applause from the audience."

The art of making the accomplishment of work seem but play has been highly developed. For most of the children there is a necessary daily routine of short and varied tasks which avoids overloading and prevents boredom.

Beginning in the school and continuing as long as they remain in the Village, they have their own powers supplemented and directed by those who understand. In no other way could life be made real for them, and worth while and safe. The whole life of the Village is built upon its simple creed, "Happiness First."

ASSEMBLY

It was a bright sunny morning. The air was full of the "tang" of spring -- crisp, bracing. There was an unusual briskness in the movements of the children as they came from their cottages and entered the Hall for their regular Friday morning half-hour assembly. These half-hours belong to them. There are no set programs. The children ask for what they want -- song, story or stunt -- and contribute what they have when called on. Friday assemblies are great fun; a bit noisy, perhaps, but never disorderly; plenty of excitement but no confusion. Everybody has a good time.

I stood at the rear of the auditorium as the smiling, expectant children found their seats. I was wondering how the Negro Spiritual, "Crucifixion," would suit their hilarious mood. I knew from experience that I would be called on for a song, and that it was likely to be, "The Three Little Owls"; "Go Sleep My Honey"; "Kentucky Babe", with its "punk-a-punk" refrain; or some other similar favorite. Today, however, was Good Friday, the most doleful anniversary of the year, and the "Crucifixion" depicted that tragedy. It was appropriate to the day but not in consonance with their mood. Would they see anything but humor in its reiterated refrain "An' He never said a mumbalin' word"?

My wondering was interrupted by the Superintendent, who had entered, been received with a joyous clapping of hands, and was announcing my presence. He ended by calling on me to open the program, always a spontaneous one at these midweek assemblies. Just at that point I had about determined to let them choose what they wanted. However, on my way down the aisle I changed my mind. Could they adjust themselves to the spirit of the day, to its pathos and tragedy? It was improbable, but one never knows just what lesson these children may teach.

Before beginning my song, I reminded them that we changed our clothing to suit the weather; that we put on heavy clothing in winter, light clothing in summer; that there was a time for joy and a time for sadness; for laughing and for not laughing -- all as briefly and simply as possible. Then I asked them, "What day is this?"

The reply came instantly, "Good Friday."

"What happened on Good Friday?"

"Jesus was crucified."

Then, very softly, "That's what I'm going to sing about."

They were quite still as I began: They crucified my Lord! An' He never said a mum-ba-lin word.

Good for them! There were none who laughed; nor were there any as I went on and finished it:

Not a word; not a word; not a word.
They nailed Him to a tree;
An' He never said a mum-ba-lin word;
Not a word; not a word; not a word.
They pierced Him in the side;
An' He never said a mum-ba-lin word;
Not a word; not a word; not a word.
The blood came twinkin' down;
An' He never said a mum-ba-lin word;
Not a word; not a word; not a word.
He bowed His head and died;
An' He never said a mum-ba-lin word;
Not a word -- , not a word -- , not a word -- .

With those several hundred children seeing and feeling the awful tragedy and the "Sublime Sacrifice" with me (for they had sat motionless through the singing), who could help carrying the test to the finish? I sang that last line ever more slowly, ever more softly, and held the last final word until it, too, died away. They had seen the cross, the agony, the "Great Sacrifice" with me.

The rest of the program that day was in accord with the "Crucifixion."

THE VILLAGE STORE

A store must have three things to be a store; a storekeeper, a stock of goods and customers. Some folks would add a comfortable place for village idlers, a nice hot stove in winter around which they can sit and talk, and in summer a long bench outside, in the shade, where they can sit and talk and whittle. As there are no idlers in the Village its store gets along without the stove and benches, having more modern though less neighborly means for warmth, but it does have those three necessary things.

First of all it has Miss Groff. She orders the supplies; keeps up the stock, checks it in; has a place for everything and keeps it there; checks it out when orders are filled; waits on customers; knows everybody; is patient with everybody, especially with the children. When all of these things are attended to she keeps the books. She's the storekeeper.

The second is the big and varied stock of goods but, as the storekeeper takes care of that, we needn't concern ourselves with it.

The third thing is the customers. The store has a good many big ones, the kitchens and dining and other rooms of each cottage, the several shops, the school, hospital, laundry, farm, and main office. All of these are so big, however, that they can take care of themselves. The most interesting thing about the store is its small customers, five hundred of them, who have got to be given very special attention. 'Small' refers only to the size of their accounts, for most of them are pretty well grown. The store carries an individual account with every last one of them.

The time to visit the store and to see it really at work is when these small customers come in to be waited on. Of course it wouldn't do to have them crowding around all of the time. Big business and small business are so regulated that each has its own special store time. The time for small business is Saturday afternoons. Though we call it small it is quite as important as the big and its customers are made to feel that their trade is as valuable as that of the big ones, or even more so.

The money used by the small customers is queer but not "queer" in the sense that counterfeiters use it, for it is worth its face value at the store. And it is not counterfeit although it is made in the Village by the children. That requires an explanation.

On every Monday morning each child gets a slip of paper with his or her name written on it. On one side it is laid off in columns and squares, a column for each day of the week and a square in each column to represent every place its owner is scheduled to work, play, eat, sleep or go to school for that day.

On Saturday afternoon these slips are legal tender at the store if there is no hole through one of those squares. Some of the slips are good for five cents, some for as much as fifty cents a week. The wage scale is determined by the spending capacity of each boy or girl. Sometimes the rate goes up, sometimes it goes down, but mostly it goes up. Everybody earns something by just doing the best they can. It is only by doing their worst that they lose their week's pay. The most unusual thing about these wages is that they are paid in advance but must be carried in their pockets until Saturday. Then the store looks them over to see if any of them have been turned into counterfeits by a misconduct hole.

This Village currency has a name, -- "O.K. Slips." It is a grand name for it is made up of "O.K's" and "Slips."

There may be from one to six or eight of the squares used daily, depending on how many 'grown-ups' their owners visit between getting up and going to bed time. To begin with there is the cottage where they live, then the school teachers, indoor and outdoor instructors, -- all of the grown-ups with whom they work or recreate during the day. Each of these puts his or her initial in the proper square, when the lesson is over or the work done. This is an O.K. Sometimes, if things have happened that make it necessary, a hole has to be punched in the square instead, and that means a slip. So there you have it, -- O.K. -- Slip.

It is the holes that make the slips spurious, -- counterfeits. Strange to say the owners do it themselves. At any rate they just make their teachers, or cottage mothers and fathers or some other of the grown-ups who are trying to teach them the right way to do and say things, -- to be obedient, truthful, courteous, honest and industrious, -- punch the holes for them.

The other side of the slip is left blank for endorsements, and of these there may be more than one, such as "Paul unusually helpful in the cottage this morning;" "Mary very fine in physical culture class;" "John is taking better care of his horse;" "Helen ironed two blouses today, beautifully." They call these extras. Perhaps, too, if there has been a hole punched a few days before, this may appear, "Please cancel the hole. Ada has said she is sorry, promised to do better, and has." But, even so, the "O.K." slips don't look so pretty after a hole has been punched in them; but, as a reminder it is not without value.

Well, Saturday afternoon comes. Miss Groff has got rid of her big customers before noon. Before small ones begin to arrive early in the afternoon the store room looks like a bazaar. The counters are covered with an array of candies and nuts and fruits; sweet cakes and crackers; pencils, writing paper, water-color paints, ribbons, belts, garters, neckties; toys and other useful things made and decorated in the school and shops; valentines and other anniversary cards in their seasons; and other things that both big and little children like or need or just want, too numerous to mention. The Director himself, or Mr. Nash, the Superintendent, or Miss Hill or somebody else is there when store opens, seated at a little table where each customer comes first to hand over his or her "O.K." slip. If it's a counterfeit it's just too bad. That customer can't do any trading today; not even if he has $10.00 to his credit, some earned, some sent from home, maybe. Everybody is awfully sorry, but all he can do is to stand around and watch the other customers buy. For a while he stands near enough to the little table to hear what is being said to the other fellows from his cottage, for they come to "store" one cottage at a time.

"Well John! No hole this week! Bully for you! See if you can't get an 'extra' next week."

"That's great, Billy, 'extras' in school and at the barn. That's worth a three-cent bonus. Miss Groff, give Billy a credit of three cents more." All of the children hear that last.

"Not quite so good as last week, Eddie. Hurt your foot? Too bad. Thought something must be the matter." And so it goes on all through the afternoon.

Meanwhile, Miss Groff stands behind the counter with her two or three grown-up helpers. She knows every child. A glance at his 'account' and she knows just how much he has to his credit; it may be only the amount earned for the week or much more, for these customers are not all free spenders. Some spend less than they earn. There is an occasional one who spends nothing. These few always want to know, however, how their balance stands.

The storekeeper knows just about how much sweet stuff, and what kind, each of her customers ought to have. Her suggestions save a lot of later discomfort and check extravagant impulses. You've ten dollars and seven cents, John. Your mother sent ten dollars last week. What do you want?" John tells her. "All right." Then to one of her assistants, "Let John have a necktie, some garters, writing paper, fruit, candy and crackers." "About two dollars, John; that be enough?" John nods and proceeds to select his tie, a pair of blue silk garters and the other things from the stock displayed on the long counter. They are all tied up for him and he carries them back to his cottage.

"Not too much candy for Billy. It isn't good for him. Doctor's orders. Sure, fig-newtons are just the thing."

"Eddie? Tooth paste? It's ten cents. Peanuts? That's five cents more. Yes; a ten cent bag of candy. That makes twenty-five cents. You've got ten cents left. Better leave it for next week, don't you think ?"

That is the way the storekeeper manages and it is done so understandingly and smilingly that her small customers go happily back to their cottages to enjoy the rewards of their own efforts. Of course the girls, too, shop on Store Day. The procedure is the same for them. Small customers are never hurried in their shopping, and as might be expected, the girls take a little more time for theirs.

The atmosphere of the store on Store Day is something that might well make certain storekeepers in the outside world a bit envious. Every customer gets special attention. Nobody gets impatient or cross. If Billy takes five minutes to decide between a red and green all-day-sucker that is quite all right. If he needs help finally, a quiet suggestion from the storekeeper "I believe I'd take the red one" settles it. The Village store has developed to a high degree the art of understanding and pleasing its customers.

The best time of all to see real shopping, real art in handling customers, is at Christmas time. It takes more than one day for that and the holiday shopping has to be done early. Every package must be wrapped just so, with plenty of seals inside and out, and ready to be sent in time to reach their homes by Christmas. The store displays its stock so that every child can see it, enjoy its wonders and, after many changes of mind, decide on this for father and that for mother and these for brothers and those for sisters; often there are aunts and uncles too.

Bessie has ten home folks to whom she wants to send presents. She has only a dollar, saved, perhaps a few pennies a week out of her five cents a week earnings. She begins her shopping. Here's a necktie for father, seventy-five cents; a box of handkerchiefs for mother, a dollar; a pair of gloves for Jim, fifty cents; this box of candy for Jennie, sixty cents! and so it goes on until her first selections have run up to six or seven dollars. All she has is a dollar but to that fact she is quite indifferent. A lot of people are like that but they do get a 'kick' out of the idea of spending. Bessie was having a glorious time with her shopping. The thrill of it was not a whit less when Miss Groff suggested "Don't you think father would like this pretty Christmas card instead of the necktie?" Of course he would; if possible it has more colors in it. Bessie's shopping was taking a wider range and her joy correspondingly. "How about this beautiful handkerchief in its own sweet little box instead of those others?" Bessie changed her mind instantly. The card was ten cents, the handkerchief fifteen. When she got through she and Miss Groff had had the most wonderful shopping trip together, every one of the family had been remembered and she had not gone in debt for any of it. The store would take care of the packing and postage. During the next three weeks, until Bessie heard from home, she could hug herself and shiver with delight as she followed her package home and see the folks dancing around when it was opened.

The children of The Village of Happiness feel, if they do not know, that it is more blessed to give than to receive. How "Miss Annie" started the giving by the children is another story, as will appear.

CHRISTMAS AT THE VILLAGE OF HAPPINESS

Christmas is, of course, the big event of the year. Nobody has any doubt of the reality of Santa Claus. He has visited the Village in person every year. Every child and every grown-up sees him and that settles the matter. Everybody is in the assembly hall on Christmas Eve. "On tip-toe" doesn't express it. Everybody is higher than that with the delicious thrill of expectation. It is seven-thirty. Santa Claus is due. No sound of bells. Somebody -- the Director himself -- opens a window. He leans so far out that there are shouts of concern lest he break his neck, so somebody has to hold his feet while he listens for the bells. Everybody is suddenly silent. Nothing. He slides back into the hall, turns a disappointed face to the sea of anxious ones. Fearful of some catastrophe they almost whisper, "Did'ja hear him?" "Is he comin'?" and he sadly shakes his head. The demand growing louder and louder, "Telephone him, telephone him." Some far-seeing soul has put up a telephone near the stage where the curtain is down. An old phone but a good one, for the Director winds the crank and the bell rings. He puts the receiver to his ear and waits. Central is asleep. Will she never waken? Such suspense. Then "Hello, give me the North Pole." Another wait. The suspense is terrific. Finally, "Hello, is this the North Pole?" "Who's talking?" "Mrs. Santa Claus?" "Oh, this is The Training School. Where's Santy? He was to be here at seven-thirty and it's now seven-forty." Another awful wait. Then, "He went to the Colony first? Must have spent too much time there?" Groans of disapproval interrupted by "On his way here now? Ought to be here in a minute or two? Thank you. Goodbye." Groans changed to cheers as the Director again opened the window, There was instant silence. Came the faint tinkle of bells which grew louder. Suddenly a loud "Whoa." Aback stage a door slammed. The big curtain went up. The huge Christmas tree, decorated and ablaze with colored lights, was surrounded by great piles of boxes and packages. Then such a shout as Santa himself strode onto the stage almost staggering under his pack. Those five hundred children and grown-ups knew that in the pack there was something special for each of them. Santa wasted no time in getting about his business even while he told them how glad he was to come again to The Village of Happiness because nowhere else did he get such a hearty welcome. While he worked and talked he still had time to shake hands with some of the older children who, presuming on old acquaintance, had crowded onto the stage; but white-haired Tim, who had welcomed him for nearly forty years and still believed, -- little, fragile, faithful Tim, was lifted from his feet in a great bear-hug of those mighty arms. Believe in Santa Claus? Here was proof, absolute, of his reality, not only to Tim but to all who witnessed that Christmas Eve party. Skeptics are converted at The Village of Happiness. They can't help it.

Miss ANNIE STARTED IT

Weeks before Christmas its spirit begins to pervade the Village. Mrs. Nash has selected the Christmas play, the cast, made up entirely from the children, and rehearsals have begun. Every child has told Santa Claus or parents by letter what he wants. Boys at the Colony have already located in the woods the best holly and laurel, trees and evergreens and mistletoe for the decoration of the cottages, schoolrooms and assembly hall. Some unusual supplies are being ordered by the store. "Christmas is coming" is in the air; it is being voiced by the children as you meet them.

The meetings of the "Children's Committee" are longer than usual as letters to Santa Claus and parents reach the office for mailing. It is a great help to Santa Claus to know in advance the heart's desires of his children.

Some years ago the "Committee" was opening the replies from parents. Each member had a stack and was busy reading and noting down the contents, for future use. Suddenly "Miss Annie" stopped them. "Listen to this," she said:

"Dear son: I was glad to get your letter. I wish we could send you the things you ask for but we can't. Not this year, anyhow. Your father is out of work and the baby is sick. Lizzie and Jo can't go to school for they haven't any shoes nor decent clothes. Jim went to the woods the other day to cut some wood, which he ain't fit for and cut hisself with the ax. So you see we ain't able to send you any of the things you want. I wish we could and it hurts not to. Maybe next year we can do better. I'm awful sorry. Be a good boy. Your Mother."

Miss Annie went on. You might have known she would, being Miss Annie. "Isn't that dreadful? Don't you suppose we could make up a box for them? Our children are always getting things. Seems to me it would be rather nice, this once, to send them some of the things they need, in Harry's name. I'd be glad to attend to it." Miss Annie was always that way.

Well, it was done. It has been done ever since. Harry's box started a very tide in the other direction and that tide has brought to the children a new joy in Christmas. They could give as well as get. Today almost as many packages go out from the Village as come into it. Just how it is done is told in the story of the Village Store.

THE PAIDOLOGICAL STAFF

The Training School was feeling its way. So it had always done, still is doing. From the beginning it had elected itself to explore a field which, in reality, was little known. Seguin and other explorers had ventured into it. They had returned with enough evidence to stimulate the interest of a few who were concerned with what someone has called the 'biological mistakes' of the human family. The field was as broad as humanity itself yet, even as late as 1900 A. D., still largely a terra incognita.

For fifteen years The Training School had been gathering samples, a wide variety of them, from this field. Every sample differed in some respects from every other sample. Each had to be assayed separately. Those who were selected to assist in the work had to be trained for it. The assaying was a slow and perplexing process. These human samples could not merely be thrown into the crucible and reduced to their physical elements. Spiritual qualities would not lend themselves to such treatment and there were some who believed that these samples had souls. Those who conceived and built The Training School thought so. They realized that the assaying would be a tedious and difficult process; that patience and skill would be required in coming into a knowledge of their origin and their physical, mental and spiritual possibilities. Much time would be required to study them in all of their human reactions in a favorable environment. It created the environment and began its work, cautiously, painstakingly. It felt its way but it kept going.

It had fore-knowledge that the going would be difficult and that a "staff" would ease and possibly point the way. The journey was begun with one in hand. Other "staffs" were to be needed on the journey and as the needs appeared they were found waiting by the way. Each of them had different qualities. Each had a special use. Each filled a separate need. They possessed one quality in common, however. All were composite in character, made up of varied materials and bound together by a common and unselfish interest to which the generic name, science, might be given. Many of the species of this genus were to assist in the exploration of the field and they were to give their services. Each was to be a veritable "Moses' Rod" bringing forth water from the rock.

The start was made in 1888 with a "Consulting Staff," not too cumbersome, just four members. Its chief function was to protect the health of the expedition. Within three years this staff was strengthened and re-named. It became the "Medical Staff." By 1902 other branches of science were becoming interested and joined the expedition. These were bound together in that year.

In December 1901, there had been a meeting in Newark, N. J. Its purpose was child study. Among those who attended were Prof. Earl Barnes of Philadelphia, H. H. Goddard of the Department of Psychology, Pennsylvania State Normal School, Westchester, and E. R. Johnstone, Superintendent of The Training School. These three returned together by train to Philadelphia. As Goddard said later, "On that train was born another of Johnstone's big ideas, the Feeble-minded Club." The following March that idea germinated. The nucleus of 'The Feeble-minded Club' was formed with six charter members. They spent the day seeing the children and just talking.

It was called 'The Gang' when it started. Later, it was renamed 'The Feeble-minded Club.' Somebody always laughed when that name was mentioned but the members were 'good sports' and joined in. Then, when it was about five years old, it was christened again and finally. This time they called it a staff, presumably because a staff is good to lean on and helps the blind feel their way. They prefixed staff with paidological and a lot of folks hunted up a dictionary. They were surprised to learn that the word had nothing to do with money.

The idea, born of that chance meeting on the train, was for a few selected souls to get together twice a year to discuss, quite informally, the training and education of children. Earl Barnes has been its inspiring head from the first. The reason for all of its meetings being held at The Village of Happiness is found in the closing words of an address by Prof. Barnes on Annual Day in 1903: "To me Vineland is a human laboratory and a garden where unfortunate children are to be cared for, protected and loved while they unconsciously whisper to us syllable by syllable the secrets of the soul's growth. It may very well be that the most ignorant shall teach us most."

The Training School had two of the three necessary elements of a real laboratory, -- materials, and experience in the assortment and handling of them. It was this experience, built up out of daily contact with this material and its human reactions, which was to prepare the way for the Research Laboratory of the future. 'The Gang' of 1902 was the first step.

As one looks back on the developments of The Training School from the five or six children gathered in the private home of S. Olin Garrison in 1887 to the present Village of Happiness one can but wonder if things just happened. Association with those events has brought to more than one mind the conviction that there has been a Divine interest in having them happen right.

If there was a laboratory in the Village in 1902 it was visible to few outside 'The Gang.' There was no laboratory building; no scientific equipment of specialized apparatus and brains. The material, two hundred or so boys and girls, was being cared for in a dozen or more buildings, including a schoolhouse in which it was gathered daily for instruction and training. The methods were those developed by its own experience and that of others in the handling of similar material. The embryo of the research laboratory existed only in the vision of the Superintendent, E. R. Johnstone. Its development began with the organization of 'The Gang.'

Prof. Johnstone was an educator. He had taught school. He attended meetings of the state and national educational associations. If there was anything new to be learned at such meetings that might be of benefit to the children of The Training School he wanted to know it. So he went to get but gave more than he received.

The public schools were becoming conscious of their own incapacity to deal with subnormal and misunderstood children. Some of them were beginning to set these children apart in special classes only to realize that the essential need, specially trained teachers, had not been met. The Training School had such teachers, selected and trained by the School to meet its own needs. Vineland experience reached these educational gatherings through its Superintendent. So it was that he gave more than he realized.

The first Summer School for Teachers was held in 1904. This initial experiment demonstrated its value, met an hitherto unrecognized need. Immediately the expedition of The Training School began to augment its material for an "Educational Staff."

Then, in 1906, the expedition found Goddard wandering about in the wilderness, not lost but rather prospecting. He liked its looks and joined it. He was destined to furnish the core of the "Research Staff."

The missionary spirit had always been strong at The Training School. Early in 1910 it found expression. Material was at hand and out of it an "Extension Staff" was created.

None of these aids has been discarded. Each has contributed a large part to the success of that expedition organized in 1887 to explore the field of feeble-mindedness, to discover its origin, develop its possibilities, utilize its products, create a sense of responsibility on the part of those more fortunate, and establish a place where these "Children of God" should find understanding and happiness.

Evidence that science was not slow in recognizing its duty and opportunity in this field of service is complete and convincing. It is found in the list of those who have shared in the work of these several Staffs. Many of the sciences and their branches have been represented; medicine and all of its numerous specialities, biology, chemistry, psychology, surgery, education, and sociology. All have given their services without thought of other reward than the success of The Training School Expedition, under the direction of Edward R. Johnstone since 1900.

The expedition, born of a dream, founded on faith, maintained on hope, has been in the field forty-five years. Its work, begun before the present era of large "Foundations" for scientific and humanitarian purposes, has been financed during all of those years by itself through the large and small gifts of money by generous friends who had an abiding faith in the value of its work for humanity. Equally valuable have been the gifts of time and service from the scientific and educational worlds.

What the influence and support of "The Gang," the "Paidological Staff," have meant during the years since that chance (?) meeting on the train in December, 1901, are seen in the development of the Summer School for Teachers, the Research Laboratory and the Extension Department.

Twice a year, at its own expense, the "Paidological Staff" assembles at headquarters, The Training School. Its more than forty members, reinforced by invited guests, represent great universities, public school systems, research laboratories and social welfare agencies. For a day they live in The Village of Happiness, breathing its atmosphere, observing its work and play, asking and answering questions, giving and getting inspiration. A common interest shared by many diverse interests holds them in close fellowship. This has gone on for thirty years. There must have been something in the Village very much alive and growing to have drawn and held their interest. Perhaps the reason for this is found in Earl Barnes' prophesy of 1903 -- "It may very well be that the most ignorant shall teach us most."

The members of the Staff live and work in the outer world in the midst of civilization's roar and ceaseless grinding. Each in his own sphere of service is engaged in the study and betterment of the human race. They are specialists in education, psychology, psychiatry, biology, medicine, surgery and public welfare.

No single mind can grasp the infinite details and delicate adjustments of the vast machine we call civilization. The Supreme Mind alone can understand, control and direct it. That Mind alone knows its ultimate destiny. The machine never stops. Its speed accelerates. It pours out its product relentlessly and a large part of it is damaged. Repairs must be made while it runs 'on high.'

The Village of Happiness is a slow motion picture of life in its every day living in a world of constant adjustment and readjustment of its children to meet their own needs. Those needs, in greater or less degree, are shared by all children, for all, in the Village or outside, are members of the same great family. The problems of childhood are the same in the Village as elsewhere. It is, in itself, a complete world in miniature where civilization's step is slowed down, a place where its processes can be followed more easily. The outside world presents its problems in the mass, with many unknown quantities. The Village world, unhampered and unhurried, working on the same problems, has reduced and is still reducing some of these unknown to known quantities. Little wonder then that the scientific world, as represented on the Paidological Staff, finds inspiration and help at The Training School for its own labors and brings to it the encouragement of its own interest and support.

Toward the closing decade of the last century Education was beginning to realize that she was badly astigmatic. For many years she had been crowding into her primary, secondary and higher institutions for learning all sorts of children. Her highest wisdom had been displayed in the method pursued in dividing these children into chronological age groups of forty or fifty or sixty, beginning about the sixth year after their birth, made up of both sexes, and in giving to each group daily doses of educational medicine during the school year. Each group was given the same dosage, fed out of the same bottle, with the same spoon. The second and each following year the strength of the mixture was increased but the same old bottle, old spoon and dosage were used. The method had stood the test of time for the great majority of children, but for a very considerable number of them the results, so far as intellectual growth was concerned, were not only not apparent but in many cases poisonous.

It was about this time some observant and anxious people began to ask Education why her intellectual suits, renewed or enlarged once a year, but all on the same pattern, fitted so many of the children so badly or not at all. These "whys" became more and more numerous and Education, unable to answer because she had taken too many things with her children as a matter of course, began to look herself over. First she sought the answer in material things, such as better and larger school houses, better equipment, revised and uniform school books or disinfected old ones. Yielding to religious or race bigotry she practically discarded the greatest and most inspirational text book of all time, the Bible.

Education was doing the best she could in the condition she was in. She began to realize that health and sanitation might have something to do with her failure. She called Compulsory Medical Inspection to help her, began to hire school nurses and established school lunches. She did a number of quite sensible things before she had the good sense to visit an oculist, only to find that she had been suffering all along from her own intellectual astigmatism. Then it was, her eyes in somewhat improved focus, she began to see and better to understand that her factory-made intellectual suits only emphasized the mental abnormalities and deformities of many of her children. Her compulsory school attendance laws were gathering up and forcing into the classrooms disqualified and difficult children for whom Education's system had no place or use. She began to see and understand their needs, to realize that she must have expert tailors to fashion and fit for each of such children an intellectual suit fitted to its individual needs and capacities.

Prior to 1900 comparatively little effort had been made to segregate difficult and handicapped children and to readjust the work of the schools to meet their special needs. There was no recognized method as yet, for the measuring of intelligence. Psychology was not quite ready to take its place as a science in Education's scheme.

Education began to look around for the special teachers such classes would require. There was scarcely a teacher in her schools who had not experienced the chagrin, worry and futility of trying to "pass" such children to a higher grade, but there were very few who had had opportunity for acquiring the knowledge and technique for special class teaching.

This situation and the necessity for meeting it gave to The Village of Happiness one of its greatest opportunities. At its Annual Meeting in 1903, Professor Earl Barnes, whose life had been and still is devoted to the general field of education, said he had found "inspiration and helpful information in frequent visits to The Training School since 1900." He called attention to "the relation of the work of The Training School to the general work of Education"; to the "changes taking place in our educational theories and practices in which The Training School is playing an important part." He said , "A feeble-minded child is an ordinary child seen under a microscope ...... students in your schools have been able to see and state facts of growth more truly than we could observe them in other schools. Especially has your constant insistence on physiological training played an important part in changing general education practices. It may very well be that the most ignorant shall teach us most."

He called attention to the movement to provide special classes for mentally retarded children in the public schools, -- Prussia in 1880; in 1900 in Germany over 6000 in these special classes; in 1900 in London 42 centers, with 85 classes and over 1200 children; the opening of such a school in Providence, Rhode Island, in 1894, with Boston, New York, Chicago and Philadelphia following.

These special classes were already showing the need for specially trained teachers. Said Dr. Barnes, "I know of no place in the world where teachers are especially trained for such work and yet there is no other educational work where training is so necessary and so possible. Why cannot this Vineland School become such a training school for teachers? The work must be done where there are feeble-minded children. You have them. It must be done where there are good buildings, generous grounds, an enlightened and progressive Board of Directors, a highly educated and experienced superintendent, a well trained and devoted force of teachers. You have all these conditions. With the addition of one expert scholar to your force it would be possible to commence in a modest way training the hundreds of teachers whom we must have faster than they can be prepared. If successful, such a departure would give to this School the stimulus of many young and ardent students passing through it; it would give the School an international reputation and it would greatly extend the beneficient work to which you are devoted."

For fifteen years The Village of Happiness had been working with mentally retarded and mentally deficient children. It had built up from its own experiences and that of others a technique for the understanding and training of such children. It had the equipment for the work. It had trained its own teachers. It was ready for one of its two (1) big missionary jobs and being ready it started forthwith.

At the Annual Meeting in 1904 the Superintendent, Professor E. R. Johnstone, reported to his Association: "As suggested by Dr. Earl Barnes,..... we have decided to give this summer a six weeks' course of training to public school teachers. .... Under the direction of the Principal of our school department, they will take charge of some of our classes during the regular school hours, have opportunity to study the children out of school, in cottages, at camp, at entertainments, on the playgrounds. Each school day the Superintendent will give a lecture on some phase of the work; a course of reading will be provided; in preparation for this our own teachers have been taking this course at their regular meetings during the winter." In 1905 he said, "Our Summer School for teachers is the first of its kind in the world."

The following year, 1906, Professor Johnstone said, "Perhaps our most significant move has been the establishment of the Summer Class for Public School Teachers. It is intended to better fit teachers to understand the peculiarities and capabilities of backward children, and is a preparation for those who propose to engage in teaching the special classes in the public schools. Our classes have been very successful, and our students have done us much good by extending the influence of our School. We are about to enter upon our third year with an increased enrollment. The school superintendents in New York and Philadelphia, as well as throughout our own State, heartily approve the idea, and give it their support. The School of Pedagogy of the University of New York will open a special course similar to ours during the coming winter, and possibly our Summer School will be the laboratory for the University classes.

"We really have a standing in the educational work of the world. In the past two months, twenty teachers in a body came from Trenton to study our plans. A class and individuals have come from New York. The University of Pennsylvania sent a class, and we have even had visitors from England and Australia. When we began our summer school, it, too, cost money; but that has been made up, and this year we shall have a surplus of a few dollars."

The first summer school opened with but five teacher-students. The twenty-seven years that followed were to see a total of over nine hundred public school teachers at The Training School for the six weeks course. From the very beginning it was evident that the facilities of the Village for their housing and care would be inadequate to accommodate all who would apply for the privilege. Four cottages were built for their special use. These were unable to care for all who sought to enter. The Village replaced them with three more commodious buildings with housing capacity for sixty. This was the limit finally fixed. It was the saturation point of the School and, wisely, it was not exceeded though the demand for entrance was greatly in excess of that number.

Those admitted were not novices in teaching. They had had an average of ten or more years experience as public school teachers. Their average age was thirty-three. They knew the problems of the classroom which their own incapacity and the faults of the "system" had made it impossible to solve. They came from every state in the Union, from foreign countries, from the isles of the sea. When boards of education were unable or unwilling to defray the necessary expense for travel and the nominal tuition fee fixed by the Village, they paid their own way.

They came full of purpose to learn. They brought with them a cross-section of the public school systems which displayed their excellences, their weaknesses, and their successes and failures in adjusting children, wholesale, to their systems. They saw their own problems solved and the weaknesses of the systems exposed at a school where training and education were adjusted to the individual capacities and needs of its children; a school in which understanding of the child was paramount and where every known facility of science and human experience was used to make that understanding possible; a school in which system prevailed but a system so flexible that it could meet the needs of each of its children.

The services of The Training School rendered through its summer school played and still is playing an important part in the correction of Education's intellectual astigmatism so pronounced only a few decades ago. During its nearly thirty years of service it has returned these widely scattered nine hundred and twenty-five teachers to the public schools imbued with greater zeal, a wider vision, a better understanding and a finer faith in themselves and their pupils. The Soul of The Training School, which our first story attempted to reveal, and its life and atmosphere as reflected in the lives of the children of the Village with whom those summer school students had such close contact during their six weeks of study, have been carried into hundreds of schools the world over. Through them the "Spirit of Vineland" has breathed upon and blessed thousands of children with its understanding of them, its patience and gentleness with them, and its faith in them.

The Village files are full of grateful tributes from those who have been privileged to carry its message:

"Once again my plans for the school begin to take shape and I realize how much better I can face the difficult problems with the wonderful training Vineland has given me...... My whole life will be happier."

"I want to tell you what has been in my mind now for many years. You did for me what nobody else ever did, possibly never could have done... I understood through you that the mistakes of children, of teachers, the errors that people made, their fumbling of ideas that seemed critical, the total surface of life inside or outside of school, were relatively unimportant. What counted, the only thing that counted, what caused all the brain work and footwork and other activities to function was the spirit of love. With that miracles were worked easily. Without that nothing worked. I carried that away from your School. I held onto it. It has never failed me.

"I cannot thank you for that because no thanks are adequate and I know you feel words matter little until they are charged with the love that turns them into service. I have tried to render service to children as you would have your teachers do and in the effort I have found peace and strength. I imagine many teachers tell you that story but I felt that I must tell it for myself so that you might know that in one more pupil your work had borne its fruit."

The scientific value of the work of the summer school to its students has had recognition by many universities and colleges. The certificates issued to those who have completed the summer school courses entitle its holder to credits on their work for academic degrees.

The summer school brings strenuous days to the Village Elders, livelier times for the children, and a new and wholesome influence to both. In the classes the women of course far outnumber the men by about ten to one. Their experiences, gathered over a wide territory, our own and other lands, are mutually stimulating, on themselves and The Training School as well. They take part in all of the activities of the Village: school, shops, cottages, playgrounds, parties, assemblies, store days, picnics, pageants, everything. Daily schedules must be met, lectures, reading and studying, discussions. The educational staff of the School, headed by its Director, Professor Johnstone; Mrs. Nash, School Principal; Dr. Doll, Director of Research; Professor Nash, Superintendent; Miss Hill, Director of Extension, is augmented by specialists in the fields of public education, speech defects, psychiatry, psychology, biology, eugenics, public welfare. Lecturing to the summer school is at once a privilege and an opportunity for service. No fees are expected or given and traveling expenses are not infrequently refused.

The summer school is a missionary enterprise of The Village of Happiness designed wholly to spread the gospel of the understanding and happiness of children whose souls are made more or less inarticulate by mental or physical insufficiencies. The summer school students have seen how some of these superficial barriers may be lowered or penetrated and how the beauty of these souls may be revealed through their efforts.

The summer school students are a happy lot. Perhaps one reason for that might be found in this suggested motto, "We Get in Order to Give." Giving is the real source of happiness. There must be much joy in such getting. And think of the happiness of The Village of Happiness in such giving!

THE COLONY

It began as a great adventure. It had all of the elements; risk, uncertainty, hardship, possible success, possible failure. It was beyond the frontier, almost 'over back of beyond.' It was a vast stretch of flat country which might well have been called The Great Oak Scrub. It was the home of wild things; deer, foxes, 'possums, 'coons, skunks, squirrels, birds, mosquitoes, ticks and 'jiggers.' An occasional trail led into it and seemed to have no other object than to wander aimlessly about to end nowhere or on the swampy border of the creek with the Indian name, Menantico. This 'Oak Scrub' began just a few miles beyond the Village of Vineland. This is the picture in 1913; thousands of acres of uncleared waste and practically valueless land.

On the border of this 'Scrub' The Training School had carried on its self-appointed task of reclaiming and utilizing Society's human wastage, -- boys and girls who had been left behind, unable, through no fault of their own, to keep up with the procession. It had been at this salvage work for twenty-five years. During those years the School had grown in size and usefulness. It had created for these under-privileged children a world of their own in which they found understanding, usefulness, happiness; happiness because useful; useful because trained in a spirit of understanding of their limitations, possibilities, needs.

Many of the children had reached physical maturity but, still children, had the greater need of guidance and protection which only the School could give; must always give. Under these conditions there had grown up in the School a large group of boy-men, for whose physical energies it was becoming increasingly difficult to find an outlet. Unused, these energies would inevitably find outlets hurtful to them and to the School.

"Where there is no vision the people perish." The Supertendent -sic- of The Training School dreamed dreams and had visions. Out of these inspirations are born. Necessity, too, was driving. These olders -sic- boys could not be turned adrift to shift for themselves. They were the School's children. They belonged to the School, the School belonged to them. Primarily, their lives and work at the School had shown that they belonged to the soil. It was unthinkable to waste their strength and abilities in corrupting idleness. Out there, a few miles, is the Scrub. It, too, is wastage. Common labor will reclaim it, make it of value, useful. Here, close by, is labor which will soon be going to waste. Why not bring the two things together, create a mutual and positive blessing out of the two wastages? Thus ran his vision and his faith and he followed both with works.

The School secured by gift and purchase some five hundred acres of the Scrub, later increased to thirteen hundred. Into this Scrub one day marched "Merri," later and still "The Boss," with a gang of boys, opening up the trail with their axes. Through this trail, later on, came mule-drawn wagons, carrying sections of a two-room, knock-down house and a larger dwelling of the same type. At the trail's end a clearing had been made and here these first of the Colony buildings were set up. Pioneer days were come again. "The Boss" and seven boys began their life in the wilderness of scrub.

In those early days a friend drove out to see "Merri" whose whole name is Frank G. Merithew. The two of them sat on the little open porch of the two-room shack where "Merri" and several of his boys lived. The sound of the axes of the boys clearing the scrub struck through the incessant humming of an army of "Jersey skeeters" than which none has a finer reputation for aggressive viciousness. The clearing was not large; on every side the view was limited by the monotony of the scrub; the whole setting was void of attraction. The visitor had a feeling of being buried in the wilderness. So they sat and talked and slapped mosquitoes.

"Merri," finally said the visitor, "How on earth can you stand it out here? What do you expect to make out of all this sand and scrub with these boys? Why did you give up your school work to come out to this God-forsaken wilderness? It's the loneliest place I ever saw. It's hopeless. And (slap) these mosquitoes!" And Merri, the builder, quietly replied, "I don't see what you see."

He had caught the vision. The scrub had been pushed back until only its green edge showed against the horizon. Hundreds of acres which it had covered for uncounted years were now ready to yield their harvest. The knock-down shacks had disappeared. A village stood in the center of a great farm. Cattle pastured in the fields. The stys were full of baby pigs. The chickens scratched and cackled in their yards and eggs were plentiful. There were roads where there had been but paths; lawns and flowers where only scrub oak had grown before. There was a blacksmith shop; a machine shop; a carpenter shop; other shops. All that a village must have for the comfort and happiness of the villagers was there. He and his boy-men had created it; torn it out of the worthless scrub.

This was the vision he revealed to his friend as they sat that day, twenty-one years ago, on the little porch of his two-room shack in the midst of the Scrub, slapping mosquitoes.

Several years later his friend stood with him at the edge of the greatly enlarged clearing. The Training School had sent an increasing number of boys to the Colony. One of these was Joe. He was in his twenties, over six feet tall, a fine woodsman, kindly, with a mentality of twelve years. He was a leader among the boys, physically and mentally. He had in charge a group of low-grade boys. They were gathering up the light brush left after the removal of the trees, piling it up, stimulated by the promise of a bonfire later on. One of the boys, with less than two years intelligence, had tottered slowly to where "The Boss" and his friend stood. He speech was inarticulate; his look vacant. His jabbering stopped as Joe called out "Pick 'em up, Jamie, pick 'em up." He turned slowly to look at Joe. Again came the "Pick 'em up, Jamie." Then, as his remote consciousness connected with the idea, he trudged off a few steps, stopped, bent over, every motion that of extreme old age, picked up a single twig, straightened up and bore it laboriously to the pile. He placed it there with great care and tottered away. His day's work was done. He had contributed his mite but into it he had put the utmost strength of his mind and body. Who shall say that, as the bonfire blazed and roared, the brightest flame and the loudest roar to Jamie, did not come from his twig? Even he, the lowliest of them all, had his place in the Colony sun.

The Colony, child of The Training School, grew and prospered. The clearing expanded, year by year. Permanent buildings, most of them of concrete blocks made by the boys, replaced the knock-down shacks. Into whatever activity common labor entered, -- clearing, ditching, draining, -- planting, sowing, reaping, -- excavating, hauling, building, -- dairying, -- stock-raising, -- road building, -- bedmaking, sweeping, scrubbing, dishwashing, -- it was furnished by the boys, supervised and directed by Merri and his helpers.

While the spirit of play pervaded their work to a remarkable degree, recreation was provided as an essential element for their contentment and happiness. In the early days the frequent celebrations and entertainments at The Training School, birthday parties, Sunday Assembly, Store Days, holiday festivals, pageants, shows, found the "Colony Boys" on hand and taking part. Colony floats were prominent in the pageants. Drawn by gaily decorated Colony mules, driven and manned by grotesquely costumed Colony boys, they displayed the Colony's products and its life. Days and weeks of preparation had given diversion and fun and brought into play a surprising ingenuity. After-supper rides in the wagons to attend a show or party at the School were rewards for good behavior.

One of these occasions came on a Christmas night. Snow covered the ground. Somewhere along the five-mile road one of the boys fell from one of the wagons, unnoticed. His absence was not discovered until they reached The Training School. Merri, at once and alone, started back to find him. The boy might be hurt. There was no fun for Merri with one of his boys missing, hurt or otherwise. Several miles back he found the boy's trail leading off into the woods. He followed it as it wove in and out through the trees and brush. Evidently the boy was wandering aimlessly, lost in the Scrub. Presently he heard singing -- a Christmas carol coming from the depths of the woods. He found the boy sitting contentedly on a log. The song stopped as Merri pushed his way through the undergrowth.

"Hello, Boss," was the greeting.

"Hello, John, what are you doing in here?" was the relieved reply. "How'd you get here?"

"I fell out'a the wagon an' got lost."

"Hurt?"

"No jus' lost. I knowed you'd find me an' I bin waitin'."

"Well, come on then. Maybe we can get back before the show's over."

A simple, child faith, unafraid in the cold and snow and woods, knowing that "The Boss" would be along presently.

As the Colony grew in numbers they developed their own amusements. Parties, games, indoor and outdoor, a store day of their own, their own Sunday assembly, singing, recitations, holiday celebrations. But on special occasions, such as the Christmas play, they visit the School. For the most of them the limits of the thirteen hundred acre tract comprise their world. It is here they largely create for themselves all of the necessities of their lives under a guidance and protection they could not find in the great outer world.

Several years ago the Colony reached its full quota of boys. Wisely the number was set at one hundred. In years their ages run from twenty to sixty; in mental years from two to twelve. Each boy has his place in the Colony world; his duties and responsibilities gauged to his capacity to carry them. A dairy herd of sixty pure bred and registered cows, with modern dairy equipment; three hundred acres of cleared and cultivated land; bearing orchards; a piggery for from three to five hundred pigs; a dam across Menantico Creek, which impounds a thousand acres of water and forms Menantico Lake for fishing, swimming, skating, boating, irrigation and domestic use; three one-story concrete cottages two of which provide comfortable living quarters for fifty boys each, the third a service building with kitchen and dining rooms for all of the boys and employees; a house for Merri and his wife; ample barns, shop buildings and sheds; storage houses for crops; a hydro-electric plant made possible by the dam and the lake it has created, which will furnish light and power sufficient for the needs of the Colony; roads, lawns and flowers and an athletic field. These, and other accomplishments, have all been made possible and are carried on by the supervised labor of these boy-men. Truly it has been a remarkable achievement viewed only from a material standpoint. But this is of less moment than the creation of a separate world on thirteen hundred unfenced acres of land, with an atmosphere in which these under-privileged and underrated boys lead contented and useful lives.

Edward R. Johnstone, Director of The Training School, dreamed the dream of the Colony. It was given to Mr. Merithew to interpret the dream and to bring it to pass. The vision has grown with the years -- is still growing -- and it is still "Merri" who animates and materializes it. Ambition will not be satisfied, duty done, or the vision ended and complete until the last acre of the Scrub has been cleared; more and richer milk produced by his cows; finer melons grown; better and larger pigs raised; more and better garden stuff produced for his own boys and the children of The Training School; the bearing of orchards and vineyards increased and improved; insect pests destroyed; plant diseases studied and eradicated; (as was done at the Colony with the destructive black rot in sweet potatoes after years of experiment, giving to the Colony and its neighboring farmers a plant immune to that disease and to the Colony boys a 1931 crop of 5,800 bushels first grade sweet potatoes from thirteen acres.) All of these, and others, his boys will do. In the doing they will find for themselves greater usefulness and happiness and this, after all, is the soul of the vision.

These boy-men have been handicapped for life, through no fault of their own, by some unknown or ignored mistake in birth or breeding. Their own plane of life is a lowly one. To raise them above that plane would bring to them disaster and unhappiness. The Colony is built on their plane, kept there, for them. Yet, in their lowly sphere, they are working with the best, only the best strains in the animal and vegetable kingdoms, in a constant effort to make the best better. They are succeeding. Their hands are doing the work.

It was ordained that wisdom should flow from the mouths of babes. Perhaps it is ordained, too, that a greater knowledge and understanding of preventable defects in the human strain shall proceed out of the lives and work of these boy-men; that the work of and for, and with them, and with the younger children at The Training School, shall clear the way, as they have cleared the Scrub, for the emergence of society into a wider clearing.

LIFE AT THE COLONY
THREE BOYS AND A TEAM OF MULES

The man and woman in a rowboat on the Colony lake, came from behind a small island. A few moments before, they had heard loud yelling, which continued. As they came into open water, they saw on the near shore, a team of mules stalled in the soft sand with a heavy load of dirt. There were three boys with the team. Billy, strong and lusty, twenty-two years old, mentally six, was in charge of the team. His helpers were Tommy, thirty-five years old, mentally five, and Oscar, thirty years old, with a mental age of two. It was Billy who had been making all of the noise.

The man and the woman quietly watched proceedings for a while. Billy would climb up in the wagon, gather up the reins, yell at the mules, who seemed never to be of the same mind at the same time. Each alternately made an effort to move the load, but it didn't budge. Billy seemed to be getting a little louder as his unsuccessful efforts continued, and it seemed to the man in the boat that he had started a little of the talk that mules are said to understand, but he had only reached the initial "D -- -- ," when he caught sight of the boat and finished with a milder expletive than he had perhaps started. The near mule presently reared up and came down with his right foreleg over the tongue. Billy was disgusted. Tommy was amused and laughed. The third boy showed no interest. Billy got down, unhooked the mule, straightened him out and hitched him up again. Several times the same performance was gone through; mule up in the air, right leg over the tongue, -- Billy disgusted and expressing himself volubly, with some restraint, however, in the selection of his expletives. Finally the mule came down and Billy's disgust was supreme when he yelled, "Now he's got both legs over." The mule seemed satisfied, even more so, for he stood quietly while Billy fussed, fumed and scolded and again unhooked him.

The man had been quietly rowing over to the shore. He got out of the boat, walked over to the boys and suggested that it might be a good idea to shovel off part of the load. The hind wheels were deep in the sand, but Billy said, "I got to get this load over to the fill, like they told me" and he again went at the mules to pull the load out of the holes.

During an interim of getting the mules straightened out again, the man volunteered his help, took the reins, and by good luck got both mules to pull together and the load moved, -- but not far. So, after considerable gentle urging and trying to explain to Billy that part of the load would be in good place where the wagon had dug the holes, Billy took his shovel and scraped a few shovelfuls to the holes and then began to scrape the sand of the road into them, making new holes to fill up the old ones. He was very busy with his shovel and worked fast.

During all of this time, Tommy had never ceased talking and laughing, with no effort to help. He merely stood leaning on his shovel. The third boy just stood where he had been left after Billy had told him to give a lift with the wheel while he tried to get the load moving. The boy's effort to help the mules was done by getting in front of the hind wheel and exercising what strength he had in the opposite direction.

In the meantime, the woman in the boat had come up and joined the party, and Tommy was busy telling her all about it and enjoying the situation immensely, remarking that -- "Billy's style was cramped when he saw you out in the boat."

As a polite and satirical suggestion to Tommy that perhaps he should be using his shovel instead of leaning on it and talking, the man remarked to Billy who was working furiously with his, "Billy, I think that shovel of yours is getting pretty hot. Tommy has a cold one. Maybe you better change off with him." Billy caught the suggestion, missed the satire, and was little inclined to see anything funny in it. He threw aside his own shovel and took Tommy's. Tommy caught the humor of it. He merely stood and laughed heartily at the idea of a hot shovel. Finally, Tommy was induced to use Billy's shovel, after giving it ample time to cool, in lightening the load, and both boys worked at it.

Oscar was probably not expected to be of any material assistance, but as he stood idly by, the man suggested to him that he pick up some of the stones in the wagon and carry them back to help fill up the holes. In fact, the man picked up a few himself and showed Oscar how to do it. From that moment, while the process of unloading was going on, he never stopped his journeying to and fro, between the holes and the wagon, carrying a few pieces in his hands each trip from the wagon and dropping them gently into the holes.

When the load had been sufficiently lightened, Billy again took up the reins and the wagon moved on to the fill. Billy was jubilant. His voice could have been heard all over the lake. I'll show you how to do it! I'm the boy! Dog-gone! I can pull this wagon out'a the holes!" Tommy agreed, and his admiration for Billy rose. Oscar, unimpressed and indifferent, followed the wagon. The straining mules, patient and understanding, probably with a sense of humor, were content to have Billy claim all of the glory. The man and woman had a new story.

JACK FROST

The day's work on the farm was over. The "boys" had climbed into the wagons; or, tools on shoulder, were hurrying ahead in the early dusk, to wash up and get ready for supper.

The "Boss" rode with John Myers, a thirty-year-old man, but mentally an eight-year-old boy. John's regular job was teaming. He loved his mules; took good care of them. There seemed to be a mutuality of understanding between them and John, but a day's work for them, as well as for John, was a day's work, so he remonstrated when the "Boss" called attention to a wagonload of potatoes, standing in the field. "John," he said, "that load of potatoes ought to be hauled in tonight. When you get to the barn, unhitch your team, bring them out here and haul them in."

"Them mules is tired. They done a day's work and it's their feeding time; mine too."

"I know that, but that load of potatoes has got to come in tonight; if it don't, Jack Frost will get them."

That settled it for John. An order was an order, even though he could see no sense in it. But he was heard to quietly grumble to himself, as he unhooked his team to go for the potatoes; "Huh! -- them p'tatas is up on that wagon. Jack Frost ain't got no feet 'n legs. How's he goin' to climb up on that wagon to get 'em?"

Well, a little imagination helps sometimes; so does a joke. John's grumble faded out. He chuckled and laughed with himself as he figured how the "Boss" would see that his supper would be kept hot for him, with probably a little something extra on the side. Probably the mules too would get an extra ear apiece. John would see to that. So everything was lovely, and the potatoes came in.

That night in the cottage, all the boys had a laugh with John over his joke with the "Boss" and the "Boss'" ignorance about Jack Frost's climbing ability.

CHRISTMAS EVE

It was Christmas Eve. Night had fallen. The supper hour at the Colony was just over. The early light of the moon was reflected by the newly fallen snow. There were brighter patches of light from the windows of the cottages. The high raised shades gave full view of the preparations made for Santa Claus, -- beribboned holly wreaths, loops and festoons of evergreens, Christmas trees bedecked and alight. At one end of the large assembly hall there was a great table and on it a big keg, cider probably; bushel baskets full of apples; huge trays full of cookies; a tall pyramid of small red boxes, -- candy; a huge stack of filled paper bags, -- peanuts. But the hall was empty of boys. "Strange," said Merri's friend to his wife, as they drove slowly up the driveway, "nobody about. The place seems deserted -- and on Christmas Eve!" But as the car slowed to a stop there came the murmur of many eager but hushed voices from a dark mass that filled the front walk. Before the car had stopped rolling its running boards were jammed with man-sized boys, shouting and pressing their faces against its windows. Voices from the mass on the pavement called "Who is it? Is it him?" and, as the visitors were recognized the answers came from the running boards with more or less of disappointment in them, "Naw, its only Mr. and Mrs. B -- -- ." Then the questions came thick and fast through the lowered windows.

"Who you got with you?" "Did you bring him?" "Is he comin'?" "Did you see him?" And many heads were thrust into the car to see who, if anyone, was on the back seat.

Then the counter questions -- "What are all of you fellows doing out here?" "Got who?" "Bring who?" "See who?" "Who're you looking for?" A joyful shout went up "Santa Claus, Santa Claus." Then a disgusted voice called from the running board "He ain't got him."

But there had to be some cheering news for that crowd and they listened, and interrupted, and clapped their hands, and shouted like the 'kids' they are as it was given to them. And, Oh happy faith! they believed.

"No, we haven't seen him but we heard from him. He's on his way. He'll be here in a few minutes. Professor Johnstone called up Mrs. Santa Claus at the North Pole and she said 'Santy' left Glassboro a half hour ago and that he was due at the Colony at seven o'clock. Come on. Let us out. It's seven right now and we've all got to get into the hall before he does."

Five minutes later the boys, 'The Fessor', Merri and Mrs. Merri, their friends, and every man, woman and child on the place or near it, were in the hall, waiting for Santa Claus. That night not one of us was over five years old.

Blood was at fever heat when the jingle of sleigh-bells was heard and a great voice shouted "Whoa there, Blitzen." In another minute in he came, pack, top-boots, red coat, tassled cap, white beard, and he was big, and stout, and real. Nobody doubted that. Such a greeting they gave him! He, himself, said that nowhere else in all the world, did he get such a reception as at The Colony.

THE RESEARCH LABORATORY

A succession of events, each springing from its predecessor, led up to the founding of the Research Laboratory.

In 1887 Professor Garrison opened his home in Millville, New Jersey as a Training School.

In 1888 he moved the School to Vineland.

In 1897 he brought E. R. Johnstone from the Indiana State School at Fort Wayne and made him his Vice-Principal.

In 1900 he died at the age of forty-seven. Professor Johnstone succeeded him at the age of thirty.

In 1901 the Paidological Staff (The Feeble-Minded Club) was organized.

In 1903 The Training School inaugurated its Summer School for Teachers -- the first of its kind.

This chronology, up to 1906, has been the framework of our previous stories.

We have now come to an event which, in its far-reaching and continuing influences outside The Village of Happiness, transcends other achievements of the School -- the opening of the Research Laboratory on September 15, 1906.

The way had been prepared. Scientific work, but without undue emphasis on its scientific character, had been done from the beginning; in the Village school; in its industrial and other employments of the children; in their care and development.

We have seen how the development of the Village began to attract the interest of scientists in other specialized fields leading to the forming of the Paidological Staff in 1901. Two years later the influence of that group of educators and other scientists who saw what the world of education needed and the valuable material at The Village of Happiness for supplying some of the essential parts of that need, led to the opening of the Summer School for Teachers.

The human element had not then, nor has it yet, been completely analyzed, classified and catalogued by science. The problems this human element had carried into the public schools were brought in large measure to the Village. Teachers from everywhere had questions to ask for which there seemed to be no adequate answer. The experiences of the Village, its methods and results, were invaluable to those teachers who attended its summer school, but their "Why is this?" and "Why is that?" too often brought the reluctant answer, "We do not know."

Before the close of the second summer school the purpose began to form in the mind of the Village Director to find the answer to those "Whys." He realized that the search would be long and difficult; that the obscure places in deficient intellects would be difficult to plumb, their actions and reactions, spiritual, mental and physical; difficult to weigh, measure and analyze; the causes contributing to their deficiencies to be discovered only by painstaking and exhaustive research -- yet these things had to be done. Professor Barnes had already not only said, "Vineland is a human laboratory" but, enumerating all but one of the essentials for a Research Laboratory, "Vineland has all of these things."

The one missing item was the scientifically equipped brain with a human touch to direct it. Like so many things in the history of The Village of Happiness it was at hand when the need had to be met. Six years earlier, as he himself expressed it, Doctor H. H. Goddard had "selected his chief" although neither of them then knew it. For seven years Doctor Goddard had occupied the Chair of Psychology and Pedagogy at the West Chester Pennsylvania Normal School. He had due him his Sabbatical year. Professor Johnstone invited him to take it at The Training School.

On September 15, 1906 Doctor Goddard took possession of a small second-story room in one of the Village's workshops. It was meagerly furnished -- a desk, a couple of chairs, and some empty shelves for a future library and whatever laboratory equipment might be evolved. The scientifically equipped brain with a human understanding was in charge of the Research Laboratory of The Village of Happiness. Its research material was scattered over the whole Village in school, shops, cottages, on the lawns and farm, at work or play. The germ of the future Laboratory was in his brain. He gave a glance at his workshop with its empty shelves, put on his hat, closed its door behind him and went out to survey that scattered material, to have that germ fertilized by personal contact with it, to mingle and get acquainted with the children in their natural and everyday life in The Village of Happiness. To those who saw him then and through later years in his relationship to the children, no further explanation of the scientific brain with a human touch will be needed.

The studies made, and the methods devised, the developments of the scientific work of the Research Laboratory during the following twelve years under the direction of Doctor Goddard are covered in his more than one hundred published research articles and books. These gave a new literature to the science of psychology in the field of mental deficiency, its causes and consequences; the identification, training, care and education of mental defectives; social responsibility for their welfare; and the prevalence of this class in unsocial and anti-social groups. They contributed to a better understanding and appreciation of the needs, capacities and possibilities of the mentally insufficient, both adults and children; and, of even greater value, they gave the methods and tools by which these capacities and possibilities could be measured, developed and utilized.

The outstanding achievement of those years grew out of a European trip made by Doctor Goddard in 1907. It was taken in order to acquaint himself at first-hand with psychological research in European countries. During his trip his attention was called to the first published work, in 1905, of the eminent French scientists, Binet and Simon, on "A Measuring Scale of Intelligence." Sceptical of its value, his scientific mind had to assure itself whether the merits claimed for it were justified or otherwise. He brought back with him a copy of their publication, not yet translated from the French. This, together with the second part of their work, published in 1908, was translated into English by Miss Elizabeth S. Kite, social investigator and research worker of the laboratory from 1910 to 1918, and published by The Training School in 1912.

Before this, however, the laboratory was convincing itself of the scientific value of this measuring scale for the measuring of the intelligence of children. In 1908, Doctor Goddard's first article on "The Binet-Simon Tests of Intellectual Capacity" was published; in 1910 a translation of "Binet's Measuring Scale of Intelligence" and "Four Hundred Feeble-Minded Children Classified by the Binet Method"; in 1911 "A Revision of the Binet Scale," "Delinquent Girls Tested by the Binet Scale," and "Two Thousand Normal Children Measured by the Binet Scale"; in 1913 "The Binet Tests and the Inexperienced Teacher"; in 1914 "The Binet Scale: What It is and How It Is To Be Used"; and in 1917 "The Place of Intelligence in Modern Warfare."

The introduction of the "Binet-Simon Measuring Scale of Intelligence" into the United States, its verification, adaptation and instruction in its use was the work of The Village of Happiness through its Research Laboratory. As affecting human welfare this, up to now, has been its outstanding contribution.

Its rapid adoption by public school systems was hastened by its use, beginning in 1909, in the courses of instruction at the Village's Summer School for Teachers.

It had a major influence in the growth of special classes in the public schools and, in many respects, has revolutionized educational methods.

It gave a mighty impetus to, and a wide-spread interest in, the science of Psychology.

Its adaptation to the measurement of intelligence of adults has been of benefit to industry and prepared the way for those group tests devised in 1917 at The Village of Happiness for sifting our American forces in the World War, the story of which will be told in "The Committee on Provision." (2)

It also gave sorely needed tools to penal, reformatory and other institutions for the scientific classification of their inmates.

Professor Barnes' prophesy has been fulfilled: "To me Vineland is a human laboratory and a garden where unfortunate children are to be cared for, protected and loved while they unconsciously whisper to us syllable by syllable the secrets of the soul's growth. It may very well be that the most ignorant shall teach us most."

In 1912 "The Kallikak Family: A Study in the Heredity of Feeble-Mindedness" appeared. The material for this had been collected in the field during two years of arduous research by Miss Elizabeth S. Kite. This work, as with other publications of the Research Laboratory, brought early recognition of the scientific and practical value of its Research findings. "The Kallikak Family" is a scientific and human classic, known wherever the influence of heredity as a cause of mental growth or blight is taught.

The laboratory's objectives as stated by Doctor Goddard in 1914 were "A broad and far-reaching line of investigation" with "intensive studies that should have immediate interest and value to all who have at heart the welfare of the children in such institutions (for the mentally deficient), to all who teach or train normal children, and to the pure scientist." As to the future he said, "It has been asked how long this research work will be carried on? Until the cause of feeble-mindedness is known; until its prevention is understood; until all that can be learned from these special cases of mental development has been found out."

In six years the laboratory had grown from only a Director to a Director with sixteen assistants. Its quarters had of necessity been enlarged. This growth was continued until, in 1913, a new hospital having been erected, the old one, a three story brick building, was turned over to the laboratory for its exclusive use.

In 1918 Doctor Goddard left The Training School to become Director of the new Ohio Bureau of Juvenile Research. He was succeeded by Doctor Stanley D. Porteus.

Under Doctor Porteus, research in the field of mental deficiency was continued and the results freely given to the world, as before and since, through the medium of books, scientific journals, and The Training School Monthly Bulletin.

During his Directorship, he, in collaboration with Mrs. Nash, Director of the Educational Department of the School, made valuable studies of the social and educational correlation of mental age and behavior. The "Porteus Social Rating Scale" was developed at this time and also "Standardized Information Records." In 1925 he retired to accept the Chair of Clinical Psychology at the University of Hawaii.

He was succeeded by Doctor Edgar A. Doll, formerly Assistant Director under Doctor Goddard, 1912-1917. Under his direction the work of the laboratory has maintained its high rank for original and confirmatory research.

While the lines of scientific investigation by the laboratory have changed from time to time as new avenues of approach have opened, the fundamental purpose of the laboratory has been held always in view.

Doctor Doll has contributed much to a fuller understanding of the mental defective by laymen, especially those charged with the administration of public institutions for delinquents and criminals. His articles, "Psychology in the Organization of Prison Industries," "Some Principles of Correctional Treatment," "Classification System of the New Jersey State Prison," "Community Care of the Feeble-Minded," and "The Contribution to Social Work from Research in The Training School," have a practical sociological value.

For more than two years Doctor Doll has directed, in collaboration with Doctor W. M. Phelps of the Yale Medical School, a study of birth injuries in their relationship to feeble-minded-ness. In its possible preventive aspects of mental defect, no research study undertaken by the laboratory has exceeded this in importance. The birth-injured cases make up one of the largest groups of the feeble-minded. Their study by the laboratory is expected to continue without abatement until its possibilities in the field of prevention have been fully explored. Special funds for carrying on this particular research have been provided by private gifts.

The scientific standards set by the laboratory have given it a standing which continues to attract to it both students and experts in the fields of psychology, education and sociology. The laboratory has made generous provision for men and women to pursue their work in the capacity of research assistants or chiefs of divisions. Doctor Doll, who has had the important role of Director of Research since 1925, has summarized some of its achievements with a keen appreciation of their value to human betterment, thus:

The Vineland laboratory has played an important role in the progress of clinical psychology; in the growth of research work in other institutions; in the demand for psychological personnel in courts, school systems, business offices and factories; in the scientific study of gifted children; in the development of the technique of vocational guidance; and in the movement for better child training. These various scientific studies here and elsewhere have promoted methods of child development which have been carried into the schools and homes of the country to an extent which cannot easily be estimated.

The Training School's research work is widely known and has promoted an intense interest in the feeble-minded throughout the country with increased interest in related social problems. This has emphasized the importance of the scientific method of approach to such social problems and has assisted materially in promoting the scientific point of view in sociology.

Not the least of the consequences of this research work has been the training of hundreds of workers, both in the laboratory and in the Vineland summer school, thereby promoting both the principles and methods of the research approach to the problems of education, child welfare and social work.

The Vineland research staff has contributed significantly to the scientific and educational literature in technical journals and in the general magazines. It has published bibliographies on feeble-mindedness and related topics; has translated important works; has addressed important audiences; has published a great many general articles; and has contributed materially to scientific method.

The first recorded question asked by man of his Maker was, "Am I my brother's keeper?" The answer he received should have left no doubt in his mind that it was a plain and unequivocal "Yes."

From the beginning of the race individuals and groups have striven to interpret and obey that "Law of Love" as more clearly exemplified by its Exponent nearly two thousand years ago.

The complexity of human nature has given a wide field for its expression which has been at times grotesque; often sublime. Love for mankind has moved some to isolate themselves from their fellows but it has been to those who worked among and for the multitude that the clearer understanding seems to have been given.

From the work of these latter the new Science of Human Welfare is being evolved and to this new science all other sciences are contributory. Perhaps it may not be too far from the truth to say that the final objective of all science is the ultimate welfare of humanity. Certainly the Research Laboratory of The Village of Happiness must take first rank with those other human agencies which, working among and for the multitude, have brought to it an increased knowledge of itself and thus made the road of fulfillment of its destiny less difficult to those who have been denied a full birthright.

The laboratory was a further fulfillment of the vision of the Director of the Village. Its beginning and early development were both made possible by the generous financial support of those whose faith in that vision had grown with its fulfillment, Samuel S. Fels, Bleecker VanWagenen, Bayard Cutting, and others; its growth and present standing in the scientific world to the very many who, with similar faith, have given expression to that faith in their continuing gifts for its maintenance.

The beneficient results to human welfare of the work of the Research Laboratory during its twenty-eight years of activity are beyond appraisal. They have cost comparatively little in money -- much in devotion and sacrifice from those who have guided its work. To these there must be the satisfaction of adding to the meaning of the Village slogan, "Happiness First" and a happiness, too, which their labors have brought to countless children far beyond the Village gates who, but for their work, might never have been understood.

COMMITTEE ON PROVISION AND EXTENSION DEPARTMENT

Almost half a century before the founding of The Training School, influences were at work in New Jersey which were to select and equip its founder, S. Olin Garrison. In 1845, Stephen Garrison, father of Olin, was a member of the New Jersey State Legislature. In that year he fathered a bill for the establishment of a State School for mentally deficient children. It failed of passage. It was not until forty-four years had passed, and following closely upon the opening of Professor Garrison's own home at Millville for the benefit of the very few children it could accommodate, that the State made its initial appropriation for an institution for the care and training of such children. In securing this action Professor Garrison played a leading part.

It is easy to imagine that as a boy, sitting about the family fireside, he listened to his father's stories of these children and their neglect and his efforts to influence the legislature in their behalf. Those family fireside evenings were common in those long-ago days. Perhaps more of the world's worth while work has been due to such early influences than we realize.

The missionary spirit was strong in the Garrison family. It is not surprising that that spirit should have manifested itself in the founding and development of The Training School. It was fortunate for the world that the spirit of giving one's self for a worthy cause did not, in this instance, flag. It was responsible for the establishment in 1903 of the Summer School for Teachers; of the Research Laboratory in 1906; of the Committee on Provision (Extension Department) in 1910; of the inauguration of the Study of Birth Injuries and their relation to mental defectiveness in 1928.

By 1910 the work of The Training School was beginning to show to the State of New Jersey what could and what ought to be done for its own mentally deficient children. It had already made clear to a few of its citizens what dangers to Society were bred, born, and flourished within their ranks. To these and a correspondingly few citizens in other states the immediate solution seemed to be, and was, increased institutional provision for this class of children.

In New Jersey, January, 1910, under the sponsorship of The Training School, a Committee on Provision for the Feebleminded was formed for the purpose of creating a public interest in the matter. The Training School had been collecting facts in this field for more than twenty years. For three years its Research Department had been verifying its findings and extending its knowledge. The time had come for the instruction of the public and its legislatures. The Committee was formed at a meeting held at The Training School. Three persons were present: E. R. Johnstone, Superintendent of The Training School; Mrs. Caroline B. Alexander (later to become Mrs. Otto Wittpenn) and Bleecker Van Wagenen. Dr. David F. Weeks, Superintendent of the New Jersey State Village for Epileptics and Dr. Madeline A. Hallowell, Superintendent of the State Institution for Feebleminded Women were asked to join them "In the work of providing for the feeble-minded and epileptics of New Jersey by studying the conditions in the State and urging the citizens and legislature to definite action." The expense of prosecuting the work of the Committee, $500, was defrayed by Mrs. Alexander and Mr. Van Wagenen.

The methods of the Committee were unique and fruitful. Names and addresses of those on the waiting lists of the Epileptic Village and State Home were secured. A personal letter was sent to the parents or guardians of each applicant asking for the names of business or professional men who knew the child. A suitable blank with return stamped envelope was inclosed. The letter stated that the purpose of the Committee was to secure proper State care for this particular child. Most of the parents went personally to their friends and secured their signatures. In this way good cooperation was secured from over twelve hundred men and women representing every county in the State within a few weeks. To each of these the Committee sent letters explaining its purpose, suggesting how they might cooperate, and naming the child in whom they had an interest. Later, letters asking for the names of other children in the community for whom State care ought to be provided were sent to the twelve hundred. Replies from these were followed up in the same way as with the original list.

As the last act in this operation, letters were sent to all persons whose names had been secured, giving the name and address of their nearest legislative representatives and urging them to see personally or write to their legislators and express their interest in larger provision for State care of the feebleminded and epileptic. Simultaneously with the latter the Committee wrote each member of the legislature, calling attention to the number on the waiting lists from his county, together with other facts, and asking for his cooperation with the Committee. The newspapers of the State were furnished with matter prepared by the Committee.

The result of this intensive campaign was large and immediate. During the preceding 22 years the State's appropriations for buildings and furnishings for the State Institution for Feebleminded Women totaled $117,279; the total appropriated for the Epileptic Village, which had been founded in 1900, during ten years was $233,527; a total for both of $350,806. The work of the Committee secured $211,000 in twenty-two weeks. In these results The Training School, a private institution, could have no share except the gratification of the missionary who sees his work, and not his own head, crowned with success.

The activities of the Committee continued. In 1911 its influence was felt in the enactment of laws for the compulsory medical inspection of all school children and for the establishment of special classes in every school district where ten or more children were found to be three or more years behind normal. The work of the Research Laboratory of the Village, opened in 1906, within four years was being accepted as showing the way and providing the means for the measuring of intelligence. (3)

By 1912 the Committee had records of over six thousand mental defectives in New Jersey, more than four thousand of whom were not under institutional care. The State Commissioner of Institutions was added to the Committee.

In 1913 public interest had been so quickened that the legislators provided for the appointment of a Commission to study the question. (4)

The campaign for increased provision for the State's mentally deficients was pushed with increasing vigor during the following years. In 1912 the State's Commissioner of Education had joined the Committee officially. Later the Departments of Labor, Forestry, State University (Rutgers) and Public Highways were to augment its membership. These several hitherto unrelated State departments were drawn together by a mutual interest in the development of the Burlington County Colony for adult feeble-minded "boys" which was opened in 1914 in "The Pines." This colony was inspired by and came into being but a little more than a year after The Village of Happiness founded its own Menantico Colony for some of its older boys.

In the spring of 1914 Professor Johnstone; Calvin Kendall, Commissioner of Education; Mr. Gaskill, State Forester; and the Commissioner of Institutions met to outline plans for the organization of the Burlington County Colony. Sufficient land was promised by Mr. Gaskill within the State Forest domain in that county. The Village of Happiness agreed to become responsible for its administration and to transfer certain boys then at the Village from Burlington County, together with their maintenance money paid by the State, as a beginning. The Colony was to become a demonstration project for the Department of Education and the College of Agriculture at Rutgers. The Director of Highways promised suitable roads. The citizens of Burlington County were to be asked to contribute necessary funds for buildings.

Beginning in August, 1913, many public meetings were held throughout the County at which the project was explained and subscriptions requested. The response was so immediate that before the close of 1914 four large frame buildings were built and furnished, water, sewage disposal and other essentials provided, and twenty "boy-men" were being cared for. The Colony grew and prospered. Six separate State departments, the citizens of a county and The Training School had collaborated successfully in a general welfare experiment. The possibilities of effective, harmonious, and economical coordination thus demonstrated was "something new under the sun" and, perhaps, still may suggest something of value to students of government. Within two years the State took it over. It became the New Jersey Colony for Boys with a present population of eight hundred.

With the year 1914 the work of the Committee on Provision, as such, came to a close so far as New Jersey especially was concerned. But the work could not stop. Its successful outcome had created so many cries of "Come over and help us" that the missionary spirit of the Village was stirred to answer them. The present Director, E. R. Johnstone, had taken the lead in organizing and directing the work of the Committee. It was he who now became the leader in the wider field. The Committee was enlarged and strengthened. Since 1911 it had in reality been known as the Extension Staff of The Training School for, in that year, due to the cumulative effect of the Summer School for Teachers, the Research Laboratory and the Committee on Provision, an office with limited personnel had been established in the Village to meet the increasing demands made upon it by other states and countries. In 1913 the growth of the work had demanded a larger and better equipment. Alexander Johnson was then called from Indiana to direct the department with the assistance of a clerk and field worker. The work of the Extension Department was now on a truly national basis. Its headquarters remained at The Training School which supported it by its own funds and missionary zeal.

Toward the close of 1914 the demands on the Committee on Provision had reached such proportions and were so wide-spread that the creation of a National Committee became imperative. The whole country seemed to be becoming feebleminded-conscious. Clubs and associations of all sorts, especially women's clubs, churches, schools and universities were asking for information, help and guidance. Their common plea was, "Tell us what we can do."

In December of that year the Committee called a conference in New York City to consider the formation of a national organization. Twenty-one people were present, representing five institutions for the feeble-minded, four state departments of public welfare, a state reformatory, a juvenile court, a city board of education, the Eugenics Record Office and various other organizations. The sole object of the conference was to discuss:

First. Do we now possess sufficient information and are our theories sufficiently developed to commence a nation-wide campaign of publicity and promotion for the care of the feebleminded?

Second. Is the general public sufficiently aroused to be in sympathy with the campaign? In other words, have we reached the psychological moment?

Third. If the above questions are answered in the affirmative, how shall the campaign be conducted and who shall conduct it?

The unanimous conclusion was in favor of the two former propositions, with the proviso that there was still much need for further research in many important departments and that nothing done in the way of publicity should be permitted to discourage further research. It was also determined that, at least for the present, the Extension Department of The Training School at Vineland should continue methods it had begun in which it had had a reasonable amount of success.

Those present further pledged themselves to sympathetic cooperation and agreed to constitute an Advisory Committee to be called upon either as a committee or as individuals when the Vineland Department should feel the need of their help.

A special meeting of the Board of Directors of The Training School at Vineland was called January 23, 1915 at which time the Board approved "a campaign of publicity and education looking to the care of the feeble-minded of the United States" and agreeing "to carry on the campaign providing it can be properly financed." A committee was appointed to draw up a plan.

The Committee reported:

"Before the Extension Department of The Training School at Vineland had been formed as such, work had been done by those now associated with it, in trying to bring about greater public knowledge of the feeble-minded.

"Public school teachers were definitely interested in Indiana in 1896.

"The public schools seemed to offer the most interested point of activity and when special classes for mental deficients were started the need of more knowledge and of trained teachers at once became evident. Our extension really began when we opened the first summer school for public school teachers in 1904. The students have come from all parts of the country (also from England and Canada). They have formed centers of interest; from or through them has come a steady demand for information and for help in developing the care and training of backward and feeble-minded children.

"When our Department of Research was organized in 1906 it, too, attracted much attention, so that within a year or two the requests for lectures, testings of children and answers to questions compelled us to employ extra help and we tried to respond to the many calls.

"New Jersey naturally felt the impetus before other states and in 1909 the Committee on Provision for the Feeble-Minded and Epileptic was formed, with the Superintendent of The Training School as its Secretary. As a result of the efforts of this Committee, laws were passed making medical inspection of school children compulsory, requiring the establishment of special classes in the public schools, retaining defectives in institutions, providing for sterilization, requiring the registration of feebleminded, allowing for the parole of certain males and prohibiting the marriage of feeble-minded or insane persons.

"Knowledge of what was being done soon spread. Similar committees were formed in New York and Pennsylvania and from more places came the call for help.

"In 1911 we put a young woman, of our staff, in charge of Extension but the field soon outgrew her efforts. In 1913, through the financial support of Mr. Samuel Fels, Mr. Maurice Ayars and others we were able to secure Alexander Johnson, give him a clerk and a field worker and the department was really launched.

"Much has been done in New Jersey. Two colonies have been formed; one entirely by the citizens of Burlington County. Never before in any state has there been such wide-spread interest in, and knowledge of, the feeble-minded. A special Commission was appointed to study the situation and the present Legislature will undoubtedly set them to developing their plans. Our department has taken a leading part in the publicity campaigns in Virginia and North Carolina, where some results have already been obtained and requests have been received within the last few months to promote such movements in Georgia, Arkansas, Missouri, Tennessee and Texas.

"These facts and the recent calls upon the Director to speak in the interest of the feeble-minded in Delaware, Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Ohio, Illinois, Kentucky, Iowa and Wisconsin have led to the conference above mentioned and the appointment of this Committee.

"We believe that The Training School is the best place to carry out a nation-wide campaign for the care of the feeble-minded and in order to do it effectively this department must:

"a. Become a central bureau for the collection of literature, data and statistics concerning feeble-mindedness, distribute this freely whenever needed and keep research students in touch with what others are doing, to avoid duplication of effort.

"b. Help, insofar as possible, in the establishing of institutions and colonies, special classes in the public schools, medico-psychological inspection of children in schools and institutions.

"c. Promote publicity campaigns in states and communities, pushing the propaganda in localities where there is evidence of its need.

"d. Encourage the development of laboratories, study of communities, investigation of family histories and survey of localities.

"e. After a preliminary study of local conditions, use its experience in outlining a practical plan for carrying on whatever work is needed anywhere.

"There are certain principles which we believe may be assumed: viz.,

"1. That the problems of those working with the epileptic and the insane; the criminals and juvenile delinquents; the prostitutes and other sex offenders; the paupers and homeless; the drunkards and drug habitues; the ne'er-do-wells and inefficients would be greatly simplified if those who are feeble-minded were properly segregated.

"2. That the offspring of parents, both of whom are feeble-minded, will be feeble-minded.

"3. That but a small proportion of the feeble-minded needing care and custody are receiving it.

"4. That feeble-mindedness is a condition, not usually the result of disease, and is not curable.

"5. That hereditary feeble-mindedness (about 65% according to the studies made) is transmissible.

"6. That the feeble-minded woman rarely escapes the sexual experiences that too often result in the birth of more defectives.

"7. That the general public must have much more information concerning the problem if the best results are to be obtained.

"We use the term feeble-minded in this paper to include only those whose defective mental condition is indubitable and easily recognized by the expert.

"To effectively carry out our program, we recommend that the Department of Extension be organized with the following:

"1st. A director and lecturer to take charge of work in the field and handle the campaign on the ground. (We now have Mr. Alexander Johnson doing this.)

"2nd. A secretary in charge of the office to direct the gathering and classification of data, plan the details of campaigns, edit the Bulletin and other matter for distribution, provide charts, pictures and exhibits, make public the results of scientific work from any laboratory, and keep in close touch with the whole movement everywhere.

"3rd. A suitable office force. (We have one stenographer.)

"4th. Field workers to examine and test children, study families and communities and help local committees to get this properly done. (We have, at present, one field worker.)

"For this there is needed a budget of at least $20,000 a year for ten years and the Committee feels that no further development of the department should be attempted until this is secured.

"We, therefore, further recommend that this Committee be continued with instructions to use every effort to raise this budget."

To R. Bayard Cutting of New York City, a member of the Board of Directors of The Training School, belongs the credit for enlisting the interest and financial support of those who contributed to the work. Largely through his efforts the budget of $20,000 a year for three years was raised.

The middle of 1915 found the enlarged and nationalized Committee on Provision organized and at work. Offices were provided by, and at, The Village of Happiness. The executive direction of the work was placed in the hands of the present writer; Alexander Johnson was continued as field secretary, and Miss Elizabeth S. Kite as field worker. Within a few months the offices of the Committee were removed to Philadelphia and Misses Helen F. Hill and Jane D. Griffith were added to the staff of field workers. The latter were augmented by other experienced and trained workers as the demands on the Committee grew.

The Training School, our Village of Happiness, now that its self-imposed extension work on behalf of the feeble-minded was on a truly national basis, was able at last to readjust its burden of responsibility without relinquishing it. The "spirit" was still alive, that missionary spirit we have seen at work through all its history. The National Committee on Provision merely opened up the wider field and provided the means for more effective work in arousing and consolidating public interest on behalf of that army of stragglers civilization inevitably drags in its progress, seemingly in greater and greater numbers.

The Training School created The Village of Happiness which was the germ from which has grown and developed, successively, those things we have heretofore narrated in the progress of our stories. With unselfish devotion to its ideals no effort has been too great, no progress too slow, nor its faith in its mission never so faint as to cause it to falter or lose hope. The National Committee on Provision, drawing its faith and hope and inspiration more largely from this source than from any other, labored in the field it was organized to serve for four years, from 1915 to 1919.

During those years it was a guiding and constructive influence in every state of the Union and abroad. It preached but one doctrine -- that of a better understanding of the feebleminded and larger and better provision for their care, with eternal emphasis on the need for scientific research in the field of prevention.

The Committee used its field staff of four experienced women in psychological surveys which covered large sections of a number of states where such work was needed and asked for. These surveys included counties, communities, schools and institutions. When opportunity offered, the field staff preached the gospel of the feeble-minded to clubs, associations and other groups of citizens. They always worked under the immediate direction of state or other officials, or organized groups of citizens. Intensive work of this nature and extensive speaking campaigns by the Field Secretary were carried on in Arkansas, Arizona, California, Delaware, District of Columbia, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Montana, South Carolina, Utah and Wisconsin. For four years this work, supplemented by correspondence, bulletins and other printed matter was prosecuted without let-up, on an annual budget for all purposes of twenty thousand dollars. Its expenses were kept within that amount; a remarkable record indeed!

The Committee early made efforts to secure cooperation of other welfare bodies and foundations. Effective and valuable cooperation was achieved with the United States Public Health Service through its then Surgeon-General Blue, who assigned several of his Assistant Surgeons-General for institutional and school surveys in Arkansas and Colorado, and as consultants with the Committee. The Eugenics Record Office also sent one of its field staff to assist in the surveys in Arkansas and Indiana. Cooperation of the United States Public Health Service continued up to the end of the Committee's activities in 1919. This was especially valuable after the United States entered the World War, with respect to the feeble-minded women and girls drawn to the vicinity of the concentration camps, where they became a menace to the health of the soldiers. The Committee's field workers were used in social and psychological investigations at several of these Camps for the Public Health Service.

We come now to one of the most valuable contributions made by the Committee on Provision to the Country's welfare. The contribution had, and continues to have, such far-reaching and beneficent results that it needs to be told in some detail for its historical value.

The United States declared war against Germany on April 6, 1917. This meant the immediate opening of training camps for three or four million men. No provision had been made for sifting from these immense masses of men those whose instability due to inferior intelligence would make them, not only of little value as soldiers, but a positive menace in the fighting lines.

Psychological examinations had already proven their value in schools, factories and institutions when given to individuals. It was impossible to think of attempting to apply these tests in this manner. Some more expeditious way had to be found at once if this sifting of four million men was to be accomplished. It would have taken years, a lot of them, employing all the competent psychologists in the country, to have done this in the usual way. It had to be done within comparatively few months.

On April 10, 1917, four days after war was declared, letters were sent by the Committee to the Secretary of War and Secretary of the Navy. They read in part:

I wish to call to your attention the desirability of extending the scope of examination of recruits for the Army and Navy to include examination of their mentality, to the end that irresponsible men, those whose mentality is such as to interfere with their judgment and stability, may be rejected for the fighting arms of the Army and Navy.

I have been advised that the Canadian authorities have experienced trouble in this direction, and that a number of recruits trained and sent to the front have had to be returned because of their unfitness, due to mental defect.

It is doubtless true that many of the class I refer to could be utilized in connection with some branch of the War and Navy Services if their condition is known and they are properly directed; but it seems evident that these people are not qualified for the services required of those who carry arms and do the actual fighting. * * * *

It is quite likely that it would be well worth while for our Government to instruct the medical officers at the recruiting stations to give special attention to the mental age of those who may enlist or be drawn for service. It may be possible in this connection to utilize the Public Health Service officials, who are trained in this work, to give the necessary instruction to these medical officers at the recruiting stations.* * * *

I am directed to advise you that if the facilities of this Committee can be of service to the Government in this connection, or in any other way, those services are at your disposal.

(Signed) Joseph P. Byers,
Executive Secretary.

On April 19, a letter was sent from the Committee on Provision to the President of the American Psychological Association, Professor Robert M. Yerkes of Harvard University, who had but recently been named chairman of a special committee of that association to consider the possibility of applying mental tests to the recruits for the Army and Navy. That letter asked for information as to the nature of the special committee's work and concluded, "If in any way the Committee on Provision can second the efforts of your association along this line we shall be glad to do so."

Much correspondence followed between April 19 and the middle of May.

April 28, Byers to Yerkes:

Yours of the 27th received. I am very glad to learn from it of the action of the American Psychological Association. Our Committee, of course, does not want to do anything to cause confusion in the minds of Washington officials. However, if there is anything that we can do to cooperate with other efforts in the same direction, we want to do it.

May 4, Yerkes to Byers:

* * * It is extremely important, as you already appreciate, that psychological and psychiatric activities in the service of the Nation be coordinated and correlated to the utmost. If individuals work independently and diverse methods of examining are employed, results are sure to be more or less unsatisfactory and misunderstanding may develop. * * * * *

Already a committee of the American Psychological Association, headed by me, is being organized to prepare methods for the psychological examining of recruits in the Army and Navy. I have not the least desire to interfere with individual or institutional liberty or initiative, but I conceive it to be my duty to point out that unless a method is prepared which has the approval of the leading psychological authorities, our work is almost certain to be brought to naught. I am, therefore, going to ask that you aid me in centralizing this work. I shall gladly confer with you at the earliest opportunity. I am enclosing a list of the already organized committees of psychologists.

H. H. Goddard, Vineland, New Jersey
L. M. Terman, Stanford University, California
T. H. Haines, Columbus, Ohio
F. L. Wells, Waverly, Massachusetts
W. V. Bingham, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
R. M, Yerkes, Cambridge, Massachusetts
G. M. Whipple, Urbana, Illinois

On or about May 13, Professor Yerkes, Doctor M. J. Greenman, Chairman of the Committee on Provision, and Mr. Byers had a conference in Philadelphia at which Professor Yerkes reported that a request made by his committee at Washington for funds amounting to twenty-five thousand dollars, to finance its work, had been denied; and further, that the American Psychological Association had no funds for this purpose.

There was no time for delay. The Committee on Provision was vitally interested in the preparation of simplified intelligence tests that could be used for large groups of men. That seemed the only solution if the plan was to be made effective. The Army and Navy authorities were interested if such group testing could be made possible. The materials and methods, however, would have to be perfected before presentation to the government officials for adoption.

Just before the conference with Professor Yerkes, the Director of The Training School, Professor Johnstone, had been advised of it by telephone and told the chances were good for getting the School involved "up to its neck." His anticipated reply was, "You can go the limit."

Thus fortified, the suggestion was made to Professor Yerkes that the Committee on Provision would finance his committee up to eight hundred dollars for traveling expenses, clerk-hire, printing, and materials; that The Training School would take care of his committee of seven for such time as might be necessary for them to complete their work, giving them full use of its Research Laboratory and all other facilities that might be helpful. In view of the facts that members of the Psychological Committee were to serve without pay, that The Training School would provide for their maintenance and every provision for the prosecution of their work, and that the atmosphere of the School was one where the Committee could work undisturbed by the distracting influences of war-time preparation, the sum of eight hundred dollars was deemed sufficient and it so proved.

This offer, after presentation by Professor Yerkes to the National Research Council, was approved and accepted and on May 21 the Committee on Provision was notified; also, that the seven members of the Psychological Committee had been summoned to convene at The Training School on May 28. Only two weeks elapsed between the original offer of the Committee on Provision and the beginning of work by the wide-spread Committee of Psychologists at The Village of Happiness.

Within less than three months after the declaration of war the Psychological Committee had completed its work of devising those group-testing methods adopted by the Army and Navy. These methods, modified and improved by experience, have been used largely since the war in schools, universities, industries and public works.

The Research Laboratory of the Vineland Training School first interpreted and developed in our own country the work of Binet-Simon on the "Measurement of Intelligence:" this in 1908 and subsequent years. It was again at The Training School, in its Laboratory with its Director of Research, Doctor H. H. Goddard, sitting as one of seven leading American psychologists, in 1917, that group-testing was developed and given immediate recognition as meeting a grave war-time emergency.

Yerkes to Byers, August 13, 1917:

Our methods have been applied in four different Army or Navy stations during the past month, to nearly 5,000 men. The results are, on the whole, gratifying, and we are all inclined to think that we can rapidly modify the methods so that they will be serviceable. The War Department has recently decided to introduce psychological methods into various bureaus. Within a fortnight we shall probably have forty or fifty psychologists at work, and if our methods prove valuable, there will doubtless be two, three, or even four times as many men engaged within two months.

This development is beyond our expectations. I had hoped that within six months or a year we might accomplish as much, but I never dreamed of the extensive and varied demands coming upon us so soon.

I have accepted commission as Major attached to the staff of the Surgeon-General of the Army and shall have general direction of the psychological examining of recruits. This will give abundant opportunity for the use of the methods which your committee enabled us to develop. * * * * *

Please express to the members of your committee, for all of us who have been concerned with the development of psychological methods, most hearty appreciation. We feel that we owe to you, the initiation of our work.

Yerkes to Byers, March 5, 1918: Relative to your interest you are informed that in certain camps low-grade men instead of being made a part of the mobile division are being left in the Depot Brigade and are therefore attached to the camp instead of to the division. This seems a very happy partial solution of the problem.

Through 1918 and the early months of 1919 the Committee on Provision continued to "see it through."

March, 1919, saw the beginning of the end of the Committee on Provision as a national body. Its financial support was being curtailed on account of more pressing war demands on those whose generosity had enabled it to perform for four years.

It closed up its affairs and disbanded early in 1919. Since then, because the need remains urgent, the work has gone on under the Extension Department of The Training School, directed by Miss Helen F. Hill. Miss Hill served with the national committee as one of its field-staff.

IT IS CHRISTMAS TIME as this little book comes from the printer, a time when we think more of spiritual than of material things. As we think of love and loyalty and fidelity, comes the thought that too often we take them "for granted."

As I turn these pages I am conscious of the many whose names do not appear therein, and yet whose lives of kindliness and self-sacrifice shine through the Book for those who are discerning enough to see beyond the type.

As you read, let your spirit look, and between the lines you may see these others who have also helped to make The Training School:

Professor Nash, Miss Fallen, Mr. Hetzell, Miss Lapp, Mrs. Merithew and Miss Vernon; with whom I reverently place Miss Annie, Mr. Arnade and Mr. Veale who have "gone on before." Although unnamed within these pages, these have given their all for more than a score of years. Of the loyalty and service of each of these a chapter might be written.

Those newer members of our executive staff who have caught the spirit and carry on the light.

The older boys and girls who have given the best they know to the smaller and more helpless ones.

The housefathers and housemothers whose love knows no hours if their "children" need them.

The whole group of other employes in school; hospital, laboratory, colony and the other departments.

The Lady Visitors with their sympathetic understanding and the Trustees with their high sense of responsibility for the children of others.

The members of our Association who have contributed to the financial as well as the spiritual needs of the School.

And the fathers and mothers of our children whose loving appreciation has stood as a wall of strength for us in good times and bad.

Truly there are many of you, and yet I would not miss one, and Mr. Byers joins me in this wish. May the light of your lives shine on for many a day in the hearts of the children.

E R Johnstone