Library Collections: Document: Full Text


The Disabled Soldier

Creator: Douglas C. McMurtrie (author)
Date: 1919
Publisher: The Macmillan Company, New York
Source: Available at selected libraries
Figures From This Artifact: Figure 2  Figure 3  Figure 4  Figure 5  Figure 6  Figure 7  Figure 8  Figure 9  Figure 10  Figure 11  Figure 12  Figure 13  Figure 14  Figure 15  Figure 16  Figure 17  Figure 18  Figure 19  Figure 20  Figure 21  Figure 22  Figure 23  Figure 24  Figure 25  Figure 26

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609  

The first local committee was formed at Milan, and the Milan school became the model for others as the Lyons school was in France. Rome, Florence, Naples, Genoa, Bologna, Palermo, Venice, and other cities followed suit as soon as the growing interest in the new gospel had aroused the citizens. In most of the northern provinces the formation of committees has been spontaneous, but public opinion has been slower in the south. In some regions the National Board has been empowered to call on the Mayors of towns to organize schools for district needs. It appears that unless the re-educational facilities of the country as a whole are increased, the law providing that all crippled soldiers shall spend at least fifteen days in a school cannot be put into effect.

610  

The outward surroundings of the schools have usually their full share of Italy's gracious charm. The buildings are often fifteenth century palaces which have been donated to the committees, or they are ancient convents surrounded by gardens, or stately public buildings fronting on picturesque piazzas. Within, the atmosphere is formal and institutional. Hours for work and recreation are all carefully regulated, and the plan of work is inelastic. Military discipline is enforced. At graduation there are usually speeches and prizes given either by the committee or by interested citizens of the town, for the naive Italian peasant has his interest greatly stimulated by such ceremonies. Every man receives also a certificate stating his fitness to follow a trade.

611  

While attending the school the men are supported by the government, that is, the government pays the school a fixed sum for their maintenance. The government also pays the men their regular soldiers' pay and gives their families the same allowances as when the men were in active service. The period of training during which the man and his family are thus supported is limited to six months, but the National Board, if it wishes, can keep the man longer at the school at its own expense.

612  

The courses in the Italian schools have been determined largely by the needs and limitations of the pupils. Eighty per cent, of the invalided soldiers, ninety per cent, in some provinces, are peasants with no experience in trades and very often illiterate. The great opportunity of the schools therefore has been to give these men a rudimentary education and in so doing to open up to them a new world. In many of the schools men are allowed to take up trade or business training only after they have completed the elementary and intermediate school courses. The business courses train the less intelligent among the pupils to fill such simple positions as concierge or store clerk; men capable of more, they fit to be stenographers, bookkeepers, and bank and office clerks. There are special courses for postal and telegraph employees which are very popular with the men since they lead to government positions, but openings in this direction are rapidly being filled, and a strong effort is now being made to divert men to the trades and to agriculture.

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The trades taught at Milan are carpentry, tailoring, shoemaking, basketry, leather work, wood inlay and wood carving, the making of wooden shoes, saddlery, broom and brush making, and mechanics. In general the same trades are taught at the other institutions, although critics have pointed out that training which is profitable at Milan, an industrial center, is little suited to the rural southern provinces. Not even a tailor or a shoemaker is greatly in demand in primitive villages where the inhabitants go ragged and barefoot. The chief need in these regions is for agricultural education, and the schools are now being urged to organize farm training wherever possible. At Palermo, where agricultural courses were started early, extremely worthwhile results have been obtained from instructing the ignorant and conservative Sicilian peasant in modern agricultural methods. Knowledge of this kind will economically more than compensate a wounded peasant for his physical handicap.

614  

In some districts in Italy famous old handicrafts still flourish and bring high pay to a skilled worker. A cripple can very well work at such a craft if his injuries are not of the arms or hands, and so a number of the schools have courses in these skilled trades. Several teach bookbinding, which in Italy is still regarded as an art; others, fine cabinet-making or art pottery, Florence has its famous toys, and Venice teaches the old Venetian arts of wrought iron and stamped leather.

615  

All the schools have employment committees which are assisted in their work by a central placement office. Many of the men of course go back to their own village and set up their shop in their house. In cases where they go to the large cities employers have been found generally anxious to help: the Electro-Technical Society, for example, has made a list of the positions it can offer to cripples and the injuries compatible with them. Private firms are obliged to reinstate their employees crippled in the war if the employees can pass the required physical tests. Accident insurance companies are not allowed to increase their rates to employers of war cripples unless more than a certain proportion of the employees are disabled.

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