The Town's Opportunity 



HOW IT MAY DO MORE THAN THE CITY FOR A 

 MORE BEAUTIFUL AMERICAN LIFE 



CHARLES MULFORD ROBINSON 



VI. — Conclusion. 



THE improvement effort of the town 

 is well under way. The commu- 

 nity has awakened to its opportunity 

 and has reached forth to grasp it. With 

 the realization that the hour of achieve- 

 ment has come, that there has arrived that 

 time when the town not merely exists — 

 in the sense of refraining from dying! 

 — but acts, begins to work for its own 

 profit and blessing, there is born not only 

 a new conscience, but a new consciousness. 

 The community awakes to know itself, to 

 suspect its possibilities. Civic pride ap- 

 pears. Neighborliness takes on a larger 

 and more joyous meaning. There is the 

 thrill of a new life, of a hope that had 

 not before been dreamed, of faith in self. 

 The town has become fairer without; but 

 that external renovation scarcely suffices 

 to express the extent of the change within. 

 Life is brighter and happier, not just 

 because the visible town is lovelier and 

 wholesomer, but because of the new in- 

 terest, the new hope, the new belief in 

 the future and in self. 



Perhaps it was one person, one man or 

 one woman, one boy or one girl, who 

 dreamed the dream that has roused a com- 

 munity. Then came the organization, the 

 making of the machine that was to carry 

 the dream into effect; then the employ- 

 ment of the expert who, out of his ex- 

 perience and knowledge, should interpret 

 the dream, transcribing it into a plan at 

 once practical and beautiful, consistent 

 and complete. And then the machine be- 

 gins to work, its pattern before it. Its 

 voice says more than "Do this" and "Do 

 that;'^ it says, "Do it here, where we are 

 all interested and all may see," "Do it to- 



gether, harmoniously," and then, with a 

 shout, it cries, "Everybody do it, working 

 with a will, as you love your town, for 

 what you do is to the glory of the town, 

 and to the benefit, profit and happiness 

 of us all." So village improvement is 

 under way, and as its effects begin to 

 appear its influence reaches far afield. 



It is a familiar experience in the af- 

 fairs of life that self-effort nearly always 

 secures outside assistance, and without 

 so much as an asking. The experience has 

 been crystallized into a pious proverb, 

 "God helps those who help themselves." 

 In no realm of activity is this more ev- 

 ident than in village improvement. The 

 outside help and generous gifts that are 

 showered unexpectedly upon those who, 

 associated in a town improvement society, 

 are working to better local conditions, 

 never cease to be a- cause of surprise to 

 these workers. Almost always there is at 

 least one wealthy person, or one wealthy 

 family, that will volunteer some precious 

 aid when it is seen that the town is bravely 

 working by itself for its own regeneration. 

 Croesus, behind his stone walls or amid 

 his acres, has not less to gain by the town's 

 improvement than have those who live 

 within it. He is quick to see this, and, 

 however selfish, to give in proportion to 

 his larger means that the movement may 

 progress the more surely and the more 

 swiftly. But generally Croesus is not sel- 

 fish. To show an appreciation of wealth's 

 obligations to the community is now the 

 popular republican translation of noblesse 

 oblige. And if there be not a Croesus in 

 the village, there are many sons and 

 daughters of the town who from distant 

 cities look back with loving e3^es and ten- 



