98 
PARK AND CEMETERY 
Annual reports or extracts from them , historical sketches , 
descriptive circulars , photographs of improvements or dis- 
tinctive features are requested for use in this department. 
Citizens of Fairfield, Me., have organized a village improve- 
ment society, and have named it the ‘‘Beautiful America Club 
of Fairfield.” If there is anything in a name, this one should 
carry success with it. 
* * * 
The Village Improvement Society of Orange City, Fla., has 
burst into poetry and posted in the waiting-room of the rail- 
way station a placard bearing tbe following verses : 
“Call of the Village Improvement Association of Orange 
City. 
Kind friends one and all, 
Please list to the call 
Which the V. I. A. utters so loudly ; 
Throw no trash in the street, 
And our town will be neat, 
And the tourists will point to it proudly.” 
* * * 
The Village Improvement Society of Somerset, Mass., has 
appointed an expert to select places for the shade trees which 
the society is to plant in the fall. The committee on side- 
walks is co-operating with the superintendent of roads for 
street improvements. The membership fee has been reduced 
from one dollar a year to fifty cents. 
* * * 
The Civic Improvement League of St. Louis is conducting 
classes in flower gardening, numbering about fifty girls, under 
the instruction of Prof. W. J. Stevens. The classes meet three 
times a week at the Civic Improvement Gardens, Tower Grove 
and Shaw avenues, and are instructed in flower culture and 
transplanting. The pupils are permitted to take home some 
of the flowers they raise, and much interest is manifested in 
the work. 
* * * 
A Civic Improvement League is to be organized in Mil- 
waukee this fall. At the spring meeting of the Milwaukee 
Outdoor Art League a committee of three was appointed to 
work with similar committees from the Citizens’ Business 
League and the Merchants’ Association, and committees from 
all commercial organizations in the city are to be asked to 
join in the movement. Mr. A. C. Clas, one of the organizers 
of the movement, is in communication with officials of similar 
leagues in Philadelphia, Boston, Washington, Louisville, In- 
dianapolis, San Francisco, Cleveland and St. Louis, and meth- 
ods of those organizations are being studied. 
i}: 
The Civic Improvement League of Omaha, Neb., is con- 
ducting a prize competition for the best kept back yards, in 
which 1,00 children are competing. Under the League’s influ- 
ence and the co-operation of officials about ioo unsightly poles 
in downtown districts have been removed ; an ordinance passed 
forbidding the spitting on walks and steps of public buildings ; 
3,500 school children and teachers brought together to listen 
to the best talent in the United States on the improvement 
of cities; and 25,000 i-cent packages of seeds sold and dis- 
tributed throughout Omaha. W. W. Slabaugh is president 
of the League, and Miss E. F. McCartney, secretary. 
, -Jf i'fi 
The Civic Improvement League and the Commercial Club 
of Indianapolis have been directing their efforts toward in- 
teresting the children of the public schools in making the city 
more beautiful. Before the close of school, President Woollen 
of the League and Secretary Hoover of the Commercial Club 
paid regular visits to the schools and were successful in estab- 
lishing several school gardens, which are still being cared for 
with unflagging interest during the children’s vacation. Many 
of them have written compositions on civic improvement 
topics which show their interest in the work. One twelve- 
year-old girl writes : “Some of the boys have been digging 
in the school yard, preparing for the dirt which other boys 
have gone nearly a mile for.” Another one writes: “We 
must not plant our seeds in a straight line, but in masses and 
clusters.” 
i-s 
The Helena Improvement Society, Helena, Mont., has been 
uniformly successful in its undertakings and has done much 
for the beautifying of that city. The society was organized 
in 1898, with 30 charter members, and now has 400 regular 
and 25 life members. The first work was to improve the 
library grounds. The next year the high school grounds were 
undertaken and the grounds of the Hawthorne School trans- 
formed at an expense of $2,000. A lawn has been made at 
the Northern Pacific depot, and trees and flowers planted at 
the Bryant School. Flower seeds have been distributed to the 
school children for two years, with good results, and the 
recent work of the society in building a foot-path up Mount 
Helena has been noted in this department. The Sixth avenue 
parking project was inaugurated by the society and has been 
brought to a successful conclusion. The movement for the 
extension of the court-house park was started by it and a 
fund of $600 raised with which to purchase the adjoining 
property. The matter was then turned over to the county 
commissioners, who built the park. H. L. Glenn is president 
of the society and E. A. Macrum secretary. 
As an aid to town and village betterment, the Massachu- 
setts Civic League is gathering a series of photographs from 
which lantern slides will be made for use in lectures on vari- 
ous phases of town and village work. Prizes have been offered 
for the best pictures, and tbe contest is open to all. For the 
most pictorial account of the life of any town or village in 
this state a prize of $25 will be awarded. The second best set 
of pictures will win a prize of $10. Ten dollars will be given 
for the best pictorial account of any particular phase of the 
life of a town or village, and $5 for the next best. Prizes of 
from $1 to $5 will be given for any feature worthy of honor- 
able mention. Some of the subjects suggested for illustration 
and description are the following: Roads and roadsides, side- 
walks, curbstones, planted trees, grass plots, wild roadsides, 
methods of lighting and cleaning streets, roadbed, bridges, 
grade crossings, dumps, set-back of houses, signs, lamp-posts, 
letter boxes, telegraph and trolley poles, drinking fountains 
and troughs, band stands and look-out-for-the-engine signs. 
Public parks, cemeteries and their surroundings, ponds, brooks, 
rivers and their treatment ; private grounds, forestry, posters 
good and bad, public buildings, monuments, schools, play- 
grounds, old houses, and everything that pertains to town or 
village life, will be accepted. Pictures and descriptions should 
be sent before October 1, 1904, to the secretary of the League, 
Edward T. Hartman, 14 Beacon St., Boston. 
