Another man, formerly at the State Farm, was there because while trying to earn a living at canvassing, after losing his sight, he had been robbed of his wares by a dishonest guide. He placed himself in the poorhouse, and had been transferred to the State Farm, where I found him. In the four months of instruction he learned to read and write Braille, to cane-seat and pith-seat chairs, and make rake knit bags. He was sent to a workshop in April to learn broom making, and before his vacation in August, had also learned to weave coarse rugs. He is now completing his apprenticeship, and will shortly find a place among the blind wageearners. He has made since July first about fifty rake net bags and sold them, receiving between forty and fifty dollars for his work. 1

Then there is the man who meets you more than half-way. You are being tested rather than he. How can you help him contribute all that is in him to give? This kind of man is healthy, in mind, body and spirit. He simply lacks the use of one senseorgan. He requires no long period of readjustment. He masters one hand process after another. He had trade-training behind him before he lost his sight, and is confident that he can, with backing and special equipment, follow his old vocation of florist, in which he has had twenty years experience. Your job as a social case worker is with possible employers and backers, and not with the blind man. It is not a question if he will "keep up his end," but whether society will keep up its end. You must prove by actual experiment, and you can do it only with the aid of some florist of standing, that this man can actually do without sight the processes he did with sight, and that there will be a market for his labor, if he is provided with the necessary capital and tools with which to work. The story of how this particular man developed a greenhouse, with crops of chrysanthemums, tomatoes, mushrooms, etc., and of how, when the fuel shortage compelled him to close down, he turned successfully to competitive factory work cleaning bobbins in a worsted mill, is full of interest, but what I have told is perhaps enough to suggest the variation in peace problems of employment of blind men.

The variation among disabled soldiers promises to be in some ways greater, in others less,-less, because the men are already sifted by certain mental and physical tests before they go to the front; greater, because of the chances of other physical handicaps in combination, perhaps quite different from those appearing in problems of civilian life. Greater, too, because among officers and men, this disability may cut across we know not what range of men

1 Massachusetts Commission for the Blind, 11th Annual Report 1916-1917.

of talent. The plans so excellently carried out at St. Dunstan's, England, for soldiers disabled by blindness, and the carefully laid plans for American soldiers who may be so disabled, all provide for curative occupation early. Visitors from St. Dunstan's go to the blinded in hospital wards early "for good comradeship." All of the nurses, including the superintendent, in some of our base hospital units have voluntarily equipped themselves with knowledge of principles and practice of occupation therapy, and the government has laid careful plans for each succeeding step to the point where the handicapped individual comes back to live out his life in the community.

Canadian experience tells us that the principle of helping a man back to his former vocation holds in 90 per cent of cases of all disabled soldiers in Canada. Only 10 per cent need complete reeducation. Placement takes on a new aspect when the country cannot afford to lose the labor of a fraction of a man. Work for the handicapped is transformed, and it is for us to see that the basis of transformation is brought over permanently into our community programs. Only ignorance of the true possibilities for individuals, and the dangers of emotional and political exploitation stand in the way.

In the meantime, for the worker with individual cases, there are suggestions out of past experience that may be helpful. The informal use of some simple classification, in arranging all the facts about the man and the situation may help both the man and the social case worker to face things together. Dr. Southard's discussion of classification in his course on Social Psychiatry at the Boston School of Social Work this winter has stimulated many of us to put in more orderly shape half-crystallized ideas and methods in social case work. The plan outlined in the footnote for rearrangement of all the facts in the situation is one we are in process of trying out at the School both as a help towards making a plan and getting at larger implications. It presupposes that all the necessary facts * Social Diagnosis, Social Case Work and Problems of Unity, Stability, Balance or Adjustment in situation of Unit:

2

have been gathered and recognized, and that only questions of actual diagnosis and treatment remain. It seems to be most helpful in the matter of proportions and emphasis. The individual as unit, and the offsetting of defects by powers are perhaps the most important points about it in relation to the blind.

In speaking to various groups this winter, students and others, it has seemed to me that it was more important to direct them to acquaintance with the life stories of handicapped individuals—in fiction (when truly interpretative), in biography, autobiography and in fact than it was to dwell on points of special technique, in the education and employment of the blind. Nothing will replace this knowledge. The part of the blind in work with the blind has been its characterizing feature from the start. Often the best thing you can do for a newly blind man is to put him in touch with some other man who has been through similar experiences, and worked out for himself a recognized place of usefulness and a philosophy of life. For suggested reading, to prepare the mind for "what blindness is like from the inside out," a short list is given below.

2. Relation to immediate environment and to others.

Many

Keller, Helen, "The World I Live In.

Montague, Margaret P., "Closed Doors."

Duncan, Norman, "The Best of a Bad Job.' Harper's Magazine, 1912, p. 412. Hawkes, Clarence, "Hitting the Dark Trail.”

Holt, Winifred, "A Beacon for the Blind." The life of Henry Fawcett, the blind postmaster-general of England.

The Outlook for the Blind, a quarterly magazine in ink print devoted to the interests of work for the blind in this and other countries; edited by Charles F. Campbell, Columbus, Ohio.

more might be given. These are selected because they seem to me to help towards imagining what life in the dark may be like. The titles, even here, often stress what is gone, like "Closed Doors" and "Hitting the Dark Trail." Two suggest both sides of the case in quite a remarkable way,-"A Beacon for the Blind" and "The Outlook for the Blind." The two most genuine and helpful titles to me are "The Best of a Bad Job" and "The World I Live In." "Closed Doors" and "The World I Live In" do not relate to employment problems of men, but they, perhaps, set you right, at the start, better than any others.

To summarize briefly, there are seven suggestions towards helping to find the man behind the handicap that seem most important to "put over" at this time. They are the following:

1. Acquire confidence in other senses than those of sight.

2. Try to understand the real possibilities of intellectual life without sight. 3. Consider character as well as economic values. Professor Amar has made this point very clear in saying, "The mutilé possesses always a perfectly utilizable capacity for some kind of work.. . . He may actually compensate for his physical defect by an active good will, which increases his social value. This is a psychologic fact which must be turned to advantage."

4. Help the handicapped to measure themselves, not only against the handicapped, but against all those with whom they must compete.

5. Make plans for offsetting handicap on the basis not of "something for nothing" but of "something for something."

6. Test the facts to be faced with some simple classification that can be talked over by you and the blind man together.

7. Look for your inspiration to the lives of the blind themselves.

General Reading with references to the blind:

Recalled to Life, an English quarterly, devoted to the care, reeducation and return to civil life of disabled soldiers and sailors.

Reconstruction, monthly bulletin, Military Hospitals Commission, 22 Victoria Street, Ottawa, Canada.

Shairp, L. V., "Refitting Disabled Soldiers, a Lesson from Great Britain." The Atlantic Monthly, March, 1918.

THE CRIPPLE AND HIS PLACE IN THE COMMUNITY

BY AMY M. HAMBURGER,

Formerly Assistant and Associate Director, Cleveland Cripple Survey.

For many generations the cripple has occupied a rather obscure place in the community, and has not had sufficient chance to share equally in all opportunities offered to normal children and adults. It is true that many individuals representing various organizations have been interested in the cripple and have helped in securing proper medical treatment for both crippled children and adults in some communities and limited educational advantages in others. Yet they have been unable, because of very apparent and justifiable reasons, to interpret to the community the real individual behind the handicap.

However, through industrial accident boards the needs of the adult cripple have become increasingly more apparent. As a result of recent infantile paralysis epidemics some of the immediate and pressing needs of children have also become apparent, stimulating in the community a deeper interest in both these groups. Although industrial accidents and infantile paralysis,-both serious causes of crippling conditions,-have increased the total cripple population, the community has not been aroused until the present time, to take any active steps in carrying out a constructive program, thus indicating their recognition of the significance of this group in community life.

Now, because of the war, the care of the returned crippled soldier forces the community to immediate action. Already, plans for his medical care, for educational, vocational, and industrial opportunities are well organized. Everything is being done to assure him of a permanent place in the normal life of the community. As a prospective idle dependent he is realized to be an undesirable citizen, so every chance for expressing himself in the kind of work he is best fitted for, by education, training, and physical condition, is to be open to him. It has even been said that a plan for some readjustment of the Workmen's Compensation and Liability Act is to be made, thus releasing the employer from the extra rates of insurance, an expense incurred by employing handicapped labor.