Massachusetts

Membership of teachers in the pension fund is compulsory as is their retirement after 70. In 1934 there were 26,889 teachers in the public schools. There are a number of sub-boards, each with a director and several advisors serving without pay; among these are a division of libraries, a division on immigration and Americanization, and a division for the blind.

Libraries and Museums.

The State is better supplied with important libraries than any other in the Union. Moreover there is at least one free public library in every town-410 in 1934 with a total of 9,610,046 volumes, and a circulation of 33,037,446. The Boston Public Library (first city public library to be en tirely supported by taxation) is one of the three great scholarly libraries of the country open to the public and is the largest municipal free library in the world, containing 1,733,953 vol umes and specializing in Shakespeare, Americana, and Spanish literature. Among other libraries are: the Massachusetts His torical Society, rich in Americana mss. ; the State Library (548,568 volumes) with one of the finest collections in the world of the laws of foreign countries; the Boston Athenaeum (328,548 volumes) including Washington's library; the New England Historic Genealogical Society (72,00o volumes and 61,000 pamphlets) mainly devoted to family history ; various libraries connected with Harvard university, totalling 3,602,040 volumes and pamphlets; Essex Institute, Salem (12,000 volumes, 400,000 pamphlets, and 1,200 old log books) ; American Anti quarian Society, Worcester (215,972 volumes, 341,783 pam phlets, and over i oo,000 mss.) with the finest collection of bound newspapers in the United States as well as the Mather library. There are other important technical libraries and many general ones of 1 oo,000 or more volumes scattered throughout the State. In Boston there is the Museum of Natural History (1830), and the Museum of Fine Arts (1870) in which latter the collec tions of Chinese, Japanese and East Indian exhibits rank first in the country, as does also its Print collection and, in point of qual ity, its Egyptian and classical collections.

Charities and Houses of Correction.

The State is well sup plied with charitable and reformatory institutions. Those under the Department of Public Welfare include a State infirmary at Tewksbury for dependents (1866) ; the Lyman School for Boys at Westboro, a reformatory school for boys under 15 years of age who are under the care of the trustees until they are 21, with a farm for younger boys at Berlin; an industrial school for boys over 15 at Shirley ; a similar one for girls at Lancaster; and the Massachusetts Hospital school at Canton for the care and educa tion of crippled and deformed children.

Under the department of health are four hospitals for consump tives at Rutland, Westfield, North Reading, and Lakeville and the Pondville hospital. Under the department of mental diseases are State hospitals for the insane at Worcester, Taunton, North ampton, Danvers, Westboro, Boston, Grafton, Medfield, Waltham and Foxborough, and a colony at Gardner; a hospital for epi leptics at Monson; schools for the feeble-minded at Waverley, Wrentham, and Belchertown ; the Walter E. Fernald State school; and the Boston Psychopathic hospital.

The department of correction supervises the reformatory for women at Framingham, a State reformatory at Concord for men, a State prison at Charlestown, a prison camp and hospital at Rutland, a State farm for petty criminals, defectives, delin quents, and insane criminals at Bridgewater, and a State prison colony at Norfolk. Many private charitable corporations report to the State Department of Public Welfare and a large number of private infirmaries are subject to visitation by an inspector from the department. The Perkins Institute for the Blind is particularly notable for its historical association with Samuel Gridley Howe.

Public support for the unemployed cost $72,966,811 during the year 1934. Fifty-five per cent of this expense was borne by the FERA. The cost of relief for the year was over $17 per capita as against a national rate of about $12.

Agriculture.

Conditions of soil and climate are favourable for the raising of apples, small fruits, berries, potatoes, onions, market-garden vegetables and some kinds of tobacco. For pota toes, oats and tobacco the average yield per acre is much above the national average. In 1935 there were 35,094 farms with a total acreage of 2,195,714, a marked increase over the corre sponding figures for 1930 when the number of farms was 25,598 and the number of acres 2,005,461. The value of all farm property in 1930 was $303,837,000, of which $261,222,390 represented land and buildings; in 1935 the value of lands and buildings was $255,676,839, an average of $7,295.48 per farm or $116.44 per acre. Transportation facilities are excellent, and farms are in close touch with the markets. The values of some leading farm products in 1935 were: hay (all kinds) $7,647,000; potatoes $1,537,000; tobacco $1,517,000. Hay, which is used chiefly to feed dairy cattle, accounted for 68% of the crop lands harvested in 1934. Live stock in 1935 included 188,686 cattle worth $10,281,438; 26,77o horses, worth 210; and 90,238 swine worth $739,952. Worcester county stood first in dairying. The gross farm income in 1935 was over $66,600,000, about $26,900,000 of which was from crops and about $39,700,000 from live stock.