CHILDREN'S PLAYGROUNDS. Spe cial provisions made by progressive modern communities, through public or private agencies affording children better opportunities for free or directed play. Socially and educationally, the children's playground movement is but a phase of the general Child Welfare Movement (q.v.) which began with the great awakening to the special needs and interests of childhood in the closing decades of the last century.
Like many other great move ments, the playground movement in America began very simply and unpretentiously. Boston was its first home, and "three piles of yellow placed in the yards of the Children's Mission in 1886, its first concrete manifestation. This Boston idea, borrowed from Berlin, had little to do, however, with the subsequent de velopment of the playground movement in the United States, which did not really begin before 1898. The earliest playgrounds were opened mostly under private auspices— charitable or philanthropic societies, especially social settle ments— and to Brookline (Mass.) belongs the honor of taking the first municipal action on the purchase of playground sites (1872). In 1887 both Pennsylvania and New York enacted State legislation on the subject of playgrounds. Chicago established her first summer play ground in 1892; Boston officially joined the movement in 1898, and the first municipal play ground in New York was opened a year later. This last proved so successful that in 1903, in response to popular demand, similar play grounds were established in other congested parts of New York city. The movement re ceived much additional stimulus from the action of the New York Department of Education, which in 1898 took over a number of private summer playgrounds and placed them in charge of a special committee. Since then the play ground movement in America has grown enor mously. Numerous special societies devoted to playground interests now exist all over the country, and several national conventions, called by the Playground Association of America, have aroused world-wide interest. According to 'The Year Book for 1915,' published by the above-mentioned national association, no fewer than 460 cities maintained playgrounds in 1915 at a total cost exceeding $4,066,377 and with the help of more than 7,500 salaried directors or play leaders. The actual number of playgrounds in
the United States the same year was 3,294, with 28 cities maintaining playgrounds unrecorded. In 1914 and 1915, 116 cities opened their first playgrounds. The rapid growth of the move ment in intent has been equally significant, for at least 70 cities maintain special classes for the professional training of playground attendants and directors. Even normal schools and teach ers' colleges now offer regular courses in play ground supervision. The work is attracting great numbers of young men and women with talent for leadership and knowledge of child activities.
Management and Equipment.--In propor tion as the educational and social importance of playgrounds becomes better understood their ownership tends more and more to pass from private associations to municipal agencies. But so great is the demand for additional play ground facilities, especially in the larger centres of population, that both private and public own ership are apt to continue side by side for some time,. as even together they cannot supply the ever-increasing demand—a demand so dispropor tionate to the supply that many cities have had to rope off streets at certain seasons for want of playground space. An idea of the number and relative proportions of private and munic ipal playgrounds may be formed on the basis of the figures given in the above-mentioned 'Year Book, which shows that in 1915, 182 cities supported their playgrounds by municipal funds, 112 by private means and 130 by both.
The tendency toward the municipalization of children's playgrounds, though unmistakable, cannot therefore be said to be very strong. Wherever such playgrounds are municipally owned, their actual management is placed in the hands of either the park department, the school board or some separate department specially created for the purpose.