Chapter X: Appendix: Reference Lists of Train, Truck, Trolley, and other Traveling (1)

Campaigns 117

BIBLIOGRAPHY 137

INDEX 143

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

OPPOSITE PAGE

The New York State Healthmobile 10

Interior of Exhibit Car of the “Peach Special” 14

Health Cars of the Louisiana Department of Health 20

Cleveland Children’s Year Special 28

Truck With Extension Devices 29

Traveling Dispensaries 30

Interior of Child Welfare Special of the Federal Children’s Bureau 31

Canning Squad and Portable Kitchen 38

A Transcontinental Truck Tour 39

Poster Advertising the Coming of an Exhibit Train 44

Group of Objects Expressing One Idea 70

Demonstration Car 76

An Outdoor Program 77

Flat Cars Used for Displaying Captured German Trophies 80

Interior of Health Exhibit Car 84

A Well Arranged Exhibit Car 85

Food Conservation Train of New York State College of Agriculture 86

Arrangement of Railroad Car Interior 87

Car Especially Designed for Cooking Demonstrations 92

I

INTRODUCTORY

The tour of the peddler with a pack or cart stocked with goods for sale and a budget of news for free distribution, and that of the patent medicine man with his illustrated lecture of misinformation that sells his dubious wares are forms of traveling publicity campaigns long familiar in rural districts.

Of recent years many peddlers, carrying new ideas and useful information but no goods for sale, have been going about the country representing national and state government bureaus and private organizations. Their wares are helps to better crops, better houses, better health. Their mode of traveling has progressed from wagons to trains and from trains to motor trucks. The size of the enterprise has varied from a single wagon or automobile with a speaker and a batch of leaflets to a train of railroad cars or trucks that carry a traveling exhibit rivaling the “Greatest Show on Earth.” The tours extend from a jaunt through the county or the districts of a city to a transcontinental journey. Whatever its form, if the purpose of the enterprise is to spread information or ideas, or to promote a community program, it is of interest from an educational and publicity standpoint.

Although traveling campaigns have been many and varied and the method has been in use for a number of years, to our knowledge there has been no attempt up to this time to set down the methods and experiences, the successes, failures, and difficulties of the various campaigners.

Believing that this method of promoting social programs will continue to be employed, whatever the type of vehicle used to convey travelers and their outfits, we have gathered information about a number of campaigns and offer it here, together with comments and suggestions for the benefit of those who may be considering the method for the first time or who have tried it and wish to compare their experiences with those of others. The descriptions and suggestions are drawn from accounts of about seventy-five tours of trains, trucks, trolley cars, and other vehicles, obtained from printed reports, articles, letters, replies to questionnaires and interviews, as well as from the observations and experience of the writer.

II

PURPOSES AND ADVANTAGES OF TRAVELING CAMPAIGNS

The popular educational tour on wheels is a method of carrying news and facts from town to town, instead of distributing this information in wholesale manner to many towns at the same time through newspapers, letters, posters, and other familiar avenues for disseminating information quickly and widely. This use of a method resembling more or less the old-time place-to-place spreading of the news but in a modern, up-to-the-minute dress, even under the most favorable conditions involves a considerable outlay in money, a great deal of hard work, careful and detailed planning, and equally careful oversight throughout the journey and the follow-up period. Therefore the person or group contemplating such an undertaking will naturally wish to consider carefully its efficiency as a method of publicity before embarking on it.

In some instances the reason for using the truck or train is that it may be routed to remote rural districts not well served by the more modern methods of news distribution. Wherever it goes, however, the train or truck has two chief advantages as a publicity method; first, it is an economical way of bringing before scattered audiences well-equipped speakers or graphic and otherwise attractive illustrative material--economical because a single group of speakers or unit of exhibits may in this way be made to serve a large territory; and, second, its visit to each town may be made an important event, something which creates news and which may appeal to the imagination of people generally.

The tours that are described in the following pages suggest just a few of the unusual and graphic features that may be assembled in a traveling show to attract attention and to make facts and ideas more easily understood and remembered. The train or truck in addition, as already suggested, to bringing into town especially talented or well-informed speakers and demonstrators, brings also equipment for demonstrations that may be bulky, expensive, or for other reasons difficult to duplicate and distribute for display; also rare objects such as the people in the communities visited would not be likely to see at all, except as they are brought in for this brief visit.

THE TRAIN AS AN EVENT

The visit of the train, like the revival meeting, the fair, or the Fourth of July celebration, may be made such a striking event in each community that its program gets and holds the attention of many people who would not read a newspaper article or go to an ordinary meeting to learn about the same topic.

Such an event may be especially timely if a new movement or plan is about to be launched within the territory to be covered. The brief demonstration presented before a representative group of citizens gathered to meet the truck or train often paves the way for the organization of a permanent activity in the community. This is true because the method often allows for a more concentrated educational effort than can be effected in the same time through other types of campaigns. For example, the occasional visit of the agricultural special, demonstrating improved methods has, in many instances, preceded the forming of a county organization of farmers to devote themselves continuously to studying and experimenting in better farming.

A train or truck campaign, well handled, will help to give freshness to ideas which may become stale if they continue to reach the people in the same familiar forms. Whatever the subject matter or purpose of a local movement for community education or welfare, both the workers or leaders and the people who form the audiences are refreshed by variations from familiar methods of presenting the ideas that need to be gone over time and again in order to get the greater numbers to listen, to understand, and to assimilate them. The local effectiveness of the work of the county agricultural agent, or the tuberculosis committee, or the movement for better rural schools may sometimes be stimulated through the visit of traveling campaigners bringing reinforcements in the way of enthusiasm, news gathered along the route, or old ideas illustrated in new and striking ways.

A TOUR AS A CAMPAIGN “FEATURE”

One occasion when a train tour may be desirable is when the need is felt for a unique feature or “stunt” in a campaign that employs a great variety of methods. The Liberty Loan trains were expected to add “punch” to local campaigns and to make bond selling easier. When a vigorous effort is being concentrated on an issue or an idea, a tour of prominent speakers, or striking exhibits, or both, may add a spectacular element and secure much publicity; first, by getting direct attention for the idea, and second, by providing material for “news” both in the press and in the everyday talk of the people.

NOVELTY AND THE DANGER OF ITS WEARING OFF

As a novel device for attracting attention both train and truck have a real though possibly a short-lived value. In many sections of the country the exhibit train has long ago become familiar, and already those who are seeking some new form in which to get their story over are equipping and operating motor trucks. In a few years these, too, may lose their power to arouse curiosity. However, the fact that the novelty of a device wears off does not necessarily destroy its value. While the novelty of the method itself may wear off, the contents of the train and the program of the itinerant campaigners leave no end of possibilities in the way of fresh attractions.

In the use of graphic methods there have been great advances within quite recent years. So far, only a few of the newer forms of expressing information in picturesque and dramatic forms have been used in truck and train projects. There is no reason why trains and trucks should not continue indefinitely to draw expectant visitors looking for the new features that may be added this year, just as a circus, a fair, or exposition is repeated successfully year after year. The exhibitor who uses an attention-getting device for the first time in any locality is to some extent responsible for the future success of any similar traveling shows in the places visited. People who went to see the first train or truck are likely to visit the second or stay away, according to the impression made by the first. This responsibility can be met through careful preparation and good management.

NOT A QUICK METHOD

A point sometimes urged in favor of the educational tour is its rapid method of carrying information over a wide area. It is undoubtedly the quickest way of displaying the same objects to a number of communities. But if you wish the people throughout your territory to have the same information as nearly as possible at the same time, any method in which the material is duplicated and sent out to all points at once from a central place is obviously more suitable than conveying the message from place to place.

TRAVELING CAMPAIGNS AND RESULTS

One objection frequently raised by those who have conducted educational tours is that they are quickly forgotten and bring no lasting results. This is probably a valid objection to the incompleteness of a particular campaign rather than to the method itself. If the follow-up work is not planned just as carefully and carried out as conscientiously as the tour itself, there is no reason to expect that people will remember it or that action will follow. Every form of publicity, whether a newspaper article, leaflet, lecture or motion picture would be just as quickly forgotten if it were an isolated effort and not part of a well-rounded educational campaign. In the section on follow-up work, page 106, methods are discussed of fixing the impressions made on the minds of visitors to the train and of inducing them to apply the instructions given.

COST OF TOURS

What it costs usually plays a larger part in the choice of a publicity method than any other single factor. Analysis of the whole plan of the tour is needed in order to decide regarding the wisdom of spending money on it. An advance estimate ought to indicate whether a given expenditure on a traveling campaign appears likely to bring larger returns than the same amount spent on some other method.

The cost and the scale of different enterprises vary so greatly and prices are so different from year to year, that it is impossible to estimate, on the basis of one project, what another one is likely to cost.[1] By writing to the sources of information listed in the appendix, beginning on page 117, the reader will probably be able to obtain detailed information about the cost of any enterprise of a type that may interest him. Several directors of tours have reported that they consider the method too expensive. It was found too expensive in one northern state because the initial outlay was so great in comparison with the relatively short season during which the truck could be operated. In one southern state the expenses of an automobile tour were found to be out of proportion to the total budget of the organization. A number have reported the method inexpensive, but they may not have charged against their budget items that others have been obliged to include. Cars and hauling may have been provided by a railroad company; the truck may have been a gift; the specialists and demonstrators may have been regular members of the staff of the organization and their salaries not charged against the budget of the tour. In some cases the truck drivers have been volunteers. All of these things need to be taken into account in making any decision on the basis of the amount a tour has cost someone else. It is safe to say that, under the most favorable circumstances, a well-conducted traveling campaign is not a cheap method of publicity, and the organization considering it should be very sure that the enterprise is timely and especially suited to their purpose before embarking on the venture.

AS BETWEEN TRAINS AND TRUCKS

The most serious drawbacks to a train are that it must stay on a railway siding, is frequently inconvenient to reach, and its location hot and dusty in summer, lacking in open space where crowds can gather comfortably, and, worst of all, is noisy. Still another drawback is that the shape of a car is not adapted to the effective display of exhibits and it is difficult also to handle large numbers of visitors.

Carries motion picture equipment for both indoor and outdoor exhibition as well as dispensary equipment for holding clinics.]

Even with these awkward handicaps, however, the railroad car has the advantage of greater size as a setting for exhibits and demonstrations. Exhibits and equipment for demonstrating, moreover, may be permanently set up in a train of cars, so that everything is in readiness for visitors at the time when the train reaches its stopping place. But the truck is a place for storing rather than displaying exhibits, which means that each time a program is given, material must be unpacked and set up in tents, in a hall, or out of doors.

Good points for the truck are that, roads and weather permitting, the truck campaigner may go wherever and whenever he pleases and stay as long as he likes, independent of the rails and schedules that limit the freedom of a train tour. Even bad roads have not prevented some campaigners from reaching what had seemed to be inaccessible districts.

While the trucks have in certain ways greater adaptability to varied conditions than trains, the latter will undoubtedly continue to be employed where its own special uses are of paramount importance and particularly in cases where the railroads may find it possible, as in many instances in the past, to provide transportation free or at a nominal price. The truck, on the other hand, is probably only at the beginning of its usefulness in educational and publicity work. There are still untried possibilities of contriving methods for the carrying of materials especially adapted to a quick display during a short stop in all sorts of places, which, it would seem, might invite to a fascinating degree the inventive genius of those interested in the popular spread of useful information.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] The following records of tours may prove at least suggestive: A three-car train, which traveled through Pennsylvania for five months in 1918, had running expenses of approximately $325 a week. This included traveling, living expenses, and salaries of three staff members, the initial cost of exhibits and printed matter, and repairs. It did not include the salaries of three additional demonstrators, or the initial cost of rebuilding the interiors of the cars, or any expenses for hauling of the cars.

A motion picture tour with an automobile truck, traveled for twenty-eight weeks in 1917 in Maryland at an expense of $124 a week. This included the fuel and repairs for the car, expenses of the field staff, rentals of films, and various miscellaneous expenses connected with the operation of the tour.

III

HOW TRAINS HAVE BEEN USED IN CAMPAIGNING

For a number of years, with the co-operation of the railroads, state agricultural colleges, departments of health, and private state organizations have carried on educational and organization work through demonstration trains. The war propaganda which utilized practically every known form of publicity did not overlook train, truck or trolley. One or more of these was used in the campaigns for Liberty Loans, food conservation, and child welfare.

Descriptions of a few of these trains will illustrate the varied types of campaigns in which they have been employed.

AGRICULTURAL TRAINS

A Peach Demonstration Train started on a tour in November, 1919, for the purpose of encouraging and stimulating the peach industry in the East Texas Fruit Belt. The train consisted of two baggage cars containing exhibits of insect pests that menace the peach industry, life-sized models of diseased and perfect fruit, and actual branches of affected peach trees, and a box car containing a tractor, orchard plows, and various other kinds of farm machinery needed by an up-to-date orchardist.

Regarding this train Mr. P. T. Cole, Agricultural Commissioner, St. Louis Southwestern Railroad of Texas, writes as follows:

The cars were moved on local freight trains nearly all the time, although on a few occasions we were moved by a through freight. The cars were opened to the public at 9 a.m., and the farmers were taken through in groups of about fifteen and a thorough lecture given them with explanations in detail regarding the various exhibits. We usually let the school children go through, but did not allow them to interfere with the work we were giving the farmers. In the afternoon, at about one o’clock, we accompanied the farmers to a nearby orchard taking with us pruning tools, the power sprayer, and the tractor. In the orchard we gave lectures on pruning, and then pruned about a dozen trees, or sometimes as many as fifty, after which we gave them a thorough spraying. This demonstration usually consumed the greater part of the afternoon, but we would return to the cars and discuss the different problems of orcharding with the growers and in many cases they remained with us until dark.

The growers in most cases were very enthusiastic over this work, and we had some excellent demonstrations. Some of the very best were given in orchards where we had done the same work last year, and where it was an easy matter to point out the beneficial results of proper spraying and pruning. We have a number of fine demonstrations to go back to next year to show the results of the work we have just done.

As a result of this work a great many spray machines have been bought, and there is more pruning and spraying in progress now than I have ever seen before.

A baggage car containing exhibits to show the diseases and insect pests that menace the peach industry, and the methods of destroying them. See page 13.]

The following account[2] of a dairy train in Illinois is supplied by the College of Agriculture of the University of Illinois:

The first dairy train which we assisted in operating was on the Chicago and Eastern Illinois Railroad from Danville, Illinois, to Cypress. The equipment consisted of an engine, three ordinary coaches used for lecture work, an automobile box car with side and end doors, and a flat car. We had four cows in the automobile car and led them direct from this car onto the flat car for demonstration purposes. We had a railing built around the flat car and also a removable platform between the two cars. We also had a milking machine installed in this box car which could be observed in operation by opening its side doors. This was all the exhibit material we had, as our stops in the towns lasted only from one to two hours. We had a special train crew and a definite train schedule to follow. As soon as we would reach a town we would fill up the three lecture coaches, and three speakers would start at once to give short talks. After talking for about fifteen minutes, the speakers would trade cars. In this way each audience heard at least three speakers, and at the conclusion of these lectures the audience was conducted to the rear car where a cow demonstration was given. At the conclusion of the cow demonstration the milking machine demonstration was given in the automobile car. I might say that the dairy train was highly successful. This was due, I think, largely to its being well advertised previous to its operation.

Later, another dairy train was operated in a similar manner except that four lecture coaches were used instead of three. On account of the warm weather, it was found advisable to give a large number of the lectures out-of-doors. The coaches were used only during rainy weather or in towns where, because of congested passenger and freight traffic, they were not given a good location. In some places our audiences were so large that we could not accommodate them in four coaches. In that case all the lecture work was given from the flat car on the rear end of the train.

The Pure Seed and Home Power Special was the name given to a three-car train run jointly by the Soo Line, the Wisconsin Bankers’ Association, and the Wisconsin College of Agriculture in the interests of more efficient farm methods. The pure seed car contained a display of the finest Wisconsin grown seed grains, reinforced by explanations driving home the vital facts concerning the advantages of pure-bred seed. The home power and home convenience car showed gasoline engine, power churn, washing machine, separator, home lighting plant, and other conveniences. A lecture car and a tourist sleeper for the lecturers and demonstrators completed the equipment. Sixteen counties were visited and over seven thousand people came to see the train.

The Hessian Fly Special, as described below, is an example of a highly specialized effort toward accomplishing a very definite purpose:

Since its first appearance in Kansas as an important factor in wheat production, the Hessian fly has alternately disappeared and reappeared. During the forty-four years of its known presence in the state it has produced seven different out-breaks, the last and the greatest of which destroyed not less than fifteen million bushels of wheat of the 1915 crop. Believing that not only the attention of the farmers could best be called to the seriousness of the infestation, but also that more interest could be created in the control methods and that a larger number of wheat growers could be reached within a short time, the Kansas Agricultural College decided to request the Santa Fé Railway Company, which had a large mileage in the infested districts, to run a Hessian fly train....

A chart of the infested districts was furnished the dean of the Extension Division who met with the officials of the Santa Fé and prepared a schedule consisting of sixty-two stops. It was left entirely with the college to decide as to the best time to run the train and it was felt that, inasmuch as the methods of control of the fly should begin as soon as possible after harvest, the best and most opportune time for the train would be the week just before the beginning of harvest.

The train consisted of a baggage car, two modern steel day coaches, each with a seating capacity of eighty-eight persons, which were used for lecture cars, and a private car, consisting of parlor and observation, dining and sleeping compartments. It was understood at the beginning that the train was to be an exclusive Hessian fly train and thus it was advertised as the Hessian Fly Special, operated by the Kansas State Agricultural College in co-operation with the Santa Fé. The speakers consisted of three entomologists of the Agricultural College, one entomologist of the United States Department of Agriculture, the head of the Department of Agronomy, the superintendent of Farmers’ Institutes of the college, and one county demonstration agent. In addition to the lecturers, the company consisted of the agricultural agent of the Santa Fé, the publicity agent of the Santa Fé, the publicity agent of the college, and representatives of some of the principal newspapers and farm publications. The divisional superintendents and roadmasters accompanied the train over their respective divisions of the road.

Addresses were made at all of the sixty-two places scheduled. In fact, at nearly all the places the attendance was such as to require two speakers and, on several occasions, it required a third speaker to accommodate the large crowd. If the attendance did not exceed two hundred, the two speakers took care of them in the lecture cars, but where the crowd was over two hundred the over-flow was taken in the waiting room of the depot, where a speaker was provided. Where there was not an opportunity for the insect train to stop, a lecturer was dropped off to hold a meeting at the depot or an up-town place. Later, the man would be picked up by one of the regular trains and left at a station where the Hessian Fly Special was scheduled to stop. Or a man would be sent ahead on a regular train to hold a meeting and would later be picked up when the Special came through. In a few cases speakers were taken to neighboring towns in automobiles. During the entire trip every speaker on the train gave practically the same Hessian fly talk. The entomologists and the agronomist of the college prepared the speech, copies of which were furnished not only to the speakers but also to all the railroad officials and publicity men who accompanied the train. The publicity men prepared beforehand all the articles to be used by the newspapers in the places where addresses were made. In other words, every address given and every newspaper article published had just one message and that was the seriousness of the infestation and what should be done to protect the crop of the next year. It is the opinion of the writer that much of the success of the Hessian fly train and the good accomplished were due to the fact that all departments and all persons concerned were together, and that nothing was said or done but what met with the approval and recommendation of every one. The fact that the very methods advocated for the control of the fly were in keeping with the very methods recommended by the Agronomy Department and which the progressive and successful wheat growers knew should be practiced for maximum yields, appealed to the better judgment of even the most skeptical ones. The time allowed for each stop was about forty minutes. The speakers usually arranged for a few minutes’ discussion before closing the meeting. Specimen cases, charts, and illustrated material were used in nearly all lectures. As the men left the lecture cars or the waiting room they were given circulars on the Hessian fly and the preparation of the seed bed for wheat. The Hessian fly circular was printed primarily for the occasion. It was simply a timely article emphasizing the methods of control and closing with a brief life history of the fly.

In nearly all cases large crowds met the Hessian Fly Special and the total attendance for the week was approximately seven thousand.[3]

HEALTH TRAINS

In the early days of the tuberculosis movement cars were extensively used in traveling health campaigns. A pioneer in carrying the message of health over a state on exhibit trains was Dr. Oscar Dowling, President of the Louisiana State Board of Health. His health train made its initial trip in 1910 and with many changes since that time has continued in service. After the first tours, made with cars loaned by the railroad, had demonstrated the popularity of the train, the State Board of Health purchased two coaches. One was fitted up as an inspection car with a part of it given over to living and office quarters, and the other as an educational exhibit car, containing displays of models, charts, and laboratory specimens. Later, two more cars were purchased for living quarters and the inspection car was turned into a laboratory car.

A practical application of the lessons taught on the tour was made by inspectors who accompanied the train. In each place visited they inspected and scored buildings in which the sanitary conditions imperilled public health, the reports of their findings being given publicity while the train was in town. This train attracted the attention of health workers in other states and has made a number of trips outside of Louisiana in response to their requests.

Showing the garage end of the laboratory car. Here a Ford is stored ready for use by the inspectors in a quick tour of each town visited.]

The Board of Health of Kansas has used a Pullman car to carry exhibits on child welfare, tuberculosis, and other health topics. A woman physician and public health nurses traveled with the car and gave health talks and explained exhibits. Sixty-nine cities and towns were visited, the stops varying from one to four days. The purpose was chiefly educational, but an attempt was made to discuss their health problems with individuals.

Another example of the Health Special was a car sent out by the West Virginia Board of Health during 1919, and described in letters sent in advance to the newspapers as:

A fine, vestibuled coach, equipped with electrically driven models, health posters, exhibits of living bacteria, exhibits of Red Cross work, a moving picture machine, and a small but complete chemical and bacteriological laboratory in one end.

WAR PROPAGANDA

During the war, trains were used in several states to carry the message of food conservation and more especially to encourage home canning by simple methods. The Pennsylvania Food Administration, in co-operation with the Pennsylvania State College of Agriculture and the Pennsylvania Railroad, ran a train of three cars during the first and second summer of the war. The train included an exhibit car containing posters and graphic devices showing why food conservation was necessary; and two cars where skilled demonstrators illustrated methods of baking with wheat substitutes and the canning and drying of fruits and vegetables.

A Save the Surplus Special of two cars toured New York State encouraging home canning and helping practically to increase it.

During the Fourth Liberty Loan campaign exhibit trains were used in some districts for displaying war trophies, and during the Fifth Liberty Loan several shiploads of war equipment and trophies were distributed over the whole country for display on trains which were sent into the rural districts and cities. Each train included several flat cars and a baggage car loaded with captured cannon, German aëroplanes, machine guns, trench mortars, gas warfare apparatus and gas masks, and thousands of other interesting trophies. One of our own tanks, dressed up in its fighting clothes, was an interesting feature of the exhibits. Each train was accompanied by an armed guard of returned soldiers, sailors, and marines.

In Missouri a Women’s Patriotic Special made a two weeks’ trip carrying women speakers who gave talks on the Red Cross, food conservation, and other war topics.

A GOVERNMENT SAFETY FIRST TRAIN

Probably the most elaborate exhibit train that has yet been sent out was the Safety First Train of the Department of the Interior, which toured sixteen states during a period of four months and was visited by over a half million people. This train, which was furnished by the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, consisted of twelve steel cars, including a sleeper and diner, and was hauled by two powerful passenger locomotives. Six governmental departments and the American Red Cross had exhibits relating to safety work, the purpose of the tour being “to acquaint the people with the work that the Federal Government is doing every day to protect its citizens against injury and death, and with the measures it takes to promote the health and comfort of the people.”

TROLLEY TOURS

Campaigns have been conducted on interurban lines in several states. For about three months the Woman’s Committee of the State Council of Defense ran a Children’s Year Special over much of the interurban trackage of Michigan, in the interests of better babies everywhere, and as a help in saving Michigan’s quota of the one hundred thousand babies the Children’s Year was to save.

The car was divided into three sections--the first part contained an exhibit, the second a compartment in which babies and children brought for tests were undressed and dressed, and the third a model examination room where tests and examinations were made by skilled physicians and trained nurses.

The Woman’s Committee of the State Council of Defense in Massachusetts also ran a children’s welfare car. The interior of the car was given over to exhibits of literature and posters on food conservation and child welfare. The front and back platforms were enlarged and surrounded by arm railings. On one platform a kitchen was arranged, where a lecturer gave actual demonstrations of the various food substitutes; on the other a trained nurse instructed mothers upon the care and feeding of children in wartime.

FOOTNOTES:

[2] Letter from E. A. Clark, College of Agriculture, University of Illinois.

[3] Journal of Economic Entomology, Vol. 9, No. 1, 1916, George A. Dean, Entomologist, Kansas State Agricultural Experiment Station.

IV

CAMPAIGNING WITH MOTOR VEHICLES

Traveling motion picture shows, dealing with health and other subjects, traveling dispensaries and tours demonstrating uses of trucks and thus advertising trucks themselves, are the chief educational uses of motor vehicles reported in response to an inquiry widely sent out.

MOTION PICTURE TOURS

Of these, the traveling motion picture show seems to have been longest in the field. Many state health departments and state tuberculosis associations have been and still are conducting a part of their educational work by this means. Recently the Red Cross has carried the story of its overseas work into remote rural districts in a certain section of the country by means of a truck equipped with pictures and machine. A returned overseas worker travels with the truck and gives talks about past achievements and future plans. An organization interested in promoting the use of commercial and industrial films has a number of well equipped trucks which are sent to city parks as well as country districts to give open-air entertainments.

A TYPICAL MOTION PICTURE MOTOR TOUR

The North Carolina State Board of Health has used a health car equipped with electric lighting plant, motion picture machine and accessories, together with a large selection of health and comic films, all in charge of a lecturer and machinist. This car was sent out in response to invitations to give health entertainments in co-operation with local committees, the latter sharing the expense.

The plan was to give substantially the same program in a different place in the county each day during one week. Each of these places then received a return visit during each of two succeeding weeks with a complete change of program. A single program usually consisted of five or six reels of motion pictures, including three health films and scenic and comedy films. A victrola was carried with the car to provide a preliminary musical program and a musical accompaniment with the comic films. While the health films were being shown, the lecturer made running comments. Free health literature was on display at a convenient place to be given out in response to requests. The programs were given in the school house, church hall or outdoors. Where special illumination was needed strings of incandescent lights were provided.

The staff carried with them a complete camping, cooking, and sleeping outfit.[4] Their schedule usually included two programs a day and 12 visits to as many places during a week.

TRAVELING DISPENSARIES

The use of motor trucks for dispensaries or clinics seems to be increasing rapidly. A number of traveling tuberculosis, dental, child welfare, and baby clinics are reported from many parts of the country, not only for rural districts but for large cities. Some of these dispensaries on wheels are intended chiefly to provide service, that is, to examine people, rather than for the purpose of publicity or education. In this case the truck is simply a convenient method of extending clinical work to districts that have no dispensaries, or to the homes of patients who cannot or will not go to the dispensary. But even where service is the main purpose, these trucks are of value educationally, particularly in this early stage of their use when their novelty attracts attention to the clinics. Other traveling dispensaries are intended chiefly to demonstrate to the community the need of establishing, permanently, some such service as the dispensary gives during its brief stop-over.

CLEVELAND CHILDREN’S YEAR SPECIAL

A traveling truck dispensary was adopted as a feature of the Children’s Year by the Children’s Year Committee of the Cleveland Council of Defense. Mr. J. Dean Halliday, Director of the Bureau of Health Education of the Cleveland Department of Health, who planned the construction of the truck and directed its use later, had charge of a similar campaign for the American Red Cross Tuberculosis Commission in Italy.

The type used both in Cleveland and in Italy[5] as shown in several illustrations (see cuts opposite pages 28 and 30) has side tents, which, when set up, provide fair-sized rooms. The tent on the left was used as a waiting and dressing room for the mothers who brought babies for examination; that on the right as lecture and exhibit room. Here posters and model outfits for the baby were displayed and literature was given away. The body proper built on the carriage of a large army truck was fitted out as a model dispensary with examining tables, scales, measuring stands, desk, cabinet for supplies, electric lights, and hot and cold water. The equipment included a screen and motion picture machine which could be set up on top of the truck for evening programs. In Cleveland the truck was driven by members of a volunteer women’s motor corps organization, uniformed for the purpose and carried a physician, a nurse, and a sanitary patrolman, all assigned from the Health Department.

Interior of truck fitted up as a dispensary with steps let down for visitors. See pages 27 and 28.]

The usefulness of this truck for demonstrations and exhibitions is more than doubled by the tents which are strapped to the sides of the truck in travel and set up at each stopping place, and by the motion picture apparatus which is set up on the roof. See page 28.]

The tour included sections of the city known as “death places” because of their high infant mortality rates. As the crowd gathered the physician in charge gave a short talk on the object of Children’s Year. While he was thus engaged the district nurse circulated through the crowd and, picking out a likely mother and child, persuaded her to step forward with her child when the physician called for babies to be examined. It was found necessary to do this in order to get the remainder of the mothers to fall in line quickly. The physician examined the child and, if normal, it was quickly weighed and measured and the regular Children’s Year forms filled out, one for the committee’s record and a duplicate for the mother. The mother was advised to report at regular intervals to the city’s nearest prophylactic dispensary where she would receive instructions as to how to keep her baby well. For the sake of its effect, she was given a card signed by the mayor, stating that she was entitled to this service and urging her to avail herself of it. She then passed on to the tent containing exhibits where child hygiene and other posters were displayed and educational pamphlets distributed. The exhibits and literature were usually presided over by the uniformed motor corps driver, although on some occasions an extra nurse was carried for the purpose. In an average afternoon, from twenty-five to thirty babies would be examined.

Although city nurses were constantly carrying on routine work in the districts visited, many cases of contagion and sore eyes were found by the traveling outfit which had been missed entirely by the regular nurses. After the truck had visited a given section the nurses in charge of the district dispensary were instructed to make a note of attendance. Records showed a considerable increase in visitors, a number of whom brought with them the cards received at the traveling dispensary or they said that they had been referred to the dispensary after a preliminary examination on the truck.

MOTOR TRUCK CLINICS IN ITALY

In Italy seven trucks were used with practically the same equipment as in Cleveland, and three more were equipped for dental work. They were operated from certain centers in the region where the American Red Cross Tuberculosis Commission worked in co-operation with Italian tuberculosis organizations. From these centers the trucks radiated on one-day trips to neighboring villages and towns carrying posters, printed matter, and a crew consisting of an Italian physician, lecturer, nurse, and driver.

A GOVERNMENT CHILD WELFARE SPECIAL

A big, gray automobile truck, known as the “Child Welfare Special,” has recently been put into the field by the Children’s Bureau of the United States Department of Labor to test the usefulness of the automobile in carrying the message of better babies into rural communities.

Dispensaries of the Tuberculosis Commission of the American Red Cross in Italy in the Court Yard of the Ducal Palace at Genoa. See pages 28 and 30.]

For detailed description see page 31.]

The Children’s Bureau has provided the following description of the truck and its tour:

The truck is modeled very closely upon the dispensary truck used by the Chicago Tuberculosis Institute. The body of the car is constructed of wood, painted white on the inside and battleship gray on the outside. The words, “Child Welfare Special” are lettered in blue and white on each side of the car. The truck is roomy enough for a conference room and two dressing rooms. The conference room is nine and a half feet long, six feet wide, and six feet four inches high in the center. This room has four windows on each side, high enough to be out of reach of prying eyes, yet admitting sufficient light for daytime examinations. The driver’s cab, which is entirely enclosed in glass, can be reached from the conference room by a sliding door; with the shades drawn it forms one dressing room. The open-end gates of the car, provided with double folding doors and heavy curtains that fit into grooves, form a second dressing room. When a mother enters one of the rooms, she has the exclusive use of it until the child has been undressed, examined, and dressed again.

Most of the equipment of the truck is built in. A 15-gallon water tank, tucked away over the driver’s cab, is connected by faucet with a stationary washstand in the conference room, which in turn is connected with a drain to the outside. The examining table and the linen lockers are built over the wheel housing, an arrangement that saves space and improves the appearance of the car. A scale for babies and older children is carried in an especially built trunk. There is enough storage space for 2,000 publications, a full set of exhibit material, a balopticon with several boxes of slides, two rolls of moving picture film, several dozen charts for lecture purposes, cot, bedding, and cooking utensils for three persons, a large supply of sheets and muslin squares, and all the other equipment necessary for conducting a children’s health conference.

Two systems of lighting, one for a 110-volt current that can be taken from a nearby public building, and the other for a six-volt current taken from the truck’s own batteries, furnish excellent illumination for night work. Two electric heaters have recently been installed for use on cool days. Weather strips have been put on the cab to keep out wind and rain, and a tarpaulin made to fit over the rear doors keeps out the dust.

Arrangements have been made for the staff to sleep on the Special--the doctor on an army cot in the conference room, the nurse on a similar cot in the rear dressing room, and the chauffeur on the driver’s seat, which was constructed to serve as a bed.

A nearby public room in a school or church is usually obtained for an exhibit and waiting room, and here, at opportune moments, the doctor and nurse give brief talks to waiting mothers, using the exhibit material as a means of illustration.

The first test of the efficiency of the Special is whether it serves its purpose. In the main the Special has proved a success from a mechanical point of view. The dressing rooms are adequate, and the conference room has proved itself remarkably convenient in spite of its small space. There are features that would be changed, however, if another truck were to be built. A more powerful engine is desirable. In spite of efforts to keep its weight down, the car when completely loaded tips the scale at 8,000 pounds. It does not seem advisable to reduce materially this weight as the body must be made to withstand the jar of travel and uncertain weather. The thirty-five horse power engine, supplemented by the extra pulling power provided by pneumatic tires, is adequate for most road conditions, but sandy, steep hills are negotiated with some difficulty. A heavier engine, one and a half or two-ton unit, would easily care for this load and at the same time carry enough reserve for any bad spots that are encountered. Mechanical adjustments made recently, however, have given greater power.

Because of its size the Special does not travel well over muddy roads. The height of the car could be reduced by five or six inches and still permit easy walking within the car. This would very considerably reduce the sway and the danger of skidding.

A report from the physician in charge of the Special says:

The Special has the distinct advantage of at once gripping public interest. This may seem spectacular from the professional standpoint, but it gets results. It is believed that the ground can be covered better by the Special than in any other way, that its improved equipment will make for more satisfactory results than any method tried to date, and that its usefulness is directly in proportion to the ability of the physician in charge to make the public realize that she is merely demonstrating the need of periodic examinations and a method of providing opportunity for such examinations. She must bear in mind that the examinations she gives are merely an incident and not the object of the Special--that her most important function is to stimulate and aid in the organization of permanent follow-up work by the community.

SPEAKING TOURS BY AUTOMOBILE OR MOTORCYCLE

One of the simplest and frequently a very effective form of traveling campaign is the speaking tour of which examples are numerous and familiar. Suffrage, prohibition, and many other causes have been promoted by traveling speakers in conspicuously painted or decorated automobiles. The speakers may carry with them all sorts of attention-getting devices, from a supply of leaflets to distribute, to a set of properties that would rival the stock of the old-time patent medicine man.

A MOTORCYCLE KNIGHT OF HEALTH

The following picturesque description of “A Modern Knight Errant, Carrying Health Gospel at Fifty Miles an Hour on A Motor Cycle,” is taken from an article by Samuel Hopkins Adams, about the work of the Wisconsin Anti-Tuberculosis Association[6]:

_The “Flying Squadron of Health”_

Seven o’clock of a June evening in the lake country to the north. Supper is over. The mail has come jolting down by stage from the nearest railroad point, fourteen miles distant, and has been distributed from the post office which is also the general store and the council-house of the locality. The population, gathered in from a considerable radius, is talking a little politics, chewing a little tobacco, speculating a bit on the likelihood of rain, and yawning itself into readiness for home and bed. Far up the dusty road there is an approaching commotion, perceptible both to ear and eye. Presently the center of it materializes in the form of a motorcycle bearing a man and a pack. The cycle pop-pops itself into a stationary phase. The man dismounts, gives a pleasant “good evening” to the gossiping group, appraises the immediate lay of the land with a practiced eye, unstraps a pack or two, and in an incredibly short time has a light silk tent up in a chosen spot by the road-way, a cooking kit laid out, a Dutch oven set, and the “makings” of a fire gathered near it.

Now, here is romance for the young of the hamlet, Gypsying a la mode! Knight-errantry at fifty miles an hour! The news runs amuck in the locality and in no time there is a growing gathering. Questions begin to fly; to each the newcomer has his brief but courteous answer, all the time busy with his preparations for spending the night in the open. Presently he unfolds carefully a case containing placards, setting them up one by one against the stone fence. Conjecture, by this time, is at the point of explosion.

“What are you sellin’, Mister?” comes the direct question.

“Nothing,” answers the stranger, setting up still another placard, and stepping back to estimate the effect.

“Got a show?”

“Why, yes! in a way.”

“Givin’ out samples?”

“Not exactly.”

“Patent medicine feller, I guess,” surmises one. “Seen a couple of ’em over to Humphrey’s last fall.” “Naw,” controverts another, “He’s sellin’ pictures, can’t ye see?” “Ain’t goin’ to preach, be ye, young man?” queries a third.

“That too, in a way,” says the motorist.

Curiosity is now at its height. The crowd couldn’t be driven away by a thunder shower. The newcomer has nursed the situation until he has an absorbed attentiveness when he addresses the people in direct and simple words, explains why he is there, and talks to them about the peril of consumption and the ready-to-hand methods of guarding against it, using the charts which he has set up to fortify his telling points. It is done with a very conversational, homely and personal touch, so that the audience is encouraged to ask questions about the individual symptoms, the danger of “catching” the disease, the chances of cure for this or that friend, what hospital will take old Mrs. Tinkley, bedridden now for six weeks, and so on through the roster of health and sickness topics which make up so large a part of the immediate interests of countryfolk.

When the talk is over the visitor asks for the telephone, calls up a town perhaps fifty or sixty miles away, and those who are near enough to cock an ear hopefully (which includes as many as can crowd into the store) hear something like this:

“Siddallville? Hello! That you, Mr. Conway? Yes. Werle.... I’ll be there to-morrow night to speak.... No; I’ve got everything.... What’s that? No; no cost. All you have to provide is the hall and the audience. I’ll furnish the rest.... Yes; seven-thirty to-morrow. Good-bye!”

In the morning all that remains at the cross-roads to tell of the visitation is a little heap of ashes, some queer marks in the dust where the heavy-studded tires have passed--and a germinating seed of education. The gospel has come to Shucktown.

* * * * *

Wisconsin has since tried something believed to be even better than the “modern knight.” Finding that the motion pictures were a much greater attraction than stereopticon slides, and having a four-reel health film to show, the Wisconsin Anti-Tuberculosis Association gave up its motorcycle and substituted a motion picture truck which is better fitted to transport the necessary machinery for its traveling campaign work.

CARRYING THE CANNING KITCHEN TO THE FOOD SUPPLY

An ingenious use of a truck as a first aid to canners is illustrated in the photograph opposite page 38. This canning truck, chiefly intended for service to those coming to see it, but also carrying its message of war service to many neighborhoods, was sent out by the Women’s Committee on Food Conservation of the Pittsburgh Food Administration. The purpose of the truck is well described in a dodger, as follows:

LET US HELP YOU

=How=--With our canning truck.

=When=--At any time you can use us.

=Where=--At your own home or any other convenient place for you.

=Why=--To save home products for home use and leave for the Government the output from commercial canneries for our soldiers. It is a sin today to waste surplus vegetables if they can be canned.

=We Furnish=--Canning equipment, a teacher, and five or six helpers, who carry their lunches with them to avoid extra work for you. They work from 9 to 4 o’clock.

=You Furnish=--Stove room, a wash boiler, the vegetables or fruits to be canned, and the jars.

Canning squad of the Allegheny County Council of National Defense, and their portable kitchen ready to help the farmers’ wives save their food products. See page 37.]

=Cost=--It will cost you no money, but we will expect some fresh vegetables or one-fifth of the jars canned during the day. We furnish the jars for this share, which will later be used for some patriotic purpose.