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 6 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY

unsatisfactory, a visitor was employed to investigate the homes and supervise the treatment of the child so placed. In the report for 1899 it is said : "A careful account has been kept of those children placed in families, and, as the homes were care- fully investigated before the children were given out, returns have rarely been made. Both the people adopting the child, and the child herself, have been made happy." And again it is said ; " Believing that the only way of knowing exactly how the children are cared for in these homes is by regularly visiting them, we have employed this method, and the results are very satisfactory." Between 1891 and 1900 the school received 1,837 S ir ^ s > an< ^ returned to their parents or placed out 1,636. The total cost of caring for these girls, exclusive of buildings and grounds, was 5144,417.37, of which $95,356.87 was paid by the counties. This is a per-capita cost of $88.28, but this does not include the provisions and other articles which are annually donated by friends of the school.

III. THE ILLINOIS MANUAL TRAINING SCHOOL FARM.

Under an act of 1883 providing for the establishment and maintenance of a training school for dependent boys, the "Illi- nois Industrial Training School for Boys " was organized in 1887, and subsequently became "The Illinois Manual Training School Farm." Under the law, a petition by any reputable citizen of the county may be presented to the county court, asking that the case of an alleged dependent boy be investigated, and if the facts are found to be as alleged, the boy must be committed to a training school, and may be kept there until he is seventeen years of age. The case is tried before a jury of six; the parents or guardians are duly notified of the proceedings about to be instituted; the county from which the boy is committed is required to pay $10 a month toward his education and mainten- ance while in the school; the boy may be placed or bound out, or adopted by responsible parties, and the school is required to look after him and see that he is properly treated.

The Illinois Manual Training School was located, first, at Nor- wood Park, eleven miles northwest of Chicago, but was soon