FRESH AIR FUND

New Zealand Times, Volume XLVI, Issue 10611, 9 June 1920, Page 6

FRESH AIR FUND

AN APPEAL BY SIU ARTHUR PEARSON. Bear Sir>—lt Is with <leop and grateful recognition of how much the Fresh Air i? und owes to friends and sympathisers in distant portions of the Empire that I venture to appeal to your readers once again to help mo with it. Looking backward over the ttventyyears since the Fresh. Air Fund was started, I cannot but rejoice at the progress which tho organisation ha a made during that period. I wish L could add that the years which have passed had demonstrated • equally the rapid and successful improvement in tho lot of tho slum child, but, nuhap-. pily, no ono can pretend for a. moment that this is the case, dt is a curious irony that during the war pdrhaps in some instances—decidedly ouiy a smaU minority—tho condition of the slum child was a little better than it had ever been, but 1 gather from tho reports received from our agents and helpers that tho present state of the children of the very poor in ©very largo town is as bad as in pre-war days.

In 19ZS wo provided 1376 mothorless children of soldiers and sailors, and children whoso fathers had been killed at the front, with a -fortnight’s holiday. Last season 1387 similar little ones benefited and tills year w© hope, at tho request, and with the assistance of the Ministry for Pensions, to give a much larger number of children who come under this category a fortnight’s holiday, in addition to our ordinary work.

It will readily be seen that this year the Fresh Air Fund requires more fund 3 than ever, because in addition to the. soldiers’ orphans whom we intend to include in our programme, the holidays wilt cost more. Even then the price asked for happiness is absurdly small. £1 provides a fortnight’s holiday by tho sea or in the country for the most needy and ailing little ones—fifteenpence gives one • child a day’s outing in the country—£l3 -defrays the cost of a complete party of 200 little ones for the day with the necessary adult attendants. Donors of this sum can have the party known by whatever namei they choose. There could be no better tribute to the memory of a dear one who has made tha supreme sacrifice than to bring a day of happiness into the drab lives of poor children. May I particularly impress upon your readers the fact that tho whole of tho money subscribed is spent upon the children. All tho expenses of tho management are borne by the promoters, who are Messrs 0. Arthur Pearson, Ltd... the publishing firm which I founded thirty years ago, and tha Shaftesbury Society.

' In the past twenty-eight years tho Fresh Air- .Fund has sent 4,040,547 poor children to the country for a day’s outing, and 63,940 to the sea or country for a'fortnight’s holiday. It is easy to record in mere hard statistics the work accomplished, but who can place on record or value the results achieved in terms of life, health and happiness? These things cannot h© estimated, but they can be imagined. Subscriptions, however small, will be thankfully received and acknowledged by Mr Ernest Kessell, hon. secretary, F.A.F., 226, Great Portland street, London, .W.l, England. Yours faithfully, ARTHUR PEARSON.