HAPPINESS!

Sun (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 68, 11 June 1927, Page 1

HAPPINESS!

A FREE PICTURES WHICH MAKE LIFE LESS DRAB FOR POOR CHILDREN.

i I _J BRIGHT HOUR IN AIREDALE ST. j ONCE every week a room is filled J with happiness at No. 2 Airedale Street. ! In the dim of the Mission Hall ! a sea of eager young faces watches a screen where moving figures play their silent parts. j Beside the organ, and above the j altar, hangs the screen, loosely susi pended from the ceiling, j Here there is no elaborate disguise; | nothing of the aristocracy of the ex- | pensive motion picture palace, no carefully modulated orchestra whose musical cadences are guided by the slim, white hand of the salaried conductor. It is just a free picture show—the Rev. C. Scrimgeour's free picture show at 2 Airedale Street for the poorer children who live in the vicinity. But happiness lives there. Eyes, shining with happiness, follow every incident, particularly of the comics. How they love the comics, the owners of those shining, happy eyes! From the highways and byways of the surrounding streets Mr. Scrimgeour gathers his audiences. He knows that his picture show will keep them from mischief, or at least from unpleasantness. He knows, too, that happiness comes rarely into some of those tired, uneventful little lives. And if happiness be measured by uncontrolled laughter, by the stamping of feet, by the excited calls to companions in other parts of the room, then he is the keeper of it—for at least once a week in that hall which is the headquarters of the Methodist Central Mission. Those children are a revelation. Their clothes may not be spotless or devoid of patches. Good manners are certainly not the prerogative of all of them. But good health is there, rude, bursting health. They are glowing with it, yelling with it. Among the children are a few parents and elderly folk, filching an hour’s respite from dull care. Tired of life some of them look as they enter the door and settle into the pews of the little chapel. But tiredness vanishes among the happiness which is lurking there, and they bend to caress the tiny mites who soon fall asleep on their mothers’ laps. Popular airs, played on the piano by one of Mr. Scrimgeour’s willing helpers, follow the amusing feats of the players on the screen and keep the audience on the alert for familiar tunes. From the shadows of the farthest corner comes the broadcast music, the receiving set of which is another gift to the mission. There is an interval while Mr. Scrimgeour tells a story—a simple story with a moral. A loutish youth breaks in with an impertinent remark. He is sternly reproved and sent outside, but he gets no sympathy from the other children. Then more pictures and more music, more happiness, and the evening is over. “God Save the King” is sung with healthy energy. Not a child moves before the end of the National Anthem. A stampede for the door follows, and the excited babble of children all trying to express themselves at once. Pennies are dropped with a quiet jingle into a plate as they go out —pennies spared from a limited family purse. From among the throng three tiny Chinese tots wait until the last. They do not hurry. There is wonder in the big brown eyes as they watch Mr. Scrimgeour with polite curiosity. “How did you like the pictures?” someone asks them. “Very well, thank you,” reply the children who have been the quietest of any in the hall. Everyone round Airedale Street knows Mr. Scrimgeour and his band of assistants. Quietly and unostentatiously he works, bringing happiness into many lives which, but for his efforts, would be more drab in a world where one gets very, very little for nothing.