ACT OF INCORPORATION.

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into the mire of sin and shame without an attempt being made for their reformation. This department is frequently called upon to seek out the hiding places of erring young girls, but when successful, as we usually are, of what avail is it? We have no place in this District to which they can be consigned, where, by judicious, moral treatment and counsel and encouragement, an opportunity would be given them to reform. Such an institution would, in my opinion, result in the reformation of a large number of such cases. At present the fugitives, after being taken from their places of co iment, are perforce returned to their parents or guardians, to be again subjected to the influences that caused their fall, thus rendering it nearly impossible for them to become respectable members of society. Humanity and civilization require that at least an effort be made to bring the erring ones to a sense of the evils attendant upon a continuation of their errors. Such an effort, to be successful, can only be made by totally severing the ties that bind them to their former modes of life, and for such purposes I again respectfully recommend the erection in the suburbs of this city of a building to be used as a reformatory for girls.

III

The act incorporating the Reform School for Girls in the District of Columbia, approved July 9, 1888, creates a body corporate to be known as the board of trustees of the Girls' Reform School of the District of Columbia, and names Samuel S. Shellabarger, Augustus S. Worthington, Adoniram J. Huntington, William C. Dodge, Mills Dean, Orren G. Staples, James E. Fitch, Thomas P. Morgan, and Alexander Graham Bell as the incorporators. No organization was ever effected under this act because no appropriation was made to carry out its provisions. On February 11, 1891, a bill was passed by the Senate appropriating $75,000 for the establishment of the school, but the bill was not passed by the House of Representatives. The District of Columbia appropriation bill for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1893, approved July 14, 1892, contained the following appropriation:

Reform school for girls.—For the erection and completion, according to plans and specifications to be prepared by the inspector of buildings and approved by the Commissioners of the District of Columbia, of a suitable building or buildings to be used as a reform school for girls, $35,000, to be expended under the direction of said Commissioners. Said building shall be erected on land belonging to the Government, to be selected by the Attorney-General, the Secretary of War, and the Engineer Commissioner of the District of Columbia.

In accordance with the above provision, the building at present occupied by the school was erected at a cost of about $25,000, the remainder of the appropriation being expended for water supply, stable, grading, fencing, etc. The land selected by the Attorney-General, the Secretary of War, and the Engineer Commissioner of the District of Columbia, was the old farm of 19 acres situated at the junction of the Loughborough and Conduit roads. The land had been lying fallow for more than forty years, and was overgrown with thickets; and also it is full of ravines.

The building was finished about November 1, 1893, and was turned over to the board of trustees of the Girls' Reform School, by whom it