ica's "dirty cities." Here public anger rose particularly high, the
magazine practically being barred from the news-stands. But again the
result was to the lasting benefit of the community.

Memphis, Tennessee, came next, but here a different spirit was met.
Although some resentment was expressed, the general feeling was that a
service had been rendered the city, and that the only wise and practical
solution was for the city to meet the situation. The result here was a
group of municipal buildings costing millions of dollars, photographs of
which The Ladies' Home Journal subsequently published with gratification
to itself and to the people of Memphis.

Cities throughout the country now began to look around to see whether
they had dirty spots within their limits, not knowing when the McFarland
photographers might visit them. Bok received letters from various
municipalities calling his attention to the fact that they were
cognizant of spots in their cities and were cleaning up, and asking
that, if he had photographs of these spots, they should not be
published.

It happened that in two such instances Bok had already prepared sets of
photographs for publication. These he sent to the mayors of the
respective cities, stating that if they would return them with an
additional set showing the spots cleaned up there would be no occasion
for their publication. In both cases this was done. Atlanta, Georgia;
New Haven, Connecticut; Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, and finally Bok's own
city of Philadelphia were duly chronicled in the magazine; local storms
broke and calmed down-with the spots in every instance improved.

It was an interesting experiment in photographic civics. The pity of it
is that more has not been done along this and similar lines.

The time now came when Bok could demonstrate the willingness of his own
publishing company to do what it could to elevate the public taste in
art. With the increasing circulation of The Ladies' Home Journal and of
The Saturday Evening Post the business of the company had grown to such
dimensions that in 1908 plans for a new building were started. For
purposes of air and light the vicinity of Independence Square was
selected. Mr. Curtis purchased an entire city block facing the square,
and the present huge but beautiful publication building was conceived.

Bok strongly believed that good art should find a place in public
buildings where large numbers of persons might find easy access to i