Los Banos Rotary Club History
Chaplain Stresses Rehabilitation Value Of Tracy Institution

Floy Barkman, chaplain at Deuell Vocational Institute near Tracy, told members of the Los Banos Rotary Club Tuesday noon that the Institute is doing a remarkable job in rehabilitating boys and young men, mostly from 17 to 22 years, who have been committed to the Institute from almost every community in the state for almost every conceivable crime.

Mostly, Chaplain Barkman said, these boys are the result of broken homes and irresponsible parents, in fact, the history of the boys confined at the Institute show that 95 per cent of the cases are tracable to this one factor.

The DIV at Tracy has a capacity of 1200 boys, and it has filled to the limit since it was opened several years ago, at a cost of $12,000,000. Chaplain Barkman emphasized that as California continues to grow the need for more and more such institutions becomes ever more critical. To meet today's need, he said, California requires construction of a similar institution every year to keep abreast of the increasing amount of crime among the younger people.
Barkman said the Institute is unique in the work it is endeavoring to do, namely the rehabilitation of young men under its jurisdiction and their return to civilian life to become useful and honorable citizens. Their program, Chaplain Barkman said, is built around a three point program: to think right, to work right, and to live right.

The young men are given an opportunity to learn a trade, to increase their educational background, to cultivate a constructive hobby, and to learn right from wrong and to fashion their future lives accordingly.

Concluding, the chaplain urged his listeners to take an increased interest in the youth of their community, to give them an occasional word of praise, to take an interest in their activities and welfare, and to make them realize there is a worthwhile place and an honorable job that awaits them as adults.

October 27, 1954

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