Although the community center had been open to everyone, its primary purpose was to get boys and girls off the streets and to offer them supervised play and instruction. The program was intelligent and well meaning, but it suffered from one major flaw. It was available to everyone in the neighborhood, including the Puerto Ricans.

Once it was understood that the Puerto Ricans were welcome, the original and older inhabitants of the neighborhood began to avoid the center and it was almost impossible to get their children to use the facilities. And then the Puerto Rican families stayed away too because they did not want to use the center if it were boycotted by Anglos.

Most of the time the clubrooms were empty, the books and games remained on the shelves, the basketball court had no one on it, and the social workers congregated in an office to brood over cups of coffee and mourn their choice of career. It was a rotten, thankless job.

On this June night, however, Murray Benowitz was happy and confident of the future. As in the past, he had publicized this dance without optimism, had encouraged the youth workers to do what they could about getting kids to attend, but had urged them not to be disappointed.

If this was a bitter, jaundiced point of view, it was founded in experience. As do many of those who make a career of social work, Murray Benowitz had viewed the world through rose-colored glasses and had seen it as the best of all possible places. Now he knew differently; the world was gray, grim and bleak. But he had to smile to keep from crying, to smile when the kids destroyed equipment, scrawled obscenities on the walls, and derided him for being a square. They called him Glad Hand, but he took it and strangely enough, still managed to think of them by their proper names.

Since eight o’clock that night, teen-agers had been swarming into the center, and Murray had had to call on two additional workers to come and help him. Standing by the record player he glanced at the fireproofed crepe-paper decorations strung gaily above the dance floor.

There were good records to be played. The punch was cold. There were reserve sacks of ice cubes and plenty of cups and napkins.

Although both Sharks and Jets had shown up, no fights had started. Murray had shivered with apprehension but the Sharks moved off to one side of the dance floor, the Jets to the other, and each group danced in competition—as if there were a wall between them.

Well, Murray thought, it was a beginning. Soon he and the other workers would attempt to get both groups together, but boys and girls were still coming to the dance, and he was far too busy.

Moving along, calling out to boys and girls whose names he remembered, stopping to chat and managing to laugh when he was greeted as Glad Hand, Murray decided not to notice that the dancing was becoming wilder and more primitive. He had always correlated mixed dancing with sexual aberration. Later, if he could ever gain the confidence of these neighborhood kids—prove that he was their friend and wanted to help them—he might speak to the district supervisor about the need for a dancing teacher.