The university did not seem to appreciate his actions. Shortly after his graduation with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1895, King applied for a scholarship so he could do a master’s degree at the University of Toronto. His request was denied. Willie and his parents were furious.
Willie had made the same application to the University of Chicago and was cheerfully offered a small scholarship. At that time, King felt it was impossible to continue his education. His family was swimming in debt and Max was eying university too. Finances were so bad that John took out another loan and Bella and Jennie were thinking of taking up jobs to help! Willie decided to work for a year and study independently. In the evenings he and a friend studied for their law degrees under John Kings watchful eye. Willie earned money by tutoring others, and he also found employment in a series of writing jobs with Toronto papers.
He knew he didn’t want to be a journalist and he was coming to the conclusion that he didn’t want to be a practising lawyer either. His father was disappointed, but Willie continued to study so that he could at least have a degree in law. He wasn’t sure which career he should chose – minister, politician, social worker or – who knew – professor? Clearly he needed more education. King soothed himself with the thought that his work on his master’s degree was merely postponed. He wrote in his diary that covering police court and other stories was a good way to see “the shadowy side of life, looking at everything from an eco[nomic] standpoint. I will derive great benefit from my after work. I fully intend to made academic work my profession and am taking journalism as an entire year of practical example in the great school of life.”
By spring his life would change.
Toronto
May 2, 1896
King spent the morning in court covering the story of two fourteen-year-old girls who had been arrested for the theft of several rings. It had been the usual morning of the sublime and the ridiculous, with fainting and other dramatic effects, to which, by now, he was accustomed. After the girls had been sentenced to jail, and court had adjourned, King left the dreary courthouse and went out into the lovely spring sunshine. He had a shave and a shoeshine and then did some shopping. He bought a silk tie and some kid gloves for evening outings and a cane of Congo oak with a silver tip. He left the walking stick at Kent’s to have his initials, W.L.M.K., engraved on it for an extra fifteen cents.
With a jaunty step, he strolled on to meet his friend Henry Kingstone. The two set off to keep a theatre date with Charlie Cross, Willie’s partner in his legal studies. On the way there they called on an old lady by the name of Mrs. Menden. Mrs. Menden was a fortuneteller. She divulged some “strange truths” to Willie.
She said I had left study for a while and was at commercial work (newspaper) which was a pity. I should keep at the other profession.
Had thought of ministry and might get into it. Tho’ now not as religious as I ought to be.
That my initials were W. M. and last name King, first name Willie.
I was fond of intellectual girls, and did not care particularly for dances etc.
Was fond of children, and practical.
Would live to be old and would be successful.
Wd. go to Chicago this fall and wd. hear of appointment in about 10 days.
Four days later King had a letter from the University of Chicago once again offering him a fellowship to study political economics and sociology. King Senior was pleased. So was Isabel, although she cried and slept badly. Willie would be leaving them.
Willie knew he could not miss this opportunity to begin fulfilling his dreams. In Chicago he hoped to study, do original work, and take steps towards achieving his goals. He told himself that he would be nearer the masses he wanted to serve more seriously, so that he would be “drawn closer to the living God.” Willie had no rest, for there was a voice that whispered, night and day, Go to Chicago, go to Chicago. He packed his trunk.
Hull-House, Nineteenth Ward
Chicago, Illinois, United States
January 7, 1897
“I am afraid, Miss Addams,” King said, nervously tapping his fingers on the desk in front of him, “that money is not my sole consideration.”
Not long after he arrived in Chicago in the early autumn of 1896, King had called on Jane Addams at Hull-House. Addams had helped found this inner-city settlement house in one of the city’s “worst” districts in 1889. Here, as at the Toynbee Hall settlement house in England, people came to teach and live with the poor. Addams and her volunteer workers hoped they were giving their charges the tools they needed to address the wrongs in their horrible living and working conditions. Volunteers helped men, women, and children, many of them immigrants, learn to read and write. They established kindergartens and worked to change legislation. They held enthusiastic talks on literature, art, health, childcare, worker safety, and industrial unions.
In October, at Addams’s invitation, King had eagerly taken up residence at Hull-House. Now, only a few months later, he was informing Addams that he could not go on as a volunteer. Thinking the issue was money, Addams responded by looking at the young student with understanding brown eyes and offering him a small salary.
“I enjoy the speeches and my work,” King yammered uncomfortably, “but it is walking and taking the train from Hull-House, for two hours each day through misery, wretchedness, vice and degradation, abomination, filthiness and noise to classes where I must concentrate! It is just too much!” Willie babbled. “In fact, I consulted my doctor as I’m afraid I’m about to have a nervous breakdown. Furthermore,” he added sincerely, “I do not feel I’m doing either job well. I think I will better be able to help others if I complete my master’s degree first.”
“Of course,” Addams agreed, sympathetically. Suddenly they heard a crash followed by a wail from one of the kindergarten rooms. Addams was on her feet and off to divert a catastrophe. The interview was over. With over two thousand souls to care for each week Addams was very busy. Perhaps, after all, she didn’t have time to understand.
King felt rebuffed for but a moment. He reminded himself his work lay in his studies. He would work hard and he would do good.
Toronto
September 19, 1897
William Mulock, the postmaster general, had the appearance of a staid Victorian gentleman. With his white beard and formal poise, he looked like someone who might have dismissed the young man before him as a wet-behind-the-ears whipper-snapper.
Young King had come to Mulock to divulge terrible wrongs that he had discovered were going on right under the governments eyes – even with the government’s sanction, he had almost suggested. “My mind was ablaze!” King passionately confessed as he described the investigation he had done for an article on the terrible conditions of the garment trade. “Women work long hours for a few pennies!” King contended. “And the work they were doing in these sweat shops was sewing letter carrier uniforms.” Government contracts, King had discovered, had been subcontracted to men who unfairly ran “sweat
