The day patrolman Jack Francis of Oakland, Calif. was given his new assignment was the day his chief totaled up statistics showing that the number of young children hit by cars had almost doubled in a year. As a member of the police traffic education bureau Francis was to figure out an effective countercampaign. First thing he did was obvious. He studied the main causes of children's accidents - crossing a street in the middle of a block, running after playthings, getting confused by traffic lights. His next step was not so obvious: he became a magician and a puppeteer.
Using his own funds at first and working in his spare time, he built a 32-foot-long, 4-foot-high collapsible set representing a little street with a school, a candy store and a pet shop. With white tape to mark off the traffic lanes and a pint-sized automatic signal to regulate traffic, patrolman Francis sets up his diminutive street scene in the playgrounds of Oakland's elementary schools. He starts doing magic tricks to bring children clustering around. Then his puppets, schooled in the proper way of crossing streets, take turns showing the youngsters how to do the same.
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images and info provided by the LIFE Magazine / LIFE Magazine International / LIFE Magazine Atlantic ARCHIVE from the Zetu Harrys Collection
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