“The three S’s,” as they were called, brought an immediate response.  They were practical in their appeal, and members began to come in.  The police force was increased from one officer at night and none in the day, to three at night and two during the day, and to this the Association added two special night officers of its own.  Private detectives were intermittently brought in to “check up” and see that the service was vigilant.  A fire hydrant was placed within seven hundred feet of every house, with the insurance rates reduced from twelve and one-half to thirty per cent; the services of three fire-engine companies was arranged for.  Fire-gongs were introduced into the community to guard against danger from interruption of telephone service.  The water supply was chemically analyzed each month and the milk supply carefully scrutinized.  One hundred and fifty new electric-light posts specially designed, and pronounced by experts as the most beautiful and practical road lamps ever introduced into any community, were erected, making Merion the best-lighted community in its vicinity.

At every corner was erected an artistically designed cast-iron road sign; instead of the unsightly wooden ones, cast-iron automobile warnings were placed at every dangerous spot; community bulletin-boards, to supplant the display of notices on trees and poles, were placed at the railroad station; litter-cans were distributed over the entire community; a new railroad station and post-office were secured; the station grounds were laid out as a garden by a landscape architect; new roads of permanent construction, from curb to curb, were laid down; uniform tree-planting along the roads was introduced; bird-houses were made and sold, so as to attract bird-life to the community; toll-gates were abolished along the two main arteries of travel; the removal of all telegraph and telephone poles was begun; an efficient Boy Scout troop was organized, and an American Legion post; the automobile speed limit was reduced from twenty-four to fifteen miles as a protection to children; roads were regularly swept, cleaned, and oiled, and uniform sidewalks advocated and secured.

Within seven years so efficiently had the Association functioned that its work attracted attention far beyond the immediate neighborhood of Philadelphia, and caused Theodore Roosevelt voluntarily to select it as a subject for a special magazine article in which he declared it to “stand as a model in civic matters.”  To-day it may be conservatively said of The Merion Civic Association that it is pointed out as one of the most successful suburban civic efforts in the country; as Doctor Lyman Abbott said in The Outlook, it has made “Merion a model suburb, which may standardize ideal suburban life, certainly for Philadelphia, possibly for the United States.”