The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1894-06-04
MRS. LEASES HUSBAND
Drawn from His Obscurity by q
Newspaper Correspondent.
he DOES THE. FAMILY HOUSEWORK.
An Old Broken Down Man White
Haired and Fourteen Years Older
Than Mrs. Lease

An Old Broken Down Man Whit
Haired, and Fourteen Years OIde
Than Mrs. Lease.
A special writer of the St Louis Post
Dispatch has made visit to the home o
Mrs. Lease at Wichita and given tn
world pen picture of Mr.. Charles
Lease, the husband of the noted won al
reformer. The Post-Dispatch says:
When raped at the door an old maj
with long. white mustache, almost q
bald as an infant and with only thil
fringe of white hair to protect the bacl
of his neck, responded. He was care
lessly and shabbily dressed and Their,
face l told him l wanted to see Mr.
Lease.
That's me-"
$50 you are Mrs. Leases husband?"
Yes, I'm he, or all that's left of him.
L introduced myself and was given
cordial welcome and invited to step in
He gave me the best chair in the house
and then sat down and freely answered
every question l asked. l grew to like
the old chap, he was SO genial and kind
anxious. apparently, to make me com
Portable and give me all the information
L wanted about Mrs Lease and the fam
lily. lie got photographs of all except
AAAoCAA, DAdlulu0 LudL he ndQ not mac
a picture taken IN so many years that he
had almost forgotten what a camera
looks like. l asked him to go down
town with me and have one taken and he
said:
mo; just put in mothers and the chill.
dren and leave me out, and I'll be very
much obliged. l don't amount to any
thing, anyway"
While we were talking 1 sketched his
face as well as l could. He told me
everything about himself there is to tell,
l should presume, though that wasn't
much. He is fourteen years older than
Mrs. Lease. He was brought up on a
farm near Freeport, Ill, and left home
to become an apothecary, finally moving
to Kansas. where he married Joan of
Arc. He failed in business, and with the
failure ambition fed. He impressed me
as a man who had been crushed by adj
versity, and who had not the slightest de-
sire to ever make another effort to get
on his feet. He is very proud of his
wife and very proud of his children, and
unless am greatly mistaken he will be
contented to live always as he is living
now, the housekeeper for an ambitious
public woman, mere grain of sand in
the desert waste of humanity.
While he was calling the children
took look through the sitting-room
and the parlor. They are plainly fur
AlSICds Jul llS S6nCIdI dSp6CL Is HOHO-
like and everything is as neat as wax.
l glanced at the volumes in the book
case and found them to be chiefly stand
ard works. Mrs. Lease has certainly
her books with nice discrimina-
ton.
Mrs. Lease's Children.
The children were brought in. the
father fairly aglOw with pride as he in
troduced them. Charley, the eldest, a
boy of 10, is attending the State Uni
versify at Lawrence, so | did not see him,
but was told by the others, who think he
is the smartest boy on earth, that he is
law and has published several
Louise comes next, aged 10. She is a
second edition of her mother and Won
derful child. She is as ladylike in her
as a cultured woman of 80
and she can converse as intelligently and
use as good language as many girls who
pupil in the high school, and this is her
second year. She has read all the works
of Dickens, George Eliot, Washington
Irving and even Balzac, besides count
less others. / asked her what she in
tended doing when she completed her
studies. and she replied that it is her in
tention to remain III school until she is
81, taking thorough course in both law
and medicine, after which she may fol-
low her mothers course and engage in
politics. 1t amused me much to hear
this child talk eloquently and logically
on the suffrage question, beratipg men
and landing women, arguing With me
the equal rights of women to ballot on
all political issues and to hold office I'M
der state and national governments 1t
was not the parrot-Iike utterance of most
smart children, for she was we'll equip
ped to argue every phase of her side OF
The question. Annie, her sister, or Jim"
as the family call her, is unlike Louise.
She would rather ride bicycle or climb
a tree than study, and it is her am bitiOn
to be famous musician and painter
Ben Hur is bright, roguish boy, as mis-
chievous as any boy can be, yet grave
and sedate in addressing strangers. He
wants to be an author.
All of the children are devoted to their
mother and speak of her as the nOblest
and grandest woman in the world. If any
one has an idea that either of the chill
1ren or the husband feels that Mrs.
Lease neglects them he should spend
at their home, as l did, and he
will speedily become convinced that he
is mistaken. They would like to see
more of her, but they think she has far
greater duties to occupy her time than
attending to their small wants.
1 talked with Mir. Lease about keeping
house.
Mrs. Lease the Provider.
He said he did most of the work, be-
cause he enjoyed it and it gave him
to occupy his time. Louise,
he said. helped him with the cooking,
but had an aversion to all other kinds of
nousewOrk and as she is so much like