The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1896-06-09
A WOMAN OF GREAT WIT
Mrs. StetsOn Keeps a Shower Of
Sparklers Falling
On Her Audience, But the Au-
dfence is Small
Lectures at Various Places in the City
and Win Remain Here Some Days.

and Win Remain Here Some Days.
ct do not claim to be a lecturer said
Charlotte Perkins Stetson to a Journal
reporter recently; IT simply talk" and
that was just what she did to the per
haps 20 women and several men that
she faced at Hamilton hall last even
ing
Her lecture was on 1.-THE Heroes We
Need Today and her hero is the man
or woman who does what he or she be
heves to be right IN the face OF the
world.
From time to time Mrs. Stetson read
or recited poems of her own that bore
ON the subject; they were good poems
that told a story and touched the right
spot.
In the course of her lecture she said:
our children-if they are well born
to begin with. and they are exceeding
~ fortunate if they are-are happy and
free as God intended through their
childhood But as they merge into man
hood and WOmanhOOd they begin to
lose their natural selves and accept the
teachings of unnatural dignity and
studied ways. In youth they are am
bilious but their aspirations are slowly
taken from them in the following of
custom; and by 80 they have reached
that stage of life which is known as
settling down No more ambition, no
more desire to do better and be better
and elevate the world. And as they in
turn look on the growing ambitious
generation that is following them they
say, Oh, yes; that's all very well now
at your age but wait till you are as old
as am and yOuu think differently and
be cOntented. Its no use trying to do
anything.
1.-THE life that we live as compared to
the life that we could live is like UNI
Matched things in eggs
life
II will give you the Wonanss side first
III q
thing to do. 1leven-tWelfths of the
women on earth are doing what is call
ed their own work-that is the work for
about eight other persons.
And i'm the interval of washing iron
ing, cooking, scrubbing and mending
we try to ind time to bring up the chill
dren merely as a side issue OF course
under those conditions we can't do it
very we'll; but we do it, in a way, and
are even proud of it.
What can you expect of a human
race whose mothers do nothing more
elevating than prepare food2
Through all the ages since the world
1 began the finger of heredity has writ
/ ten on each mans forehead. His moth
I er was a cook Do YOU think our world
! would be as good as it is today if the
/ men were all cooks.
THE great trouble with US is that we
are mostly doing the things we hate.
Ihere are two main troubles in the
/ world today One is money. The other
/ is trouble in the family-uncomfoFta
] bleness with people YOU have to live
! with I don't mean marriage now, al
/ though there is enough of it, there
VIII add another reason after all, and
/ that is I'LL health but this latter so oft
/ en- grows from one or both of the 9th
! ers that it might be classed with them.
w G don Z worry about religion any
more We don't worry about govern
ment any more We mostly make out
/ own politics. I don't think much of the
pattern. but we must like it or we
/ wouldn't follow it.
our great trouble is in economics.
! Our race today is not up to par in
/ health and is not happy. Tt is not doing
/ the things it wants to do, and is not
I happy. and the economic pressure is
I crushing the life out of it. We are never
II should be a much more foolish per
son than believe am if I should I'M
! dertake to prescribe any one thing as
! q panacea Tor all the Ills, but if had
/ lots of time I could tell you many
/ things that would help
! The kind of heroes we need today
] are the heroes that can stand up for
4 what they believe at home, in business
4 and on the street; that use their cOur-
4 age and intelligence to stand UP for
| what they want.
There is more heroisn REQUIRED to
wear the things you think are right to
! wear than to lead a regiment. The bi-
/ cycle is bringing it, however. it is teach
/ ing us to wear better and more com
! Portable clothes
THE business wOman's dress could
I be anything so it is short and light
I and plain, and has plenty of pockets.
And women should have freedom
see no reason why a woman should be
any more afraid in the dark than
/ man i'm this age of firearms. "A man once
/ told me that q woman should go out
| at night without a man. Man is wO-
/ mans natural protector he said and
asked HIM Protector against What2'
He didn't say anything more about
! man being wOman's natural protector
I after that Tt isn't the women we need
/ be afraid Of"
MRS. Stetson addressed the teachers
/ at the high school building this morn
/ ing on Educated Bodies"
Tomorrow evening she viii speak to-
/ the public at the high school on Dress. %
She viii lecture this evening at 41S
/ Kansas avenue on Production and
/ Distribution" Her lecture VIII be free