The National tribune., 1902-10-09
WOMAN'S. CITIZENS
COMMITTEE.
its Personnel and its Work
Never Before So Many Organ
izatiOns to Care For.

Preparing to entertain National En-
campmcnt is accounted labor of love,
but it is none the less hard labor. While
willing hands make light work, those hands
must have guide and a safe and sure
one, or they will grasp things by the
wrong end and trouble follow. 1t is prob
able that no National Encampment Com
mittee ever worked against greater odds
or more harmoniously than has the Com
mittee whose labors for the 36th National
Encampment of the Grand Army of the
Republic are drawing to a close ooo
1t has been big committee, over l,OuU
members, taking both men and women
workers, but it has had big people at the
head of it. and, of course, it was bound to
succeed. BY common consent, and be-
cause of his splendid executive ability,
Mr.. Brainard III. Warner, of Washington,
was made Chairman of the Citizens Com
mittee, at the first meeting that was held
to discuss plans for the Encampment. Mr..
Warner is himself veteran, though one
of the younger ones, and member OF the
Grand Army of the Republic. Mr.. Barry
Buckley, the son of one of the prominent
Surgeons in the war uf the rebellion, was
appointed Secretary Of the Committee,
and more courteous, accommodating man
never before filled that trying position.
Mr.. Warner placed at the head of the
Womans Citizens Committee Mrs. Ellen
Spencer Mussey, and she in turn appointed
Mrs. Laura Virginia Mccullough Secre-
tary, and the initial steps for the National
Eneampment work had been taken.
Mrs. Mussey has proved to be exactly
the right woman in the right place. If
she was not born with the bump of exc
cutive and diplomatic ability well de-
veloped, it has grown since, for she has
displayed it to immense advantage during
the past six months. Even patriotic
women working along exactly the same
lines do not always work in harmony, but
in the six months that Mrs. Mussey has
been directing the labors of the Woman's
Committee, there has not been hitch or
Mrs. Mussey is an Ohio woman. edu-
Gated at the Geneva High School and
Lake Erie College. Ohio, and Rockford
College, LII. Her father was the author
of the famous Spencerian Penmanship.
as Principal of the Ladies' Department in
the Spencerian Business College. which
position she resigned to become the wife
of Gen. r. ID. Mussey, who mustered in
10000 colored troops during the war OF
the rebellion, and was brevetted Brigadier-
General for courageous conduct and re-
ceiyed a Medal of Honor for gallantry in
service. Gen. Mussey was taken i'll in
1876, and Mrs. Mussey began the study
of law in his Office to enable her to at
tend to his large practice. She practlced
side by side with him for 16 years, and
at his death, in 1892, at his request and
with the approval of the Bench and Bar
and of her husbands clientele, she has re-
tanned it. She has now a reputation as a
woman lawyer second to none in the world.
Mrs. Mussey has the distinguished honor
of being the only woman dean of a law
school in the world. Women are not ad
mitted TO white law schools in the Dis
trict of Columbia, and for this reason Mrs.
Mussey has felt called upon to give out
of her busy life time and thought to this
need of women for higher education, SO,
with the assistance of the Bench and Bar
OF the District, she established the first
law school in the world ever organized
primarily for women.
Mrs. Mussey is the granddaughter of a
Revolutionary soldier, who carried to his
grave the broad scars of tie sword. She
is intensely loyal, and spends much time
and money in work for the veterans. She
is Past President of the Legion of Loyal
Women. and of Ladies' Auxiliary No. 80.
Union Veteran Legion, and Past National
Counsellor of the Ladies Of the u. v. L.
She was one of the incorporat0rs and orr
ginal promoters of the Red Cross Organi-
zation in this country, being Third Vice
President and Counsellor until she re-
signed the position on account OF pressure
of other work. During the Spanish War
she was acting Assistant Field Agent at
Headquarters, Washington. ard visited
every hospital within go miles Of the
: Capital. including the small field hospitals.
Under her direction a model diet kitchen
was established at Fort Myer and main
tanned in the face Of opposition in the be-
ginning, but afterwards gave great salts
faction to the close Of the war. To her
executive ability was due the instantane-
Gus supply Of needed clothing for conya-
c;cly f6o
Fort Meyer and Fort Sheridan and Camp
Alger, and in her Office hangs testimonial
from the New York Committee of the
Red Cross OF appreciation of her valuable
services in behalf of the Red Cross.
She visited Galveston, at the time Of
the food. going in on the first train. and
assisted Miss Barton in organizing relief,
establishing headquarters, procuring store
rooms, etc. On her return to the North
she made addresses in the principal cities,
setting forth the conditions in Galveston,
and the need of funds to rebuild the city.
Mrs. Mussey was the author of the
law Of 1896, which first gave TO women in
the District of Columbia the right to their
own earnings. and made them joint guard
ians. with the fathers, of their children
and in the new code of the District of
1902, generous recognition of the pres
ent conditions of family life and the laws
accorded are largely due to her. On her
recent TIP 10 EilSldnO hrS. SIuSSeg WIS
received at Oxford and accorded honors,
both public and private, never before ac-
corded to a woman, all on account OF her
standing rs the dean of a law school.
As Chairman of the Woman's Citizens
Executive Committee, Mrs. Mussey had
the appointment Of over 700 women on
subcommittee. She has planned and
prepared for the entertainment Of seven
woman's organizations, numbering in dele
gates -hany thousands, task never be-
fore undertaken for q Grand Army En-
campment.
Mrs. Mussey appointed Mrs. Rosamond
B. Meacham, Past President of Thomas
Corps, First Vice Chairman: Mrs. Hen
rietta n. Rose, Second Vice Chairman, and
Mrs. Mccullough, Secretary.
The Secretary of the Committee, Mrs.
Laura Virginia Mccullough, is a New
Jersey woman who went as n girl to Illi-
nois, where her parents established their
home on the banks of the Mississippi. Mrs.
Mccullough has been a teacher and a
writer, and she can draw and paint, and
does fine pen work. Her beautiful talent
is all devoted to phiianthropic and chari.
table work, in these days, except when
she turns aside to do little things for her
friends, which she has a graceful habit
of doing. She married a veteran, N. n
Mccullough, now Past Coh- -.nander Of Kit
Carson Post, Of Washington. Among her
other literary efforts of higher order is
the Centennial Hymn Of the Northwest
Territory" an odd prose and poem story
of the successive changes in boundaries