Tazewell Republican. [volume] (Tazewell, Va.) 1892-1919, 1905-08-31
STRAW CAR PARTIES.
NOVEL FORM OF FUN IN WHICH
COLLEGE GIRLS INDULGE.
Old Trolley Cars Rugged Up for the
Purpose by Inventive Smith
Students Brought Into
Play,

Many Smith college girl feels now
adays Gust like having a good cry"
because a new kind of fun, known as
the STRAW car party" has been denied
them by the president of that institu-
ton. In former years, says the New
York Tribune, the girls had been wont
to have straw rides, such as are so well
known to every rural American COM
munity, but every summer the horses
seemed to go slower and slower and
the wagons were more rickety. The
modern spirit stirred them. They
yearned for rapid transit, and so at
last an especially brilliant young wo-
man exclaimed:
Come, girls, let us take straw ride
in an old trolley car We can hire
one Of the work cars, take of the sides,
cover the floor with straw and sit
around the edges. Then we can get
nice mouorman to run 1t for US real
fast, and we can have just the sweet
est time ever!"
AS soon as the suggestion was made
1t was greeted with a chorus of Per
fectly lovely!" Wont it be simply
grand" "Oh, it'll be just dear!"
The first trip was from Northamp-
ton, Mass, the seat Of the institution,
to some nearby villages, and it lasted
from little after supper time until
$3.50 o'clock. Many took their mando-
Inns and banjos along, and sang and
played as they rode. All who went
told Of their fun so enthusiastically
that the more timid students who had
hung back at first were now "just
crazy" to go. Before long the straw
ride party" became "all the rage" and
hardly a night passed but that beyy
of college girls sailed forth on a con-
struction car in some direction or
other.
Not content with simply sitting on
the cars edge and watching the land
scape slide past, some Of the more an
bilious aspired to run the car and by
little taffy" they persuaded the mo-
lever.
But while the girls were having
"such fun" the village gossips who
lived along the trolley lines put their
heads together and decided that the
girls were no better than tomboys,"
and that 1T was simply shameful" for
them to sit on the edge Of the car and
'1et their feet hang" Indeed, 1t was
said that not few cautious mothers
babe their boys keep away from the
trolley tracks, so that their minds
should not be upset by those dangling
feet. At last some one carried CON-
plant to President Seelye, and when,
a little later, one Of the straw car
parties" bumped into regular trolley
car and the girls came near hurting
themselves seriously the head Of the
college promptly put stop to this sort
of recreation,
The girls at once submitted to the
new order, but they have not stopped
whispering about It, Some Of them
say that the president stopped the
riders not because of the accident, but
because he didn't want them ito have
such fun" and they recall the time
when he asked them not to eat apples
and doughnuts in the street Yet they
have not lost heart, but will only go
ahead and invent some new sport to
take the place Of the straw car party"
Smith girls are nothing If not original,
and among the fads of which they
boast Of being the authors is that OF
coasting down the hill back Of the cam
pus in winter seated in fudge pans or
on pieces Of oilcloth.