Republican news item. [volume] (Laport, Pa.) 1896-19??, 1907-08-29
REST ROOM IN STORE
Suggestion Of VaIue to Merchants
VINO Want Country Trade.
PLEASE THE FARMERS WIFE.

provide Accommodation For Women
and Children Who Spend Day or
an Afternoon In arters
With Home Comforts.
Some merchants wonder why so
many OF the women on the farms keep
mail order catalogues constantly on
hand and buy articles from the big
city houses which they might purchase
from the home stores to equal advan-
tage Did 1t ever occur to you that the
town merchants who make any special
provision for the comfort of farmers
wives and daughters who patronize
the stores are scarcer than hens teeth?
a recent writer ID Golfers has some
thing to say which may offer u valua
bic suggestion in the matter of keeping
and increasing home trade.
Suppose you're Kansas farmers
wife. says this writer. You have driv-
EN- into town for street fair day in the
willing heat of the prairie summer
your husband, the three small children,
including the baby, under the big vel
low umbrella strapped to the wagon
seat. Shopping done, the wagon un-
hitched in a vacant lot, lunch eaten in
its shade. the man goes back to the
holiday street. The woman stays be-
hind TO mind the children. She might
go to store, to be sure. where she
would be in every ones way. Well
meaning folks would give the children
candy until their little hands would
stick to everything they touched, in
Guiding their mothers skirts, and there
would be nothing to do but go out into
the street and walk, then return and
wait and wait So all that long after
noon she sits on the ground, holding
the baby in the little patch of shade.
The sun beats down; clouds Of dust
envelop them; the children's hands and
faces become grimy. Finally, at 6
O'Clock, the man returns. bitches up.
They watch the balloon ascension and
start home. Then what: Supper to
get, milk to strain and put away,
dishes to wash. chickens to shut up,
calves to feed and the tired babies to
bathe and soothe to sleep. The woman
had looked forward to this outing as a
much needed change. When she final
ly gets to bed she is too tired to sleep.
Her holiday had been spent under a
wagon on Il dirty vacant lot. The
shade of the trees of her own yard
would have been pleasanter.
This" writes woman from Car
bondale. Kan, lis the condition in the
average town. There are numerous
places where the men are welcomed,
where they can spend an hour without
thought of being in the way. Should
not these busy women have~a place of
their own where, when their shopping
is done they can take their babies and
visit and rest and go home refreshed
and strengthened rather than utterly
worn out!"
Golfers asks If this is a case for
some plutocrat with money to donate
;or the establishment of town club
for country women or should 1t be
looked after by the township or the
county? 1t appears that 1t should be
looked after by the individual store.
keepers. Here Is :. iiue opportunity
for some enterprising merchant who
wants to sell goods to the women who
live on farms.
Suppose you are Il farmers wife and
you drive into town for days recrea-
ton and shopping. Instead Of having
to keep the children by the tied up
team and eat cold luncheon on the
grass or in the dusty street you take
the little ones to the enterprising store
of Blank Il Co., general merchants. In
the store building Is commodous
room set aside for women and chill
dren. There are cozy chairs, tables
with the newspapers and magazines In
easy reach a couch or two for loung-
ing or mapping and a motherly woman
on duty to look after the children.
You find In this store place where
YOU may wash the dust of the drive
from your face and do up your back
hair and see that your hat is on
straight You make the rest room your
headquarters for the day, leaving your
bundles there as well as your children
You are free to go about town on err
rands. returning at noon to eat your
luncheon from one of the tables, per.
haps with a cup of coffee hot off the
little stove provided for that purpose
You meet here also some of the wo.
men who live I'm town and who drop in
to rest and chat while doing their
shopping. When the time comes for
you to bundle the children into the
wagon and start for home you will feel
a great deal better than II you have had
TO undergo the experience of the wo-
man described above.
If Blank & Co. offer you such club
room, where will you do most of your
trading: With Blank & Co. of course.
Thus the firm gets more than value re-
ceived for the expense of maintaining
the clubroom and in addition has the
t.s,Fe q. .x,.s..