The Washington times., 1909-08-22
Many Are Children, Battling
Courageously Against
Painful Affections.
ALL LARGE CITIES
HAVE SAD CASES
Boy and Girl "Shut-Ins' at Local
Hospital Are Buoyant
Playmates.
By ALLEN D. ALBERT. Ir.

a Z tT2Vel Ogetfler-yOu and
Wv |. You read and | write.
In that way we 90 far
distances and come upon strange,
true stories. Among the ore furnaces
we learn of the stealing Of a little
boy. In farm house, on the slope
to river, We see (while our hearts
ache) how a young mother and her
babes can suffer when the husband
and father is bricked away for leD-
rosy. Out on the prairies we find
how knight can wear the garb of a
country banker Of our own time
and give more than his life for his
daughter. Some of # has been Jour
neyjng out of worn paths and for
a Seyen-day-so quickly gone that It
has ended while scarcely we noted
tive have wondered how every
where the human heart IS the same.
Yet all that time there have lain
stories untold at our very door
steps-stories quite as strange as
any of these. All that time there
have been striyings quite as des-
peFate to the soul as the search for
little Billy Whitla, resolutions fluffy
as brave as those OF John EarIy's
wife heroes even as fine as John
B. Saylor We have passed them
over-you and I. Suppose this week
we stop nearer to home. Suppose
We look around right where we
are.
In our time we have all heard
something of "shut-ins." We have
all known that this society or that,
these settlement workers and those
agents. this fund and that institu-
ton, were for their benefit. Some
Of us have given TO them-maybe
as We give to the heather, maybe
just to get rid of somebody. Now
these are the ones to whom We
travel this Sunday And before we
slip out of the line, any OF US, let's
have the curiosity to go and ses
at least one of them and find out
what they are
CAPITALS PITIABLE SHUT-INs.
IN WESTINGHOUSE there shut-ins
l in city 50 rich and happy. and 50
beautifully arbored? White shut-ins?
Persons lie US. whose only freedom these
summer days is the freedom of patient
eyes to rest themselves on the sight OF
such trees and grass as can be seen
from narrow windows? Let's look and
see.
Down between the, Marine Barracks
and the Eastern braact. Of the Potomac
German family is counting every day
as it passes Carl Romer is the father,
and he and his good frau and four OF
their children are in constant COM
r?unication with the ChiIdren's Hospital
far over the city at Thirteenth and "
szreets. Theirs is a wireless communi-
cation that antedates all the discoveries
of electricity. For one they love dearly
is being kept away from them-shut-in
under another roof
It is little Carl, another smiling
Joe" only two and a half years old.
In the sun parlor OF the hospital he
spends the greater part OF every day
not riding a rocking-hOrse, O. toGdIing
beside a nurse, but bound TO a board
with the head and shoulders lower thaH
his trunk lie has Potts curvature of
the spine We mustn't pull away.
This is not a story of hopelessness, OF
fruitless baby torture. It is a story
fright with hope Tor the future. a hope
that might never have existed a few
wears before this tot was born, but now
is fortified by the cure of dozens OF
Smiling Joes
Father Tells
OF Baby's Illness.
six weeks ago Carl went awsy from
the Romer home. ANY OF us who know
what home means 90 the German viii
understand vaguely what torture lay in
that day for this faulily of southeast
! washington In October the babk0
/ caught a heavy cold" as the father
tells. There was fear of tuberculosis.
Last February there was an eXamina-
ton for tuberculosis OF the lungs, and
no sign was found. So the little fellow
was kept at home, where eacn new
step and every new ward. German er
English made six hearts glow as love
for helpless little babies has made
CONTINUED on Fourth Page)