The Washington times., 1911-08-07
MRS. M'HENRY To
GET BUSY" AGAIN
IN LIQUOR BATTLE
She Is Going Back To Kan
sas To Renew Her Cam
paign.
BEEN IN CAPITAL
SEVERAL MONTHS
Has Different Plan Than That
Pursued BY the Late
Carrie Nation.

Mrs. Myra Warren McHenry is "go-
ing back to Kansas to get busy" she
said today. She has been in Wash
ington for several months. far away
from the scenes of her activities by
which she has broken up more than
one whisky ring" in Kansas.
For Mrs. McHenry is a militant
against liquor. She and the late
Carrie Nation worked for the same
purpose, Mrs. McHenry said, but they
went at the matter in different ways.
Carrie fought the liquor, fight the
men behind the liquor" Mrs. Nc
Henry declared. Mrs. McHenry is a
hard fighter. She fought so hard to
clear her county OF impure politics
and politicians that her home life
was destroyed, her husband leaving
her when her attack struck his per-
sonal friends. She grieved, but never
faltered.
Her Remarkable Life.
II is a very remarkable life that
she has lived.
Iook at that, now-that makes me
look like an old hag, doesn't itT she
asked. when she pointed to a por-
trait of her in a newspaper. "Of
course, am a grandmother now; but
] don't look like that" In her youth
she was positively beautiful That
beauty started her romance.
Mrs. McHenry is a native of Mis-
souri,. but her parents were natives
of Kentucky and for a long time
lived at Biloxi Her father, DR.. War
rem, was noted physician and
scholar. He was a descendant of the
Warren that fell at Bunker Hill. Her
mother was a Speed. and in that way
Mrs. McHenry, a veritable oratorical
amazon of politics. is related to the
John Mosby whose fighting was one
of the wonders of the civil war.
Her Romance
From those forebears she got her
courage and her beauty. She was liv-
ing in Missouri when her married
sister moved to Neodesha, Kan. The
married sister carried with her a
daguerreotype of Myra Warren.
James A McHenry, a lawyer of
Neodesha, saw the portrait. Mr.. Nc
Henry wrote letters for eight months,
and then began his suit. He went to
Myra Warren's home in Lafayette
county. Mo, wooed, won, and welded.
They were very happy. Many of
the prominent men of Kansas were
friends of the young lawyer. Ingalls,
among them. They visited the Nc
Henry home and the young wife be-.
gan to know something of public life.
Mr. McHenry later was elected county
attorney of Wilson county, and Mrs.
McHenry was still more interested in
public life. After a little they moved.
first to FredOnia, then to Howard, in
Elk county, where Mrs McHenry had
her home for twenty-eight years.
Children came to bless their home and
perfect their happiness. In the hand
bag in which Mrs. McHenry carries
some of her wonderful pamphlets
there are also the portraits of the
other four are alive and married.
Her Entrance Into Politics.
Mrs. McHenry's actual political life
began in 1899. 1t has been a stormy
one, in which she has been arrested
on various charges, including an allie
cation that she was insane. She has
been carried along the streets in the
strong arms of policemen, she has been
hooted and jeered, she has been the
objective point of eggs and other mis-
siles Of a humiliating character. But
she is as energetic, as uncompromising,
as brave, as resourceful, as wonder
fully dramatic and oratorical today as
she was in 1899.
She read on a day in that year that
a druggist in Howard had applied for
a license to sell liquor for medicinal
purposes. The druggist had Just been
under charges of Illicit selling, and she
determined that he should not have the
license: In her campaign against IL
Quor she found out what she declared
was the rottenness of the liquor ques-
tion-the impurity of politics in which
the liquor question plays part.
She began writing for the local news
papers. She was a Southern woman.
with conservative ideas about women
and politics. But she felt that she was
called and from writing for other
newspapers she became an editor of
her own newspaper, founded by her in
the heat of political strife, and aptly
called The Searchlight." It searched
and 1t lighted.
Husband Left Her.
She vowed that she would defeat the
officials exposed as unfit for public Of
fee. Some of them were her hus-
bands closest friends. He declared that
IL her campaign against them did not
cease there must be a separation of
husband and wife.
Then it was that had my test"
Mrs. McHenry said simply today She
opened fire upon a certain probate
judge and opposed the politics of her
own husband. He deserted her in 1900
she related. In the trial Of the divorce
suit his counsel endeavored to show
that she had neglected her home duties
TO meddle in politics. Two little boys,
born Of the romance of the old daguer-
reotype, were brought into the court.
Their clothes, even their caps, had been
wholly made by the mother, and the
material used was part OF the old
clothes OF their father.
Is Not a Stalwart.
Mrs. McHenry is not a stalwart in
politics. She declares she is for the
right. When she married she vas a
Democrat She became a Republican
under the influence of her husband.
Since then she has been an independent
She is the arch enemy of TIE Demon
Rum. She doesn't smash things in the
nome of Demon Rum. She doesn't
smash the glasses with a hatchet or
cast the bottles on the floor. She goes
after the man and the men whose
politics she thinks are made of, for, or
by liquor.
MIS- McHenry, on her present visit
70 washington, has been working in
5he otnce of Senator Curtis of Kansas
She oiq not tell what she was goinss to
90 IN Kansas, except that she was go
Ing, TO get busy" It will hardly be
q change of program-only one of place.
She is always busy. -