Ashland tidings. [volume] (Ashland, Or.) 1876-1919, 1912-10-10
Americas Mothers.

hHicflNd > MOtlcIS.
Five generations of mothers have
borne the children of this republic.
The first generation left behind
them the memory of hardships pa
tiently borne, and bitter sorrows as
they saw their loved ones laid low
by unknown diseases or murdered by
willy foes. No wonder these fore
mothers steal, like ghosts, across the
stage of history.
The second and third generations
were more sturdy and more firmly
their cheeks. Necessity had taught
them to knit, to spin and weave the
cloth for their homes. They were
an honest, patriotic class of women
with much practical common sense
and bravery. They forded streams
and climbed mountain Businesses that
their children might receive the ben
efits later on.
With the fourth generation of
mothers began the civil conflict
True heroines were they, giving to
their country their own hearts blood,
again and yet again for four long,
weary years. At the close of this
great war our country was in chaos,
to be reconstructed Thousands OF
broken-hearted widows and daugh-
ters left fatherless were forced out
of their sheltered homes into the
marts of trade. Women did not in
vite this radical change in their lives
1t came as a result of being left with
out means to support them.
Almost at once they had to cope
against great numbers of foreign
workmen who began to fill our bor-
ders. Capital was made of both
these classes by INSCRIPTIONS specu-
lators, also the product of the war
So, from the very beginning, the
woman wageworker had evil condi-
tions to contend against. The moth
er who was fortunate enough to pos
sess a home was too occupied with
her own sorrows to pay much atten'
tion or try to protect her less for.
tunate sister. Thus many evils found
root in our country that should new.
er have begun.
The troubled lives of the fourth
generation of mothers was over, the
fifth began. These found that men
who had not sufficiently studied al
close range the schemer, were
amazed to find that he and his kin.
dred had acquired much of the un-
used wealth of our land for his own
ACKNOWLEDGMENT and that he was
shackling the poor, creating the
slums of America with every inten-
tion to elevate himself and lower the
masses. Thus began the mighty
struggle with the bosses. These
distating, told womankind to steI
aside and keep out of the way-"keeI
/ house." no matter if there was nc
bread in the cupboard. But mems
wars and mems politics were max,
! ing their impression. Women begaI
to say How can we make bricks
without straws?" Thus the equa
suffrage party swung out into the
stream. Demands were made fol
betterment of things and the right
of ballot be given women. Eacf
year there is a greater awakening
What do the last generation o.
mothers see confronting them?
conflict between Greed and his co
horts and all righteous fathers and
mothers for the souls and bodies o.
their own flesh and blood. The con
gested centers of trade, with prob
lens of sanitation, and immoralit!
menace them on every hand. Child
laws that do not protect menace
them likewise, as well as many othel
things.
Drugs to cure the sick are adulter
ated. Despite the skill of the ply
sician, the mother loses her child.
Milk, canned goods, soft drinks
and a thousand and one food prod
ucts are adulterated Some one dies
of ptomaine poisoning, the result O
dangerous adClteration.
Thus is the mother hampered il
the duties of the home and can SET
no way of redress, so that she ma!
protect her own except by the ballot
She well knows the mothers of the
bygone race had no such things tt
contend against. Each day makes
the problem greater.
In those states where equal suf
frage has been granted, pure fooC
laws were the first laws created.
Washington is the fairest example
to women, as the sexes are more
equally divided. The results in pure
food alone were worth the givint
women the ballot. Should l follow
up the work that must be done tt
better our school system, to throw
out undesirable text books and 81
on, it would show mothers that the!
have their work cut out for them
but have not the space. The spin
ming wheel, the OK cart, the Dutcl
oven and the sickle are relegated tt
the past Men should be fail
enough, and the best of them are, tC
allow us to work toward the imme
diate betterment of the present gen
Grafton of children in whom, natur