Iowa state bystander. [volume] (Des Moines, Iowa) 1894-1916, 1914-02-27
AERQ:AMERCAN CULL|NCS

In an address delivered at the Audi.
torium at Houston, Tex, e. l. Black.
shear, the head OF the Prairie View
Normal and Industrial College for Col,
ored Youths, had this to say concern.
ing the reasons why the negroes Of
Houston are specially interested in the
movement to build general hospital
In Houston. The plan contemplated
does not seek to make one hospital do
for both races. They will be separate
and distinct institutions; but there is
to be a hospital for both, and upon the
basis that in caring for his own health
interests the white citizen must pro-
tect the colored as a matter Of Safe
ty First" s
Following is the address delivered:
Rev. Mr.. Pevoto Of the Baptist SAM.
tarium of Houston in visit to Prairie
View on recent Sunday used the Sab
bath school lesson of the day as the
basis OF his remarks. 1t was the les
son Of the Good Samaritan, and the
speaker saw In this parable the germ
of the modern hospital. And indeed,
how true is it that this spirit of the
Good Samaritan. who picked up help
less stranger, wounded and sore, and
bound up his wounds and placed him
in the Eastern inn for care and pro-
lection exemplifies the spirit of Christ,
now manifested in modern hospitals,
and In the Red Cross system of nation
al and international relief Regard
less of race, nationality or creed, the
Red Cross spirit, the modern hospital
spirit, takes hold of helpless suffer-
ers and gives them relief and medical
and sanitary attention. The spirit of
Christ is not the secular spirit and
pride of nationality or race so we'll ex-
empllfied in the classic civilizations of
Greece and Rome, but it is the spirit
of humanity, the spirit of the Golden
Rule, the spirit of human sacrifice for
human good, the spirit of the Good
Samaritan.
The colored people as a part Of
Gods common humanity need the help
of modern medical science and sani-
tation. From the standpoint of self
protection, the municipality owes its
colored population sanitary conditions,
for bacterial diseases are no respecter
of race or color once they find lodg-
ment; and bacterial infection or con-
tagion, originating from unwholesome
conditions among colored people may
thrust their fatal hand even into the
mansions of wealth and culture. 1t is
of interest to the whites that the
bodies and hands and homes of those
of the colored people who cook the
food and wash the clothing and dress
and handle the children of the white
people should be clean, wholesome and
sanitary. Speaking generally, insani-
tary conditions and disease among the
negro people weaken the efficiency of
the city's labor and entail loss upon
invested capital, which is fruitless
without efficient labor.
In the older days faithful slave
women were the nurses of the south.
They sat in humble patience at the
bedside of the stricken mistress or her
children, the dusky Samaritans of an
alien race. Just as my grandmother,
Aunt Harriet of Montgomery, Ala, was
type of the cooks of olden days who,
Midaslike, turned whatever cooking
material they touched to the gold
palatableness, so my wife's grandmoth-
er, Aunt Celia of Grenada, Miss, was
a type of the nurses of old, who was in
truth a Good Samaritan in black, and,
for miles around, was sent for to nurse
the afflicted white women and children
back to health and happiness.