Alma record., 1915-05-20
LETTER FROM PHILIPPINES

pines, TO his little brother, Charles X.
Morgan Jr.
Paul j. Morgan is well known in
Alma, having graduated from the
high school in 1910. He was stud
ent of Alma College and of Columbia
University, Mo-, from which place he
received his appointment by the Gov
ernment to go to the Philippines as
Supervising Teacher of Misamis Dis
trict At the close of the first year,
he was promoted to the position of
head teacher, with four supervising
teachers under him.
A team of girls from his district
won the championship of the Philip
F! pines in baseball
Cagayan, Msamis, March Ia, 1915
Dear Brother
received your nice long letter the
other day and was much surprised at
how well you can write. suppose
you have grown lot too, since | left
and that | will hardly know you when
! get home. | am glad you are saving
money to buy bicycle with. will
send you some more to help you get
it, but perhaps you would rather have
me send you some present from Japan
or China than to have money toward
a bicycle. Write and tell me which
you would rather have. am hoping
that ! can spend my vacation this
summer in Japan and China. Do you
know where those places are? You
look US up on the map Some of the
places | expect to visit, Hongkong,
Tientsin, Shanghai, Peking. Canton,
Kiauchau, Port Arthur, possibly Seoul
and Nagasaki, Kobe, Kioto, Toxic and
Yokahoma. / will probobly visit many
other places but these are the large
cities that will be liable to touch at.
Do you know that some little brown
Filipino girls, not much bigger than
you are, had a chance to go to Manila
this year to play indoor baseball and
that they won the championship of
the Philippines. They come from Oro-
quieta, Misamis. don't know wheth-
er you have a map that is good enough
to show that place or not, but they
come from the province in which
live and they go to schools which
often visit on my inspection trips.
The oldest one OF these little girls is
only 10 years old and the youngest ten
but they are much smaller than Amer
lean boys and girls. The little ten
year old short stop is about the size
of six year old boy or girl in the
United States. When | come home |
will bring picture of these little
girls. There are none. of them who
have finished the fourth grade except
one and that one is in the fifth grade.
You must remember that Filipino boys
and girls do not begin to go to school
when they are as young as American
boys and girls and they do not go to
school regular because there is no law
compelling them to go to school and
then to they are studying in a foreign
language and that makes it much
harder for them But whatever these
little girls lack in academic education
they make up in physical education
for they know what they must eat to
keep in training to play baseball and
they play the game as we'll as any.
baseball team ever saw in the United
States. They are as hard as bullets
and | almost believe you could throw
one up against a stone wall and not
hurt her bit. Last August they be-
gan to play indoor baseball every Sun
day afternoon. This would be consid-
cred very bad in the United States but
here where there is nothing for the
people to do, it is considered alright
With the help of their supervising
teacher, league was organized with
the other schools near Oroquieta and
these little girls played two or three
games every Sunday afternoon. Soon
the people began to come to see their
games and IN many of the barrios the
people Go not go to the cockpit any
more if they know that the girls
are going to play indoor baseball. The
girls are very poor and so they had to
walk to these towns because they had
no horses TO ride and there was no
roads that a wagon could travel. Many
times they would walk from to Z or
miles TO play two OF three games of
indoor baseball and then walk back i'm
the evening. How would you like to
do that? But that is what made them
so hard and strong and anyone who
thinks athletics is not good thing.
ought to come and look at the devel-
opement of those girls They played
a game every Sunday from the middle
of August to the middle of December
when | decided that they were good
enough to represent Misamis in the
Inter Visayan Field meet at Duma-
guete where seven provinces were rep
resented. There they won every game
and big silver cup. That made the
girls feel very good but it was only
month later when they were chosen
to go to Manila to compete in the Car
nival Meet for the Championship of
the Philippines in Indoor Baseball. |
The money to send them, about $500, |