Evening capital and Maryland gazette. (Annapolis, Md.) 1910-1922, 1917-12-13
ORIGIN OF THE RED
CROSS CHRISTMAS SEAL
Started Nine Tears AgO As individual
Venture By Miss Bissell Since
Then Nearly SIS, 600. 900 Has
Been Raised.

Nine years ago Miss Emily r. Bis
sell, of Wilmington. Del. a well
known social worker, conceived the
idea Of the Red Cross Christmas Seal
Miss Bissel knew from personal ex-
perience that the only way to fight
tuberculosis was By means Of a pop
ular campaign Of education, and She
knew this could not be carried on
without money
She got the idea Of raising this
money al Christmas time. when the
spirit Of humanity is at It's height.
from an article by Jacob Riis, in which
he described the stamps used by the
Norwegians in their fight against the
disease. Ii the Norwegians could
raise money in this way. Miss Bissell
argued, why not the Americans
She consulted her friends. secured
all the publicity she could and
launched the movement. 1t proved to
be wonderful success, and thou
sands of Christmas parcels went out
! bearing the gay little seals People
We're delighted with them. They add
ed to the appearance of their gifts,
and they liked the idea Of helping
big cause in this unique way
BY Christmas $4,000 had been
raised. Miss Bissell was elated She
saw great future for the little seals,
but she had difficulty in making 9TH
ers see it, She appealed to the Amer
lean Red Cross 10 take over the ven-
ture, enlarge it and conduct the sale
on vast scale. The Red Cross au-
thorities at first could not see how
they could make this a part of their
national program, but Miss Bissell
proved to them that fighting tubercu-
losis by means of harmless and at
tractive Christmas stamps was worthy
peace-time propaganda
With some misgiving and at slight
cost the Red Cross printed the seals
for the second years campaign The
result more than justified Miss Bis
sells expectations, for S135,O00 worth
OF seals was sold in 1908 The Christ
mas seal became a national institu-
ton The management of the sale
was turned over to the National Asso-
citation for the Study and Prevention
of tuberculosis and each year since
then sales have increased by leaps and
bounds
Last year 105,O00,000 stamps we're
sold, bringing the total sales for the
I nine years up to $4,S00,0OO This
year the 300,000,o00 mark has been
set as a goal and the American Red
Cross and the National Association
are striving TO raise the record break
ing fund of 100000 with which to
fight consumption.
The policy on which the sale is con
Quoted is to give the community in
which the money is raised the benefit
of it's own efforts. About 80 per cent
of the funds therefore remain in the
community and go to state and local
anti-tuberculosis work, providing
propaganda to prevent the spread Of
the disease, maintaining Senatorial
and visiting nurses to educate the
public and TO care for the afflicted
The Red Cross takes the remaining 10
per cent to meet the actual expenses
of the campaign.
Don't forget that every seal you
buy will help to carry out our pro-
gram of national physical prepared
ness" is the appeal of the workers
'eThis year the work is intended es-
pecially for the protection and care OF
soldiers"