The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1917-12-29


methods than our ancestors. The
women in America are not going into
the death battalions as the women of
Russia are doing to encourage their
slackers. They are not fighting from
their windows with belt buckles OF ire
| mendous size, as did the women in the
| battles of the early centuries.
They are giving time, money, INTEL
ligence, organization and influence to
| the task of making this world as good
a place to live in as it can be when
half the world is a battle-ground.
The historian, who, having finished
| with the political reasons for the pres
ent war, looks with interest upon the
| advancement of women into public life
at this epoch, will find material worthy
| of a brilliant pen.
No one has yet written of that feeble
start made only two decades ago
among the women who wished to earn
their own living in this country. From
that lighting Of the candle. the his
torian can trace the path until it
comes to the present day and passes
on into the brilliant light of fulfill
ment
In this invasion of women into civic
and business affairs, there is wrapped
up a nations growth and whole CEN
fury of psychological and moral de-
velopment.
Two decades ago, one did not speak
of a woman who was in business with
any degree of pride. The family made
excuses for her. Men wondered what
the sex was coming to and vowed that
such women could never be wives and
mothers The professions opened
their doors to women half way, and
few were paid the prices paid to men.
Contrast that beginning with the
situation before the war. Thousands
of women in the department shops, IN
all the superior offices of the country,
as heads of magazines, richly paid re-
porters on papers, dressmaEers rolling
in fortunes, lawyers handling difficult
cases
Then the war broke and the tidal
wave that washed up on the shores OF
society carried women to higher pin
nacles, than they had ever hoped to
reach in the affairs of nation None
were so rich, none SO poor, none so
conspicuous, none so obscure but founo
a way in which to serve the country
Society is secondary. clothes are
secondary. The professions, such as
the stage, art and singing. are sub
merged for a time. Our women are
not forming battaltons of death;
they're forming battalions Of life. They
are aroused to the -uttermost depths
of their age-old instincts to preserve
and to help.
Woman has saved while man has
slain all throughout the history of life
on this planet. She is doing it now,
but there is a gulf of difference fixed
between the way she did it in the Civil
war and the way she's doing 1t in this
war, and on that very difference rests
the foundation for the historians
great story of woman's advancement
between the two great wars on this
continent.
She is not morbid. and therefore,
she will not abjure or eliminate the
necessities of life and the pleasures of
living She will still dress well. and
she will spend her leisure time en-
joying herself, for that is the Anglo
Saxon manner and it will prevail until
the race is extinct.
WHY not look that fact well in the
face instead of talking about eliminat-
ing everything that makes life pleas
ant and endurable and reducing it to
the bare skeleton that makes it unen-
durable. If a woman is hard at work,
she is not morbid, and the American
women. formed into huge battalions of
endeavor, will probably feel
a certain strain of happiness during
this next winter that they have never
before felt in their narrowed and Jim
tied lives.
In addition to those who work for
pleasure, there ar literally thousands
who are going to labor for money for
the first time in their lives. Release
the men, is the cry of the day. Hire
the women" is the cry that comes af-
ter And already these two slogans
have proved so successful in the battle
of this country for commercial SUI
premacy that the men are beginning
to grumble because they fear they will
not get back their places when the war
is over.
1t seems as tho there is no occupa-
ton in which women cannot equal
men as soon as the responsibility is
put upon them. They're leaping at
their chances like young lion cubs to-
ward pieces of meat held before their
noses.
Take your place in the stir of these
timcs!" called out a great preacher to
his congregation, and every woman
answered the command. His cry has
become the trumpet NaI to the women
of the country, and there is no use
wasting tins pr dieting that they will
go back to their own level when this
war is over.
When the intelligence is awakened.
as it has been, there is no narcotic of
wealth and security that can deaden
it again. The situation must be looked
at in the light of a great historic
event It viii be regarded as one of
the supreme movements in the upward
path of women in mass.
The Clothes We, Need
There is no use preaching to women
to be stingy about clothes, and there
Is no use teIilng these women OF aWak-
ened intelligence that they must wear
old and rlabby things, because they
are beginning to understand that this
is not the way to make a nation pros
porous. Ten years ago. that slogan
might have appealed to women; to-
day. it is brushed aside as a silly argu-
ment
The Standardization of clothes is an
other bit of childish talk, verbal pap,
as it were, given to children who have
grown to be thinking beings.
If ten thousand women decided
upon a coat and skirt for everyday
wear this winter. as a uniform, the
price of that suit would be raised far
beyond the present price of any cos
tune. So there's no economy in that.
In such a suit. ten women will look
well and one thousand win look their
worst So that's an argument that
might work as leaven against the