The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1917-09-18
Dorothy Di1 Says
BY DOROTHY DIX
worlds Highest Paid Woman Writer
THE REWARD.

! having a special medal struck to pre-
/ sent to such of the men in our army
as perform deeds of signal valor, even
as Germany and England and France
pin decorations on the breasts of their !
| heroes, so that all who see them may |
know of their bravery. !
/ When this medal is struck, another /
one should be struck as a companion |
piece to it. This other medal should .
| be in the design of a bleeding heart /
with two white bars across it, and on ,
4 these bars should be in letters of gold /
/ the words PATRIOTISM and COUR- !
AGE, and this insignia of the highest
order of merit should be pinned on
| the breast of every woman who has
willingly given husband or son to the
/ service of her country
| Hers is a love of country greater .
| than the love of life because she Of
fers up on the altar of her patriotism
that which is far dearer to her than
life itself. Hers is a courage greater
than that Of the man who goes into
battle, because he can only die once
while she dies a thousand deaths of
anxiety every day, ina ginning the nor
rors that may be happening to him.
| The man has the strange. thrilling
I excitement of war to~keep his pulses
tuned to concert pitch. He has the
rush and press of work to occupy his
thoughts; new scenes and experiences
to divert him; the support. mental and
bodily, of doing things in large crowds;
the touch OF spiritual and physical
The woman must make her fight
alone in the silence of the empty
home. with nothing but monotonous
household duties to fill her days, often
with new necessity for pinching
economy now that the bread winner is
gone, and always with too much time
in which to think the thoughts in
which madness lies. 1t takes courage
to face a prospect like that, and the
woman who does it gladly and cheer
fully for her country's sake is just as
truly a patriot and q hero as any man
who ever led a forlorn hope in battle.
| l should like to see that badge OF
| the bleeding heart dominated by the
white bars of patriotism and courage
on the breast of every true American
woman who has not wept, nor plead
ed, nor tried to keep her men folks
from doing their duty to their coun-
try. 1 should like to take off my hat
every time l see such a decoration, as
, a Frenchman salutes the cross of the
Legion of Honor, and so 1 suggest
that when our government strikes
> medals for it's heroes, it also strikes
, a medal to give to the heroic women
who have given these heroes to their
country.
No one would minimize the sacri-
flee that a mother makes when she
sends her son forth to war, but this
is to be said to comfort her-War is
not wholly evil. 1t is not even as dan
gerous as her morbid fancies paint 1t,
: and if many a woman will lose her
son in battle. many another woman
will get back son who has been re-
born in that fiery furnace. one who
2 went forth a weaking and came back
a man.
Those who know what the raining
of an army camp will do for a youth
physically declare that as many of our
young men will save their lives thru
Y the>war as will be killed by it. Thin
chested, aenemic, stooP shouldered
lads, who have never done any man
ual labor, harder than pushing a pen
across sheet of paper or up and
2 down ledger, and whose only exer-
else has been confined to fox trotting
in a crowded restaurant, will come
back from the war broad of shoulder,
,. straight as an arrow. big muscled.
. Five more years of office work would
= have landed these boys in the graves
them
+ Hard work in the open air. sleeping
out of doors, regular hours, plenty of
:, plain nourishing food. these will drive
= | the angel with the scythe back into the
| shadow for a quarter of a century or
6 more for unnumbered thousands of
9 young men whose days, but for this
war, would be numbered. The big in
II demnity that fate is going to pay us
Il in this war is to turn lot of sickly
little fabby manikins into husky he
q men.
n Another bright spot in this war is
4 that it is doing more in one minute
s to stamp out intemperance than has
been done in all the balance of the
history of the human race. And the
mother who sends her boy forth to
serve his country may count on get
ting him back cured of the drink
e habit. if he had it, or YVES acquiring it.
e That alone almost atones for the
e sacrifice of war, for while it may
II wiring a womans heart to watch and
e for her
e war, and she may shed many tears
II picturing him in the trenches. her
l. heart is not so desolate nor her tears
e so bitter as if she sat watching and
|; waiting for the stumbling steps of a
e drunken son, or if her fancy pictured
him lying in the gutter. For in one
r case she has the comfort of knowing
that he is doing the part of a man.
e and in the other she has the sorrow
of knowing that he has descended be-
low the level of the brute.
L No man in the uniform of the
United States army can touch a droI
! of intoxicating liquor. That ruling is
u | going to save from the curse OF
" drunkenness tens of tiousa nds of boys
, who were just beginning to acquire q
a taste for liquor. AT the risk of their
- skins their souls will be saved
" Building up their bodies is going tc
keep the neurotic from having theil
4 nerves cry out for stimulants The
,e cold hard fact that drink diTninishe:
" mans efficiency to such an extenr
that it cannot be risked in war time.
is the biggest temperance argument
Mt that could possibly be offered to 2
- man with any intelligence in his head
Keep a boy away from drinking dur.
ing the silly years in which he think.
it shows how much of a man he is t.
N make swine out of himself, and he.
- not likely to ever become a drunkard
All of these are factors in the grea
| nat ion in drira LII
is bringing about, and that will almos
justify it in the eyes of women VIII,
have found King Alcohol as deadly al
enemy ever the kaiser is