The Fargo forum and daily republican. [volume] (Fargo, N.D.) 1894-1957, 1917-03-01
AMERICANS ARE
REBUILDING THE
FRENCH VILLAGES
CBy Associated Press.l

Vitrimont, near Luneville, France,
Feb. 28.-American sympathy with the
civilian sufferers from the war has
been given more concrete expression in
this little village than in any other part
of the devastated country Immediately
behind the French fighting lines.
When Mrs. William Croker, ,of San
Francisco, chose Vitrimont in which to
carry out her idea of reconstructing
with her own means one of the villages
destroyed by the German troops in
their first rush into France she met
with much doubt and suspicion. The
people of Lorraine are practical and
hard-headed and also object to partake
of anything given in the form of char
make the proposition a purely bust
nesslike one before laying it before the
villagers.
Ali the men of fighting age are at
the front with their regiments. One of
the villagers while in the trenches one
day received from his wife a letter Civ
ing details of the plan of reconstruct
ton. He Immediately replied: "IESn't
waste ink on telling me fairy tales:
You are ready to swallow any yarn told
you. Just make up your mind as I.have
done that we have lost everything and
don't dream that good fairies are going
to restore all to u.s.
In order to convince this man and
many of his village neighbors serving
in the same corps that somebody was
really taking interest in them and that
they WOuld not merely nave TO De coll
tent with the government indemnity of
so per cent of their losses, Miss Daisy
Polk, also a Californian and now ad-
ministrator of the plan, gave printed
wives left behind. These were forward
ed at once to the men at the front, who
could be assured only by documentary
evidence of this kind of the good for
tune to be conferred on them and their
dependents.
Miss Polk, who since the beginning
of the war has been occupied in relief
work of various kinds, was chosen by
Mrs. Croker to administer her benevo-
lent scheme. She decided at once to
live among the people so as to become
better acquainted with them and to
learn their needs. Every house, with
out exception, had been either shelled
or burnt. She, however, was able to
find a one-roomed cottage which could
be repaired and here from her single
room Miss Polk directs, all the work.
She interviews there the architect, the
builders, the departmental officials and
government functionaries and only re-
Gently received Ambassador William G.
Sharp, who had come to lay the cor
nerstone of the first new house.
OF the seventy houses composing the
village, thirty-four were shelled and
the remaining thirty-six burned The
government itself decided to repair the
bombarded houses. which were not so
badly damaged as those which had been
set afire. The reconstruction of these
latter was undertaken by Mrs. Croker.
No attempt was made by the authors
of the scheme to force American ideas
down the threats of the conservative
Lorrainers Very little change had
taken place in the village since the
fifteenth century and the style of ar
chitecture was very uniform, usually
taking the shape of one or two-story
cottages with grange-door entrances
and attached at the back the granaries
and cattlesheds. The only changes in
sisted on by the promoters OF the
scheme as well as by the French gov
eminent were the introduction of SAM
tary arrangements which hitherto had
been non-existent, the provision of
ventilation in the rooms and the separ-
alton by an intervening courtyard of
the cattlesheds and the human habita-
tions.
ants could be induced to accept some of
these changes, but at length reason
prevailed and the plans were finally
drawn up.
The new village is to have wider
streets and the main road through it is
to be planted with trees, while the town
hall and school are now to occupy
prominent and spacious positions in the
center of the village instead OF being
hidden as before the war in narrow
lanes without any air space.