The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1917-12-18

recently as a benefit for their charity
fund. Miss Yoder is a prominent
member of the league. and went to
Kansas City for rehearsals and the
performances of the show kansas
City weekly paper remarks:
although our young people showed
exceptional talent in the 'Follies.' and
the dailies have given extra space TO
its exploitation, the consensus OF
opinion seems to be that the three
stars in the feminine contingent were
Betty Smith Virginia Reiger and
Helen Yoder. These three were most
professional in their poise, not being
at all embarrassed by the large audi
ences. All three girls are types dis
tinctly different but brunettes. I hope
the Comedy club affords these three
chance to do serious work.
X X x
VERSATILITY.
Our womankind. time out of mind
Having Won her halo in Red Cross,
She now is playing poker!
Ona Winants Borland, wife of Sen
ator BorIand of Missouri, has writ
fen an article on Our War Christmas
for a Missouri paper. Friends OF Mrs
Borland in Topeka who have seen the
article have asked for its reprint here.
1t is as follows:
ers away from home at training
camps, dreaming of a peace on
earth" to be won only thru their sac
rifice and bloodshed.
Christmas! and our boys tossed on
the gray Atlantic now alive with
more dread monsters than ever the
ancients imagined it to have in the
DAYS of earth's innocency, when naVl-
gators were kept near shore by stories
of sea dragons and ocean lions
Oh nd
husbands already in the trenches.
Christmasl and on Christmas Day,
perhaps, some dear one will breathe
out his last agonizlng prayer as from
somewhere in France his soul goes up
to be born anew into life eternal on
Christmas Day.
And shall we women toy with silks
and ribbons, laces and embroidery, to
make for each other the nameless
nothings that have so long parodied
we not forswear the mockery of 'eX-
changing presents" and learn from
the Master how to give?
Give to the poor. a little tele-
phone girl said the other day as she
knitted khaki wristlets 1T isn't real
giving if we give to people who can
pay back"
Does it need a war to teach Ameri-
can women that it is more blessed to
give than to receive? If only we mad
learned the lesson long ago, II we nad
freely given to Belgium millions in
stead of dropping pennies into tin
cans because they clinked as loud as
dimes. If we had applied to our
money giving the maxim, Give until
it hurts" perhaps we should n Ot now
be giving our very flesh and blood.
But our pocketbooks are like an ul-
cerated tooth The first touch hurts!
Let us this Christmas give as we
have never given before, not only un-
til it hurts, but give and give until it
stops hurting and becomes JOY.
But let it be to those who cannot
pay US back" to the soldiers and sail
ors, to the poor and sick and needy.
Let us go back in memory and recall
those with whom We used to go to
school, old neighbors who have al
most slipped from our memory; hunt
them out and see how many of them
are in need, how many of them have
boys at the front to whom we can
send real gifts; how many of them
have boys or girls whom they cannot
afford to send to college, but whom
we can send. The colleges have lost
not recruit among our acquaintance?
For even more than soldiers Uncle
Sam will soon be needing men and
women of disciplined mind. Where
will they be found? Is there not some
poor boy in your office, some girl in
your Sunday school whom you could