Atlanta semi-weekly journal. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1898-1920, 1917-12-18
GERMANS TRIED,
BUT COULD NOT,
DRESS IN PAPER
Shortage of Wool and Cotton
Drove Government to Ex-
pertinent With Paper for
Clothes, Failed
BY HERBERT COREY.

against most probable contingencies
DURING II time of war y wandering
tinker had been arrested on charge
Of wasting bread by feeding it to his
performing bear.
"But the bear must eat said the
tinker defantly, to the Judge He is
my livelihood
The judge held the point well taken
but he ordered another process inSti-
tuted and fined the tinker score of
marks.
You should have conformcd to the
law and secured a bread card for the
bear" said he.
Modern man needs clothing quite as
much as he does food. The German
government carly took into conSidera-
ton the fact that a replenishment of
the supply of clothes and the raw ma
terial for clothes would be next to i'm
possible, because Of the blockade and
the restrictions on the neutral nations.
Germany produces no cotton and not
enough linen and wool to even partially
FIJI her most moderate annual needs.
Even if il had been possible for The in
dividnal to buy clothing outside the
German border, The buying would have
been frovned upon by the government
1t would have sent money out Of the
country, and that was. distinctly
against the country's interests. The
desires of the individual have never
been taken into account by Germany.
To meet this situation the govern
ment imported what linen and wool it
could, for weaving into cloth i'm Ger
many. 1t imported all the cotton pro-
durable. for use in making explosives.
Then il began TO nirt with substitutes
The German success in making 1000
different and disable things out of coal
tar seems to have almost turned the
Teutonic head. \ theory grew up that
substitute could be found for every
thing. Artificial fats. miIks. buffers,
chocolates, coffees and the like almost
ruined the German digestion before the
fact finally soaked home that real food
cannot be made in this way
I'VE will make clothing out of paper"
said the German scientists.
The reasoning was conclusive, even if
they had never heard of the paper vests
of Russell Sage. 1t seems to have run
about this way. Clothing cannot be
made out of ordinary paper, because
paper tears. But cloth is woven out of
thread. We are making very excellent
paper string and paper thread. Let us,
therefore, weave paper cloth out of paper
thread We will destroy the cotton
grower of America who has proven him
make our friends the sheep raisers in
the Argentine sell their wool to us at
our own price, on pain of ruin. Are
not our artificial nitrates to put out
of business the nitrate beds of Chill?
Well, then.
But the paper clothes seem not to
have been a success. The paper cloth
was all right. 1t looked like a good
Scotch mixture, or broadcloth or any
other texture that it was desired to
initiate The official report was that
the paper cloth wore we'll and stood
strains we'll and was in all ways de-
sirable, and yet it appears that paper
clothes never became fashionable in
Germany. The time may come when
the householder may gather up the days
supply of lettings and Arbeiters and
go down to the mill and have them
woven into nobby suiting. but that day
seems not to have come yet Perhaps
cloth woven of paper strings proved too
receptive to the chill German wind,
or there may have been other difficult
ties.
At any rate, while one hears a great
deal of the talk of paper suits. men who
have just left Germany after continuous
residence there during the war assure
me they had never seen them in use.
A similar effort was made to make cloth
out of wood pulp, but this seems to
have shared the same fate. 1t was the
oretically possible, but practically it
did not go. A cloth made of woollen
shoddy was loaded with wood pulp. so
that it made a fair appearance, but it
was not practical for clothing. Some
thing else had to be done.
The government solved the problem
by placing restrictions on the pur-
chase of new clothes. Each German
was compelled to wear out the stock
Of old clothes on hand Nowadays neck
ties are the one article of apparel that
can be bought without a police permit,
but before regulations became so severe
every effort was made to lessen pur-
chases. Merchants were not permitted
to advertise bargain sales, attractive
offerings might not be placed in the show
windows, and comparative prices were
not permitted to be displayed. If one
wanted an article which could be
bought without a special permit he might
go in a store and buy it. but the store
was not permitted to suggest his want
to him.
Nowadays Germany is clothed entire
ly in garments of the cut of 1914 and
before Everyone is wearing out his or
her cast-offs. 1t is a mark of patriotism
to wear shabby suits and the man who
appeared in a new one would feel him
self compelled to explain his reasons to
his neighbors. AS not every German
had enough old clothes on hand to equip
him for the sartorial needs of today the
government has established a second
hand clothing bureau, which buys and
sells old clothes. One of it's principal
functions. however. is to receive gifts
from those who have a surplus and pro-
vide those gratis who have none and
cannot afford to buy.
The shoe situation was met in the
same manner. 1t has been fashionable
"a real fad--to go barefoot during the
past summer in many of the German
towns and cities and almost universally
in the rural districts. Children in
majority of the German schools, though
not in the well-to-do city districts, were
told by their teachers that on a certain
day they might appear at school bare
foot, something unheard of before. So
general did the barefoot habit become
that the administrations of some dis
tricts were forced to issue warnings to
tender-footed persons who had worn
shoes all their lives.
Many cases of tetanus have been re-
ported because of barefoot-going," the
warning ran in effect. Harden your
feet gradually before you venture on the
public thoroughfares."
Sandals are now in very general use
and will be up to snowfall-whlch
are made of a wooden sole and a few