The Hays free press. [volume] (Hays, Kan.) 1908-1924, 1918-11-28
THE BLUE TRIANGLE
ON BABEL'S TOWER

due inquire suddenly Oenl OOW1 over |
her. Excitedly she shook her head in |
answer To- the question that she could |
not understand. She searched through
her red plaid waist for the paper that
Tony had folded into a little square
and given TO her. The writing on it,
in the English that Tony knew and she
did not, told the house where she lived.
Tony had explained it all to her that
morning. He had told it to her again
at the station. Then, waving his hat,
he had disappeared into the train with
the rest of the men, and Lucia haG
been left standing oueside the gate.
There were crowds of women pushing
all about her. They were weeping.
So Lucia wept, too.
Lucia had been betrOthed to Tony
in the old country. Five years before,
with a long ticket for New York
pinned into his inside pocket, her lover
had left her. He wrote in every let
ter that he had made her a home in
the new country. Her dOwry money
had finally provided her own transpOr-
tatiOn, and for two months Tony and
she had been married. Then he had
drawn q ticket with number on 1T,
and this morning he had gone off to
war.
To the policeman Lucia told all these
things in rapid Italian. But the pO-
Iiceman only talked back to her as
rapidly in a language that was not
Italian She followed him dumbly to
headquarters. An hour later a wom-
an wearing American clothes gently
J, in, fTTI
ian.
Italian Lucia was only one of thou
sands of fOreign-born women, Syrians,
Italians, Armenians, Russians, Lithu-
anians, Polish, who, when the draft
called their men folk to the American
colors, asked in helpless confusion
what it was all about. When would
their men be back? What did people
mean when they told them they would
receive money through the mail?
! Where could they find work that they
knew how to do? Was there no one
who could explain It all to them in
their own language?
The Y. w. c. a. was ready to offer
assistance, but it would be of no value
| to offer it in English. Consequently
| it had to supply a corps of women who
| could talk to the foreign-bOrn woman
at her own door in the language that
she was used to hearing in the home
land. To teach her English was as
essential factor in her AmericaniZa-
ton as to find her a job. Therefore
| the war council of the Y W. G. 4. set
out to find her English.
A year before the war began in Eu-
! rope, the leaders of the Young WOm-
! ans Christian association fOresaw just
such a situation, and made ready to
| meet it. They studied the needs Of
| the immigrant. They trained skilled
American social workers to become IA
miliar with the home habits and to
speak the language of the Lett and the
Hungarian and the Greek and the 9th
er foreign mothers who brought ba-
bfes and bundles over from Ellis island
to Battery park.
The organization into which this ex-
pertinent has developed was named
by the 7. W. G. A. national board, ''The
international Institute for Young
Women" In terms which these wOm-
en- can understand, it is teaching the
foreign-born how to sew and cook and
care for the baby.
To girls like Italian Lucia, who con
fusediy fingered on the station plat
forms when the draft trains pulled out
the W. Y. c. A. is giving direct as
sistance. Educated European women
appointed to the regular staff Of work
ers at the camp Y. W. G. A. Hostess
) Houses are able to talk to the drafted
5 men in their own language, assist then
) in writing letters home, and in ar
s ranging furloughs and little visits tt
3 the camp.
'aThe Home Information Service fol
Foreign Families of Enlisted Men" Il
doing practical relief work for TIT
wives and mothers. The purpose o
s the board is to help the women foil
left behind to understand where thei
5 boys are and how they are being treat
ed; how they need home support ant
5 cheer, how to send them comforts, AM
Z to keep pace themselves by learnini
) English and other things, so that whel
the boys come home they will not fin
: their women still very un-Americal
= and out of sympathy with them.
Food conservation bulletins hav
: been translated into IS or 10 languages
1
( interpreters are available for the nOI
English speaking women by whom tn
real war industries of the country ar
being largely carried on. In % in
( portant cities international Insttut
Bureaus are training American an
: foreign women for full time socif
9 service work with foreigners Twent!
3 four trained women are employed o
9 the national and district field staff {
3 the 7. w. c. A On June Is there wer
9 100 trained women working at Amer
8 canization.
81 When more than 10000 Chicago me
3 filed out their blue cards for the Sci
8 TENDER ID draft, Gang Luo Wong al
8 peared at one precinct bringing wit
g him Mrs. Gang Wong and the thre
8 children. All five wished TO registe
8 The enrolling clerk explained, but Il
8 Gang Luo Wongs make many broke
g Chinese remonstrances before the ma
s ter Of the family was induced 10 sig
9 a card without his wife. Mrs. WOT
s could not speak English. What wou
g his family do in a strange country
4