The daily Gate City and constitution-Democrat. (Keokuk, Iowa) 1916-1922, 1919-02-01
When It Comes to Proving Them up
in Work Of a Year and More.
Done Without Thought OF
Time Element.
RED CROSS WORK BADGE
1t Looks Like Few Of Them VIII Be
Asked for In keokuk and Fewer
Awarded Under Conditions h
Imposed.

Imposed.
How many Keokuk people did
enough work-and can prove ito
get one of the Red Cross service
badges and certificates?
Considerable discussion among
Keokuk women shows that the an
swer to this question is not easy to
give at this stage of the proceedings
Some women are requesting appll-
cation blanks from Howard w. Wood
secretary of the Keokuk Red Cross
chapter, and many more are not.
The most difficult problem of esti-
mating time is that of the at-home
knitters and Of those who belonged
ito the rural auxiliaries who took
sewing to their homes. They took
no thought of hours, but knit ana
|sewed at spare moments.
A dozen interviews with as many
different women in West Keokuk, at
Sandusky. Montrose and belmont
brought the one answer.
They Did All They Could.
II haven't Ill luSd, gave Oh 'sAS
time could spare"
From the knitters often came the
answer to the inquiry as to time
given: II could have done much
more, only that we were not able to
get wool much Of the time" This
scarcity of wool often for weeks at
la time prevented the knitters from
making the average of two full days
a week for ffty-two weeks, or four
full days week for twenty-s1x
weeks.
The gist OF information gained
from twenty or twenty-five interviews
points to the probability that when
the Questionnaires are received by
the, secretary Of the Red Cross and
the workers come to compute their
own time and III out the blanks. the
number of certificates and badges
awarded will be few compared with
! the whole number who worked at the
shops or at home.
| Also, that many Keokuk women
who worked many hours and accom-.
plished much, will not even apply for
! a QUESTIONABLE, because they do not
care to take the trouble to try to
j figure out how many hours they
worked-and anyhow they did not
work for reward. but to help the
soldiers.
Estimates over TWO Hundred.
! One woman who has done an i'm
mense amount of work in the Red
Cross of Keokuk, and who will not
apply for a service badge, estimates
the number of women who have done
enough to win the badge as over two
hundred in Keokuk alone.
Il put in every minute / could at
any old time in the day, like many
other women" Mrs. Grace Swan
Wirth said, land l knitted evenings
and Sundays, If you whisper it low
and it's utterly impossible for me
to ever even estimate what the total
time is that / put in at the Red
Cross work.
zone evening, a few of us were
making dressings together, and one
woman said she had made a certain
number that afternoon with her din
ner dishes unwashed, and that even
| ing she made another certain num-
Der with the supper dishes unwashed
and next morning she was going
to have a carnival Of dish-washing at
her house.
Unlisted Heroines Of the War;
There are hundreds of women just
like that who find it utterly impos-
sible to tell how many hours they
worked as total-whether it was
eight hundred, or eighty, or eighteen
hundred.
They will never claim any service
badge, because they have no definite
idea themselves how many hours
they worked in the almost two years
they gave all the time they could to
the good cause.
I'VE worked without any idea of
any honors to come to us, and I'm
mot going to put in any claim for a
badge now, under all the circum-
stances.
When it was suggested that per-
haps output might be made another
basis for the award of the service
badges of honor, Mrs Wirth gave
five good reasons why that plan
would not work equitably at all-for
one thing, it would give the expert
enced seamstress who found sewing
easy the advantage over another
woman who worked twice as hard to
create half the output.
Hundred Hours Long Time.
That there are fewer eligibles for
the service badge than might appear
at first is indicated by the fact that
Mrs. r. M. Lapsley, who was one of
the most faithful and efficient work
ers at the shop, has taken the pains
to compute her time. She began
work as the shop was opened-and
worked as instructor and as a regu-
lar member OF two auxiliaries beside
doing inspecting, as long as gauze
work was done, and the time as COM
pnted by Mrs. Lapsley amounted to
500 hours.
Mrs. George s. Merriam who has
been one OF the diligent knitters as
se:l 5s-ia<s 81 4i.<a .is-