Rock Island Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1893-1920, 1919-03-22
WINS PRIZE FOR
THE BEST ESSAY
ON PROHIBITION

Appended is the essay of Flor
ence Stewart, pupil at the Frank
lin school, who won first prize in
the W. C. T. q. contest, writing on
the subject of "Some of the Good
Things That National Prohibition
VIII Do for Our Boys and Girls"
We, the children of America,
have reason to be grateful to our
parents and all the great leaders
| of national prohibition for put
ting out of our country the liquor
evil. AS we move forward to fill
/ our fathers places, we as nation
will not have this great foe to
fight.
But we will have many respon-
sibilities upon our shoulders and
will need the best of educations.
The liquor traffic being out of the
way will give US more money for
this purpose. There will be need
of less asylums and fewer jails
because drink is responsible for
most Of the inmates of these in
situations. A large per cent of the
children born of alcoholic parents
are idiots. In our own city, we
have had many examples of Grim
| inals who have committed their
crimes because they were under
the influence of liquor. The money
that was spent to take care of
these people can now be used for
schools.
The children of thousands of IA
theirs who drink with the past
years have suffered utmost tor
ture from their drunken parents
They have gone hungry for days
and without shoes or clothing.
When pay day would come the ia
Their would go to the saloon and
pay his bill, then drink and treat
some other men. Thus the saloon
keeper would get the money that
should have gone for groceries,
clothes and books. Since prohibit
ton has begun to go into effect
these children have been coming
to school better clothed, with
cleaner, stronger bodies and plenty
of books.
Boys and girls in poor homes,
where there are drunken parents,
are obliged to leave school and go
to work as soon as they are old
enough, to help support the family.
With the temptation to drink out
of their way the parents will be
able to work and the children can
remain more years in school and
become better fitted for their life
work.
The death of John Barleycorn
will fhiC country for
boys and girls to grow up in.
inals and drunken men abroad
after dark and children will be
saved from much agony of fear.
Neither will there be as many
temptations to lead children into
sin. The pool hall and public
dances, as we'll as other bad
places, are the result of the sa-
loon. Then, too, children are fire.
quently sent to the saloon for Ii
Quor Many a boy or girl has been
caused to blush with shame as
they pass some of their school
mates while they were carrying a
bucket of beer from the saloon,
home to their parents
In the future there will not be
so many dull children in school. In
1901 DR.. MacNicholI made some
scientific Investigations for the
New York Academy of Medicine,
and discovered that out of every
100 children of drinking parents,
there were So billiards, while out
of the same number of those whose
parents did not use alcohol, there
were only 10.
A story in the newspapers re-
Gently shows what a terrible thing
alcohol is for the youths of our
large cities. A 10-year-Old boy and
his accomplices killed their play
mate who was 8. These boys lived
in a westside tenement district of
Chicago where saloons are plenti-
full. They came from families who
are very poor because of booze
The father of the murderer earned
SIS the week before this occurred,
the mother told the detective, and
only gave her 81. He spent the re-
mainder for whisky.
The Chicago Daily Journal said:
'The boys, the most youthful muir
derers in the country's police rec