Ellsworth American., 1919-02-26
Y. ". C. A. OPENS
WORK IN ITALY
Tea and Club Rooms Opened for
American Women.
Miss Charlotte Niven, Director OF itai-
ian Work, Prepares for Influx OF
American Woman Students.

Italy is now included In the war
work of the American Y. w. c. A.
Miss Mabel Warner of Salina, Kan.
and Chicago left Paris few days ago
for Rome, where she will be in charge
of Hostess House for American girls
employed there by the American Red
Cross, the Embassy and the new Tu-
berculosis Commission. Miss Warner
has been director of the Y. w. c. A.
Hostess House at Brest, France.
Miss Warner will open a tea room
and club rooms where the American
women can gather for social times.
Rome is harboring a refuge population
of about 10000 and accommodations
are difficult to find.
The work in Rome was started as
direct result of the appeal of Miss
Charlotte Niven, one of the National
Y. w. C. A. secretaries Of Italy. who Is
spending few months in France as
advisor in the French work.
Miss Niven's dreams of Y. W. c. A.
work In Italy include the maintenance
of a residence for non-ltalian women,
who, she feels, will come TO Italy IN
great numbers after the war to study
music and art
~ believe at this time such project
is particularly important because wo-
should hQ
encouraged to come TO Italy to replace
the great numbers of German women
who flooded Italy in the past, many OF
them paid agents of their govern
ment." Miss Niven said In discussing
her plans.
Miss Niven has asked the American
Y. w. G. A. to aid the Italian Assocla-
ton in establishing a center, perhaps
at Genoa, with two American secreta-
ries, with physical and recreational
training, to act as a training school for
italian women. In connection with II
her plan would include Hostess House
for girls passing through the city or
employed there. Such center would
DttDlilh SNtutuhls Alit NthANi Apt '''
Y. w. C. A. work in Italy, both Italian
and foreign.
In her formal appeal for help for the
Unione Cristiana Dele Giovanni (the
Italian name for Young Women's
Christian Association) Miss Niven has
emphasized two facts, the poverty of
the Italian Association on the one hand
and the need and opportunity on the
other for an American program in
Italy at the present time.
Miss Niven's favorite way of Illus
rating the friendliness of the Italian
woman to America is by telling the
story Of the Italian mother who said
Madonna which had hung for many
years over her bed md was putting in
its place one of President Wilson.
"In our work In the Unione we have
lacked trained leadership as well as
the material resources to give such
training. We have had no means to
buy modern equipment. Consequently
we have not the visible results of
American and British work
"Feeble as our work may be, II is
not useless. Many girls in all parts of
Italy have told us how much the
Unione meant in their lives. Italian
girls are touchingly grateful for the
smallest efforts. They respond eagerly
to friendliness.
There is no other agency doing in
Italy what the association is trying to
do"
Miss Niven has spent the past seven
years in work with the Italian women.
starting as director of hostel, or
boarding home for Italian women STU
dents. at Florence. She is an Ameri-
can from New York, where she was
onetime head of the Christadora Set
tlement House.