The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1919-03-03
'. W. c. A. OPENS
 WORK IN ITALY
Tea and Club Rooms Opened for
 American Women.
Miss Charlotte NIVen, Director of ital- Ian Work, Prepares for Influx of
 American Woman Students.

Italy is now included fin the war work of the American Y. ". c. A.
 Miss Mabel Warner of Salina, Kan, and Chicago left Paris a few days ago for Rome, where she will be in charge of a 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 '. W. 0. A. Hostess House at Brest, France Miss Warner will open 6 ten room and club rooms where the American women can gather for social times Rome Is harboring 6 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 1 Charlotte Niven, one of the National Y. ". c. A. secretaries of Italy, who is spending a few months in France as 1 advisor in the French work. l Miss Nivens dreams of '. ". c. A. work in Italy include the maintenance i of residence for non-Italian women, ] who, she feels, will come to Italy in l great numbers after the war to study music and art
 i q believe at this time such project | is particularly important because wo- i men from other countries should be 1 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 r. ". C. A to aid the Italian Associa- htion in establishing a center, perhaps at Genoa, with two American secreta- ries, with physical and recreadonal training, to act as a training school for l Italian women. In connection with ii 1 her plan would include Hostess House l for girls passing through the city ol l employed there. Such a center would become eventually the center for al Il Y. W. c. A. work in Italy, both Italian and foreign.
 In her formal appeal for help for the
 Unione Cristiana Delle Giovant (thf
 Italian name for Young Women! Christian Association) Miss Eiven ha!
 emphasized two facts, the poverty O the Italian Association on the one hant and the need and opportunity on th' other for an American program Il Italy at the present time.
 Miss Niven's favorfte way of illus trating the friendliness of the Italian woman to America Is by telling tn story of the Italian mother who satt she had taken down the picture of tn Madonna which had hung for man. years over her bed nd was putting il ] it's place one of President Wilson. "In our work in the Unione we hav
 lacked trained leadership as well a
 the material resources to give Eucl
 training. We have had no means t
 buy modern equipment. Consequent
 we have not the visible results 0
 American and British work.
 Feeble as our work may be, 1t
 not useless. Many girls in all parts 0
 Italy have told us how much tn
 Cnione meant in their lives Italia
 girls are touchingly grateful for tn
 smallest efforts. They respond eagerl
 to friendliness.
 There is no other agency doing 1
 TtaEy what the association Is trying t
 do"
 Miss Niven has spent the past seve
 years in work with the Italian womeI
 starting as director of a hostel, (
 boarding home for Italian women stl
 dents, at Florence. She Is an Amer
 can from New York, where she ws q onetime head of the Christadora Sc a tlement House.