The Belding banner-news. (Belding, Mich.) 1918-1973, 1921-02-02
v. c. |. j. TAKES
DECIDED STAND
AGAINST CIGARETTE
COFFIN NAILS" is THE MOST
HARMFUL OF ALL FORMS
OF USING TOBACCO

The January meeting of the w. c.
T. u. was very interesting and in
structive.
The topic "The cigarette evils"
was discussed and brought out many
startling facts.
At the rate the use of cigarettes
are increasing the future of the
youth today is greatly endangered.
The average age at which smoking
is begun today is eleven years. OF
all forms of tobacco cigarettes are
the most harmful and they injure
mentally and morally.
The following which is a report on
school is no exception and would
generally apply to any or all:
"The High scvhool senior was qui-
city investigating something. Just
what his fellows did not know but
it seemed to be about smoking, and
as ne was the best al-round athlete
in the school, captain of the track
team, quaterback on the eleven,
member of the glee club, fine stu
dent and general trusted favorite,
the boys freely gave him the infor-
nation he asked for especially as
they knew he would keep his promise
not to reveal the name of any fel-
low who had given him a special
piece of information.
The principal of the high school
allowed him to consult the school
records of marks and attendance, and
SO as a piece of senior school work
x finally prepared his report on
the effect of smoking on student eff
cheney.
He found there were three groups
of boys: (1) Those who had never
taken up the habit of smoking; (2)
those who had smoked more or less
but had given it up; (3) those who
were habitual smokers. Here is
what he discovered about the boys of
the second, third and fourth years of
the high school. Their average per-
centage during the entire time they
had been in the high school was as
follows.
SO non smokers, 83 per cent.
20 reformed smokers, 79 per cent.
38 smokers, 76 per cent.
There were 62 Freshmen in this
high school, Here are their marks:
al non smokers, 81 per cent.
a reformed smokers, 80 1-3 per
cent.
II smokers, 76 per cent.
Most interesting of all perhaps
were the records of those who had
recently learned to smoke, for the
marks showed slump after they be-
gan the practice.
Before they began to smoke their
general average of marks had been
85 per cent; afterwards, it fell to rs
per cent. One young man who con-
fessed to having smoked fifty cigar
cts in a single day, when he learned
these facts stopped his smoking and
in six weeks his marks increased 10
per cent on the average.
The ten boys in school having the
highest rank averaged 90.9 per cent
in marks; not one of them used to-
bacco. The ten smokers having the
highest rank could only show an av-
erage of 1873 per cent.
Twenty-Five boys had dropped out
of school in the three proceeding
years without finishing their course.
They were all smosars and not one
of them had good marks. Their av-
erage grade in all studies was only
so per cent or six points below the
passing mark.
Here is what the principal of thai
high school concluded about smoking
by the boys:
(1) The boy who has a hard time
to keep up with his class anyway, if
if he takes to smoking fails in his
work and drops out of school. He
smokes away whatever chance he
had.
(2) The boy who makes a practice
of smoking is seldom a success in
high school sports or athletics.
(3)/ The really ambitious boy
knows better than to spoil his schol-
arship and athletic chances by smok-
ing.