The Birmingham age-herald., 1921-01-16

decoration or the graves or union, aS | well as Confederate. soldiers seems al- most unanimously to have been accorded to Columbus, Miss, and inspired that beautiful poem of F. w. Finch, "rho Blue and the Gray" When this poem appeared in the Atlan- l tic Monthly of September, IS67, it carried the following head note:
 The women of Columbus, Miss, anni- mated by noble sentiments. have shown themselves impartial in their offerings to the memory of the dead. They strewed flowers upon the graves of the Confederate and of the National soldiers (From my fathers scrap book) I This episode becomes the more touch- ing by reason of the fact that the far Columbus lady who initiated the move ment to place flowers upon the Union graves at time when such action was sure to provoke much criticism in the l south, was none other than the lovely Mrs Augusta Murdock Sykes, herself the widow of a Confederate soldier. And so, with an equal splendor l The morning sun rays fall
 | With touch impartialiy render l On the blossoms blooming for all. Under the sod and the dew,
 | Waiting the judgment day'
 B1oidered with gold the blue l Menowed with gold the gray. l From the queen city" of MisslssippF- l Columbus-comes today one of the falF- est flowers of them all Mrs. Frank N' simms the lovely and gifted Fay Haugn- 1 ton. formerly of Aberdeen, whose for- bears the Haughtons and the Brown- r;eps stand pre-eminent in the social. lesal medical and judicial life of Missis- sippi. Mrs. Simms' talent and her many graceful social attainments emitting her to al, the admiration and adulation which
 is lavished upon her.
 One of the most popular belles who ever lived in Aberdeen and Columbus Mrs. Simms from her earliest youth was a great lover of music and literary pui-
 suits. and for many years devoted heF
 life to the study of the beautiful art oA which she is so charming an exponent
 After her marriage to MT. Frank k
 Simms. a brother of Birmingham
 lovely Mrs. John P. Tillman. Mrs.
 Simms continued her study Of music
 and desirous of passing on" her great talent to others, she later organized class of talented pupils-giving them instruction in the Fletcher method which has been her most cherished and
 adored fetish in regard to music.
 .-The world has been mesmerized into thinking that music is mysteri- ous art and only for the itiated,
 whereas it is the simplest of Ian
 guages and the common speech of all people; but we by our monstrous methods have made it well nigh unin- | telligible Some day I shall prove this to you and you will believe" said Evelyn Fletcher Copp to a group of musicians and students on one occa-
 sion in the past, and believe you will
 then awaken the world from it's age-
 long nap regarding the truths of musi-
 cal interpretation"
 That was more than 20 years ago.
 Mrs. Copp, fresh from five years ex-
 perience in the musical mlIl oH lorelSn
 countries and thoroughly dissatisfied
 with the results produced by so-called
 masters of music, began teaching
 music herself and making experiments
 that led to the adoption of methods and
 apparatus which have completely
 changed the aspect of musical in-
 struction both in this country and abroad.
 It was just this very thing that
 prompted Mrs. Simrns to adopt the
 Fletcher method of teaching after she, like Mrs Fletcher Copp, had studied
 abroad--in Berlin with Herr Heinrich
 Earth, director of the Royal High
 School of Music and with many other
 eminent teachers in Europe and Amer . ica.
 Mrs. Simms was formerly a member , of the faculty of the Mississippi State College for Women" at Columbus, and it was during this period that she was