The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1921-10-12
TOPEKA STATE JOURNAL
Information Bureau
ATHLETICS AND MOTHERHOOD.
FREDERIC j. HASKLN, Director,
Washington, D. G.


New York City, Oct. SEQ right
on being athletic, girls-it won't hurt
youi" So say American physical cul-
ture experts, who take issue with the
recent charges of English educators
that athletics are uniting our mod
ern women for motherhood. The Vic
torian girl, according to these English
authorities, was a much better mother
than the modern feminine athlete, be-
cause she wisely conserved her store
of vital and nervous energy for the
crisis of motherhood instead of vast
ing it daily on the tennis court, golf
course, or hockey field.
This surprising assertion seems to
have made a serious impression upon
England, where there is now a strong
movement for milder school athletics
for girls, but so far it has received
little sympathy over here. Absolute
tommyrot!" is the way most of our
directors of physical education have
dismissed the subject, while a few of
them have taken the trouble to eX-
plain why.
1T is unfortunate" says DIR. Dudley
Sargent, Harvard physical director and
head of the Sargent School of Gym
nastics in Cambridge, that such state
ments have just enough truth in them
so that they cannot be contradicted in
their entirety. 1t is true, of course,
that many women do have trouble at
childbirth, but it is unfair to say that
it is because of athletics. Athletic
training is ideal for woman; it de-
Velops just the muscles of the alb
domen and the lower part of the back
that she is compelled to use in this
crisis.
observation-disclosures, overtraining-tha
is another thing altogether 1 do not
believe in that. / have fought ex-
cesses all my life. I do not believe in
the entertaining, for instance, that
leaves a boat crew in entire collapse
once the race is over.
Il believe that these girls who spe-
cialize in tennis, who play all the time,
all over the country, are the ones who
would be sure to have trouble in the
crisis of motherhood. Such women
are tight, tense, keyed up all the time,
and muscle bound. There is a vast
difference, you know.
Where is a girl going to get that
vital and nervous energy the Victor
ians claim to have monopolized, if she
does not develop it? And if she de-
veiops it. she must keep it up. A man
who is well developed and then sud-
denly ceases physical exercise goes
of a woman. Her muscles must be
developed and kept developed if she is
to perform her function of mother
hood.
Mothers Need Muscle.
"You read more and more of the
ian method. 1t is because so many
women have undeveloped muscles of
the abdomen and lower part of the
back. It is because these women have
never been called upon to do any hard
work, or make any effort of their
own
DIR. H N. MacCracken, president of
Vassar college, thinks that the objec-
ton of the English educators to ath-
letics for girls is based upon an in
feriority complex. In other words, it
is merely one more attempt of a dying
generation to assert its superiority
over its Iivelier successors. Victorian
ladies have lately had to endure much
scornful pity from their modern
granddaughter Their waists were
pinched, they have been told, their
minds inactive, their clothes were
clumsy and they were physically weak
6witness the fainting habit) for lack
of fresh air and exercise. "Ah,'' they
reply at last, but we We're better
mothers"
THE argument advanced by the
English opponents to athletics for
girls says Doctor MacCracken, lis
about as logical as urging a young
man not to deplete his mental ener
gies by studying during the year, but
to keep them intact for the great cri-
sis of examinations.
There can be no doubt but that
good muscular development is an adj
vantage in childbirth. A case was re-
gently brought to my attention in
which a woman was almost unable to
bear her child because her abdomi-
nal muscles were undeveloped. Moth
erhood was the first hard work she
had ever been called upon to do, and
naturally she was unequal to it.
"Proper athletic training improves
a girls general health and physical
condition. Far from injuring the
next generation5I believe that it gives
her children a superior inheritance of
health and strength.
"If anything our women have been
coddled too much. Athletics are moth
ing but strong muscular exercise
Hockey is not as hard physical work
as doing a family wash"
College Girls Good Mothers.
Doctor MacCracken is supported in