The dispatch-news. [volume] (Lexington, S.C.) 1919-2001, 1922-11-29
PUT. away "DuDs1
People Of Today Universally
Nearing Less Clothing.

How Tar this nation has departed
from the ways Of its sainted fathers!
The pious old New England custom
Of sewing up the children from fall to
spring in red flannel underclothes
nay still be followed in remote and
Gcd.fearins rural districts, but IN
larger centers Of population people
arc wearing scandalously little pro
lection against the blasts Of winter.
And they're wearing less every
year: That the moderns don't all per
ISL Of pneumonia is only another'
proof that our grandmothers DIDN'T
know as much about hygiene as tneS
thought they did. And everybody who
was ever stitched up for six months
in red flannel will admit that the boys
and girls of today are happier as we'll
as cleaner than those of the past
With the modern girl exposing her
chest and knees to the biizzards and
the modern boy defying February
With loose, sleeveless and knee-length
lawn combinations, it is curious to
realize that up to the last generation
II was considered necessary to wear
wool next to the skin, not only In
winter but also in summer.
Listen to Youman's Dictionary OF
Everyday Wants." published in 1884,
the New York Sun en3oins:
T; "Dress children warmly. WOODEN
hannels next their person during the
whole year. BY every consideration
protect the extremities well. 1t is
ignorant barbarism that allows child
to have bare arms, legs and feet, even
in summer"
> II the writer Of that censorious dec
laration Is still alive, having failed TO
expire from wearing wool next to his
hide. he must be terribly shocked at
the ignorant barbarism" Of 1922, With
its shameless display Of arms and
legs-or limbs" as he would prob
ably call the latter.
Those, were the days when people
slept with their windows shut be-
cause they thought the night air was
"poisonous." Don't blame them too
much for the doctors gave 'em that
dope about the night air. Yes, and
the poor old docs believed It them
selves.
t It was the doctors, too, who sprang
that fuzzy one about wearing wool
next the skin summer and winter.
And then when the victims got fever
ish the doctors would bleed 'em. A
fear of cold, fear Of fresh air, a
fear of all nature was the keynote Of
medical practice in those good old
days of our daddies. The irritated
and exhausted wool wearers used to-
die plentlfully from pneumonia, then
called inflammation Of the lungs.
When tsst happened the doctors
shock their beaks and said the slsptI
must have snsakea auE and bres iaed|
soine psisuresis mig air. OF ths he
I1ust have tass or his flannel II hs|
cap, or neglected TO take his blue pin
and black draft or that he should
have called the doctor sooner and
thereby parted earlier with his first
quart Of blood.
A New York doctor Of today was
called to a pneumonia case while an
icy blizzard was blowing. The pa.
tient was child. Her temperature
was very high. The windows were
shut tight,
"Open the windows top and bottom
az wide as you can" said the doctor
to the horrifed parents. !
And despite protests and domestic
Inconvenience the thing was done. I'M
response to the anxious foreboding.
Of the father the doctor said: !
"Why, II you threw that child into
q snowbank she would melt the snow,
but It would do her more good thar
harm"
The child lived to be a fapper with
hardly more clothes on her in winter I;
than In summer.