The Seattle star. [volume] (Seattle, Wash.) 1899-1947, 1924-07-19
Here Is Poverty
Hurt 7 Years Too Soon, Law Says
Who's to Blame?
BY LELAND HANNuM

IETHEN hard luck and poverty once plunge their alons
w into mans shirt thew never let up They dig deeper
media IN Douglas county can TESTIFY to the anguish they
bring
Twelve years ago Mr. and Mrs Kaden and their young
daughter and baby lived in Clallam kaden en-
poyed in mine until March 90 1912 That day accident
IN the mine marked the beginning of the fall of the House
OF haden when his brother workmen carried him home on
strecher his hip bone crushed and his spine injured.
A German immigrant, Kaden knew little of business
affairs The state started him off with $40 month com
pensaton for time and then cut II TO $50 month. kaden
had TO give up his Caam home rented IL out and moved
onto dry homestead near Alameda
10 the young fellow, secure in steady job and with
money for cgarets, weekly movie admission and plenty
to eat living on dry homestead means little. But when
you have three other mouths 20 feed and have TO hobbe
around on erutches 1t means lots.
THEN the war came on Kadens house fell into disrepar
He appealed TO the state department of labor and indus
tries and got close to $4,000 to repair the houseand in lieu
Of the money advanced his pension cut again 10 sl24
ia month
But union wages rose and so did the cost of building
materials There was money needed to keep up the home
the bank at Caam Since then the bank has been collect
ing the Sl2 n month rent he gets from his house.
-nourshed poverty stricken beyond the worst dreams
OF the average person according to kadens story his fam
lily finally broke up.
Their simple old country hearts were wrenched when the
daughter left for Long Beach, Cal to in hospital
she sent money home for time and then last Christmas
she became III and was taken TO hospital.
FOR SIX months they heard nothing from her and then
the other day came word that she convaescent and
working from time to time, hardly able to support herself
yet.
ADEN had TO dispose of his single cow He had starved
himself that his wife broken by worries and hard work
ana his l2year-od son might have enough to eat He had
begged food from his neghbors.
Ills PRIDE gone kaden lost all interest in himself Only
his wife and counted NeghboIs helped him. The county
offered nm $40 or $50 from its hardpressed treasury for
la couple Of months
And then Kaden read that the compensations allowed dis
aoed workmen had been increased by the legislature But
appeals to Olympia brought this information he says
The increases applied TO those injured after July 1923
man with wife and child in Kadens condition, after the
st SIX months receives $3.50 But if the accident occurred
plo 10 March To- 1919 (as kadens did it at $50
for the workman, his wife and child
hadens il-advised advance from the state cut his ao
ment down to Sl2.54 But" he says "a man must eat
The wife and boy must eat 1t costs just as much to
i've as 1t does one who was hurt in 1928 Why not our
compensation raised also ?"
Kaden made last appeal to the state department NJ labor
and industries last month They told him they cannot raise
ms compensation unless the law is changed to include his
and 1000 other similar cases.
The gzzled old man started for Olympia 275 miles away
ho6bng along on his crutches Motorists picked him up so
miles from Seattle, and brought him here.
II INABLE to get an increase at Olympia Kaden went
~ home again.
He found his wife, utterly nerve-wecked and ill., She is
still too sick to work The boy undernourished and weak
ne says able to help neghbors for something to eat from
time to time. kaden cannot work.
Now he is back in Seattle staying at the Charles hotel
ISll2 Washington ST. and working hour and half for
meal at the Millionaire club Still hoping that the powers
that be, can do something for him.
The mining company for whom he worked has washed
hands of the affair The county in which he lives pleads
itself too poor to aid him. He has no influential friends
ony the MISREPRESENTATION homestead neghbors who do
what they can to keep his family from starving
ADEN is at the end of his string-and it's been stretch
ed to a thin thread. His mind is puzzled He's wor-
ed about the wife lying sick in that little arid homestead
shack He's worried about the daughter so far from home
He's worried about the undernourised youngster still too
young to help.
He's simply an aging man with money no friends and
mo future but with all consuming desire to keen his
wife living and his little family from senar
Iatng He cannot understand the tecnicaes of law nor
lWhY rich state does not watch its weak citizens