Evening star., 1927-10-30
VALUE OF sMAIN STREET,
PROVED In FLOOD ZONE
Spirit of ROtarians and Other Clubs
at Best i'm Times of Stress,
~ Hoover Finds.

Main street, under the brunt Of a
great disaster, has proved itself the
| bulwark of the Nation, he Is not re.
sorting to fancy phrases for the edi
fication of those who live there. He
simply is according Main street Its
due, on the basis of personal observa
| ton at close range over period OF
several months during the flood catas
trophe.
Noble Response Cited.
MAIN street, with its local clubs
and chapters and posts and other
| organizations for civic welfare. was
called on to perform an almost insult
ferable task, and it responded nobly,'
| Hoover points out.
with the water rising about them
and the cries of women and children
ringing in their ears, the heroic men
| and women Of the Main streets of the
Mississippi Valley, through their clubs
| and associations, organized relief
| groups that went to work immediate.
| ly. Nearly every fair sized city or
| town had it's Rotary or other club, its
Red Cross chapter, it's American lie.
gion post. its Y. nj. c. A. and its
women's auxiliaries. With the war.
| time skeleton of the Red Cross organi-
| zation to build upon, these public.
| spirited men and women, imbued with
| the spirit of service characteristic of
| their clubs, set to work untiringly to
| minister to the needs of their disor-
ganized helpless fellow beings.
''In addition to joining in the emerg-
ency rescue work, they set up can
teens for the hungry and prepared
tents or other shelter for the refugees.
Thus. when the national representa-
tives of the American Red Cross
reached the scenes of desolation, they
found quite frequently that much of
the preliminary emergency work had
been DONE"
Club Spirit Goes Far.
Nor is that all. Secretary Hoover
will vouch for the fact that this club
spirit resulted in the raising of thou.
sands of dollars for relief work, not
only in the valley, but in other parts
of the country.
Members of these organizations,
moreover, took a leading part in the
program of rehabilitation and re-
construction which Secretary Hoover
has mapped out for the blighted flood
area. They are materially assisting
in the economic recovery of the af-
fected region by lending their efforts
to the task of easing financial bur-
dens on the farmers and of securing
from the State Legislatures adequate
fax relief measures.
1t is of interest in this connection
to point out that the three men
placed by their respective common
wealths in charge of State rehabilita-
ton work. are all products of Main
street. who have attained success in
Of
Harvey Couch of Pine Bluff, Ark, is
an active Rotarian. He rose from oh.
scurity in a small town to president
of one of the South's largest chain
of power companies. The other two,
l.. o. Crosby of Mississippi and w. II.
Sullivan of Louisiana, are leading
lumbermen Of the South who got
their start in a small town.
Hoover Proud to Join.
When Mr.. Couch invited Secretary
Hoover to become an honorary mem
Der of the Pine Bluff Rotary Club, it
was in no sense of condescension
that the flood relief dictator accepted
the honor. He was proud to join the
membership of an organization whose
personnel had demonstrated so ably
a trained capacity for leadership and
service. He accepted similar honors
at the hands of the Jackson, Miss.
Rotary Club.
Hoover voiced his appreciation of
the self-sacrificing devotion to duty
of the rank and file of the citizenry in
speeches before the Rotary Clubs of
New Orleans and Hot Springs, Ark.
In both of these addresses he gave
expression to the thought that to Main
street must go much of the credit for
Dixie's rapid recovery from Americas
most disastrous flood.
If this be Babbitry, Hoover de-
clares, then let us have more of it!