Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1929-10-28

The party of scientific investigators
which included DR.. Mandel Sherman,
director of the Washington Child Re
search Center: DR.. John c. Eckhardt,
Washington child specialist, associated
With the center, and DR.. Paul E. Howe,
biochemist of the Department of Agri-
culture. They succeeded in rounding
up a considerable group of mountain
children in the neighborhood OF the
Nicholson Mountain Schoolhouse, the
scene of q colorful experiment in noun
tain education this Summer.
In their visits to the cabins they were
especially interested in the preparations
for Winter, when the people apparently
have no source of revenue and must live
until Spring on what has been stored
away in the Fall. The Corbin Hollow
people now have harvested their tiny
corn patches and some have taken the
grain to a mountain mill, four miles
away, to be ground into meal
Other cabins showed the corn, still
on the cob, packed away under the
crude beds and in the small, low lofts
where the children sleep, the piles of
ragged bedding almost hidden under the
golden ears and the cabbages. Corn
meal and cabbageS evidently are the
chief Winter diet.
DR.. Eckhardt made several prelimi-
nary physical examinations and was
impressed with the tobacco chewing
habit of the children. He was not
aDle to determine whether this had any
serious consequences, or was In any
way responsible for the lethargy Of the
Istle boys and girls.
Bad Living Conditions.
Living conditions in the cabins, DR..
Eehhardt said, were unbelievable" and
he was enthusiastic over the possibilities
offered by such isolated and backward
communities for the study of various
health problems and the relation of
physical condition to mentality. The
children, he said, constitute a ready
made control group, whose characters
tics can be checked against groups OF
children living under more favorable
circumstances.
ANY conclusions on the diet of the
people are impossible from such short
survey, DR.. Howe said but he was Of
the opinion that it was just sufficiently
balanced to be adequate, provided there
Is enough Of it. The slender stores and
the large families make this rather
questionable. Probably the saving fea-
ture of the Winter diet is the cabbage,
he said, which contains essential
vitamins.
Women complained that the cabins
were very cold in Winter, snow drift
ing into the lofts and through the
floors. Winter. falling upon the noun,
tasns in an uneXcelled glory OF red and
geld, frightens the women with the
prospect of long months of complete
isolation. .s.
Bright Toys Given Away.
DR.. Eckhardt distributed collection
of: l0-cent store toys among the chill
,l<sa 80 49,
because of their bright colors. While
children elsewhere already are looking
forward to Christmas and Santa Claus,
none of the mountain children talked
with yesterday ever had heard of the
patron saint of the nursery. Some said
they had heard OF Christmas, but when
asked what the day meant to them re-
piled that it was lest Christmas"
Apparently there was no idea of the
meaning of the festival. Parents know
about Christmas because of Christmas
trees which used to be held for them
by @. Freeman Pollock, proprietor Of
Skyland. But apparently they are not
passing on The tradition.
The same language difficulty which
was experienced by visiting psycholo-
gists month ago in trying TO apply
standard mental tests to the children
was encountered yesterday In trying Il
determine just what is in the minds o.
the children.
For example, a child who replied tina
Christmas was lest Christmas" wa:
asked if she had ever heard OF Christ.
"Ye-aa"
"Who was Hep"
"Its the Lo-ard"
s'What is the Lord?"
''Its jest the Lo-ard."
God Not Understood.
A little later child explained thai
God was "a thing to keep the hands
warm" although the word was repeated
to her several times.
But, 1t was explained, this may no
mean very much siace the children ma!
have a better concept Of Christmas anC
its associations, which they cannot pu
into words.
DIR. Sherman Is especially interested
in the heredity-e aspect o
the mountain situation after analyzinl
the results of the mental tests which ~
applied on his last visit. He was i'm
pressed with the fact that both children
and adults seemed to remember littl
incidents connected with the previou
visit, which speaks we'll for thei
ability to learn, once outside contact
and stinulations are provided for then
Meantime the Nicholson Mountat
School. which has been in session onl
for a few months In the last 20 year
Is closed again. 1t forms a part {
the county school system of Madiso
tTx