Evening star., 1935-01-27
BY ROBERT CRAWFORD.

N@S~~
to thinking out all sorts Of things to
help people. He is the head OF
great corporation that can tell one
about the investment Of millions of
dollars and at the same time figure
out O budget for family of three or
five-except out in Ohio where the
colonel and Senator Vic Donahey
came from-there are not many
families larger than five-ten just
how much it will cost to send boy
to college or buy and maintain a yacht
for him. So when Col. Doherty says
that the Roosevelt balls this week
will enlarge the fund for the bene-
fit Of infantile paralysis by more than
q million dollars, everybody believes it
and goes to work to make a grand
success.
You know Helen Eames Doherty is
the colonel's step-daughter, and seems
to have just naturally absorbed some
of his executive ability. AS the pri-
vate secretary to Minister Ruth Bryan
Owen, she has seriously carried on
and has been a great success In Den
mark. Lovely to look at, accom-
plished-and all that sort of thing one
reads in the society column, but 1t IS
q fact that the attaches of embassies
and legations in Copenhagen seem to
have to make a great many trips to
the American Legation, and are always
anxious not to bother the Minister, as
they say Miss Doherty can attend to
the message
BY the way, has Mrs. Owens diary
or notes on Greenland or whatever
she calls the book yet been issued
from the press? 1t goes without say
ing it will be gobbled up, for the Min
lister has a delightful sense of humor
and is a keen observer, and then, too,
the majority of readers do not hear a
whole lot about Greenland and the
more intimate life of its people. She
doubtless will not put in her book all
that she saw and heard-especially a
few of the side-splitting stories she
told at intimate dinner parties when
here a few months ago. Me thinks
the White House family has not had
ever a more amusing and jolly guest.
With her quick repartee she was a
good counter for President RooSeVelt'S S
wit.
A little bird SayS-maybe one of
those obnoxious, nagging little star
lings in Pennsylvania avenue. that
will ruin Postmaster General Farley's
gorgeous new building if something is
not done about it-that several of the
lady Representatives up on Capitol
Hill like to sit in at little game of
draw now and then-they do not play
with buttons either, but Represent
ative Virginia Ellis Jenckes Of the
sixth Indiana district confesses right
out to being bridge fan. Golf is a
royal, good game, she likes to knit
and is fine horsewoman, but for an
all-arolmd, rousing, wake-up amuSe-
ment, she prefers contract bridge.
At the National Press Club they
say she throws a mean card and chal-
lenges all comers when it comes to a
brisk game. Last year the team from
the Hoosier State won the cup by a
score of 16 match points out of a
possible 81, which those who know
say is a rating seldom attained in a
tournament contest. The team won
13 boards, halved 6 and lost only 2.
Its the genius of the game, the fine
points, which appeal to Mrs. Jenckes
more than the final outcome. She
will take a chance and has sporting
blood because she came from a dis
tinguished line of ancestors who were
noted for their fighting qualities in
the early history of America; perhaps
this Is why she is such a good cam
paigner and on the huStingS fights it
out to a finish. None of her political
honors have been handed to her on
silver platter. In both of her cam
paigns for Congress she has had bit
ter fights; opposition from her own
as well as from the opposing party.
1t has been her policy to carry her
record right into the homes of her
constituents and talk it over with
them. Her district is farming dis
trict and she has been a dirt farmer
herself. Her husband, the late Ray
Jenckes, was a farmer and elevator
owner we'll known for his public works.
Representative Jenckes has had
lot to do with coal mines; she is one
Of the few women who have been in
vited to address the United Mine
Workers of America. She can talk to
them in their own language, and dis
cusses their problems from a human
as well as a business viewpoint No
sentiment-juSt one worker to an
other.
She has met the forgotten man out
In her State and thinks he Is also
here in the District of Columbia. So
she has espoused the cause of the
Government employees in their fight
for restoration of pay. More pay.
more buying power. She keeps house
during the sessions Of Congress and
knows what it costs to live in Wash
ington. Housekeeping is one of her
joys and she demonstrates that a
woman can take part in public life
without neglecting her home.
But now this is interesting-a la
Will Rogers-Those ancestors of Mrs.
Jenckes helped to blaze the Western
trail. One of her ancestors-her great
grandfather was Capt. Henry
Van der Burg of the Revolutionary
Army and aide de camp to Gen.
George Washington. He was mem
ber Of the Society Of the Cincinnati
and was the first circuit judge of the
Northwestern Territory, holding court
once year in Kaskaska, Detroit and
VincenneS. He was a warm friend
and neighbor of William Henry Har-
rison, who was the first Governor of
the Northwest Territory and later
President of the United States. One
Of Mrs. Jenckes' priced possessions
was mahogany folding top table
with the initials "F. "" in mother of
pearl 1nlaid in the center. This was
Mr.. Harrison's wedding present to her
great-grandmother. The table Is now
in the William Henry Harrison mu-
scum In Vincennes-once the home of
President Harrison.
A pretty romance about Judge Van
der Burg is his meeting with Mrs.
Jenckes' great-grandmother, Frances
Conoyer, a young French girl he res
cued from the Indians at Fort Sack
vile. She was beautiful; he fell in
love with her and married her and it
must have been from this ancestress