Evening star., 1936-06-01
TLADY TELLS
/. FARM WOMEN Of
NEED FOR CHANGES
Closer. Cooperation De-
manded in Modern Life,
She Declares.
$500 DELEGATES DUE
TO VISIT WHITE HOUSE
Secretaries Hull and Wallace Also
Address International
Conference.

Drawn together by mutual interests
Of country, home and community life
the world over. several thousand rural
women from % countries and all the
States massed in Constitution Hall at
noon today for the opening of the
third triennial conference Of the
Associated Country Women of the
World.
Mrs. Franklin D. Roosevelt. homo
rary chairman and an affiliated men,
ber of the organization, delivered the
principal address after greetings had
been extended by Secretary of State
Hull and Secretary of Agriculture
Wallace.
Later in the day Mrs. Roosevelt and
the President we're to receive $500
delegates and visitors at garden
party at the White House. The Presi-
dent was to deliver greetings from
the south portico, with Mrs. Roosevelt
at his side. after which she expected
to mingle with her guests while punch
was served.
AS she addressed the conference to-
day Mrs. Roosevelt called attention
to the necessity Of farm women ad-
justing themselves to changing con-
ditions of present-day life.
To-day we are entering into new
world where We must adjust our
selves to closer cooperation with each
other as against the necessary in
dividualism which marked the farm
home of the pioneer period in Amer
ica,' she declared.
Machine Age Cited.
I'VE are going to adjust to the
necessity Of learning to live in a ma
chine age. 1t requires skill. 1t re-
quires getting together. it requires a
greater appreciation of our problems
and of the situation as whole both
in the country and city"
Secretary Hull, describing the
worldwide depression as an almost
unprecedented catastrophe, in large
measure of our own making" pointed
to mutual friendly understanding
among the nations Of the world as
the panacea for international ills.
organizations like yours and con-
ferences like the present are powerful
instruments in the search for a better
world" he said. Great unfriendh-
ness and short-sightedness in interna-
tional relations have brought the world
to its present unhappy state. A great
world awakening cannot come a day
too soon and there is no more impor-
tant first step toward this exalted goal
than mutual understanding and
peaceful cooperation"
Secretary Wallace, declaring women
make a more important contribution
to farming than they do to any other
single industry, asserted that during
the next generation or two the farm
women of the world will be a determin-
ing factor in civilization.
Mrs. Watt Presides.
Mrs. Alfred Watt, president of the
conference, who has presided over the
two previous meetings in Vienna and
Stockholm, made the response. Pre-
vious meetings were attended by be-
tween 200 and 300 delegates.
Washington Cathedral was filled to
capacity yesterday as conference Wis
itors, who arrived during the week
end, attended vesper service around
the peace cross.
Registration, which opened yester-
day at the Government auditorium in
the Labor Building, and at the Willard
Hotel, continued today, all but over
seas, Canadian and official delegates
being enrolled at the auditorium.
Extensively advertised as a low
cost convention, with formal clothes
the conference grew
from an original estimate of 1900 to
Washington's largest convention of
the year and the visitors are housed
in tourist camps and private homes as
well as hotels. Many are guests of
local women interested in the meeting.
Reports to Be Made.
After today, with the exception OF
Mrs. Watts presidential address to-
morrow morning, and addresses by
Secretary Wallace and Mrs. Carrie
Chapman Gait at the banquet Thurs
day night, there will be no formal
speeches, but programs will be devoted
to brief reports and group discussions
of rural problems with special relation
to the home.
What farm women are doing to
improve community and home life
and to increase their individual in
comes is demonstrated in exhibits set
up in the auditorium, where sessions
will be held after Tuesday. Foreign
exhibits include the Warwickshire
loan collection from England and
from Ireland, Wales, Fin
land, Sweden, New Zealand, Southern
Rhodesia, East Africa, Germany and
Ceylon. Revival of traditional handi-
crafts of patchwork quilting and
weaving are compared with modern
in the American booths.
"Open house" will be observed dur
ing the week by all branches of the
Federal Government in which country
women are particularly interested.
Lady Eleanor Cole of Kenya, East
Africa, vice president of the A. c.
w. w., will preside over tonight's
session, which will include five-minute
reports from more than a dozen for
eign delegates. A film showing activi-
ties of country women's organizations
will also be featured