Evening star., 1940-09-15
Aunt Hit Guards Housewives
As Uncle Sam Shops for Guns
Only Woman Member
Of Defense Bourd
Has Unusual Job
By the Associated Press.

By the Associated Press.
What the housewife pays next
winter for her family's meals may
depend largely upon the success
Aunt Hit" makes of job un-
usual in the professional and in
dustrial life of women.
Aunt Hit" is Miss Harriet Elliott,
only woman on the National De-
fense Advisory Commission.
The task of this small, sturdy,
blue-eyed Quaker, born 56 years
ago in Carbondale. Ill, and trans
planted to North Carolina in 1913,
is to see that Mr.. and Mrs. Average
Consumer don't have to pay out
of-line" prices for food, clothing
and rent while Uncle Sam shops
for cannon and airplanes
To students at the woman's COL
lege of the University of North
Carolina-Miss Elliott is on leave
from there as dean of women
she is Aunt Hit" A small nephew
once dubbed her that in trying
TO say Aunt Harriet" and word
got around the campus.
There's hustle of excitement
and activity about Miss Elliott's
Office in the Federal Reserve Build
ing. An interview on how she is
setting up plan to keep down the
cost of living had to be sandwiched
among closely scheduled appoint
mentS.
Learned, as Dean, to Listen.
Miss Elliott was for many years
professor of political science AS
a dean of women, she explained,
she learned how to listen as we'll
as to talk"
In her gray and green corner Of
flee she now sits behind a fiat
topped desk and listens to repre-
sentatives of retail and wholesale
trade associations, manufacturers,
farmers organizations, civic groups
and women's clubs
Some seek her voluntarily. others
in response to her request. She has
held two national conferences, one
of representatives of civic groups
and the other of retail trade associa-
tions and plans similar meetings
with other groups.
From these conferences and from
individual confabs she is gather
ing viewpoints and ideas that she
and her small staff of assistants are
weaving into a setup designed not
only to keep the defense program
from disrupting civilian life but to
strengthen the latter.
Watches Human Defenses.
President Roosevelt in appoint
ing the commission of seven men,
bers last May instructed it to pre-
pare program of total Defense"
and total defense" to Miss Elliott
includes the social well-being of
every man, woman and child in the
United States. She said:
Hungry people, undernourished
people, ill people are national liza
bility. This is doubly true in an
emergency. BY making health and
welfare defense concern, the Pres
ident has emphasized the fact that
human welfare is as important to
the national defense as the manu-
facture of arms and e.nobilization
of material resources"
To translate that philosophy into
action she has needed both her scho-
lastic background and her practical
experiences. An assistant related a
concrete instance.
The Defense Commission was dis
cussing placing a several million
dollar order for Army blankets.
Miss Elliott listened, then asked:
when are these blankets to be
delivered?"
I'm the fall" she was told.
Suggests Staggering Order.
Then she went into action. Fall,
she knew was the time Mrs. House.
wife usually bought blankets. If
Mrs. Housewife and Uncle Sam
bought at one time it might cause
an apparent blanket shortage.
Miss Elliott inquired if it was
necessary for the Army to have the