Evening star., 1945-04-01

The Hardy School was the first TO
organize a wagon brigade, an energetic
group signing up their carts for the
campaign and, with helpers, going regu-
larly about the business of hauling in
all collections found which were too
heavy to carry. Other schools follow
ing Hardy's lead, found the wagon
brigade an efficient method of collec.
ton.
One boy, lacking a wagon, asked that
he be permitted to join the brigade
at his school using an old baby carriage,
He was warned by his principal that
he would come in for lot of ridicule,
but he persisted and was permitted to
join. The first trip to school brought
the ridicule which the principal had
anticipated and when a larger boy at
tempted to 60 beyond ridicule and tip
the carriage over, the much smaller
wagon-brigader lit into him, drove him
on and made his way to school under
convoy OF group of small admirers.
Businesslike System
The Hearst School set up a business
like system OF collection right from
the start. Mimeographed slips were
distributed to every house in Hearsts
territory asking If the paper of the
household could be picked up by Hearst
children and if so, when. Then a card
index was set up and the collections
were made regularly.
Grimke School, which was one of the
leading producers for a time. hit on
the system Of paper parades, the
children marching along the hallway
and dropping their bundles at the COL
lection point, while others sang patriotic
songs. This procedure was followed
twice week and was highly productive.
kingsman School had a safety talk
by Dick Mansfield scheduled and set
as the price OF admission to his popular
illustrated lecture Is pounds of paper.
That particular performance netted
about $4,000 pounds.
The Foxhole Plan
Another successful promotion scheme
was that during the week of March
l8 at Petworth School, where the prin.
cipal, Miss Bessie K. Lacy, hit upon
the idea of building foxholes. on the
auditorium floor. Each class selected
general to be honored and signs bear
ing the names of Eisenhower foxhole,
Macarthur foxhole and so on, even the
Navy being recognized with a Nimitz
foxhole, were prepared. When the paper
came in on Wednesday morning it was
taken to the auditorium by the indi-
vidual classes and the foxholes were
erected. This game resulted in total
collection Of 17,47o pounds, a mark Of
IS pounds per capita for the one day.
Mcfarland. staging an all-star bas-
ket ball game to which admission was
gained by the presentation of Is pounds
Of paper, with 100 pounds calling for a
reserved seat, gathered In nearly 10000
pounds.
The amazing part of the entire pro-
gram has been the loyalty and regu-
larity of the school children who have
carried this work along through "A long,
arduous months in good weather and
bad, seldom faltering in the steady pro-
duction of the critically short material
and when the collections have Stacked
OF always responding promptly to
each fresh plea to keep the paper com.
ing in that supplies may not be de-
layed in reaching the fighting fronts
through lack of containers In which
to ship them.
The project has been a test of citi-
benship and the response has been so
wide, so wholehearted and SO willingly
made later years will benefit from the
lesson in teamwork. industry and loyalty
which these $4,000 papertroopers have
SO completely mastered.