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Show . j Qood Euesight Makes Champions " v i f v.- - -;?-.' v;x -, i-- . . . -v :vfX- . - 'X- Tf '-2 WILLS N3tTtt;q A " Vt- .fyf v w ; h h XS- i-Xjctitb t V H V,'' T 111 is i its ',V ,A l A A 1 W - i - s- $ ' v l i i i -s V 'r4M j WILLIE McFARLANE By JOHN D. GRANT itumwMiinaliAWN and agility alone Yi will not make sports cham-pions. cham-pions. Without good eye-sight eye-sight it is impossible to WrSg gain eminence in any of the A (j-V;- sports that are most popu-JSJJ'Y popu-JSJJ'Y lar witu tne Public today. iOpR The ability to see a fast JpljpU ball quickly and accurate-ly accurate-ly has made Babe Ruth the "home run king" and Helen ii M. Wills the "tennis, queen," declares David Resnick, staff associate of the National Society for the Prevention Pre-vention of Bliudness. The American public loves to create heroes for itself in the different fields of sport, and Babe Ruth is one of the most popular of these national idols. It is possible that some of our readers, read-ers, who never glance at the sporting columns, may not know about this Ruth person, so we will enlighten them briefly. Babe Ruth started out as a pitcher, and he was an excep-I excep-I tionally good one. It' was not long before his ability as a batter became noticeable and it was decided that he was too valuable in that capacity to repose on the bench a large part of the time, co they made an outfielder of him. He immediately started in the business of manufacturing home runs. He turned them out with such persistent per-sistent regularity that the sporting writers began to take notice and dig into their records. They had to throw them away because the Babe made new ones, nnd continued to do so until temporary Incapacity curtailed his output. What has enabled Babe Ruth to achieve his reputation on the diamond? dia-mond? Some people will say that it is his powerful swing of the bat, made possible by great strength in his arms. This is true, but equally important is the good eyesight which is essential when a fast ball is coming toward the man at the bat. It is not only the sturdy arms of Helen Wills, but it is also her steady eye that make her queen of the tennis court. Bill Tilden. Jack Dempsey, Bobby Jones nnd the other topnotch-ers topnotch-ers in the field of sport owe their reputations rep-utations and success largely to the fact that they are blessed with healthy eyes as well as strong bodies. Good eyesight is also important to the thousands of sport fans who go to watch their favorites perform. One cannot truly enjoy any athletic game, whether in playing or watching, unless un-less one lias clear vision. Without such good eyesight that a strategic situation may be spon accurately accu-rately and understood at a moment's glance, one cannot acquire skill In any sport. .Most professional athletes realize real-ize this, nnd therefore, take every precaution pre-caution to keep their eyes in good condition. Sometimes it is necessary for the athlete to wear glasses, but this docs not mean that his days of usefulness on the field are past. It is interesting to note that a few of the best known ball players in the major leagues find it necessary to wear glasses. Lee Meadows, an outstanding out-standing pitcher in the National league for several years, wore glasses in the pitcher's box. Another pitcher who wears them is Vic Sorrell of the Detroit De-troit Tigers, wdio is one of this year's sensations. Others are Toporcher and MaeFayden. Glasses are worn on the baseball field also by Chick Hafey, outfielder of the St. Louis Cardinals, and by Mark Koenig, shortstop of the. Detroit team in the American league, wdio is rather well known in New York city where he was shortstop for the Yankees for several years. Hafey and Koenig are the first fielders in baseball to wear glasses while playing. Glasses are worn in other sports also. In tennis, for instance, Watson .Washburn, who was for several years a member of the United States Davis cup team,, has worn glasses on the tennis court for a long time. And in golf, Willie McFarlane, former national na-tional open champion and now a professional pro-fessional in Westchester county, New York, usually wears glasses while playing. In colleges and high school throughout through-out the United States, athletic directors direc-tors are specially careful about the eyesight eye-sight of members of the various school teams. Incidentally, boys and girls of high school age seem to be most susceptible to accidents that Involve eye injuries. Perhaps this is so because be-cause they are very active at that age. The National Society for the Prevention Pre-vention of Blindness, in a survey of eye accidents, found a strange variety of hazards in athletics, In the home, and especially in industry. There was a record of a painful injury when, in wrestling, one boy's finger found its . way into one of his opponent's eyes. Also, there was the Incident of one basketball player who apparently confused con-fused the eyes of another player with the basket at which he was supposed to be aiming. One university student was so confident of his own abilities that he took off his mask while fencing fenc-ing and had one eye put out by his opponent's foil. In many sports there are chances of injuring the eyes with a ball golf ball, tennis ball, baseball, handball, basketball, football and others. But in golf, aside from the danger of being struck by the ball, Inquisitive persons HP -X t p fc r .s I i ; V v N V i-.v. ;.m I HlV yKTTWMAHoKn lyk'f-' Lee. jVSS M&ADOW5 1 occasionally suffer eye injuries in cutting cut-ting open discarded golf balls. The knife may slip and strike the eye, or the rubber may cause the ball to rebound re-bound and hit the eye. In any event, this curiosity as to the contents of a golf ball has a certain element of danger. Among the games of boyhood, Important Im-portant causes of eye accidents are the realistic cowboy, Indian and racketeer rack-eteer games which make necessary the actual use of air rifles, blank pistols, pis-tols, or bows and arrows. The old-fashioned old-fashioned sling-shot has not gone out of existence either. Apparently there are many parents who do not realize the obvious mistake in trusting children chil-dren with such dangerous toys and weapons as these. In case of an accident to the eyes, it is well to know exactly what to do. There are three cardinal principles of first aid after eye Injuries. .The first of these is cleanliness; next, prompt rest for the eye; and, third, medical care directed by a competent physician, preferably an oculist. These principles apply even if the injury Is slight, and they are Imperative with serious eye injuries. |