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Show kyJLJ J.a Eleanor Roosevelt VISIT IN MINNESOTA In our St. Cloud, Minn., visit we stayed with Mrs. Albert G. Whitney. It was a very memorable experience, experi-ence, for it was not often that one finds an older woman who has kept the ability to manage her own life and to do the things she enjoys doing. do-ing. She still makes a pleasant homelike center, to which her children chil-dren and grandchildren come with great joy. Miss Thompson and I were very grateful for her hospitality. We spent an hour or more in the morning morn-ing at work, after which I had the pleasure of seeing four young people. peo-ple. They came with a boy who was with the Internationa Students institute in-stitute at Campobello last summer, and is still at the University of Minnesota. At two o'clock, I started out, in spite of occasional snow flakes interspersed inter-spersed with rain, and visited eight public schools. From the primary grades up to the high school, they lined the streets outside their various vari-ous schools to greet me. Large Veterans' Hospital. Finally, at about three o'clock, we reached the veterans' hospital, for mental cases, one of the largest I have seen. Some of the patients were gathered gath-ered in the recreation room and sang and played for me. How much music can mean to these men, and how they enjoy the violins, piano and the men's chorus! I spoke to them briefly and went into one of the wards to see some of the men who could not be out. One is happy to think that these men have care and pleasant surroundings, surround-ings, and yet it tugs at one's heart to see old and young men, some of them seeming entirely normal, others oth-ers seeming already to have left the world around them, so far as their minds are concerned. One hopes that many may be restored to health. Back to New York. I was back at Mrs. Whitney's house a little while after four. We had a cup of tea, then a little more work, and a rest before dinner. After Aft-er my talk and the questions which followed, we drove all the way into Minneapolis. This meant getting to the hotel Nicolett at about 11:30, and being up next morning to catch a five-o'clock plane for Chicago. I confess that I was more worried that the plane would not fly, than I was about a few hours of sleep. Once on the plane, I went off to sleep again until we reached Chicago, only waking wak-ing up to talk to a newspaper woman wom-an from Milwaukee. Breakfast in the Chicago airport restaurant, and then a comfortable trip to New York city. GIRL SCOXJT ACTIVITIES One afternoon the rain came down and made the ceremony at the Girl Scouts' "Little House" a trifle damp for everyone. We went out to the garden and watched the girls cooking cook-ing under real difficulty, but the plate of food they handed me was very good. I took a taste of each thing and then passed my plate along to Father Moore, who had left the NYA advisory committee meeting with me to see the girls at work. We visited all the different branches of work, saw the first aid class in action, girls knitting, making mak-ing pottery, cooking and, finally, returned re-turned to the living room, where a group of colored Girl Scouts were singing charmingly. After listening to one or two songs, and admiring their chart for health and morale, Mrs. C. Leslie Glenn, representing the National Girl Scouts, presented Father Moore with the Girl Scout Medal. They have given the medal this year to four men who have been of great assistance to the organization, organiza-tion, and one of their officers has been designated to present it. In this case, since Father Moore was present, Mrs. Glenn, who had been chosen to present him with this medal, med-al, pinned it on his clerical coat. He was really touched and came back with me to the White House, wearing it proudly. Even though I gave him my plate of food, because he had worked through his luncheon hour and had had no food, I found that he was quite ready to have a cup of tea with us on our return. By the time we came back to the NYA national advisory committee meeting, they were nearly finished with their afternoon session and adjourned ad-journed until the evening. We had a very pleasant small group of people gathered together for dinner. They were shown a 10-minute 10-minute film of the taking of a poll, which was interesting in showing the variety of people who are sampled in trying to arrive at an accurate estimate of public opinion. DESTROYER TORPEDOEING The news of the torpedoing of one of our destroyers off Iceland was the first thing that the President spoke of on the morning after the incident and that cast a shadow over the whole day. I can not help but think of every one of the men and their families, who are anxiously anxious-ly awaiting news. When this is t -islated into terms of a specific destroyer on which your own child is serving, it makes it seem a very close and personal anxiety. |
