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Show Red Cross Club in London Mecca of Soldiers, Sailors American and British Women Lend Hand In Making Life More Comfortable For America's Fighting Sons. By BARBARA MILLER American Red Cross Worker in Great Britain. LONDON. Long hours, exacting work, incessant deraands on tact and ingenuity fail to daunt the tireless American and British women working side by side in the American Red Cross clubs in Britain. The thousands of U. S. sailors and soldiers who pour into the clubs every day like them all, because they are cheerful, sensible and capable women, whose first and only aim is to make the boys comfortable. The American women wear theJ air force blue of the American Red Cross, their British sisters the pearl gray smocks (the British call smocks "overalls") of the volunteers. volun-teers. Most of the American women were sent to Britain by the Red Cross; a small percentage are American women who previously lived in England. In London, most of the British women volunteer di- ia v.: J I s-. 4 -k 2 t ' 1 "1 v ; - s j atfttasAlhii . . f (It Hi r -ilThiS r Ith I lit. spot called the United States room is operating full blast. When the dishes from the lunch hour are cleared away in the cafeteria, cafe-teria, Miss Hill goes back to the time-cards, then supervises laundry and finishes at 4 if she's lucky. Usually it's five, or six. She never hesitates to take time out to chat with the boys who want to share parcels of food from home with their English friends, talk over happenings since their last leave, proudly "display, perhaps, a "My life in the Service" book and ask her to write her name on its page for autographs. auto-graphs. Characteristic of the singleness of purpose shown by American and British women is the suggestion made by Mrs. Beatrice Brazier, formerly for-merly of New York city, hospitality director at the Washington club. She is the American-born wife of a British Brit-ish army officer and has headed the Washington club personal hospitality hospitali-ty bureau since the club opened on July 4, 1942. She was helping a lad from Texas make plans for his honeymoon. hon-eymoon. "You say you're going to Scotland?" Scot-land?" she asked. "That's fine, it's lovely country. Now, if you get into a small town at night and haven't any place to stay, get in touch with the nearest W.V.S. headquarters. They'll find a nice place for you to stay." "Yes, Ma'am," the boy answered. "I know all about the W.V.S. They've always been swell to me at my station sta-tion out in the country." Mrs. Brazier's day lasts from 10 to 6, or later, seven days a week. In addition to planning tours of London, Lon-don, arranging for servicemen to spend week-ends in the country or dine with English families eager to offer hospitality, she is always doing do-ing something "extra." Last week it was a daily batch of 100 boys from a nearby General hospital, who arrived at her desk each morning for a day's sightseeing. sightsee-ing. Mrs. Brazier divided the party into groups of four, each with a guide. The guides were English women volunteers. The English woman said: "American "Ameri-can boys are fit, good - looking, charming." One added: "It's stimulating stimu-lating to see how Americans from a vast, new country whose history is in the future, not the past appreciate appre-ciate the antiquities of England." The Eagle club in Leicester square is an outstanding example of Anglo-American Anglo-American collaboration. The club was founded by Robert H. Hutchinson, Hutchin-son, American, and his British wife; Maj. Walter Currie, now with the U. S. Special services; and Mrs. Barbara Blake, British wife of an American. Perhaps the quickest way to tell how British women harmonize with the American spirit is to mention that an English girl who dispenses coca-colas christened the pet wire-haired wire-haired terrier at the new Red Cross Mostyn club in London, "Coke." The American Legion Auxiliary, through its 539,000 members throughout through-out the country, has raised funds for six mobile kitchens and ambulances ambu-lances which it has recently presented pre-sented to the American Red Cross. Shown at left is Mrs. Roy N. Pier-son, Pier-son, national volunteer special service, serv-ice, American Red Cross. Mrs. M. G. Andresen, of Olympia, Wash., national vice president (1941-42) of the western division, American Legion Le-gion auxiliary, is shown at right. rectly; in the provinces the majority are members of the Women's Voluntary Vol-untary Services called simply the "W.V.S." by U. S. fighting men in the British Isles. In numbers the workers are about 95 per cent British, 5 per cent American. Amer-ican. Back of the small group of American women serving the Red Cross stand the thousands of British Brit-ish women who work in canteens, information desks, on hospitality committees, and countless other jobs, all the way from making beds to arranging parties. Getting to work at 7 a. m. on rainy winter mornings in the blackout black-out is called "good fun." That's the phrase of one volunteer, a charming middle-aged woman who serves coffee cof-fee to the boys. Hundreds of London typists, who insist on helping after an eight-hour day in the city, hurry without supper to the club to stand the 6 to 10 p. m. shift in the crowded snack bar, serving hot coffee, sandwiches, sand-wiches, coca colas and doughnuts to never-ending streams of U. S. soldiers sol-diers pouring into the clubs on leave. Meet a typical volunteer, Miss Alicia Ali-cia Hill, one of the hundreds of volunteers vol-unteers at the Red Cross Washington Washing-ton club: Miss Hill's day starts at 7 a. m. On her way through the blacked out streets she often stumbles over an American boy just off the train and on his first leave in London, trying to find the club. She just brings him along as part of the day's routine. rou-tine. She's on deck early because breakfast is served in the huge cafeteria cafe-teria and the food must be ready before be-fore service starts at 8. As many as 700 hungry soldiers have breakfasted break-fasted on a Sunday morning at the Washington club, approved the cornflakes corn-flakes or oatmeal, scrambled eggs and bacon, toast, jam, coffee and ice water. "They fly straight to it," Miss Hill said, adding that she also has become be-come an ice-water convert, 'After breakfast she turns to the records and keeps the volunteers' timecards and work-hours up to date. At 11:30 it's time to go to the cafeteria to serve lunch for anywhere any-where from a hundred to a thousand hungry soldiers. All this time the Washington snack bar a gay little |