THIS DAY IN 1918 IN THERECORD

Thursday, May 9, 1918. The Troy Child Welfare Committee urges Collar City mothers to take children age 5 and under to examination stations opening throughout town later this month, The Record reports. “The government, because it is about to wage a campaign for the conservation of children, requests that mothers do this,” our reporter writes, “the examination will furnish the mothers with much useful information.” The child bureau of the U.S. Department of Labor “intends to measure and weigh every child under five years age.” This is the first step in an extensive child-health campaign crafted in response to reports that “over 90 per cent of our children are physically defective when they enter school.” Worse, at least one-third of all draftees for the world war who have been found physically unfit suffer from “defects that might have been corrected in early childhood.” Citing the Ladies’ Home Journal, the committee claims that “a soldier in the trenches is safer than is a baby in the cradle.” It’s estimated that two out of every 100 men who participate in a battle are killed, while fourteen out of every 100 babies die in their first year of life.

Y.W.C.A. Enters Upon Its Mission

Members’ Night is the last of five nights of dedication events at the new Y.W.C. A. building at the corner of State and First streets, The Record reports. Mrs. Robert E. Speer, president of the national Y.W.C. A. board, affirms the importance of women’s work to the war effort. “She said she heard in Washington a few days ago the statement made that if the women and girls of England and France should stop their work for 20 minutes the allies could not win,” a reporter notes. “A strong plea was made to the girls and young women to prove themselves worthy of the men who have gone from our shores to fight on the foreign field. Each one was urged to place her mind, her energies, her every ability to the task of rising to this world-wide task, and each one take her part in winning the world war.” Caroline B. Smith, general secretary of the Troy Y, calls for another 125 volunteer workers. Since last September, Y workers have knitted 1,010 garments for local soldiers. Local president Mrs. George B. Cluett tells the assembly that “The house, the rooms, are to be flung wide open to all girls and each is to be received by others with loving hearts. No set or class of women are to work for others; it is to be one working with another, and all for the good of each.”