Sunday, June 17, 1917

After struggling last week to meet its controversial quota of Liberty Bond sales, Saratoga Springs is gearing up for the next big fund drive of the war with Germany.

Next week’s American Red Cross fund drive has a more modest goal. While Saratoga Springs was given a quota of $921,000 during the Liberty Loan drive, the Spa City is only expected to raise $13,000 for the Red Cross toward a nationwide goal of $100,000,000. To get people motivated for the Red Cross drive, the Broadway Theatre hosts a “well attended” mass meeting tonight. The main speaker for the evening is Henry Noble McCracken, the president of Vassar College.

“Last week you were asked to subscribe to the Liberty loan, but that was not a case of giving,” McCracken says, “You were investing your money then. Now you are asked to give outright – to a cause that is worth giving to.”

The federal government used the Liberty Loan campaign as an alternative to higher taxes to raise $2,000,000,000 for the U.S. war effort. While Saratoga Springs fell short of its goal, depending on whether the goal reported was accurate or not, the campaign was a success in the nation as a whole.

McCracken treats his audience to a litany of suffering imposed by war on Poland, Belgium, Romania, Armenia and Serbia. More than 750,000 people have died in Poland and Romania, he reports, while in Armenia “1,500,000 of this persecuted race have been put to the sword.

“You cannot say, ‘Well, what does a famine in China mean to us?’” McCracken insists, “It does matter to us. The nations of the world are not separated any more; they are united. The shot that killed the Austrian archduke [in 1914] pierced us all. We are pierced; America is stricken, and to atone for the misery, it is our right to ask for love, mercy and generosity.”

At the same time, McCracken emphasizes that the money raised next week “is to be used to follow the American boys into France….This hundred million is going to protect your sons, your brothers, your friends, and make their lot on the battlefield as comfortable and safe as possible.”

Do Saratogians have more to give after pledging more than $500,000 to the Liberty Loan? McCracken thinks Americans are just getting started.

“We’re all tired out from our Liberty loan work last week, but we’re very happy. Probably that’s when the American is happiest; when he’s tired out. We love to bustle about and accomplish a lot and get all tuckered out, and then start out and do something else.”