The Health bulletin [serial] - University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

14 The Health Bulletin December, 1927
every state in the union, and so on.
When we begin to thint: that it is not
appreciated and start out to take off
of the subscription list some name, in
Japan or Australia for instance, in
due time we receive a letter protesting
that their copy of the Bulletin has
not arrived. No name is ever placed
on our mailing list
except on direct request
of the recipient or some friend.
If the Bulletin is to continue carrying
a worth while story each month and
to continue to be a militant agency for
the advancement of the cause of public
health throughout the State of North
Carolina and elsewhere, it is necessary
for us to receive the product of many
minds and especially from people who
are authorities on the subjects about
which they write.
Yours for good articles, and ten thousand
dollar a year jobs for the writers
of every one of them, including the
editorials.
THE WARFIELD HOME FOR AGED WOMEN
One of the great beneficent bequests
made in the South during 1927 was revealed
in the will of the late President
Warfield of the Seaboard Air Line Railway
following his death sometime ago.
President Warfield left most of his
property (said to be between five and
ten million dollars worth) to the building
and endowment of a home for aged
women at his fine estate in Maryland,
the institution to be known as a memorial
to his mother.
President Warfield was one of the
South's great citizens. He had an abiding
faith in the future of this section
and put his life and his money to work
through the agencies of the Seaboard
Air Line Railroad for the upbuilding
of several southern states. The activities
of this railroad touches the. business
interests of North Carolina at a
great many vital points. It is somewhat
significant that a man of Warfield's
business capacity should settle
upon such a worthy enterprise on which
to spend his fortune after his death.
This example of Mr. Warfield, we hope,
will lead to many other bequests of
like character.
A cold calculating world has been
accustomed to looking with too little
sympathy toward the aged and infirm
who have fought its battles and made
possible the most of whatever progress
is achieved. In public health work the
tendency has long been directed almost
exclusively toward the conservation of
the lives of infants, children, and the
very young. It is argued now, and has
been argued all the while, that the
value of these lives from a cold commercial
standpoint so far exceed the
lives of people past life's meridian,
that most of the efforts, and nearly
all of the money, should be spent on
protection for the very young classes.
This is all right both from a commercial
and a humanitarian standpoint,
but when done to the neglect of the
aged and infirm it is nothing short of
a shameful procedure.
We have but to look about us in any
community in the State (almost every
household can hold an inventory of its
own) and we can all, by checking up,
see instances of neglect, either innocent
or wilful, of many aged people, especially
old women. An old man is generally
sufficiently able to battle for himself.
When thrown uix)n his sons or
his daughters for the necessities of life
in old age, as is often the case, he usually
has the faculty of making it so
disagreeable for everybody around him
when crossed or neglected that he generally
gets what he wants, because in
getting it life is made easier for his
sons and daughters. On the other hand,
the aged woman left a widow, as is
very often the case, is buffeted about
between the children. The old home is
either sold and divided or it goes for
debts contracted by the children or by
the husband before he died. Stark
tragedy is too often the portion of such
old women. If they live with a son and
his wife, there too often seems to be a
biological imcompatibility between the
old woman and her daughter-in-law, although
the younger woman strives to
do everything in her power to please
and comfort her mother-in-law. Owing
to the fact that the younger woman has
her own family cares and her own
struggles in the upkeep of her family,
the older woman has simply to take