The San Francisco call. [volume], November 10, 1913, Image 8

About The San Francisco call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1895-1913

Image provided by: University of California, Riverside; Riverside, CA

                
EDITORIAL PAGE
THE iijf CALL
F. W. KELLOGG, President and Publisher
JOHN D. SPRECKELS, Vice President and Treasurer
San Francisco Can Train Men
To a New Service
The State University Hospital May Be an Agency in Eradi
cating Oriental Superstition
Charles W. Eliot, former president of Harvard university, who
last year made a tour of the orient on behalf of the Carnegie
foundation in the interest of international peace, has published
his impressions and conclusion in a pamphlet just issued by the
foundation. In discussing the mental character of the oriental
peoples. Doctor Eliot concludes that the lack of inductive reasoning
is responsible for the stagnation of those races, and he expressed
the belief that with the development of the inductive method of
thought, marked progress will be observed among the nations
beyond the Pacific. Furthermore, he states that among the best
methods of inculcating western mental processes in the far east
is through the application of western medical methods; that is,
that the occidental medical methods, being largely the result of
inductive reasoning, will prove the worth of that system of thought
to the oriental.
Now, California, touching as it does on the orient, and am
bitious to develop an oriental commerce, to which its geographical
position eminently entitles it, will not be purely mercenary in its
relations with the races across the sea, but will be humanitarian,
3.S well.
California may be the state which will carry the gospel of
modern medicine into China and Japan, and San Francisco may be
the center from which will radiate humanitarianism for the far
east—which, as a matter of fact, is our "far west."
An impetus for such a movement will surely be found in the
new University of California medical college and hospital, which
is about to be constructed in the Affiliated Colleges group in Par
nassus avenue. Now the state medical college and hospital are
rendering efficient service, but the institution is about to expand
until it will become the largest and most important teaching hos
pital west of St. Louis. A building to cost $600,000 is to be.
constructed to house the greater institution, and there will be
available for medical research the $1,000,000 Hooper foundation,
the gift of Mrs. Sophronia Clapp Hooper, widow of George Wil
liam Hooper. Young men trained in medicine and surgery
under the conditions which will exist with the new college opened,
can do much to carry light into the dark places of the east and to
eradicate superstition with the beneficent agency of a physic.
Where Store the Automobiles?
It Won't Be Long Before the Question Will Be: Where
Shall We Moor the Airboats and Aeroplanes?—and San
Francisco Will Probably Be Just as Much Embarrassed
as It Is Now.
In the state of California there are 100,000 automobiles —more
in proportion to population than in any state in the Union and
more than in any state except New York. San Francisco has its
share of them, and in the day time every curb is lined with
machines.
And still they come. And still we wonder WHAT SHALL
BE DONE WITH THEM?
We can not allow them to stand upon the streets save for
brief stoppages; we have not enough side streets or scarcely any
vacant spaces for their receptivity. Our downtown streets were
laid out long before anybody dreamed of automobiles, consequently
no provision exists by which the vehicles can be kept available
for their owners while they are at business.
In the old days there were only a few proud people to drive to
business behind a pair of high stepping horses, and all of these
simply had the coachman restore the team to the family stables.
IT IS DIFFERENT NOW. Any number of men who come
down in automobiles in the morning drive their own cars.
Nobody knows how many thousand commuters' roadsters and
runabouts dodge into the city in the morning and out again at
night. These automobilists have been content to put up with
risks and discomforts without ever petitioning the city for free
parking spaces.
The automobile dilemma is simply another evidence that San
Francisco has outgrown all calculations. Other cities do not have
the problem in anything like the intensity with which it inflicts us.
THE WORST OF IT IS THAT THE DIFFICULTY
SEEMS LIKELY TO INCREASE RATHER THAN
DIMINISH.
What we are going to do when the airship becomes a familiar
method of coming down town, even the prophets will not venture
to guess.
Just now America has but one commuter by private airship,
and he is in Chicago, where he isn't crowded and, as it is winter
there now, he can't fly.
But any day we may have airships plying regular aerial
voyages in and out of this city. Some day they will be so common
as to cease to cause remark.
Already there is a passenger carrying aeroplane in service at
the exposition grounds, and a plan is on foot to have an aeroplane
ferry established between San Francisco and Oakland.
When aeroplanes become common vehicles, WHERE ARE
THEY GOING TO ALIGHT?
When there are a thousand airboats flying to downtown San
Francisco every day, and ten thousand land machines, something
will have to be done. And this time is not so far in the future that
San Francisco of today can afford to dismiss the notion with
a smile.
It took only 15 years to cover the roads and streets of the
world with automobiles. THE AIR IS LIKELY TO BE FILLED
WITH FLYING MACHINES IN AN EQUALLY SHORT
SPACE OF TIME.
May we not offer the suggestion that hereafter when sky
scrapers are erected their roofs shall be arranged as landing places
for aeroplanes, and their cellars set apart as garages for auto
mobiles to accommodate the office building tenants? Build for
the future. It will soon be here.
Seven Southern Counties Are
To Come in 1915
Of course "they could not stay away, the seven sisterly south
ern California counties which were slow in deciding to participate
in the Panama-Pacific international expositon. At a meeting held
in Los Angeles on Tuesday representatives of Los Angeles,
Orange, Riverside. San Bernardino, San Diego, Imperial and Ven
tura counties agreed to negotiate with the Panama-Pacific Exposi
tion company for from 20,000 to CO,OOO square feet of space at
the fair.
There was a little delay about the final decision, but every one
knew the difficulty was not serious. California could not do with
out those seven counties' exhibit—and the seven couldn't do with
out the exposition
THE SAN FRANCISCO CALL
If home rule passes Ireland will have to wear its Ulster in a storm.
♦ # ♦
Seventy nine million people have decided to do their Christmas shop
ping early—in the morning of December 24.
* * *
What's the trouble up there? A week has passed without any Santa
Rosa couple celebrating their golden wedding.
* * *
The largest lobster ever caught in Massachusetts was landed near
Boston Saturday. Some Harvard fullback, presumably.
» « #
The Navajos threaten to go on the warpath. But that won't inter
fere with the production of Navajo blankets. There is no warpath in the
New York east side.
# # » r
The girl who lost her heart Saturday afternoon at the football game
will not have it restored to her until next Wednesday afternoon at the
matinee.
THE BEE IN HIS BONNET
THE TWO WINDOWS
Evening Calls
Hints- to business girls—a knowledge of punctuation will cover a mul
titude of freckles.
♦ * #
The outside inn keepers think they won't be in much in 1915 if an
inside inn is in the fair grounds. They're looking out for their inn.
* * *
Mary Garden has been sued for $534 for the costume she wore in
"Thais." This is the first time that zero multiplied by four acts amounted
to 534.
# * # *
With an unloaded revolver Policeman Cannon arrested an armed thug.
But why does Cannon need a revolver? He should just slip over his
visiting card.
# * #
A book on birds, to cost $1,000 each, is being sold in California.
What a waste of mnnrv—it's as much as some men spend a season to kill
a brace of ducks
NOVEMBER 10, 1913
Cooking in
The Schools
Let Music and Drawing
Go, Says Dorothy Dix,
but It Is of Moral Im
portance to Teach
Girls How to Cook.
DOROTHY DIX
IT is reported that the commit
tee on school inquiry, ap
pointed by the board of esti
mate and apportionment, is
going to recommend that the
teaching of cooking, music and
drawing shall be dropped in the
public schools.
Drop the teaching of' music
and drawing if you think it
wise, Mr. Committeeman, for
we can live without poetry, mu
sic and art, as a bard with a
stomach as well as a heart once
wrote, but for Heaven's sake,
and for humanity's sake, don't
drop out the teaching of cook
ing!
Don't eliminate the cook stove
from the public school, for it
is not only the palladium of our
liberties, it is the guardian of
our health and the measure of
our future greatness.
For what he have achieved,
what we are achieving, and what
we are able to achieve, depends
upon the way we are fed, and
the way we are fed depends upon
the way our food is cooked, and
that depends upon the knowl
edge of the woman who pre
sides over the range.
Napoleon said that an army
fought on its' belly, and that
saying is equally true of the
whole world.
The amount of fight that's in
us depends on what's in our
stomachs, and whether it makes
good blood and optimism that
render us equal to any strug
gle, or whether it turns' into a
sour, indigestible, dyspetic mess
that makes us bilious and pessi
mistic and ready to throw down
our weapons and quit.
In all sincerity and good
truth there has never been any
other education or philanthropic
movement instituted that had in
it such possibility for good as
has teaching cooking in the pub
lic schools. Consider what it
means, first to humanity in gen
eral, and then to the girl her
self.
To begin with, if every girl
was turned out of the public
school a first class cook, it would
do more to conserve the public
health than all other sanitary
measures combined.
Any doctor will tell you that
half of the sickness of the world
can be traced back to badly pre
pared food. The wife and
mother practically holds the
health of the world in her
hands. Is it not important that
she should be taught how to
safeguard this inestimable asset
of the nation?
It is of the greatest economic
importance to the country that
its girls should be taught to
cook, because that is the only
way they can meet the high cost
of living. Women buy expen
sive cuts of meat because they
do not know how to cook the
cheaper ones so that they are
palatable and nourishing.
They are guilty of enormous
waste, because in their ignorance
they destroy vast quantities of
food by overcooking or under
cooking. The prosperity of the
middle classes in France is
founded on the fact that its
women know how to cook. The
money that paid off France's war
debt was literally retrieved from
the stock pot.
It is important morally for
girls to be taught how to cook,
because it is the bad housekeep
ing of their wives that literally
sends the men of the poorer
classes to drink. The ill chosen,
unsavory, unappetizing food that
their wives set before them nei
ther satisfies their appetite sor
The Motive
WILLIAM F. KIRK
feller from the city." said old Hiram Hathaway,
j "Was stoppin' up to Westcott's while the gang was makin' hay.
* When Westcott lost his youngest hoss, tne one he needed most.
And couldn't raise no money if he'd looked from coast to coast,
The feller from the city went and bought that husky bay
And gave the hoss to Westcott jest afore he went away.
Of course, I know the feller's rich; he comes here every season;
But I wonder why he done it. Thar must have been some reason."
This wondrous world we live in, if we look in any land,*
Is full of Hiram Hathaways. who can not understand. „
The poor man lost his working horse and couldn't get another-
The rich man made a present just to help a luckless brother.
This world knows many mortals, men of many sects and creeds
Who think unworthy motives lurk behind all worthy deeds- '
Who might find time themselves to do a kindness now and then
If they were not so busy keeping books on other men.
% % %
nourishes their bodies, and they
try to supply the deficit by alco
hol. There is no way to fight
the demon Rum that is so ef
fective as with good food. A
well nourished man has not the
craving for drink as has his un
der nourished brother, who has
supped on a piece of greasy fried
steak that had about as much
substance to it as a shoe sole.
Is it not, then, of the first im
portance to the nation to teach
its girls to cook? It is also of
equal importance to the girls.
It is important to the girl her
self, because whatever else a
woman knows, or doesn't know
how to do, the one thing that she
is certain to need to know at
some time during her life is how
to cook. This is equally true
whether she is rich or poor.
If a woman is rich there is
sure to be some domestic caty
clism in which she will find her
self without a maid, and then her
own comfort, and that of her
family, depends on her ability to
get a meal. Also, if she knows
how to cook she knows how to
manage servants, how to get the
best results from them, and how
to train inexperience and will
ing maids into efficient help.
There is nothing like the boss
being on the job to get good
work.
If a woman has to do her
own cooking, and statistics show
that 89 per cent of the women
in this country do their own
housework, then the welfare of
her household depend.? upon her
skill. So does her own happi
ness and well being, for it makes
all the difference in the world
whether the woman in the
kitchen is a skilled professional
or a bungling amateur.
The girl who has been taught
to cook, along with her a, b, c's,
finds' it no burden to do the
housework of her family.
With ease she turns out meals
that make her husband arise and
bless her name, whereas the girl
who has never boiled an egg be
fore she married, works herself
into nervous prostration prepar
ing meals of overdone meat and
underdone bread that make her
husband regret the club he left
behind him.
To teach a girl to cook is also
to give her a profession by which
she can always earn a good,
comfortable living. She can al
ways draw a fair salary in some
body's kitchen, and if she has
the enterprise to raise her pro
fession to the dignity of an art,
she can name her own price, and
get it, or make a fortune keep
ing boarders or a hotel.
Perhaps, you say, that it is not
the province of the public school
to teach girls to cook, and that
they should learn that from their
mothers. The answer is, that
the mothers in the great major
ity of families don't know how to
cook, but their daughters can
teach them. Even among the
more intelligent classes the
mothers cook in the hit or miss
style, which was handed down to
them by their mothers, and
which is far removed from the
scientific instruction given by
the teachers of domestic science
in the public schools.
For these and a million other
reasons that will suggest them
selves to every one who think*
about the subject, let us entreat
the committee on school inquiry
not to drop cooking out of the
school curriculum. The millen
nium will have arrived when
every woman is a good, free
hand cook, and that halcyon time
can only come via the public
school.