When They Were Girls contains the stories of a group of American women, each one of whom occupies a very important place in her particular field. The stories of these women have been written many times before. We feel, however, that in this book you possibly may find that their stories have been written in a little different way. Our desire has been to bring very closely to the attention of our many readers some of the outstanding characteristics in the girlhoods of these women, and to show the relationship between these qualities in girlhood and the achievements of adult life.

To many people, doubtless to almost everyone, comes the desire to produce results, to achieve, and to add one’s bit to the welfare of the world. Sometimes one is apt to become impatient, and to feel that he is not arriving at his goal. Under such circumstances it is helpful for us to acquaint ourselves with the life story of someone whom we feel has reached the goal for which we are striving. We may then learn that success does not come overnight, but that years of careful, painstaking work are often spent before the contribution that one has for the world is completed.

It is so easy to admire someone who has attained success, and to wish for that same success and recognition oneself. Often, however, we are not willing to pay the price that he or she paid. To very few people does success come easily. The small minority to whom it does seem to come in that way can only remain successful through careful, painstaking work.

The women whose stories are within this book have not obtained the praise of the world easily. As girls, some of them were wealthy, some of them were very poor; but they all had obstacles to overcome. Each one had her own way to make. No amount of money, nor an especially fine environment, could ever be the means of making anyone successful. Success comes not from without, but from within.

It is, of course, desirable to have every opportunity that will help to develop one’s particular ability. The greater a person’s opportunity to receive help from all available good sources, the better it is for him. However, success depends upon oneself. No amount of encouragement, no effort put forth by loving parents, no amount of money expended for advantageous purposes, will ever accomplish great things unless the person himself really desires to achieve.

No matter how small our part in the world may seem, it is possible for us each to do our work in such a way that it will prove to be a forerunner of greater things to come. We can take but one step at a time, and by taking that step as best we know how we shall be led to something higher. In reading the stories in this book you will see at once that when these women were girls they had no idea of what they would ultimately achieve. Nevertheless, they each took the steps that seemed necessary to their progress, as each step presented itself. This careful preparation, this conscientious work, has enabled these women to give to the world their best, and has made it possible for us to profit not only by their gifts but by their example, as well.

Helen Mildred Owen.

Rochester, New York,

November 28, 1923.

WHEN THEY WERE GIRLS

Jane Addams—

The Girl Who Became a Neighbor To the Needy

“Why do people live in such horrid little houses so close together, Father?” asked seven-year-old Jane on a trip to the city.

At home in the village, when she was tired of playing in the big roomy house, she could run across the green to the stream by her father’s mill. Here, in the city, instead of wide green slopes and the low hum of the sawmill were narrow, dirty alleys and the clatter of carts and street cars.

When Mr. Addams explained that some people do not have money enough to choose pleasant places for their homes, Jane declared: “When I grow up, I shall have a large house, of course, but I shall not have it among other fine houses, but right in the midst of horrid little houses like these.”

Now, strangely enough, when she grew up, she did that very thing. She went to live in a big house situated in the midst of poor Chicago tenements. Later, this little girl, who was Jane Addams, became known all over the world as the friend of the poor.

Jane Addams was born at Cedarville, Illinois, September 6, 1860. Little Jane could not remember her mother, who died when she was a baby, but she thought that no little girl ever had a father like hers. She was proud of his imposing figure, and she loved him dearly. Though he was a very busy man he always had time to answer her questions. She had a great many to ask, too, for even as a small child she did a good deal of thinking.

Jane’s father had been a state senator for sixteen years and could tell her interesting stories about the history of the country. He talked to her so often about Abraham Lincoln, who had been his friend, that Jane felt almost as if she herself had known the great-hearted man.

One Sunday Jane appeared before her father dressed for Sunday school in a beautiful new coat. It was a finer coat than any other little girl in the village had. For this reason, Mr. Addams suggested that Jane wear her old coat to save the feelings of the other little girls. Jane consented to do so, although she was very much disappointed.

As they walked to Sunday school, Jane wondered how the good things of life could be more evenly divided. Ever since she had first seen the “horrid little houses” about a year before, her young mind had been busy with this problem. Jane turned to her father and asked him how it could be solved. He explained that even though everything cannot be divided evenly, people should act and dress in such a way that those who are less fortunate will not be made to feel so. He told her that in school and church, at least, people should be able to feel that they belong to one family.

Jane Addams attended the village school, and later, at seventeen years of age, entered Rockford Seminary, at Rockford, Illinois. Soon after she was graduated from this school it was declared a college, and she received the degree of B. A.

She had intended after her graduation to study medicine and to help the poor, but she was urged to go abroad because she was in poor health. While in London and elsewhere, she was greatly distressed by the wretched condition of the poor. Now she was more determined than ever to go about the work of helping others.

Miss Addams believed that it is better to show people how to help themselves than to give them gifts of money. “It is hard to help people one does not know,” she reasoned, “and how can one really know people without seeing them very often?” True to the decision she had made as a child, she resolved to live among the poor and be a real neighbor to them.

With the help of some friends, Miss Addams opened Hull-House, which is located in a tenement section of Chicago. Here, she established a day nursery where mothers who had to go out to work could leave their babies in good care. A kindergarten was organized for the young children in the neighborhood.

There are clubs for girls and boys, and also for men and women. Classes in sewing, cooking, and millinery are conducted for the girls. “The Young Heroes,” a boy’s club, to-day has for its own use a five-story building equipped with recreation and study rooms. Printing, photography, and many other trades can be learned there. Hull-House, originally occupying one building, is now using thirteen buildings, each fitted for some special service.

For more than thirty years Miss Addams and her fellow-workers have stood ready to do any neighborly act, from bathing little babies to teaching and entertaining lonely old women. At Hull-House a cordial welcome always awaits everyone.

Besides her friendly aid to those who flock to Hull-House, Jane Addams has been a good neighbor to people whom she has never seen. She helped to have a law passed in Illinois to prevent children who are under fourteen years of age from working in factories. Through her efforts public baths have been provided in Chicago. Remembering the merry games she played as a child on the river banks near her home, she has made many a plea for more playgrounds for city girls and boys.

Miss Addams has been a member, often the chairman, of many important committees that have been organized to plan ways for making the world a better place in which to live. She has also found time to write books on this subject.

Jane Addams might have given money to the poor and spent her time in travel and amusement, but she preferred to give herself. Because she loves people enough to learn what they really need and works with them as well as for them, thousands bless her as a true friend and neighbor.

Louisa M. Alcott—

Whose Stories of Real Life Are A Delight to Girls and Boys

When Louisa Alcott peeped into her journal on the morning of her tenth birthday, she found a little note from her mother filled with loving messages. It read: “I give you the pencil-case I promised, for I have observed that you are fond of writing, and wish to encourage the habit.” Louisa’s mother often wrote little messages in her daughter’s journal, urging her to keep on trying to be good. Very often the notes encouraged Louisa to go on writing. On both her fourteenth and fifteenth birthdays her mother’s gift was a pen, with a poem and a loving letter.

As Louisa, at eight years of age, had written a little verse about a robin, Mrs. Alcott hoped that her daughter would some day be a great writer. It was a hope that was realized, for Louisa M. Alcott’s books have become famous, delighting each succeeding generation.

Little Women, her first great success, is the story of the Alcott family. It tells of their jolly times and their hard times at the Orchard House at Concord, Massachusetts. The lively outspoken “Jo” of the story, writing in the attic, is Louisa herself; the other “March” girls are her own dear sisters, Anna, Elizabeth, and Abba May. “Marmee,” of course, is the beloved mother, and Mr. March, the father.

Louisa May Alcott was born at Germantown, Pennsylvania, November 29, 1832, but most of her girlhood was spent in Boston and Concord, Massachusetts. It was a happy life that she led even though the food was plain and her clothes were generally “made over.” There was never enough money to go around in the Alcott family, but there was no lack of love, kindness, good conversation, and good reading.

Louisa and her sisters received their education chiefly from their father, a man of rare intellect. Mr. Alcott was devoted to his children and he took great pleasure in teaching them. In addition to these daily lessons there often were long, hard tasks of sewing and ironing, but there was plenty of time for play, too.

What fun they had! In the old barn at Concord with their playmates, the children of Ralph Waldo Emerson and of Nathaniel Hawthorne, they acted out their favorite fairy tales and also The Pilgrim’s Progress. Their giant tumbled off the loft when Jack cut down the bean stalk, and there was a real pumpkin for Cinderella’s coach.

Their mother’s birthday was always a great event. When that day arrived Louisa would say to herself as soon as she awoke, “It’s Mother’s birthday: I must be very good.” After breakfast the children always gave their mother her presents. One year Louisa’s gift was a cross made of moss with a bit of poetry attached. That day there were no lessons, and everybody was very jolly and happy.

Two great joys of Louisa’s life were books and the outdoors. She enjoyed a quiet corner with a good book. She also loved to run in the woods in the early morning before the dew was off the grass. She liked to feel the velvety moss under her feet and to look up into the green branches overhead. Once, when she was a child, she paused in her running and stood still listening to the rustle of the pines.

“It seemed as if I felt God,” she wrote in her journal, “and I prayed in my heart that I might keep that happy sense of nearness all my life.”

Louisa had a quick temper and found difficulty in managing it. At fourteen years of age she wrote a poem about her struggles entitled, “My Little Kingdom.” It began:

“A little kingdom I possess,

Where thoughts and feelings dwell.

And very hard I find the task

Of governing it well;

For passion tempts and troubles me,

A wayward will misleads,

And selfishness its shadow casts

On all my words and deeds.”

She kept on trying, however, and never let her little kingdom control her.

As Louisa Alcott grew older she began to realize very keenly all the cares that burdened the dear “Marmee” because of their lack of money. None of Mr. Alcott’s ventures in teaching or lecturing had added much to the family treasury.

Louisa was determined to help and she willingly did any kind of work that would enable her to earn a little money for her dear ones. Sometimes she taught school, sometimes she helped a relative with the housework, and sometimes she took care of an invalid child. Often she did fine needlework.

While her hands were busy with her daily tasks, her brain was active planning stories. She wrote them late at night, and soon publishers began to accept them and pay her small sums of money. For her first story, written when she was sixteen years old, she was paid five dollars.

Writing was a joy to Louisa Alcott and sewing a tiresome task. However, she continued her sewing because at first the needle paid better than the pen. It was a pleasure to her to earn enough money to buy a new shawl for “Marmee,” a crimson ribbon for May’s bonnet, or a new carpet for the whole family. Cheerfully she wore her old bonnet and her shabby shoes.

During her spare moments, the young author continued to write happily in her attic. To her delight the mail often brought her the news that her stories had been accepted. This greatly encouraged her.

Then came the Civil War. Louisa realized that no matter how greatly she desired to write, her first duty was to her country. Therefore, she went to the Union Hotel Hospital at Georgetown, D. C., as a nurse. The letters that she wrote home telling of her experiences were later published as a book called Hospital Sketches.

By this time Miss Alcott’s work had become so well known that she was asked to write a book for girls. She began to write Little Women to prove to the publisher that she could not write for girls. What she did prove everybody knows. Young people and their elders as well, not only in this country but also abroad, were soon laughing and crying over the doings of the “March” girls. Miss Alcott had become famous.

Little Men and other books followed rapidly and proved so popular that Miss Alcott received many thousands of dollars from her writings. She was happy because now she could fulfill her dream of giving her dear mother some of the comforts that she had never had. It was but small return, she felt, for all the help and encouragement that her mother had given her.

Miss Alcott’s books have lived because they show people as they really are. They tell, too, how jolly and happy life can be if people think less about money and more about living unselfishly and enjoying the outdoors and the simple and beautiful things of life. Louisa M. Alcott could not help writing in this way, for it was the way in which she herself lived.

Susan B. Anthony—

Who Worked for Sixty Years to Secure Rights for Women

Young Susan vigorously attacked, with her broom, the cobweb in the corner of the schoolroom ceiling. It was a stubborn cobweb and Susan had to step upon the teacher’s desk to reach it. No girl trained by so good a housekeeper as Susan’s mother could be happy in the same room with a cobweb.

“Deborah will be pleased to have the room clean,” thought Susan. However, Deborah, her Quaker teacher, was not pleased. Susan’s heavy shoes had broken the desk hinges, and the girl who had tried to do well was severely scolded.

It was often very much like this in Susan B. Anthony’s later life. When she tried her hardest to brush away the cobwebs that kept the world from seeing that women did not have the same rights as men, she was jeered and scorned. Nevertheless, she kept on wielding her broom, the broom she used being her clever tongue. This little Quaker girl grew up to be an interesting and eloquent lecturer, who never lost an opportunity to speak a good word for her fellow-women.

Susan Brownell Anthony was born February 15, 1820, in Adams, Massachusetts, in the midst of the Berkshire Hills. She was the second of eight children. Every night, as a little girl, she used to watch the sun go down behind “Old Greylock.” She came to love the great mountain, and all her life she liked to think of its rugged strength.

Mrs. Anthony was a very busy woman. In addition to caring for her lively little children she also cooked and washed for a number of factory hands. However, she found time to read good books and to be interested in all her children’s doings. Susan’s father was a Quaker, a man much liked and respected.

At an early age little Susan learned to be a good cook and housekeeper, like her mother. Once, when Mrs. Anthony was ill, twelve-year-old Susan with the help of her two sisters, ten and fourteen years of age, did all the household tasks, including packing the lunch boxes for the factory hands. Susan was so anxious that everything should be done exactly right that she and her sisters carried samples of the food to their mother for her approval.

At three years of age Susan, who was very bright and quick, learned her letters and also some words, while on a visit at her grandmother’s. When she was a little older she attended a district school, and then a private school conducted in the Anthony home. Later, she joined her sister at a boarding school near Philadelphia, where she studied for a year.

Susan began to teach in a district school when she was seventeen years old. She was boarded in turn at the homes of her pupils, being paid in addition only one dollar and a half a week. Susan was a very successful teacher, and often she grew indignant to see that men who did not do their work so well as she received four times as much pay. Equal pay for equal work was one of the rights that she began to demand for her fellow-women from that time on.

When Susan’s father failed in business, she saw his creditors take all of her mother’s personal things. Susan was enraged with the injustice of it and declared that there should be a law to make a wife’s belongings her own.

In 1851 Miss Anthony made a trip to Seneca Falls, New York, to urge the admission of girls to the People’s College then being founded. There she met Miss Lucy Stone and had an opportunity to become well acquainted with her and also with Mrs. Elizabeth Cady Stanton, whom she had met a few months before.

Mrs. Stanton and Miss Stone believed that women should have a share in making the laws of the land, and Miss Anthony soon became their most ardent co-worker. Twenty-five years later, Miss Anthony drafted the federal suffrage amendment. However, it was forty-five years from the time that the amendment was drafted until it became a part of our Constitution.

Susan B. Anthony was one of the greatest friends that women have ever had. When she was born there were only three things that a girl who wanted to earn her living could do: be a millhand, a servant, or a teacher. Before the close of Miss Anthony’s life, a girl might fit herself to be a doctor, a lawyer, a business woman, or, in fact, almost anything that she chose.

When Miss Anthony was a young girl, the doors of nearly all colleges were closed to women. The girl who dared to ask for as much education as was given to her brother was considered a great oddity. However, Miss Anthony lived to see girls admitted to college quite as a matter of course.

Susan B. Anthony found a world where a married woman could not do what she liked with the property that she owned. Neither could she do as she wished with the money that she had earned or received as a gift. She could not even take charge of her own children if anyone objected. Miss Anthony left a world where women’s rights in all these matters were considered and where in four states women could help to make the laws. The Nineteenth Amendment, giving women the vote, came later.

Miss Anthony devoted all of her time to public speaking. She traveled from coast to coast, always making the most of every opportunity to speak in behalf of the various reforms to which she devoted over sixty years of her life. Sometimes she pleaded for the freedom of the slaves, sometimes for temperance, but always for her favorite cause—rights for women.

Susan B. Anthony kept on pleading for women, no matter how much people laughed at her. Gradually, the world began to see some reason in what she said. To-day, all women who cast their vote, control their property, and send their daughters to college, can thank the determined Quaker girl who had such a large share in giving women their rights.

Clara Barton—

The Girl Who Unfurled The First American Red Cross Flag.

The Barton family was made very happy on the Christmas of 1821 with the gift of a baby girl. The four older sisters and brothers gave the baby a royal welcome, though they little thought that this gift was also to be a Christmas present to the whole world. This baby was Clara Barton, called in Civil War times the “Angel of the Battlefield” and known by all nations as the founder of the American Red Cross Society.

Baby Clara grew up to be the pet of the family, although no coddling was allowed on the Barton farm in Oxford, Massachusetts. Each member of the family wanted to teach her something, and Clara was equally eager to learn.

Mrs. Barton taught her daughter to be level headed. Nothing could have been worth more to the girl who was to be the first woman to carry organized aid to the wounded on an American battlefield. Mrs. Barton also taught Clara to sew, to cook, and to be an excellent housekeeper.

Clara was particularly grateful for this knowledge and had countless opportunities to use it. Once a dying soldier whispered his wish for a custard pie, crinkly around the edge, to remind him of home. With what materials she could get together, Miss Barton made the pie and scalloped the edge with her finger, just as her mother had taught her to do in the farm kitchen.

It was Big Brother David who taught the little sister many things that were to make her a very practical “Angel of the Battlefield.” At five years of age, thanks to his training, she rode wild horses like a young Mexican. This skill in managing any horse meant the saving of countless lives when she had to gallop all night in a trooper’s saddle to reach the wounded men. David taught her, also, to drive a nail straight, to tie a knot that would hold, and to think and act quickly.

From her father Clara heard thrilling tales of his fighting in the Revolutionary War under “Mad Anthony” Wayne. These stories doubtless made a deep impression on the youthful listener. Little did she realize that in the years to come she, too, would play an important part on many battlefields.

Clara Barton attended a boarding school for a short time. However, she received her education chiefly at home, being taught by her brother and then by a tutor. Later she had an opportunity for more advanced study at a near-by school.

The little farm girl was busy and happy from morning until night, for she loved to do things. She went for the cows, helped with the milking and churning, and had a hand in planting the potatoes. When the house was being painted, she begged to help with that, too, and she learned how to mix the paint as well as to put it on. Once she went into her brother’s factory and learned how to weave cloth.

Her first experience as a nurse came at the age of eleven when Big Brother David was injured by a fall. For two years this cheerful, patient little nurse scarcely left his bedside.

When she was only fifteen years old, Clara Barton began to teach school. She taught well, too, for she understood girls and boys. It seemed as if she had found the work that she best liked to do. However, after eighteen years of teaching, her health necessitated her giving up this profession. Clara Barton did not know how to be idle, so she went to Washington and secured a position in the Patent Office.

When the Civil War broke out many wounded soldiers were brought to Washington. Clara Barton helped to care for these boys, some of whom were her former pupils from Massachusetts. She also sent out appeals for money and supplies.

As Miss Barton saw the wounded taken from the transports, she was extremely sorry for them because they did not have proper care. She felt that she must go to nurse the soldiers who were close to the battlefields. This was entirely against army regulations, but Miss Barton was very persistent. She was finally allowed to take her store of bandages and other supplies to the front, where they were most needed.

People used to ask Miss Barton if she had not always been brave. The woman who walked coolly through Fredericksburg when every street was a firing line answered, telling of her childhood: “I was a shrinking little bundle of fears—fears of thunder, fears of strange faces, fears of my strange self.” It was when the shy girl forgot herself in working for others that she forgot her fears.

Bravery and willingness to help others, however, would have been of little use to Clara Barton had she not been level headed. The ability to see what should be done next and to do it quickly and well were of equal value. It seemed as if Clara Barton worked magic, but her magic was only a mixture of common sense and a great pity for the suffering.

Once at Antietam, when there seemed to be nothing to feed to the wounded men, she noticed that the medicine had been packed in fine meal. Quickly she borrowed several big kettles from the farm where they were quartered, and she soon was serving the men with steaming gruel.

At another time, at nightfall, one of the doctors complained about the mismanagement that left him with a thousand wounded men to care for and only an inch of candle for a light. Miss Barton had fortunately brought along several boxes of lanterns, which she gave him. Her remarkable forethought meant the saving of many a life that night.

After the Civil War Clara Barton did not give up her work of mercy. For four years she helped to trace missing soldiers.

While in Europe, during the Franco-Prussian War, she saw the wonderful work that the Red Cross societies abroad were doing. She was deeply impressed with the value of such an organization and immediately decided that, upon her return to the United States, she would do all that she could to interest her country in the Red Cross.

Miss Barton worked for years to persuade the United States to found an American Red Cross Society. “We shall never have another war,” people objected. However, Miss Barton pointed out that in time of great floods, fires, earthquakes, and other disasters lives could be saved by organized aid. At last she was successful, for in 1882 the American Red Cross Society came into being. Clara Barton was its president for many years.

The Red Cross banner was first unfurled for service in this country at Miss Barton’s home at Dansville, New York, where she established a local chapter to aid the forest-fire sufferers in Michigan. Ever since that time the Red Cross has continued to give its efficient aid wherever needed. It had an exceptional opportunity during the World War to prove its worth. Our country has cause for deep gratitude to Clara Barton.

Clara Barton risked her life on sixteen battlefields of the Civil War to care for the wounded. She founded the organization that has brought relief to thousands of people in war and disaster. She did great deeds, but they were possible only because she had learned to do the little things of life well.

Amy Marcy Cheney Beach—

The Girl Who Made Melodies

“See, the conquering hero comes” rang out in the studio, clear and true as a bell. The photographer thrust his head out from under the big black hood of the camera and stared in amazement at the tiny sitter. The two-year-old child was singing the very air that he had been practicing for the first peace jubilee, and she was singing it absolutely correctly. Others were eventually to be astonished at the musical ability of this little girl, who grew up to be America’s foremost woman composer.

Amy Marcy Cheney was born in the little town of Henniker, New Hampshire, September 5, 1867. From the time that she was a year old, her talent amazed even her musical mother. She learned dozens of airs and sang them, keeping the pitch perfectly. She would listen delightedly for hours to violin music.

At the age of four Amy was finally allowed to play on the piano. Often when her aunt was seated at the instrument, little Amy would stand on a hassock and play with her, making up an accompaniment as she went along.

Just as other little girls plan how to arrange their playhouses or how to make new dresses for their dolls, this little girl used to think out tunes. Once, when she was visiting at a house where there was no piano, she composed a little piece of music. She remembered it and three months later was able to play it correctly on the piano at home. She had composed three other little pieces before she was seven years old.

Long before Amy knew the names of musical notes, she knew their meaning and could read them. It amused her to transpose from one key to another, and she never found it difficult.

When she was six years old Amy thought that she should have regular music lessons, so she begged her mother, who was an excellent pianist, to teach her. You may be sure that little Amy Cheney never had to be urged to practice. At seven years of age she played several times in public. Before long she was playing difficult music from Chopin, Bach, and other composers.

When Amy was eight years old her family moved to Boston. The prominent musicians of this city before whom she played agreed that she was ready to go to Europe to study music. However, Mr. and Mrs. Cheney did not want their little girl to be trained only in music. They knew that she would be happier and healthier if she were to go to school with children of her own age. They also realized that she should have plenty of time to romp and play outdoors with other children.

Amy was therefore sent to a private school, conducted by Mr. W. L. Whittemore, where she rapidly mastered the regular studies. She was greatly helped in her piano work by her good ear and accurate memory. She was able to play a whole Beethoven sonata without notes after she had heard one of her fellow-pupils practice it.

While Amy was quite young her quick ear and good memory gave her an opportunity to be of real service to the world. Professor Sill, a scientist who made birds his special study, asked her to record the songs of the California larks.

Out into the fields they went together and waited, motionless, for the birds to appear. Then just as soon as one of the little feathered creatures trilled out his melody, Amy wrote it down in notes. The song thus caught was kept for all time. She continued this practice of recording songs so that she finally had a volume filled with bird melodies.

Amy Cheney studied under Ernst Perabo, Carl Baerman, and Junius W. Hill. She also studied many musical subjects independently. She did not always want to be helped over the problems that confronted her, preferring to work them out alone. Translating books on music and memorizing and rewriting difficult music were some of the hard tasks that this earnest, thorough young student set for herself.

At sixteen years of age this young pianist made her first professional appearance before the public at a recital in Boston, and was greatly praised. The next year she played with the Boston Symphony Orchestra and with the Theodore Thomas Orchestra. During that year a beautiful song which she had composed, entitled With Violets, was published. It was considered by musical critics to be faultless in form.

The following year Amy Cheney became the wife of Dr. H. H. A. Beach, of Boston. She did not, however, give up her musical career. In fact, all of her most important pieces of music were written after her marriage.

Mrs. Beach has composed music for the orchestra, piano, and violin, and has also written cantatas and many songs. One of her most famous and successful pieces of music is her Jubilate cantata, written for the dedication of the Woman’s Building at the World’s Columbian Exposition, held in Chicago in 1893. At this Exposition Maud Powell, the famous violinist, and Mrs. Beach played one of Mrs. Beach’s compositions written for the violin and piano.

The music for a poem called Dark Is the Night is thought by many people to be her best song. Other favorites are: Across the World, Scottish Cradle Song, and Fairy Lullaby. Mrs. Beach’s songs are always enjoyed by those who appreciate the best music.

Success did not spoil the young girl whose marked musical ability had attracted attention ever since her babyhood. Not content with what had come easily to her, Amy Marcy Cheney Beach kept on working to develop her talent. Her love of music and enthusiasm for it were not alone responsible for placing her foremost among the women composers of America. It was her desire for knowledge, leading her to studiously apply herself to her work, that enabled her to create music which has brought pleasure to thousands of people.

Cecilia Beaux—

Whose Paint Brush Has Brought Her Fame

Cecilia’s gray eyes grew thoughtful as she considered the drawing that she was copying. She held it at arm’s length, scrutinizing it critically.

“Ah, this is much more fun than practicing scales,” she reflected.

When the family examined these drawings, they said, “Cecilia would never be a success at music, but she draws very well.”

This little girl was Cecilia Beaux, whose portraits have won many medals. She was born in Philadelphia in 1863. Her father came from Provence, France, where the people have ever been famed for their enjoyment of beauty. Her mother was of New England descent and had inherited from her ancestors the ability to do things and to do them conscientiously and well.

From each parent the little girl received a golden gift: from her father, his joy in the beautiful; from her mother, the love of doing things. Her good use of these two gifts has made Cecilia Beaux a famous artist.

Cecilia was taught at home until she was twelve years old. Then she attended a private school for a short time. Because of the skill that she had shown in copying drawings her aunt and uncle, with whom she spent a great deal of time, proposed a training in art for her.

This young girl had a few lessons in drawing from a Philadelphia artist, Mrs. Thomas Janvier. She also had an opportunity to have her work in painting criticized by Mr. William Sartain. Her gray eyes shone with happiness as she applied her colors and listened eagerly to every word from this distinguished teacher. Cecilia Beaux was practically self-taught. These few lessons constituted her only instruction in art until she went abroad some years later.

Instead of sitting and dreaming of the great pictures that she might paint some day, Cecilia Beaux looked for an opportunity to use her brush or pencil to aid her financially. A scientific society needed some one upon whom they could depend to make accurate drawings of fossils. This kind of work necessitated very careful attention to detail. The drawings were to be made into plates to illustrate scientific books. They would have been useless if they had not been exactly correct.

Some young artists, eager to do what they would call big things, would have been impatient with such slow, tedious work. Cecilia Beaux did not despise it. She did it to the very best of her ability, just because she believed in doing things well. Little did she dream that this training in careful and exact drawing was to be of great help to her when she began to paint portraits.

Another way in which she earned money was by giving lessons in painting and drawing. She also found that she could increase her income by painting portraits on china plates, taking her subjects from photographs. She did these very well, too, being careful to make correct likenesses.

Then Cecilia Beaux began to make crayon portraits from photographs. These attracted attention and she soon received many orders for portraits.

One success followed another, but although Cecilia Beaux received much praise for her work, she was not content with what she had accomplished. She felt that she needed still more training and that to have it she must go to Paris.

Accordingly, Miss Beaux went to Europe and began to broaden her talent by studying with several great French masters. One of them, Robert Fleury, used to summon her before the class to praise her work publicly. So modest was this American girl that she thought he could not be in earnest. Her fellow-students, also, used to discuss her excellent work.

The many friends that she made in Paris begged her to stay in that beautiful city and paint there, but she was too thoroughly American to spend her life in a foreign land. So, after a few years, she returned to her own country.

A great many of Miss Beaux’s best-known pictures are of women and children, but she has painted men with great success, too. In fact, she was chosen to paint portraits of Clemenceau, Admiral Beatty, and other great war leaders. Her portraits of women and children are really little pictures of everyday home life. She has caught the children as they have paused in their play for a moment.

“Ernesta,” one of Miss Beaux’s well-known portraits, hangs in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. Among her other important paintings are “The Last Days of Infancy,” “The Dancing Lesson,” “Sita and Sarita,” and “The New England Woman.”

Cecilia Beaux has won medals and prizes at many exhibitions of art. People are glad to pay large sums of money for her pictures, and it is considered an honor to be painted by her. She has steadily achieved success because she has never scorned nor slighted small tasks. She has done them conscientiously and well, making them a preparation for greater things to come.

Evangeline Booth—

The Girl Who Lived The Meaning of Her Name

Many a passerby on the crowded London street paused to glance at the earnest, thoughtful face of a slender, golden-haired flower girl and to buy a nosegay from her basket. When her stock was sold this girl, as fair and fragile as one of her own flowers, picked her way through the throng. She presently disappeared into one of the dirty alleyways, where only the poorest of Londoners lived.

Children ran to meet her and rough men touched their caps as she passed. The sick woman whose wretched room she entered fell asleep peacefully after receiving a bowl of soup from her hands and a cheery word.

For weeks this sweet-faced young girl, who sold flowers or worked at making matches, had been winning the hearts of the poor, discouraged people of this district. She tended their babies and prayed with the lonely old women. These people felt that they had found a friend who was sorry for them and who was always ready to give them aid. They called her the “White Angel.”

One day she told these people that she was a Salvation Army lassie. The Army was hated in this district because it was trying to close the saloons; only a few months earlier its preachers had been stoned in the streets. The “White Angel,” herself, had been warned by the police that it would be dangerous for her to speak in this part of London. Yet so beloved and respected had she become that she felt perfectly safe. Because of her good work, the people in this poverty-stricken and wicked district were soon attending the meetings of the Army.

The girl who dared to go into the very worst part of London to live the life of its poor people that she might better know how to help them was Evangeline Booth. In later years she became the Commander-in-chief of the Salvation Army in the United States.

Evangeline Booth’s father, William Booth, had been apprenticed as a boy to a pawnbroker. He was so touched by the poverty and wickedness around him that he put his whole soul into helping others to lead better lives. The Mission, that he established in London after many struggles, became in time the Salvation Army. For years, William Booth, General of the Army, toiled against odds of every kind.

The thinking world now has respect and admiration for the splendid work that the Salvation Army carries on. In those days, however, the street preachers of the Army were as likely to be showered with stones and bricks as to be sneered and ridiculed. The rougher people disliked the Army because it was fighting drink and wickedness. Other people could not see that the drum and tambourine and simple prayers might help to turn a man’s heart to God as readily as could organ music and learned sermons.

It was into the home of the founder of this once despised organization, at Hackney, a suburb of London, that a seventh child, Evangeline Booth, was born, December 1865. There was a loving welcome for the little girl, though she had come into a home where both mother and father believed that their family must be second to the work that they were doing for the world.

Little Evangeline and her sisters heard so much of their father’s work that even their favorite game was playing prayer meeting with their battered dolls. She and the others had very few toys, because their parents thought that the money should be spent for the poor.

It was a very busy home in which Eva, as her father preferred to call her, grew up. The bell was always ringing. Messengers were coming and going. In one room her father’s deep voice might be heard planning his work. In another room her mother was busy writing for the Cause. The younger children murmured their lessons in a third room, and in a fourth, one of the older girls practiced on the piano.

The General would often stop in the midst of his work for little chats with his children. He would take Eva, for whom he always had a specially deep love and tenderness, upon his knee and ask her about her puppies or kittens. Once when Eva felt very sad over the death of her pet dog, her father took her to the city and spent the whole day telling her stories and comforting her.

At an early age Eva learned that she should pick up her books and toys for, above everything else except sin, her father hated disorder. Orderliness was a useful habit to be acquired by one who was later to have charge of the affairs of a great organization.

Though Eva’s mother was often too busy to spend much time with her, she heard her daughter’s prayers and urged her to study so that she could help the weak, the poor, the ignorant, and the wicked. Mrs. Booth often reminded Eva to carry out in her life the meaning of her beautiful name, Evangeline, “bringing glad tidings.”

Evangeline Booth began her work of “bringing glad tidings” when she was very young. She had inherited her father’s gift of eloquence as well as his fearlessness and love of work. At fifteen years of age she spoke very beautifully at a meeting near London. When she was seventeen years old she was made an officer in the Army and began the work in the slums which won her the title of “White Angel.”

After ably filling various positions in the Salvation Army in Great Britain, Evangeline Booth was made Commander of the Army in Canada. At the time of the Gold Rush in 1898, she sent Salvation Army workers to the Klondike. In 1904 she was made Commander-in-chief of the Salvation Army in the United States. Besides her duties as Commander she has composed words and music for the Army’s songs and has written articles for the Army publications and other magazines.

In addition to its religious work the Salvation Army maintains homes, hospitals, clinics, and day nurseries; it finds employment for men and women out of work; and it sends mothers and children on summer outings. Every Christmas and Thanksgiving pennies dropped into the big red Salvation Army kettles provide dinners for thousands of the poor. In a single year the Army in the United States made 175,698 children happy with Christmas toys.

During the World War the pies and doughnuts served by the Salvation Army lassies cheered thousands of lonely soldiers, and many a mother has the Salvation Army to thank for her boy’s last message.

Evangeline Booth was for almost twenty years Commander-in-chief of this great organization in the United States. She believes, as her father did before her, that the first step in influencing a man to lead a better life is to make him feel that you really care whether he sinks or swims. Her courageous, selfless life shows that she does care.

Frances Hodgson Burnett—

The Girl Who Loved Stories And Wrote Them

From under the sitting-room table came strange whispers, but Mrs. Hodgson was not at all surprised. Beneath the long overhanging cover she could see a chubby, curly-headed little girl seated on the floor talking in low earnest tones to her wax doll, braced against the table leg.

Frances, the little girl under the table, would have described the scene very differently. What she saw was not an ordinary center table, but an Indian wigwam; not a speechless doll, but a squaw to whom she, as the chief, was telling tales of the war-trail and the happy hunting grounds.

“Frances is pretending again,” said Mrs. Hodgson to herself as she went out of the room, a bit puzzled at this little daughter’s way of playing.

The chubby little girl and her doll had many an adventure together. They took mad gallops on coal-black steeds that seemed to ordinary eyes nothing but the arms of the nursery sofa. As survivors from a sinking ship they drifted on a raft that Frances’ two sisters would have called the green arm chair. These experiences seemed very real to this little girl.

Something within little Frances’ curly head helped her to transform the sitting-room cupboard into a temple in Central America and the stiff doll into Mary Queen of Scots. It was the gift of imagination. How surprised her family would have been at that time had they known that this gift was one day to make her a famous storywriter.

In the smoky factory town of Manchester, England, Frances Eliza Hodgson was born, November 24, 1849. When she was about four years old, her sweet, gentle mother was left a widow.

Like other English children of families in comfortable circumstances, the Hodgson girls had a governess at home, before they entered a near-by private school. The lessons which interested Frances the most were those that contained stories, such as certain parts of history. She could never satisfy her great appetite for stories, though she read continually.

There were not so many good books for children then as nowadays. Frances’ relatives seemed to think that the birthday and Christmas gift books were quite enough for a little girl. Frances, however, did not agree with them. When she made a new acquaintance at school, she was sure to ask her, first of all, what books she had to lend. Sometimes when she went to visit a little friend, she forgot her manners entirely and buried herself in a new book, so eager was she to read.

One gloomy rainy day, Frances wandered through the house looking for something to read. She glanced at the tall secretary and wished that its books looked more interesting. However, she decided that she might at least try one. Accordingly, she pulled out a fat volume. It had short lines, which, to Frances, meant conversation and a story. She opened another book and found more stories. Delightedly, she continued to examine the books.

Frances was so excited and happy that she forgot to go to tea. She had discovered that there were stories enough to last her for months! It was in this way that Frances Hodgson discovered Shakespeare’s plays, Scott’s and Dickens’ novels, and many other interesting books.

Not content with reading stories, Frances was always telling or writing them. On the afternoons at school when the girls were allowed to talk quietly over their crocheting and fancy work, Frances would tell stories in low tones to the group of girls near her. They were delighted with her tales and continually begged her to tell more.

At home she often wrote stories on slates or in old account books. For fear of being teased she rarely showed the stories to anyone except her mother. Mrs. Hodgson always had an encouraging word for her little daughter’s tales and verses. This gave Frances an added incentive to continue writing.

Just at the close of the Civil War a great change came into the life of the little storywriter. Mrs. Hodgson decided to leave England and move to America. The family fortunes were impaired, and an uncle had promised to find work for the boys in the United States.

Romantic Frances was delighted with the change. Her first American home was in a tiny settlement in the forests of Tennessee. Everything was so new and strange that she seemed actually to be living in a story. The next home on the top of a hill, with mountains in the distance, was even better. How she loved the bright sunshine, the flowers, the birds, and her bower, a cozy retreat in the woods!

The boys had not as yet been able to add very much to the family fortunes. Frances and her sisters did not mind worn-out frocks and scanty meals, but they were troubled to see their dear little mother so worried. The girls decided that something had to be done immediately.

“How wonderful it would be,” thought Frances, “if an editor would buy one of my stories!”

She was only fifteen years old, and she did not know how to send a story to an editor. She had read in a magazine that contributors must write very clearly on foolscap paper, and enclose stamps.

Not having sufficient money with which to buy stamps and paper, Frances and her sisters earned the money by selling wild grapes.

At last the story was sent, but it was done secretly, for Frances was afraid that her brothers would tease her. What a happy day it was when, on its second trip, the story, together with another, brought a check for thirty-five dollars! She had found a way to help.

Frances Hodgson went on writing and selling her stories. Soon her books became famous. When she married Dr. S. M. Burnett, she was able to help him complete his education by her writing. Their son, Vivian, is also a writer. He has been a journalist and is the author of several books.

Mrs. Burnett has written many novels for grown people as well as stories that children love. Little Lord Fauntleroy, the tale of a lovable little American boy who won the heart of his crusty old English grandfather, is the best known of her books for children. Among her other well-known books are Editha’s Burglar, Sara Crewe, The Cozy Lion, The Secret Garden, and Land of the Blue Flower.

Mrs. Burnett does not preach in her delightful stories for children. One can, however, easily see in her stories the lessons in thoughtfulness and courtesy she had learned from her mother. Frances Hodgson Burnett’s great gift of imagination, together with her desire to write, enabled her to give us stories that have brought pleasure to many people.

Katharine Bement Davis—

The Girl Who Has Helped To Straighten Twisted Lives

The villain had received his just deserts, but he, or rather she, was smiling with satisfaction. Her play, for Katharine was the author as well as a principal actor, had been a great success. Nobody had forgotten a line, and, in addition, the scenery had added a realistic setting. Who would ever have dreamed that the deep forest and bold cliffs were only boughs cut from the shrubbery, and boxes covered with mother’s old gray shawl?

The back parlor of the Davis home was crowded with a friendly audience of girls and boys and a few mothers and fathers. This attendance was very gratifying to Katharine, for it assured her that the receipts would be large. With them she intended to provide a bountiful Thanksgiving dinner for a good woman who was having difficulty in supporting her crippled grandson.

Little did this merry eleven-year-old girl think that the work of helping others, begun in such a small way that night, was the work that she was to choose for her own later on. When she grew up she became a sociologist. This is simply a long word for a person who thinks, studies, plans, and works to help people lead happier, healthier, and better lives.

Katharine Bement Davis was born in Buffalo, New York, January 15, 1860. Within a short time the family moved to Dunkirk, New York. In the happy childhood days spent in this town on Lake Erie, there was no hint of the sorrow of life which Katharine was to cheer in later years.

Besides four younger sisters and brothers for playmates, Kitty, as she was called, had no end of school chums. They were always welcome at her home, for the Davis house was a sort of center of good times for the neighborhood. In the winter the children acted plays in the house; in the summer time they played Indian in the backyard, or built houses of kindling wood.

Kitty was usually chief builder, because she loved to watch something grow under her hands. Making things was always such a joy to her that years later, when she had charge of the Bedford Reformatory, she taught her girls how to do all sorts of useful tasks. They even laid the concrete walks between the buildings.

This little Lake Erie girl had as great an appetite for finding out how other people did things as for doing them herself. Once when a friend of the family took her for a drive, she inquired the name and use of every part of the carriage. By the time they reached home, her companion felt as if he had been put through a severe examination; but Katharine knew all about the carriage. This habit of going to the very bottom of things was to be of great use to a woman who was to have hard problems to settle in her public life.

Kitty Davis was very fond of reading. Her sisters and brothers often found her deeply absorbed in a book. Some of Scott’s and Dickens’ novels were among the book friends that she made at eleven and twelve years of age.

Little Katharine Davis liked to create with her mind as well as with her hands. When she was eleven years old, she had thought out tunes for a number of hymns. She enjoyed her music lessons, especially the part which showed her how music is made. The grown-up Katharine Davis realized that music helps people to forget their troubles and to think better thoughts. For this reason, she made sure that her girls at the reformatory should not only hear good music but should sing it themselves in their own glee club.

In the Davis family lived Grandmother Bement, a woman who had always had a hand in any new movement to make the world better. Katharine and the other children loved to hear her tell about the escape of slaves by means of the underground railroad, the fight against drink, and the struggle for rights for women. It was not strange that the granddaughter of such a woman should have a desire to be of service to the world.

The years flew on until Katharine Davis was ready for college. Business reverses had come to Mr. Davis, and he told his daughter that he could not pay her expenses.

“Never mind,” answered Katharine, “I will earn them myself.”

She kept her word. Studying by herself while she was teaching science in the Dunkirk High School, Katharine Davis completed two years of college work. She then entered Vassar College as a junior. She successfully passed the many special examinations that it was necessary for her to take. Upon the completion of two years’ work at college Katharine Davis was graduated with honors.

For a number of years, Miss Davis spent her time, first, in teaching; then, in settlement work; and later, in further study. After three years of graduate work, the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, with honors, was conferred upon her by the University of Chicago. Thus she was ably prepared to enter the field of social service.

When it was announced that a new reformatory for women was to be opened at Bedford, New York, Dr. Davis was immediately interested. She thought that there she might be able to carry out her ideas for helping girls who had not had a pleasant home and wise parents like her own.

Dr. Davis received the appointment as superintendent of this reformatory, and set about getting acquainted with her girls. She believed that many of these lives that had been started in the wrong way might turn out happily, if some one took the trouble to study them.

Dr. Davis endeavored really to know the girls at Bedford. She was vitally interested in their welfare and did everything that she could to help them. She spent many successful years as superintendent of this reformatory.

Dr. Davis’ ability to grasp a situation and meet it was clearly demonstrated at the time of the Messina earthquake. She was in Sicily when the disaster occurred, and immediately set about to aid the sufferers. Her work of rehabilitating the earthquake victims was so important that it won for her a Red Cross Medal, presented by President Taft.

When Dr. Davis took charge of all the prisons in the city of New York, as Commissioner of Correction, she had another opportunity for continuing her wonderful work. Katharine Bement Davis has served on a number of commissions formed for the purpose of social betterment. Many persons who desire to learn the best ways of working for humanity go to her for advice. Because of the little girl who carried into later life her joy of working and her habit of investigating things, many twisted lives have been straightened.

Grace Hoadley Dodge—

The Girl Who Worked For Working Girls

A group of prominent men and women were sitting in the drawing room of a beautiful home in New York City, talking earnestly. Close by them sat a young girl, the eldest daughter of the house. She shyly added only an occasional word to the conversation, but she gave very careful attention to everything that her elders said.

One member of this group was Dwight L. Moody, the famous preacher. The girl listened to him with particular interest, and was deeply impressed by all he had to say.

There were often such gatherings in this home. No matter with what subject the conversation started, sooner or later came the question of how to help men and women lead the best kind of lives. It was not strange, then, that one day this young girl went to her mother and said, “I have found out what there is for me to do. I am going to help people.”

That is exactly what Grace Dodge did. She helped people. Perhaps you will be surprised to learn that she helped each one of you girls and boys.

Every girl who has learned in a cooking class how to bake a wholesome loaf of bread; every boy who brings home from school a well-finished footstool for his mother, has Grace Dodge to thank. Every one of your older sisters who enjoys a swim or a game of basketball at the Y. W. C. A. has her to thank too. Of course, there are others to thank as well, for every good work needs many helpers.

When Grace Dodge was young, girls and boys in the public schools were not taught how to work with their hands; and girls who were earning their own living had no pleasant clubs. Grace Dodge believed strongly in these things, and worked so earnestly all her life for them that other people became interested too, and gladly cooperated with her in her beloved work.

Grace Hoadley Dodge was born in New York City, May 21, 1855. The Dodge family divided their time between their city home and their beautiful country house at Riverdale on the banks of the Hudson. Here Grace had many a fine gallop through the country with her brothers. Aside from these lively rides, which she greatly enjoyed, she lived quietly.