While spending some time in Florida with Mr. Thomas A. Edison [1847-1931], the noted electrical genius, and Mr. John Burroughs, the eminent naturalist, the question of cigarette smoking and its evil effects, particularly upon boys and young men, came up for discussion.

Mr. Edison advanced some pronounced views in condemnation of the cigarette. For several years he had been experimenting with combustion of various substances for the purpose of discovering a suitable filament for use in incandescent lamps, and it was during this research that the harmful effects of acrolein were observed. I asked Mr. Edison to put his conclusions in writing. He did so, and the letter is herewith reproduced in facsimile.

Following receipt of this letter, I authorized an interview in which I went squarely on record as opposed to cigarettes, making it plain that

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"the scientific facts are all in favor of the cigarette;" "that it contains less nicotine than any other form of tobacco products; that it is absolutely pure; that the combustion of the paper is harmless in its effects on human physiology."

I was challenged to either prove my contention or enable the manufacturers to disprove it; to give as much publicity to the retraction Mr. Hill felt certain would be forthcoming as was given to my "original unwarranted attacks."

I do not ask you to accept my word alone in this matter. I want you to read carefully Mr. Edison's letter, Mr. Hill's defense, and the opinions of doctors, judges, university instructors, athletes, etc.a few selected at random from hundreds who have testified. Then you will be in a position to judge for yourself whether "the scientific facts are all in favor of the cigarette;" whether you can afford to become a slave to a habit that a no less noted person than Hudson Maxim [1853-1927] declares [p 21] is "a maker of invalids, criminals and fools."

Dr. A. D. Bush, who enjoys a world-wide reputation as a physiologist, recently decided to conduct an investigation along the lines of tobacco smoking in its relation to mental efficiency. In its issue of May, 1914, Efficiency Magazine had this to say in regard to the results:

"As a result of a series of experiments by Dr. A. D. Bush, it has been ascertained that tobacco smoking causes a decrease of 10.5 per cent in mental efficiency. There was a series of 120 tests on each of fifteen men in several different psychic fields. The men who volunteered for the tests were all medical students ranging in age from 21 to 32 years, of varying previous experience, from the farm laborer to the life-long student. The mental capacity of the students varied from the failure to the honor student. The subjects were attendants at the University of Vermont, where Dr. Bush is an instructor in physiology."

Ed. Note: Even "second-hand smoke hurts children's grades. See "Can secondhand smoke hurt kids' grades?" (Reuters, 29 July 2010). This article cites the study by Dr. Sai-Yin Ho, et al., in Journal of Pediatrics, online July 20, 2010. "Ho's team notes, it is biologically plausible that the many toxic compounds in tobacco smoke -- including lead, arsenic, ammonia and hydrogen cyanide -- could affect children's cognitive abilities." Tobacco's toxic chemicals include both the ingredients and the emissions.

The Brain Acts More Slowly

As superintendent of Walnut Lodge Hospital, Inc., in Hartford, Conn., Dr. T. D. Crothers had exceptional opportunities for observing the effects of cigarette smoking. Here are some of his conclusions:

In young persons who begin on cigarettes there are always pronounced symptoms of poisoning, such as pallor and dullness of activity. The brain seems to act more slowly to outside impressions, and the reasoning is always more or less inaccurate; minute statements of events and capacity to carry out work that requires steadiness, accuracy and persistency is lacking. Later there are distinct marks of palsy, twitching of the nerves of the face, absence of expression from loss of nerve force. In older persons these symptoms are not so prominent, but are all present in greater or less degree. I consider cigarette smoking the most dangerous because the products of combustion are drawn into the mouth directly and absorbed Loss of power, loss of control, diminished vitality and general inefficiency and profound weakness are almost certain to follow. Other diseases are invited, and show greater persistency and fatality. The one conclusion, to which there are no exceptions so far as we are able to determine, is that tobacco

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is a more or less dangerous narcotic to the senses and the higher brain activities, and no person can be in complete possession of his faculties and power of control and exercise the highest efficiency possible who uses tobacco.

Mind Wrecked by Cigarettes

The following item which appeared in the Detroit Times on March 20, 1916, is significant testimony in the indictment of cigarettes and their use, even by men of mature age and development. The clipping tells the whole story, and so we reproduce it without further comment:

"One hundred cigarettes a day were too much for Frank Winters aged 46 years, of this city. He was declared to have been mentally affected by excessive cigarette smoking in a certificate filed in the Probate Court, Saturday morning, by Dr. M. A. Layton. A petition asking for the commitment of Winters to an insane asylum was filed with the probate court by Joseph Perman, No. 542 Lawndale Ave., with whom Winters lives. "His strange actions had made his associates think him insane. Dr. Layton declared in his report that he was unable to find well defined symptoms of insanity, but that cigarettes had made him simple minded."

Cigarette Evil is Most Serious

As a principal of Eastern High School, Detroit, Mr. J. Remsen Bishop has each year had under him hundreds of youths who were at the formative stage. Here is how he regards cigarette smoking:

"Experience of many years, chiefly with boys between the ages of thirteen and nineteen, has persuaded me that of all the agencies which make for non-success in high-school work the cigarette evil is the most serious with which we have to deal."

Makes Slaves of Boys

Writing in the Scientific Temperance Journal, Rev. Ozora S. Davis, D. D., president of Chicago Theological Seminary, says:

"The power of the cigarette habit is greater than we would be inclined to think. Boys in school who are in the clutch

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of it become its slaves. They cannot put their minds on their work. They are incapable of remaining long without the stimulant of another cigarette. Their whole physical and moral condition is involved. This is the universal testimony of teachers, and it is something that is known to the writer from experience as a high school principal. The fetter of the cigarette habit becomes welded at last with a grip that no act of the weakened will alone can break. This is the terrible and tragic end of the matter in case after case. Boys think that they can smoke a little now and then when they please and that they can stop when they are ready to do so. They do not know that the very continuing of the use of cigarettes involves their wills so seriously that when they want to stop they cannot. This can be proven from every school in the country."

Smokers in Football Tryout

To the athletically inclined boy who enters college the greatest honor attainable is that of "making the team." With a view to ascertaining what effect, if any, smoking had on athletic fitness. Dr. Frederick J. Pack, of the University of Utah, gathered statistics from a number of colleges, selected at random, the football tryout being chosen as affording the best comparable evidence.

Twelve colleges and universities in all parts of the country supplied the facts, according to the Scientific Temperance Journal. A total of 210 men contested for positions on the first teams. Of the non-smokers 65.8 per cent were successful; of the smokers only 33.3 per cent were successful. This was not only true in the six institutions which furnished data about the tryout when taken as a total, but in each of the six the non-smokers far outstripped the smokers. In one institution not a single smoker obtained a place on the team.

Smoking Causes Lower Efficiency

Dr. Charles B. Towns, of New York, is a recognized authority on neurotics. He has for many years specialized in the treatment of nervous diseases. Recently he has been assisting Mrs. William K. Yanderbilt, Sr., in her crusade against drug habits. Here is his estimate of the cigarette as expressed in an article in the Century Magazine:

"It is generally admitted that in the immature the moderate use of tobacco stunts the normal growth of the body and mind, and causes various nervous disturbances, especially of the heartdisturbances which it causes in later life only when smoking has become excessive. That is to say, though a boy's

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stomach grows tolerant of nicotine to the extent of taking it without protest, the rest of the body keeps on protesting. Furthermore, all business men will tell you that tobacco damages a boy's usefulness in his work. This is necessarily so, since anything which lowers vitality creates some kind of incompetence. For the same reason, the boy who smokes excessively not only is unable to work vigorously, but he does not wish to work at all. If there were some instrument to determine it, in my opinion there would be seen a difference of fifteen per cent in the general efficiency of smokers and non-smokers. And despite the fact that cigarette smoking is the worst form of tobacco addiction, virtually all boys who smoke start with cigarettes."

What Dr. Wiley Has to Say

When Dr. Harvey W. Wiley was chief of the federal bureau of chemistry at Washington he had impure food and drug manufacturers on the run all the time. He is unquestionably the leading health and food authority in the United States today. Would you know his opinion of the cigarette?

"I commend Mr. Ford, Mr. Edison and all people who join them in efforts to curtail or restrict, obliterate or destroy the pernicious habit of cigarette smoking. The use of cigarettes is making inroads, on the strength of the nerves of all who smoke them, especially boys of tender years or women who smoke them because they think that the practice is smart. The effect may not be so bad on people of more mature years, but not in any case, no matter how old a man or woman, is smoking helpful. Besides constituting a nuisance, the financial strain connected with use of tobacco stands between millions of people and home comforts."

Undermines Success

Dr. Winfield S. Hall, Ph. D., M. D., is professor of physiology in Northwestern University Medical School, Chicago; Fellow of the American Academy of Medicine, Member of the American Physiology Society. He looks at the use of tobacco from a scientific standpoint. His are the views of a man who knows by experience and observation, as he was for years a smoker before he came to realize that he was forming a "drug" habit, and quit:

"Tobacco does much to undermine the success of young men. Why? Because it is the entering wedge of two lines of dissipation. either of which may defeat success. The first line is the dissipation of money for things unnecessary. The second line of dissipation, is that of sense gratification. One uses

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tobacco partly because of its flavor and partly for the sedative action which it exerts upon the nervous system. It is just this sedative effect which steals away a young man's vigilance and alertness and handicaps him in the struggle for success. The use of tobacco paves the way to other dissipation by requiring a compensating stimulant to overcome its sedative effect and by making the common wholesome food taste insipid and flat. A vast majority of drunkards were smokers before they were drinkers. The mental attitude and lack of resistance which permits a man to smoke is likely also to permit other forms of dissipation more destructive in their influence."

Cigarettes Injure Morally

Dr. D. H. Kress is the man who perhaps more than any other single individual has helped boys and men who desired to break away from cigarette smoking through the administration of treatments that effect a cure.

"The cigarette," says Dr. Kress, "strikes a direct blow at the most vital organ of the body. It weakens the heart action. For this reason it is difficult for the cigarette addict to engage in athletics. He finds he is easily winded and is lacking in endurance. He soon loses all ambition to engage in sports, or, in fact, in any useful occupation. Associating with others of his kind, he soon begins to visit the pool rooms. In time he may end up in the juvenile court, reform school or penitentiary. It is estimated that 96 per cent of our youthful criminals are cigarette addicts. The boy with a weakened heart is more apt to succumb to typhoid fever, tuberculosis or other acute diseases which especially tax the heart, should he be stricken down with them. The cigarette injures the boy morally. He is almost as difficult to impress as the cocaine fiend."

The Cigarette as Related to Disease and Mortality

In addition to the effect of cigarette smoking on the morals, Dr. Kress makes some statements concerning effects of the habit on the physical state of the nation itself. "The Medical Times" for April, 1916, contains the following paragraphs, which seem especially pertinent. Dr. Kress here says:

"In an ungraded room of a Detroit school, out of twenty-six boys, ranging from twelve to sixteen years, only two were found who did not habitually smoke cigarettes. These boys had never smoked and were, in all respects, the best developed boys in the room. The principal called my attention to two other boys, one of whom admitted using cigarettes since the age of five or six years, and the other confessed to having smoked them as long as he could remember."

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"Physically, the latter two were the most defective of any in the department. The boy who had smoked as long as he could remember was unable to write his name, and a pulse tracing showed the heart in a most defective condition. Whether these two boys would have been as tall and well-developed as the other two, I cannot say. It seems more than a coincidence, however, that the only two boys who had never smoked should be the best developed in every way, while the inveterate smokers should be most defective. All four lads were of the same age, about fourteen, but in stature the smokers resembled boys of eight or nine."

It is not difficult to identify boys and young men who are habitual users of cigarettes. A small, delicate instrument known as the sphygmograph is employed, being placed on the wrist so that it covers the radial artery. As the artery pulsates against a sensitive spring, a tracing is made on smoked paper which moves through the apparatus. The diagrams below show

_\_\_\_\_\_\

Pulse tracing of a non smoker. _ \ _ \ _ \ _ \ _ \ _ \ _ \

Pulse tracing of habitual cigarette smoker. Heart in serious condition. _ \ _ \ _ \ _ \ _ \ _ \

Pulse tracing of boy 14. Has appearance of boy 9 years of agestunted and very nervous and feeble heart.

the heart action of the confirmed smoker of cigarettes in comparison with the strong, regular heart action of the normal healthy mana demonstration of the most vital importance.

"It is generally recognized that any habit of life which places an extra tax upon the kidneys, heart or other vital organs, wears them out prematurely. Such a habit is the use of cigarettes as practiced today from youth up. A careful study of six Canadian insurance companies found the mortality rate of non-smokers to be 59 and that of moderate smokers 93.

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"A tobacco crippled heart cannot stand the extra strain that is placed upon it during any disease accompanied by high temperature and high blood pressure. Pneumonia frequently weeds out those who possess some organic disease, and its field of operation is chiefly confined to men whose hearts are weakened by the excessive use of tobacco. "Mortality from tuberculosis is greater among men than among women after the age of twenty, due probably to a weakening of the lungs through the inhaling of cigarette smoke. The Phipps Institute in Philadelphia found that mortality from pulmonary tuberculosis is greater among smokers than among non-smokers."

The relation of tobacco, especially in the form of cigarettes, and alcohol and opium is a very close one, declares Dr. Charles B. Towns, of New York, in an article in the Century Magazine.

"For years I have been dealing with alcoholism and morphinism, have gone into their every phase and aspect, have kept careful and minute details of between six and seven thousand cases, and I have never seen a case, except occasionally with women, which did not have a history of excessive tobacco. "A boy always starts smoking before he starts drinking. If he is disposed to drink, that disposition will be increased by smoking, because the action of tobacco makes it normal for him to feel the need of stimulation. He is likely to go to alcohol to soothe the muscular unrest, to blunt the irritation he has received from tobacco. From alcohol he goes to morphine for the same reason. The nervous condition due to excessive drinking is allayed by morphine, just as the nervous condition due to excessive smoking is allayed by alcohol. "Morphine is the legitimate consequence of alcohol, and alcohol is the legitimate consequence of tobacco. Cigarettes, drink opium, is the logical and regular series."

What Mike Donovan Says

Mike Donovan has been a familiar figure in athletics all his life. For thirty years he has been athletic director of the New York Athletic Club. His work has brought him in touch with all classes of men and boys under the most trying conditions. His word is law with those who know him. And when it comes to smoking he speaks out with characteristic directness. Listen to this:

"Any boy who smokes can never hope to succeed in any line of endeavor, as smoking weakens the heart and lungs, and ruins the stomach and affects the entire nervous system. If a boy or young man expects to amount to anything in athlet-"

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ics he must let smoking and all kinds of liquor alone. They are rank poison to his athletic ambitions."

Worst of Tobacco is in Cigarettes

Says the Medical World speaking editorially of cigarettes:

"The worst of tobacco is found in cigarettes. The feature of their use which makes them most dangerous, and which is subtly enslaving and demoralizing, is the practically universal habit of inhalation of the smoke. This brings it into contact with many square feet of vascular tissues in the mouth, throat, bronchial tubes and air cells in the lungs, which almost instantly absorb the poisons from the fumes and nearly as quickly infuse them into the circulation. "In young boys the effects of cigarette smoking are quickly noticeable and soon become alarming. If the habit is not checked, sallow skin, sunken eyes, loss of appetite, stained fingers, listlessness and loss of memory, of application or concentration of the mind, shortness of breath, nervousness, palpitation of the heart, insomnia, giddiness, irritable throat, impaired digestion, malnutrition, and in many of the cases impaired or permanent loss of vision results. "Unquestionably, in the face of the facts, it is the plain duty of every practitioner of medicine not only to oppose with all the vigor at his hand the use of the cigarette among the boys of his clientele, but also to do all in his power to enforce the laws against their sale to minors."

How About This Experiment

Mrs. T. E. Patterson, of Griffin, Georgia, president of the Georgia Woman's Christian Temperance Union, and a woman of exceptional mental attainments, takes issue with Mr. Hill, president of the American Tobacco Company, regarding the harmfulness of cigarette smoking. Says Mrs. Patterson:

"I have heard amateur chemists say, 'I have investigated and find that cigarette papers contain no poison.' We are told that they do contain lime, lead and arsenic, a solution used to toughen the paper. "Several years ago I stepped into a grocery store and asked to buy a package of cigarette papers, such as were given away at that time with Durham smoking tobacco. I took two small bottles, each holding about three tablespoonfuls of water. In one I placed 15 of these cigarette papers, and in the other an equal thickness of leaves of tissue paper from between visiting cards, for the tissue papers were much thinner and it took a larger number of leaves. "I found that a few drops of the water from the bottle containing the cigarette paper would kill a mouse quicker than

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you could say 'Jack Robinson,' and teaspoonsful of the water from the other papers seemed to cause a mouse to suffer no inconvenience. "I have killed dozens of mice with this water and there are others who have tried the experiment with the same success. Will Mr. Hill please tell me what made the difference in the same water, in the same kind of bottles, except the papers that were placed in the bottle?"

What a Noted Sport Writer Thinks

Grantland Rice is a writer of recognized authority on all sports. He has been sporting editor of some of the largest newspapers in the country, and is an athlete of renown. He should know what he is talking about. And here are his views:

"For the last eighteen years I have been either playing or covering for newspapers all different forms of sports and competition. In this way my observation has been from close rangeclose enough to develop facts and not mere theories. "Smoking by the young brings a double burden to carrya burden in both a physical and a mental way. I have noticed that those who do not smoke, who keep in clean if not exactly strict training, have far more energy, much greater stamina, much better control of their nerves, and they also appear to develop a much keener knack at picking up a game. "In addition to this I have found that they think quicker and better. Under 25 years of age they are developing both physically and mentally, and if this development is hampered by smoking the loss can hardly be made up later on. "The young in sport make up for their lack of experience by nervous energy and vitality. Smoking cuts in heavily upon both, wearing away the reserve force which youth needs. A cigarette smoker would have but little chance in any red-blooded competition against one who stuck to training. He would have neither the speed for the short sprint nor the stamina for the long race. If I am wrong in this the statistics of 18 years are wrong, and records and results mean nothing."

Tobacco Killed a Cat

Dr. David Paulson, president of the Anti-Cigarette League of America, tells of an experiment he conducted when a student at Bellevue Hospital Medical School, in New York, that impressed upon his mind the fact that nicotine is a deadly poison. A large, healthy cat which made night hideous for everybody in the neighborhood was the victim. Here is the incident in the doctor's own words:

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"I soaked enough tobacco to make an ordinary cigarette in water. Then I injected under the cat's skin a hypodermic syringe full of this tobacco juice. In a few minutes the cat began to quiver, then tremble, then it had cramps, and in less than twenty minutes it died in violent convulsions. The poison destroyed the nine lives a cat is popularly supposed to possess. "I take no pride in relating this experiment, for I knew a shorter as well as a more merciful way of ending that cat's life; but what distresses me now is the fact that thousands of boys are repeating that experiment upon themselves with as certain though less immediate results, and only a few people seem to be concerned over what is taking place right before their eyes."

And This is from the London Lancet

The London Lancet, perhaps the foremost medical publication in the world, made an exhaustive examination of cigarettes some two years ago. Portions of its finding were given wide publicity by tobacco interests, particularly that section in which doubt was expressed as to the quantity of nicotine found in a cigarette exerting a harmful influence. Here is an excerpt from that report, under date April 13, 1912, which was not given such wide publicity by these same men:

"To aldehydes the poisonous effects of crude, immature whisky are ascribed, although they occur in relatively small quantities, but the furfural contained in the smoke of only one Virginian cigarette may amount, according to our experiments, to as much as is present in a couple of fluid ounces of whisky. The presence at any rate of aldehydes in the smoke of the Virginian cigarette, which is so often smoked to excess, accompanied at the same time by an almost insignificant amount of nicotine, gives material for reflection when approaching the broad question of evils of the cigarette habit. "Furfural, the principal aldehyde, which we have found present in marked quantities in the cigarette smoke of a very popular tobacco, is stated to be about fifty times as poisonous as ordinary alcohol, and small doses cause 'symptoms of transient irritation, such as ataxia, tremors and twitching,' while in adequate quantities furfural 'gives rise to epileptiform convulsions, general muscular paralysis, ending in paralysis of the respiratory muscles.' "Again, 'one of the commonest effects of over indulgence in tobacco is a chronic inflammation of the throat and upper parts of the respiratory passages, leading to hoarseness and excessive secretions of the mucous glands. This is explained by the constant application to the throat of an irritant alkaline vapor, and is probably not due to the specific action of the nicotine."

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Connie Mack Speaks

The boy who does not know of Connie Mack is not old enough to read the newspapers and take an interest in baseball. As leader of the Philadelphia Athletics, Connie Mack takes rank as one of the greatest generals baseball has ever known. He reads men and boys as an ordinary person reads a book. He contributes to the Scientific Temperance Journal this characteristically clear statement:

"It is my candid opinion, and I have watched very closely the last twelve years or more, that boys at the age of ten to fifteen who have continued smoking cigarettes do not as a rule amount to anything. They are unfitted in every way for any kind of work where brains are needed. No boy or man can expect to succeed in this world to a high position and continue the use of cigarettes."

Cigarette is One of Worst Habits

Hon. Benjamin B. Lindsay [1869-1943] is judge of the Juvenile Court in Denver, Colorado, where are handled the cases of boys and girls who have gone wrong. He is often referred to as "the golden rule judge" because of his kindness, and the deep interest he takes in boys and girls. In telling "What I Have Seen of Cigarettes," Judge Lindsay says in part:

"One of the very worst habits of boyhood is the cigarette habit. This has long been recognized by all the judges of the courts who deal with young criminals, and especially by judges of police courts, before whom pass thousands of men every year who are addicted to intemperate habits. These judges know that in nearly every case the drunken sots who appear before them, a disgrace to their parents, themselves and the state, began as boys smoking cigarettes. One bad habit led to another. The nicotine and poison in the cigarette created an appetite for alcoholic drink. The cigarette habit not only had a grip upon them in boyhood, but it invited all the other demons of habit to come in and add to the degradation that the cigarette began."

Hudson Maxim on the Cigarette

Hudson Maxim [1853-1927] has won world renown as the inventor of high explosives for use in battleship guns and torpedoes and for various other purposes. He comes out squarely against the cigarette in this fashion:

"The wreath of cigarette smoke which curls about the head of the growing lad holds his brain in an iron grip which pre-

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vents it from growing and his mind from developing just as surely as the iron shoe does the foot of the Chinese girl. "In the terrible struggle for survival against the deadly cigarette smoke, development and growth are sacrificed by nature, which in the fight for very life itself must yield up every vital luxury such as healthy body growth and growth of brain and mind. "If all boys could be made to know that with every breath of cigarette smoke they inhale imbecility and exhale manhood, that they are tapping their arteries as surely and letting their life's blood out as truly as though their veins and arteries were severed, and that the cigarette is a maker of invalids, criminals and foolsnot menit ought to deter them some. The yellow finger stain is an emblem of deeper degradation and enslavement than the ball and chain."

For more from Mr. Hudson Maxim, see Dr. Jesse M. Gehman, Smoke Over America (E. Aurora: Roycrofters, 1943), pp 20-21.

Makes Boys Soulless

"Several of my young acquaintances are in their graves, who gave promise of making happy and useful citizens," declares Luther Burbank [1849-1926], the wizard of the plant and vegetable kingdom, whose experiments have caused the civilized world to wonder, "and there is no question whatever that cigarettes alone were the cause of their destruction. No boy living would commence the use of cigarettes if he knew what a useless, soulless, worthless thing they would make of him."

Want Cigarettes More Than Liquor

At Dwight, Illinois, is located the Keeley Institute, where men from all parts of the country are sent to be cured of drug and liquor and tobacco habits Dr. Charles L. Hamilton is superintendent of the Keeley Institute, and knows what is going on there at all times. He is in close touch with every case. What does he say?

"Our experience here at Dwight, where many hundreds of cigarette cases have been treated, is that persons applying for treatment for both liquor and cigarettes dread giving up their cigarettes more than they do the liquor. Moreover, those who return to the use of cigarettes in after life are almost certain to resume the use of liquor to allay the irritability on the nervous system produced by tobacco smoke inhalation."

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Every day I am more sure of the mistake made by good people universally in trying to pull fallen people up instead of keeping the yet safe ones from tumbling after them; and in always spending their pains on the worst instead of the best material.Ruskin. -24- TO THE MAN OF TOMORROW

THE AMERICAN BOY OF TODAY

When I first made public the letter sent me by Mr. Thomas A. Edison, the world's greatest electrical genius, in response to my request for an expression on the harmful effects of cigarette smoking by boys, Mr. Percival I. Hill, president of the American Tobacco Company, denied the truth of Mr. Edison's findings.

Mr. Edison, a facsimile of whose letter was published in the preceding volume, said:

"The injurious agent in cigarettes comes principally from the burning paper wrapper. The substance thereby formed is called 'acrolein.' It has a violent action on the nerve centers, producing degeneration of the cells of the brain, which is quite rapid among boys. Unlike most narcotics, this degeneration is permanent and uncontrollable. I employ no person who smokes cigarettes."

Among other statements made by Mr. Hill in his letter to Mr. Edison and myself, which was sent all over the country, was this:

"Aside from the overwhelming weight of scientific testimony, common sense will convince any reasonable man that the cigarette is not injurious. "The increase of cigarette smoking in the United States in recent years is significant. This tremendous popularity, which is growing all the time, is possible only because millions of American men have convinced themselves that cigarettes are good for them."

I want you to notice how Mr. Hill speaks of American men in his defense of the cigarette. In the interview I authorized as an accompaniment to Mr. Edison's letter I made it plain that men did not enter into our discussion of the subject; that I

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"I do not feel called upon to try to reform any person over twenty-five years of age because by that time the habit has been formed. Then it is only a question of the strength of will or mind of the smoker which will enable him to stop. He knows the injurious effects and controls his own destiny. "With the boys it is a different matter. Most boys are told to refrain from many things. Seldom are they given a reason. Boys must be educated so they will know why cigarettes are bad for them. "If you will study the history of almost any criminal you will find that he is an inveterate cigarette smoker. Boys, through cigarettes, train with bad company. They go with other smokers to the poolrooms and saloons. The cigarette drags them down. Hence if we can educate them to the dangers of smoking we will perform a service."

Replying to Mr. Hill's defense, Mr. E. G. Liebold, my secretary,

So much for the moral side of the question. Let us pass that by for the time being, and consider another aspect of the subjectthe economic. Let us see whether you as an ambitious American boy can afford to ruin your prospects by doing those things which are disapproved by employers generally,

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If "millions of American men have convinced themselves that cigarettes are good for them," they have not succeeded in convincing their employers of this fact, and this is especially true as regards boys. I want you to read the expressions of opinion from some of the large employers of the country as they are set forth in the following pages; to consider the views of others who have voluntarily stated the case as it appears to them. I know you will then be in a position to judge for yourself whether you can afford to take chances on losing everything, and I am willing to leave the decision in your own hands.

H ENRY F ORD . -28- HOW EMPLOYERS FEEL

TOWARD CIGARETTE SMOKERS Here is an Automobile Company's Attitude NOTICE

"Cigarette smoking is acquiring a hold on a great many boys in our community. The habit has grown in the last year or two. Since it is such a bad practice and is taking such a hold upon so many people, we think it is a disgrace for a grown man to smoke cigarettes, because it is not only injurious to his health, but it is such a bad example to the boys. "Boys who smoke cigarettes we do not care to keep in our employ. In the future we will not hire anyone whom we know to be addicted to this habit. It is our desire to weed it entirely out of the factory just as soon as practicable. We will ask everyone in our factory, who sees the seriousness of this habit to use their influence in having it stamped out. "We have two objects in interesting ourselves in this matter: First, to help men and boys; second, we believe that men who do not smoke cigarettes or frequent the saloon can make better automobiles than those who do."

The foregoing notice was posted conspicuously by the Cadillac Motor Car Company throughout its large factories at Detroit, Mich. Commenting on this action, the company says further:

"Several years ago we began a somewhat active campaign against this evil. We made a study of the effect upon the morals and efficiency of men in our employ addicted to this habit and found that cigarette smokers invariably were loose in their morals and very apt to be untruthful, and were far less productive than men who were not cigarette smokers. We might mention a large number of instances which substantiate this latter statement, but space does not permit. We put up notices in conspicuous places about the plant. This had quite an effect among the employees in general. We allow no cigarette smoking about the plant; in fact, will not hire men who we know use cigarettes. "We are proud to say that none of the prominent or executive men in this company use cigarettes for two reasons: First, that they believe the effects to be injurious, and, second, that it would be difficult to enforce a rule they themselves did not adhere to."

-29- Where the Employee Shares the Benefits

"Factory to family," is the slogan of the Larkin Company, Buffalo, N. Y., in whose immense plants thousands of persons are constantly employed under the most favorable conditions. Mr. Wm. R. Heath, vice-president of the company, in outlining his company's attitude on the labor question, says:

"Mr. Roosevelt spoke very wisely the other day when he said: "'The problem must be, so far as it concerns the great industries in which the immense majority of wage workers are engaged, to combine efficiency with the proper sharing of the rewards of that efficiency. There will be no rewards for anybody, no adequate wage for the working man, no proper service to the public, unless the business pays. "'A business run at a loss will have to shut its doors. No prosperity can be passed around until the prosperity exists. The main element in the success of any business must be efficiency, and the wage worker must do all in his power to contribute to this efficiency. But the wage worker who by his efficiency adds to the productivity must have that added efficiency recognized in increased wages. The benefit must in part accrue to him exactly as it in part accrues to the man who furnished the capital, without which the business could not go on, and in part to the general public.' "So there are three parties involved in this great industrialquestion, three parties to be benefited, three parties charged with the responsibility, and three parties who must make their contributionthe possessor of capital, the possessor of labor, and the general public. "Mr. Gompers, in speaking with reference to the New York Workmen's Compensation Act, said: "'We should speak out m thunderous tones our severest condemnation of employers who are attempting to nullify the act by the enforcement of physical examinations of employees, which is contrary to the spirit of the law.' So, then, business must be successful, the country must be prosperous, and the ability of the individual to deliver must not be questioned, and the general public must be relieved of its responsibility to initiate means of efficiency by encouraging the use of leisure hours for healthful recreation and wholesome play, and by extending its protecting arm for the benefit of its subjects. "If the general public will not awaken to its responsibilities how can the business be successful, unless the employer to the

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extent of his ability selects that employee and only that one who is capable of efficient performance? "All applicants for employment in this business must submit to a physical examination by a competent physician. Those passing a satisfactory examination are to this extent eligible for employment. Those requiring medical or surgical attention, or requiring a course of treatment or a change in personal habits, are accepted subject to conforming to instructions imposed; some of them may receive financial assistance from the company, while carrying out these instructions. Others are barred entirely from the eligible list. Among those whom we do not employ or place upon our eligible list are boys who are habitual cigarette smokers."

Cigarettes Spoil Boys for His Business

George W. Alden is head of the big mercantile establishment in Brockton, Mass., that bears his name. Here are his views on the efficiency and desirability of the cigarette-smoking boy:

"So far as I know none of my employees smoke cigarettes. We don't hire that kind of boys or men. I should not consider for a minute any candidate for a position if I knew he smoked cigarettes. It would be pretty strongly against him if he applied for a position with either a cigar, pipe or cigarette in his mouth. With the general knowledge prevalent in this state as to the injurious effects of cigarette smoking, any boy should have ambition enough and decision enough to let cigarettes alone. My observation has taught me that cigarette-smoking boys are woefully lacking in both ambition and decision. They soon become dull, smoke-befuddled boys. I let them know that cigarettes spoil boys for my business."

Non-Smokers Given Preference

The Burroughs Adding Machine Company's plant at Detroit, Mich., is one of the country's model industrial institutions, every attention being paid to the physical and mental well-being of the employees. Only the highest grade of machinists are employed and these are selected with care. Writes General Manager Lauver:

"We have taken no definite steps to suppress cigarette smoking other than to forbid the smoking of cigarettes in our office. I wish you success in your effort to correct the evils of cigarette smoking on the part of young boys, and am frank to say that, other things being equal, we will always give preference for employment to boys and young men who do not smoke cigarettes."

Believing that smoking cigarettes is injurious to both mind and body, thereby unfitting young men for their best work, therefore, after this date we will not employ any young man under twenty-one years of age who smokes cigarettes. J. C. AYER CO.

This notice may be found throughout the great laboratories of the J. C. Ayer Co., manufacturing chemists, Lowell, Mass. It was prompted not by unwarranted prejudice but by careful study of the situation on the part of Charles H. Stowell, M.D., treasurer of the Company. Commenting on this attitude, Mr. Stowell says:

"Close observation for many years among the boys employed by this company has shown that those who are most energetic, active, alert, quick, spry, do not smoke; while the listless, lazy, dull, sleepy, uninteresting and uninterested boys are, we find upon investigation, those who smoke cigarettes." "It lessens the natural appetite for food and injures digestion. Any close observer will know at once how true is this statement. The boy who smokes has a bad digestion and a poor appetite. Because of this interference with appetite and digestion, the food is not properly digested and assimilated, cellular activity is checked, and the growth and development of the body seriously interfered with by this early poisoning. "It seriously affects the 'nervous system. We often hear about the 'tobacco heart' of the adult. If tobacco is strong enough to affect the beating of the adult heart, how much stronger must be its effect on the heart of a young person, long before tissues have become fixed. The rush of blood to the head, the dizziness, the unsteady beating of the heart, the distressing dreamsall show how seriously is the nervous system affected. "But a more serious charge can be brought against it under this heading. This effect on the nervous system is sufficient to produce the most marked changes in the mental activity. Recent statements from the University of Michigan, Northwestern University, Yale College, Union College, together with scores of other institutions and hundreds of the most eminent teachers of the country, all testify to the fact that cigarette smoking interferes with scholarship. If it interferes with the scholarship of young men over twenty-one years of age, how much more seriously must it interfere with the mental activities of those under this age.

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"It lowers the moral tone. Boys who would not tell a lie on any other matter, not for a fortune, our best and noblest boys, do not seem to hesitate a moment to tell any kind of a falsehood in order to keep from their parents the fact that they are smoking cigarettes. They hide the cigarettes. They smoke them away from home. They try in every way to conceal the truth. Indeed, they will do all manner of things in order to deceive those who are nearest and dearest to them. "It creates a 'craving for strong drink. There has been a great deal of discussion on this point, but I am convinced that the statement is logically true. The hot smoke from the cigarette tends to make the mouth and throat dry, and creates a peculiar sinking sensation in the stomach. Water may temporarily relieve this dryness and may temporarily check the sinking sensation. But with the 'moral tone lowered and the 'mental power weakened, the desire to yield to the first temptation is strengthened, because of the flimsy excuse that the boy must have something to wet his throat. And so it goes on, from bad to worse. In other words, the boy who smokes more easily accepts an invitation to a treat than one who does not smoke. "It is a filthy and offensive habit. No matter how stealthily the boy may do his work, sooner or later his clothing becomes saturated with the odor of tobacco. "It is unlawful. In nearly every state in tlie union there are most stringent laws forbidding the furnishing of cigarettes or tobacco to minors under a certain age. In most of these states there are laws against selling to such minors."

Cigarette "Fiends" Not Employed

Writes A. M. Phifer, superintendent of the Joseph Home Company, dry goods, Pittsburgh, Pa.:

"While we have no fixed rule on the subject, if we know an applicant for a position is a cigarette 'fiend' we will not employ him. We might add further that a state law in Pennsylvania makes it an offense punishable by fine or imprisonment or both, to either give or sell to anyone under twenty-one years of age cigarettes, or for minors to have cigarettes in their possession."

Cigarettes Detrimental to Development

Marshall Field & Company, Chicago, the greatest department store in America, if not in the world, bar cigarette-smoking boys, giving this as their reason:

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"For many years it has been our policy not to engage boys who make a practice of smoking cigarettes, as we believe it to be detrimental to their development."

What a Merchant Prince Says

The fame of John Wanamaker, merchant prince, with immense establishments in New York and Philadelphia, where thousands of persons are employed, is world-wide. Mr. Wanamaker says:

"The question of the use of tobacco and cigarettes by the young men who make application to us for employment comes in for serious consideration, and where there is evidence of the excessive use of cigarettes the applicant is invariably refused a place in our ranks."

No Cigarette Smokers Employed

Brown Durrell Co. are importers and manufacturers of hosiery, underwear, handkerchiefs and furnishings, with headquarters in Boston, and large branches in New York and Chicago. Great numbers of men and boys are in their employ, and they have excellent opportunities for judging who are worth while and who arc not. Mr. Thomas B. Fitzpatrick, president and treasurer of the company, comes out squarely against the cigarette in this manner:

"We have found in the main that the young fellow addicted to cigarette smoking is not a profitable or desirable hand to have in our employ. This fact is so apparent that we have made a rule against employing such young men if we know that they have contracted the habit. Therefore, for business reasons, independent entirely of the moral consideration, the cigarette smoker has a handicap that interferes with his value to himself or to us."

No Smoking is Better All Around

Wm. T. Isaacs, vice-president and general manager of the Gurney Heater Manufacturing Company, Boston, says:

"The policy of our company when employing young men has been to insist upon their refraining from the use of cigarrettes, as we feel this is not only for their own benefit, but we get better service from them."

The opposition of employers to cigarette-smoking boys and young men, their refusal in many cases to hire them, is not a matter of sentiment. It is a plain business proposition. They know that the boy who is not addicted to the use of cigarettes will return larger dividends on the investment both to himself and his employer; that, other things being equal, he will get to the front more rapidly, and that he is better equipped mentally, morally and physically to assume the responsibilities that come with promotion.

Prof. Selby A. Moran, of Ann Arbor, Michigan, is one of the best known instructors in stenography in the world. The nature of his profession has made him a close observer of boys and young men. Here is what he writes:

"I have been a teacher of shorthand almost constantly for the past thirty years. During this time I have taught thousands of young people, ranging from students of grade school age to university graduates. "During my experience, covering nearly a third of a century, I have yet to discover, among the thousands of young men whom I have had in my classes, a single instance where a young man who becomes a slave to the cigarette habit during his early years has ever been able to develop into more than a third or fourth rate stenographer. Such people seem to have their nervous systems so paralyzed and their mental faculties so dulled or stunted, and the control of their physical organism so weakened, that it seems utterly impossible for them to become first-class stenographers, although in many cases I have known such young men to heroically struggle to fit themselves to do high grade stenographic work. "I recall many cases where the efforts of young men to overcome the stupefying effects of cigarette smoking have been pitiable. I have tried every possible method to help such students to overcome their weakness. In every case the effort of such pupils has resulted in failure. If this is true in the development of shorthand ability, it is undoubtedly true in every other kind of work where steady nerves, clear minds and physical skill arc required. "To the close observer the number of young men who, without realizing it, are to-day in this deplorable condition is

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appalling. It is therefore very fortunate that powerful influences such as will result from the action of your company and that of other great commercial organizations, are being added to the forces which are opposing this evil, one which is threatening the stability of the American people.

-36- THE WAY OF THE

TRANSGRESSOR By Len G. Shaw

I shall not mention their names. That would be revealing identities that might better not be disclosed, for the sake of both. Neither shall I sketch the two careers too intimately. If I did it is more than likely that even in his pitiable mental state the one would recognize the portrait of himself, and there is no desire on my part to add one jot to the mental anguish he must suffer when in the few lucid moments he is permitted he looks back over opportunities that were worse than wasted.

* * *

It was in the heat of a gubernatorial campaign in Michigan that I first met themtwo fellows whom to know was to like. One was the star political writer on a metropolitan newspaper, the other a reporter on a small city daily.

They had struck up an acquaintance during the afternoon, while one of the gubernatorial candidates the political writer was accompanying on a spellbinding tour was making a speech at the country fair grounds.

We sat up late that night in the hotel lobby, swapping stories and talking over matters of mutual interest, and I was impressed by the striking similarity of characteristics in the two men. Both were splendid physical specimens of manhood, clean-cut, alert, immaculately attiredmen who would attract attention in a crowd.

Scarcely had we settled down in our chairs when the political writer produced a box of cigarettes, and after extracting one for his own consumption passed them to his new-found acquaintance. They were declined with thanks.

"Ha," laughed the political writer, jokingly, "you have no small vices, eh?" The reporter looked grave. "I am not sure that is such a small vice," he replied slowly. "Oh, well, we'll not quarrel over that," went on the political writer. "I do not smoke much myself." But during our session that evening he emptied one box and had made serious inroads on a second.

* * *

It was some months later, in Lansing, that I met them. They were "covering" the legislature for rival papers in the same city, but this fact had no bearing on their friendship.

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They were inseparable and had come to be known as Damon and Pythias, so devoted were they to each other's interests. Only, wherever Damon was encountered he would be found puffing at a half-burned cigarette, or with feverish haste rolling a fresh one.

* * *

The years rolled by. I had kept close track of the small town reporter who had developed into a star metropolitan man, and was turning his attention to theatrical reviewing with marked success. But the political writer had dropped from view, following a disagreement with the newspaper he had served.

One day a shadow fell across my path, and I looked up to come face to face with the one-time star. He was bronzed. His clothes were in sore need of a valet, and his linen had not been on speaking terms with a laundry for some time back. He grinned at my gasp of astonishment.

"I don't wonder you are surprised." he went on. "You see, I've been down in Georgia, working on a peach farm. I had to do something, so I thought I'd cut out the old life for a time. I'm pretty near down and outbut I'll come back. I'm just as good today as I ever was, and I'll show those fellows that have turned against me. By the way, can you spare me a cigarette?"

A month or so later I was wandering along the docks, watching the operations of a gang of lumber shovers, when an overalled figure separated itself from the rest of the party and came shuffling over to where I stood. There was something familiar about the man, yet I had to look a second time before certain as to the identity of the grimy, perspiring individual.

"Yes, it's me," he volunteered, extending a calloused hand on the fingers of which the tell-tale yellow cigarette stains showed through the dirt. "You'd never have thought it of me, would you?"

There was a wistfulness in his tones, and it seemed almost as though tears glistened in the shifting eyes.

"You see," he went on, "it was a little dull in the newspaper business, and I had to live while something was turning up in the old game, so I'm down here for a little while. It doesn't pay very muchand it's awful hard workbut it's enough to keep me going until I get back. I can make good again. All I need is a fair show. I've got the stuff in me if I get a chance. And by the way"

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I hadn't. If I had possessed a cigarette, I think it would have been his without the asking. He craved it like a man recovering from a long spree craves a drink of whisky to slake his thirst. From time to time strange stories reached me concerning the one-time political writer. He was successively panhandler, hobo and potato peeler in the kitchen of the county infirmary, to which he obtained admittance through the good offices of men who had known him in the prime of his career. It was a crisp October morning suggestive of winter apparel. At a downtown corner stood a gaunt figure, from whose parchment-like countenance two fishy eyes stared forth uncomprehendingly. Under his arm he carried a small bundle of newspapers that he essayed unsuccessfully to dispose of to passersby. And as he called the papers in a rasping monotone he pulled away at a cigarette "butt" he had picked from the gutter. * * * I saw him again the other day, moving unsteadily along the street, having eyes but not seeing, possessed of ears yet not hearing. The overalls that partly encased his withered limbs were frayed at the bottom and flapped about forlornly with every step. A checked blouse took the place of a coat. A ragged straw hat, whose original color had long since disappeared beneath a coat of grime, surmounted his tousled hair. His face resembled that of a coal heaver at the end of a day's toil. His hands, swinging loosely at his sides, were dark as those of an African. I have seen men in the throes of delirium tremens, screeching for help at the top of their voices, while hospital attendants fought to restrain them. I never saw so horrible a spectacle as was represented by this one-time Beau Brummel, who had forfeited every claim to consideration, and sunk to unbelievable depthsvictim of the Little White Slaver. Not one of his former acquaintances would have recognized him in this pitiable conditionand it was well. Possibly before you read these lines Death will have mercifully laid hold on this human derelict, and he will have passed to the great beyond. * * *

The other manthe one who had "no small vices?" He is today dramatic editor of one of the leading New York newspapers, standing well toward the head of his profession, a man known personally by every actor and actress of consequence in the country, and whose opinions are accepted as authoritative.

-39- A New Arithmetic "I am not much of a mathematician," said the cigarette, "but I can add nervous troubles to a boy, I can subtract from his physical energy, I can multiply his aches and pains, I can divide his mental powers, I can take interest from his work and discount his chances for success."Anon. -42- TO THE BOY WHO WANTS TO

PLAY FAIR WITH HIMSELF

In a letter to Mr. Thomas A Edison and myself, published elsewhere in this book in which he takes exception to our attitude toward cigarette smokng among boys, Mr. Percival I. Hill, President of the American Tobacco Company, makes one statement in which I heartily concur.

"The increase of cigarette smoking in the United States in recent years is significant," says Mr. Hill.

It isvery significant. The increase is so tremendous as to constitute one of the most serious problems confronting a nation that wants red blooded, sound-minded men for the next generation, and the nexta land that should be vitally concerned with the mental and moral and physical well-being of its bovs, who are going to be the men of tomorrow.

"In 1900," continues Mr. Hill, "two billion six hundred thousand cigarettes were made in this country. In 1913 fifteen billion eight hundred million cigarettes were made here, an increase of 700 per cent."

Do you wonder, in the light of such a showing, that thoughtful men who have the best interests of the American boy at heart are stirring themselves in an effort to check the inroads being made by this blight, as manufacturers and merchants and other employers of labor put the bars up against cigarette smoking boys because they have convinced themselves that they are less desirable than non-smokers?

To quote further from Mr. Hill, "when one confuses his dislikes or likes with scientific facts he certainly can hardly be expected to be taken seriously."

I ask you in all earnestness, after you have considered the proof submitted by each side in this

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I have enough confidence in the American boy to believe that when the facts are placed before him he will decide rightly. And here they are.

H ENRY F ORD . -44- One of the Most Baneful Influences to Combat

Judge Henry S. Hulbert, of the Juvenile Court, Detroit, Michigan, is called upon to pass judgment upon hundreds of cases each year, ranging from mild truancy to larceny and incorrigibility. He has long been a student of boy problems, and his conclusions are not theories but the observations of one who knows. Says Judge Hulbert:

"I did not suppose there could longer be any doubt in the minds of men who are informed, or who follow at all closely the growing youth, of the influence of the cigarette habit upon the boy from ten to seventeen years of age. We find it one of the most baneful influences which we have to combat in this court. Perhaps nowhere is it more apparent than in the case of school truancy. "I have in mind the case of a boy, Raymond, brought before me, who had been addicted to the cigarette habit since he was thirteen. He was nearly two years behind his grade, efforts at improving his school conditions failed, and we were finally obliged to commit him to the Industrial School. There it was no longer possible for him to obtain tobacco in any form, and the change in his personal appearance, habits and ability to study during the brief period of one year he was confined there, was remarkable, so much so that the boy afterward wrote this court a letter in which he stated that if the school had done nothing else for him, the fact that it had broken him of this habit was worth everything to him. He is now doing extremely well, is a straight, clean, manly boy, and one we are proud of. "There was the case of Joe , also brought before this court for truancy. At the age of twelve years he had been smoking cigarettes for about two years. He was behind in school, was an habitual truant, and spent most of his time about the poolrooms in his neighborhood. It took nearly a year to break him of the habit of smoking, but after it was eliminated he became interested in his school, eventually caught up with his classes, has never returned to the habit, and is now doing well. "John , at the age of fifteen years had been smoking since he was twelvean habitual user of cigarettes. In personal appearance he was a marked type of this class of boys. His mother had given him up completely, and felt she did not care if she never saw the child again. It required more than a year and a half of persistent work before the boy was weaned from his cigarettes. With it went most of his other bad habits. In a letter of gratitude received from his mother, the court

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felt amply repaid for the many hours of hard work. Once broken of this habit, from an indifferent, lazy boy, he became bright, a good worker, and before he left the hands of the court had four other boys on probation to him, all of whom did well under his supervision. "At eleven years George  was an habitual truant. He had been tried in four different schools, in not one of which could he make any progress. He was carried on probation nearly four years. It seemed impossible for him to make any progress in school. Finally he was placed with a teacher who gave a large part of his time to breaking George of smoking cigarettes. He began to improve rapidly, caught up with his class, and was finally dismissed from probation. "Ross , aged fourteen, was an habitual truant, and in the second grade in school, having been there three consecutive terms. His development was so arrested, and he was so certainly backward that it seemed he must be mentally deficient. It was planned to place him in one of the schools for defectives, but further observation convinced the probation officer that much of the trouble came from cigarette smoking. His case was taken up on this score. It was an uphill battle, for the dulled faculties were slow to respond. However, once the habit was broken he began to climb rapidly. It is now three years since he was taken in hand, and he is now in the eighth grade, averaging 86 per cent in all studies last term. He holds a prominent position in class and school work, is school correspondent for a daily newspaper, and is one of the brightest boys in the room. When he first came before the court, he lied habitually, stole, and could not be trusted with anything. He was nervous and uncertain in his movements. Now, although living in a bad neighborhood, he is holding himself up to a high standard. In addition to keeping up his studies, he is working after school to learn a trade. The good results in this case can be credited entirely to his giving up cigarettes. "I might go on citing case after case of this kind. Sometimes the only remedy is commitment to the Industrial School, where tobacco can not be obtained. Often by persistent effort on the part of the probation officer, a boy can be weaned from his habit of smoking. In all cases the result, is the samea great improvement in his mental and physical condition, a renewed energy, and a respect for right and wrong which seems strangely lacking in habitual cigarette smokers. "Most of the bad examples of this type who come before me have begun smoking at the age of nine or ten years, and are steeped in tobacco when they first come to this court. We can not overestimate the effects of tobacco upon the mentality of the boy at this early age. That it is responsible in many,

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many cases for the backward and truant boy has been proved beyond a shadow of doubt."

The Boy and the Cigarette

There is no better known worker among boys in this country than Eugene C. Foster, boys' secretary of the Detroit Y. M. C. A. The following is Mr. Foster's comment anent cigarette smoking:

"I have had the privilege of corresponding with many boys on the subject of cigarette smoking, and I have asked them frankly to state their opinions about this habit; besides this, I have selected from other boys' letters some statements which they have made. Here are some of the replies: "'I smoked a little, but have given it up because I think it is a dirty habit and unbecoming a gentleman.'F. R. O., 18, Mt. Hermon, Mass. "'I do not smoke. At an early age my father convinced me that smoking injures a person and that it sometimes leads to drinking. As my father does not smoke I concluded that I could get along without it.'H. D. W., 19, Lawrenceville, N. J. "'I quit because I think the use of tobacco both unclean and unhealthy.'E. D., 18, Philadelphia (a wireless operator who has made trips around the world). "'A wise grandfather, who had smoked himself, urged me not to. To be free from the habit is a real asset now, while I am at the University.'A. C., 19, Grand Rapids, Mich. "'I quit. No sense in it, and it costs money.'P. C., 16, Coldwater, Mich. "'I did smoke, but I quit. I wanted to get out for athletics, and the smoking injured my chances.'K. S., 15, Wausau, Wis. "'I saw the effects on other boys, and saw that it was not good, so I stopped.'L. A., 14, Eaton Rapids, Mich. "'I never smoked because I have heard many men say that they wished they had never started the habit.'R. E. H., 19, St. Johns, Mich. "'I quit because a smoker does not make good in athletics. Besides this, it weakens a fellow, makes him nervous, stunts his growth, and dulls his brain.'E. B., 16, Grand Rapids, Mich. "'I have smoked several times. I quit because my ambition is to be, both morally and physically, as clean and as pure as I can.'L. F. S., Milwaukee, Wis.

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-48- Physically, Mentally, Morally Deficient

For years Professor Templeton P. Twiggs was principal of the largest grammar school in Detroit, Michigan, located in the most congested section of the city, and drawing its clientele from all classes. More recently he has been supervisor of the departments of school attendance and employment permits having among other branches under his control the ungraded schools, where backward and incorrigible pupils are taught. His observations have extended over a long period, and he has made a close study of the causes leading up to truancy and incorrigibility. Referring to the general effect of cigarette smoking as observed in the ungraded rooms of the public schools, he formulates these conclusions on the physical, mental and moral effect of such indulgence:

"The physical development of the young habitual smoker is irreparably checked unless he has an unusually robust constitution. In any case the physical development is noticeably arrested. He has no ambition to enter into games or any boyish activities. He apparently cares little for his personal appearance, and could be classified as of the 'down-and-out' type. "If he is under sixteen years of age, and the habit is well formed, his mind is a blank. He can not memorize and retain for even a period of twenty-four hours such easy matter as ordinary words in spelling. As to mental calculations required in the courses of arithmetic, he is practically helpless. He seems to have no control over himself in making a determined effort to accomplish definite things. Mental paralysis seems best to describe his condition. "Through his loss of self control, he has no moral standard. He seems unable to distinguish between right and wrong, or to possess sufficient will power to enable him to do what is right even if he knows. He is absolutely untrustworthy, and there is usually no extreme to which he will not go. "Such cases as these may be seen in a number of our ungraded roomsthe strongest indictment against the cigarette it seems to me it is possible to bring, an object lesson that should cause every boy who cares for his future to avoid falling into the same trap."

Will Power Broken, Moral Sense Blunted

The late Booker T. Washington [1856-1915], Negro educator, and principal of TheTuskegee Normal and Industrial Institute, which he organized at Tuskegee, Alabama, declared that cigarettes cause a breaking down of will power and a blunting of the moral sense. He wrote:

"We have had some interesting

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experiences at Tuskegee Institute with boys who smoke cigarettes, for every year in the thousand or more young men assembled here there are, of course, a few who are addicted to this habit. We have a rule prohibiting smoking by our students. "For disciplinary purposes our students are organized on a military basis with a commandant. Major J. B. Ramsey, who for many years has held this position, states that it is generally the students who have the cigarette habit who give the most trouble with reference to discipline. Their will power is broken down, their moral sense is blunted, and it is very difficult when inveterate smokers before coming here, to make anything of them; they will go to any length, take any sort of risk to get an opportunity to smoke a cigarette. It may also interest you to know that in connection with our hospital, boys addicted to the cigarette habit are given regular treatment for its cure."

Cigarettes Make Wrecks of Men

O. C. Hamlet, United States Navy, retired, Oakland, California, has had the harmful effects of cigarette smoking driven home in a forcible manner.

"I have a friend in government service," he writes, "who is practically a slave to the cigarette habit, and it has, in my opinion, entirely undermined his health, and he is now only fit for retirement. When on the active list and in command of a government vessel, I had an executive officer, a very bright and capable fellow when in his proper sense, but he had a craving for drink and cigarettes which finally proved to be his undoing. He had to leave the service, and I heard of his death in Cleveland, a short time ago, undoubtedly a miserable ending to what could have been a useful life."

Should Prohibit Smoking by Boys

Nathan P. Stauffer, M. D., sometime professor of hygiene in Dickinson College and head coach of the University of Pennsylvania baseball team; laryngologist and otologist to the tubercular wards Philadelphia General Hospital, the Home for Crippled Children, and ex-member of the executive committee National Collegiate Association, has had more than fifteen years of experience and contact with athletes, hence his views must carry weight. He writes:

"I am glad to see your crusade started against boys smoking cigarettes. To win in a race, or in American business competition, one must be physically and mentally fit. Smoking, drinking, gambling, overeating, sexual excesses and cigarette

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smoking irritate, overstimulate and exhaust a man's principal nerve center. In inhaling cigarette smoke the delicate nasal and throat mucous membranes quickly absorb the nicotine and carry the stimulus rapidly to the nerve centers. When this controller becomes unbalanced from excesses, the heart and mind can not stand prolonged strain, consequently we find parched throats, unsteady legs and confused minds. The spark plug (brain) may become sooty from cigarette carbon and the engine (body) stops because the electric current (nerves) have been broken or run down. I believe that a law should be passed prohibiting men under twenty-one years of age from smoking; by that time they have attained their growth."

Moral as Well as Financial Gain

When the Jersey Cereal Food Company, of Cereal, Pa., decided to bar cigarette smokers from its employ in the sales force it was prompted by a desire for increased efficiency. Here is how the plan worked out, according to R. J. Foster, one of the directors of the Company:

"The past seven years we have debarred the cigarette smoker from our sales force. Out of five hundred men employed this year in our sales and advertising force not a single one uses the cigarette or liquor in any form. The cost of this department for results obtained has been cut almost fifty per cent since this rule went into effect. Past experience in our advertising and sales department has shown us that the cigarette smoker was inefficient, very frequently immoral, and practically without exception his results showed the highest cost on the unit of calculation of any of our men. The results obtained in cutting the cost in this department have been far beyond our expectation. "Just last week the writer came across a group picture of one of our conventions seven years ago, when we made the announcement to our men of our attitude against the use of cigarettes and liquor by them. We find that only one man who used cigarettes at that time is still in our employ. He discontinued the use of them. Two of our salesmen who have captured the honor of leadership for the past three years were in the same picture. They are young men that have never at any time used cigarettes. "At the time we took the stand we did, we were prompted from the standpoint of the dollar that we might receive on account of having more efficient men; but since we have been able to observe the great difference in results, we have felt we rather owe the business world a moral duty along this line, and emphasize the fact in as broad a way as we can."

-51- Once Defended TobaccoNow He Feels Differently

One of the authorities quoted by President Percival I. Hill, of the American Tobacco Company, in defense of tobacco was Dr. Leonard Keene Hirshberg, of Baltimore. Dr. Hirshberg did defend tobacco. He freely admits it. But he also frankly states that within a year his views have been entirely revised, because of the evidence adduced. In Physical Culture Magazine under the caption, "The Truth About Tobacco," Dr. Hirshberg says:

"Cigars, cigarettes, the pipe, and chewing tobacco are, like a certain notorious character, forever being haled into court before the bar of moral and scientific justice. With its moral aspect a scientist has nothing to do, but the truth is mighty, and must prevail, so the facts must, even though from day to day they seem to change, be brought out. Their eternal and ever shifting state may be judged from my analysis last year in Harper's Weekly, when I, a non-smoker, was forced to take up the cudgels in favor of smoking. Now after the lapse of a brief interval it must perforce be said that the world does move, because the evidence at hand seems to be against tobacco. "Be these things as they may, comes Dr. George L. Meylan, of Columbia University, with an investigation of the real effects of tobacco upon smokers. After calmly and without moral prejudices pointing out the conflicting conclusions of many distinguished investigators, moral, medical and truly scientific, he comes at last to his own results, which are devoid of moral or economic endeavor, but aimed strictly at the physical and mental characteristics of men, more particularly college ones. "Assisted by Dr. Hyman Cohen, A. N., they carefully tested 223 college men. There was about an equal division of smokers and non-smokers. It was soon plain that there was little difference in physical measurements between those who smoked and those who did not. What, however, was quickly discovered was the fact that muscular exertion and differences in scholarship which stand between the smokers and non-smokers are distinctly in favor of those who do not use tobacco. "Every other possibility which might be present, such as age, sex,, weight, home surroundings, and previous conditions of servitude were excluded, and there certainly appears a striking superiority in athletics, social matters and scholarship entirely on the side of the tobacco abstainers. "The non-smokers belong to another type, have hearts and blood-streams that are more resilient and have better endur-

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ance; they grade higher in their studies; they are recruited from the poorer and more parentally attentive families; they grow better than the tobacco users; they are more ambitious; apply themselves better; and are more attentive than the smokers."

Cigarettes Caused Insanity

Dr. David Paulson, President of the Anti-Cigarette League of America, tells of an experience which caused him to enlist in the war against cigarettes:

"Years ago God used a never-to-be-forgotten incident to burn into my soul the enormity of the cigarette evil. An elderly woman with a faded red shawl thrown over her stooping shoulders came into my office and asked if I could see her boy. Two strong men then brought before me a wild-eyed, thoroughly insane youth of seventeen years. The mother wanted to know if he could recover. After investigating his case I was compelled to tell her that the outlook was hopeless and that she might as well send him to the insane asylum. She broke down and sobbed as though her heart would break. I asked her what had brought this terrible condition upon her son, and she said, 'Oh, it was cigarettes. He smoked more and more until he used fifty a day, and then his mind gave way.'" Continuing, Dr. Paulson says: "Some ask, 'Is it worse for a child to smoke a cigarette than for a man to smoke a cigar?' It is, for three reasons: First, a man may safely tolerate a quarter of a grain of morphine while we dare not give a child more than a sixteenth of a grain. The child's nervous system is peculiarly susceptible to the influence of such narcotic drugs as nicotine and morphine and hence an introduction to either of them early in hfe means almost certain nervous or mental disaster later in life. Second, the loosely packed cigarette does not permit the nicotine to condense to the same extent as when it is drawn through a pipe or a cigar, hence the smoker gets the full benefit of this virulent poison. Third, the oxidation of the cigarette paper produces a deadly poison that is only second in its effects to that of nicotine itself."