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MOOSEHEART MAGAZINE
Conversations With Six Hundred Thousand
AUNT WINNIE’S VISIT TO MOOSEHEART
By the time we got to Aid Hall, it was just about dinner time; and when I went in, there was the twins, and they jumped up, and were awful g'lad to see me. “I’m afraid you’ve been pretty lonely, sad, and unhappy,” says I, “ljaven’t you; so far away from all the folks,” “Oh. no,” says they, “we miss our dear father and mother, and we’d like to see all the people in Deledo, but this seems like home to us, too.” So each one took a hand, and they led me downstairs to their kitchen. I thought there was a big dinning-hall at MOOSE-HEART, but it appears that they live just like families; each in a building by themselves, and the children help some in the housework, just like they would at home. And this is what we had at dinner.
Beef Steak Mashed Potatoes Buttered Beets	Fruit
Bread and Butter Milk
After dinner, the children said they must go back to school, because they was in the second grade and they liked the teacher, and they mustn’t be tardy. There I found a great big school-house, just as nice and as warm, and as well-furnished as our new two hundred thousand dollar schools in Deledo. And ten temporary school-houses alongside, just like a hen with ten chickens, because the twins explained to me the school building was “cornjested”.
While they was in afternoon school, Mr. Adams sent a girl to take me around, and show me the lake where she said there was the most beautiful swimming. Mebbe they was under the ice, but I told her I guessed the twins could wait till summer, before they went swimming there. And then they took me to the babies. Well, I have raised some babies myself and never saw any anywehere else that were so pretty and so healthy, except perhaps the Bellcraft twins. But, my, if that wasn’t a garden of little roses; healthy and happy, and stretching out their little arms to me and when Mr. Adams just happened to come in, they ran up him as though he was a ladder. I never believed much in incubator chickens, but those babies are certainly the prizes.
After school the twins and I had a nice time talking things over. I though mebbe they might have some hard times away from all their folks, but they said, no. They said the children didn’t fight each other; seemed more like brothers and sisters. And they had no complaint to make of the teachers or the matron, or anybody.
At five_ o’clock, they took me to the Assembly in a great big hall. I never saw such a handsome hall, not in Cleveland, nor Columbus, nor even in Deledo. They say it twas named for Theodore Roosevelt, because he was a Moose and because he loved children. There they had a kind of convention of the older children; some of them almost young men and young women. And if any of them thought that a teacher or a proctor hadn’t given them a square deal, they came out with it, and it was explained, and the children had a chance to vote on whether they thought it was just or not. I noticed they most always voted for good order and decent behaviour.
Then after supper there was the wind-up in the Theodore Roosevelt Auditorium. A moving-picture show, just as good as you could go to in Deledo for twenty cents back and twenty-five cents front, and a lot of the children there, and not much fuss made if they made a little noise. And then up on the stage, was the band. I thought it a big extravagance to hire a band like that, but they told me that every player was a Moose boy, and there is also an orchestra where girls play, and they sing a rousing song that they call “Mooseheart the Happiest”, and I guess that’s about so.
They don’t undertake to put visitors up at MOOSEHEART, but they found a place over night for me, because they said I was kind of a mother to the Bellcraft twins. The next morning they took me back to Aurora in one of their own automobiles, and I almost stuck out my tongue when I saw those two hack-drivers at the depot. “Mooseheart the Happiest!” After I’ve been there, I think that’s pretty near the truth. Of course, I konw I can make my children happier than anybody else in the world could. Parents is about the best thing־ in the world after all; but when you think of the children without parents, that mebbe would be on the street or worse but for the Moose, you feel sure that for them it is really “Mooseheart the Happiest.”
By PROFESSOR ALBERT BUSHNELL HART Harvard University-------Mooseheart Governor
and plants, and petrified rocks,, and a concrete sidewalk, just like Methusalem Park in Deledo. The first thing I did, I got lost among so many houses and buildings and smoke-stacks, and the American flag waving on top of a great big concrete barrel up in the air. Then I saw a lot of children running around. It seemed like they were coming home from school. And I says to them, “Where is the Main Building where they keep the children?” I knew there must be a main building, because I have been to lots of orphan asylums, and they all had main buildings, and in some the children wore uniforms, and they had to keep still when they were not studying. Those MOOSEHEART children were running around, and laughing, and shouting, and playing leap-frog and all kinds of things.
“Perhaps, madam,” said one little girl, with a real nice friendly smile, “what you want is the Administration Building.” “What I want,” says I, “is the Bellcraft twins.” “Do you think that there Administrator up in that building, will know where they are?” “Oh. I know who they are,” says the little girl, “they have just come, and they are living in Aid Hall; but I think the best way is for you to see Mr. Adams. Most everybody likes to see Mr. Adams first.”
So I went over to that Administrate’em Building. I don’t like to ask questions very well, so I thought I would find that Administrate man for myself. The first door I looked into, I knew couldnt be the place, because there were six or eight boys holding a meeting around a table, and a kind of round-faced young man was at the head of the table. Of course, I knew Superintendents and Administratings and people like that don’t associate with the children in an institution. So I turned in at the next door, where it said “Mooseheart Press”. I thought maybe it was a cider press, and I was kind of warm trotting around, and—well, it wasn’t anything but a printing press, with a spruce-looking young man, sky-rocketing around, and giving-orders. And there in one corner was a stack of MOOSEHEART Magazines about ten feet high, and a lot of young ladies putting them up to mail.
So I went up two flights of stairs, and there I found a whole mess of young ladies driving typewriters; and there was a sort of a cave inside a door, where a lot of men were keeping hooks. Then I struck my head in at another place, and there was a slew of gentlemen around a table arguing with, each other, till I thought they would shake their fists •off.
The one that seemed to be the head one, stood up and says he, “Madam, what can we do for you?” “Do for me, why find me the Bellcraft twins from Deledo. I’ve been hunting for them the whole morning.” says I.
“The Board of Governors is in session just now,” says he. “but I will send someone down with you to the Superintendent,” says he. And then he turned to the others, “You remember the case of the Bellcraft twins; that pretty boy and girl that was taken care of by a good woman with a large family of children of her own for three months till we could find room for them. Do you know Mrs. Winifred Hawkins?” says he to me, “that was so good to those children?”
“Lands sake,” says I, “seems like I do, and I know you, too. You’re Jim Davis, Supreme Grand Dictator General. I heard you speak once in Deledo, and I must say you made quite a good speech for such a young man. And that one over there, that’s John J. Lentz. He made a speech as big as he was in our Legion, and said that sooner or later, there would be “thousands of children” at MOOSEHEART. And you. sir, I guess you are Mr. Ford, that they say has such a nice little Lodge in Philadelphia and they gave the hospital that the picture was of in the Magazine.”
They all laughed at that, and sent, me down to Superintendent Adams, and he was just that round faced young man that I had seen before. I asked him where I would find the Bellcraft twins, and his face lighted up as though I were talking about his nieces and nephews. “They’re getting along fine,” says he. “I’ll take you right over to them now.” “But mebbe they’r not ready,” says I. “I didn’t send any word that I was coming. Mebbe their faces are not washed. Mebbe this isn’t the visiting day.’ He laughed, and says, “Why, every day is visiting day here. There isn’t a child on these g'rounds that can’t be seen any time by anybody who has a personal interest in them.”
HOW did I go to Mooseheart ? Just like anybody—by the train. Some folks have always thought I was a little flighty, but not' enough for a flight in an airship, not yet! I went to MOOSEHEART because this is a free country, especially for the Moose. If I want to go to MOOSEHEART, I go. I haven’t any boss, only the Senior Regent and the Junior Regent and the Past Regent and the Recorder and the Treasurer and the Guide and the Assistant Guide and the Sentinel and the Argus of our Legion, “Deledo, No. 1323”. Yes, and the pianist, ?-playing “Battle Hymn of the Republic”. But I allow that I don’t have to mind them only in the Legion meetings. They told me not to go to MOOSEHEART; said the right way was to have an official go, that knew the ritual, and could give the pass-word to the Outside Guard that watches the MOOSEHEART Gate.
The real reason why I went to MOOSEHEART was along of those Bellcraft twins, that was born and lived seven years right in the next house, and their pa was the right kind of a man-conductor on the Indigania Central. Well, he died of the flu a year ago, and his lodge gave him the right kind of a funeral. There wasn’t much left for wife and children, till last August, she broke down. Well, she couldn’t afford a trained nurse, and somebody had to take care of her. My husband said he’d be ma to our children for a while, and I was over there most of the time till she died.
I shall never forget that last night, when she said, “Aunt Winnie,” said she “is it true what they used to say down at my husband’s lodge that if our children was left orphans with nobody to look after them the Moose Order would take them, and give them a good chance in life?” “Yes,” I says, “Your husband couldn’t leave you much money, but he always kept up his standing in his lodge.” “That makes my heart easy,” says she; “and, Aunt Winnie, if ever my children go out to that MOOSEHEART. won’t you go see them sometimes, and tell them about their father and mother, and how we expected that the Moose would be father and mother to them after we was gone.”
So when all was over, and there was no money for those twins, our Lodge put in a request to the people at MOOSEHEART, and they sent out papers. We had to fill up the teacher’s certificate, and the doctor’s certificate, and the Lodge’s certificate. It’s a good thing to be sure that children have a right to such privileges. A lady came over from MOOSEHEART, said her name was Case Walker, or something like that, and inquired around, and came to me. and when I told her about it, she said she guessed these twins was clear. And last December, the secretary of the Lodge took the twins to MOOSEHEART. But seven year old twins is pretty small, and I thought mebbe might be lonely down there, and nobody’ much interested in them, and so I told my husband he’d have to ma the children again for a few days, ,while I went to MOOSEHEART.
So he gave me the money, and I went down to the station; and I says to the ticket agent, “MOOSEHEART!” says I. “Are you?” says he. “You look to me more like Sweetheart.” Of course, that was a joke; we’ve knowed each other more than twenty years. “I mean Mooseheart, Illinois,” says I. “Oh, I know,” says he. “A man gave me a MOOSEHEART Magazine last week, and it told all about it.” So he sold me a through ticket, with a free bus across Chicago. The ticket read to Aurora, but the agent explained that Aurora was a kind of suburb of MOOSEHEART.
When I got off there I looked all around for the Bellcraft twins. The only twins I saw was two hack-drivers alongside their autos, and they wasn’t even brothers, but they acted just the same way. “Where do you want to go?” says they. “MOOSEHEART,” says I. . “Jump right in” says they. “How much?” says I. “Five dollars,” says they. And then a young man who was waiting there, stepped right up, and said, “Madam,” says he, “I belong to MOOSEHEART. Don’t let them fel-■ lows skin you. Just walk down two blocks to the car, and it will take you out for sixteen cents.’
So I just got on the car, and it sort of rambled along through a village and a town and. country, and brick houses, and along a river, until we came to a city park. I knew it was a city park, because it had such an ornamental entry, and playgrounds,