1918-10-30oo Teacher Volunteers

When volunteers were desperately needed to assist the Sisters of Service with at home visits, work in the kitchen at First Methodist Church basement or delivery of meals by automobile, most of the teachers in the Hamilton Public School system answered the call:

 “That Hamilton public school teachers are not behind their more leisured sisters in the matter of prompt and effective service at this crisis in combatting the Spanish influenza and taking care of the many distressed cases, may be seen from the fact that about ninety teachers have volunteered their services gratis as S.O.S. workers. Of these, thirty-five have already been requisitioned and are acting as voluntary nurses and assistants at the diet in the diet kitchen at First Methodist church and at the emergency hospitals.

“Six teachers, with cars, in charge of Miss Patton, are in daily attendance, ready to do and go wherever dispatched, whether delivering delicacies from the diet kitchen or affording some recovering patient a breath of fresh air, so necessary to convalescence. These helpful ones are Misses McKenzie, Cotter, Gamble, Patton, Lake, Lester and Mrs. Wilson.

“At the diet kitchen of the city hospital, four teachers – Mrs. McArthur, Miss Troup, Miss Steer and Miss Stellens – are on duty day and evening, while Miss Fairley, of the King Edward school, has been doing splendid service as a dietician at the Jockey club hospital. At the diet kitchen in First Methodist church , the work of the teachers has been most capable and acceptable to the I.O.D.E. committees in charge. Here Misses Morton, Harding, Robinson, E. Hendrie, Jamieson, Morrison, Henderson, Marsden, McHaffie, McKindsey, Mrs. Westland and others are working everyday.

“From the office of the Y.M.C.A., most of the S.O.S. work has been done under the direction of Miss Kate Smith, whose efficiency and special gifts as organizer and superintendent are apparent in the quiet and effective manner in which the various workers have taken up their duty at the posts assigned to them. With Miss Smith, as assistants in clerical work etc., at central office in the Y are : Misses Marie Jamieson, J. Wood, Stock, Allan, Cameron, Gamble, Hayward, Hunter, Johnson, Leadley, H. Lawson, Ross, Patterson, McCallum, Middleton, Ruse, Sutherland, Shephard, Stringer, White, Kappele, M. Lawrie, Gill, McFarlane and others. Among the S.O.S. nurses who have been working and visiting homes stricken with the ‘flu’ are Misses Hazel Roberts, Sabine, Masha McLeod, E. McLeod, Alma Harris, Buddy, Cody, Horning, May Schofield, and Mary Schofield.”¹

¹ “Teachers  Have Answered Call : Ninety Volunteer Services in ‘Flu’ Epidemic : Taking Care of Many Patients in Distress”

Hamilton Spectator.   October 30, 1918.