October 12-19, 1916
“Dorothy and Eva McAdoo arrived in Princeton Junction by the 4:04 train from New York City. Had chauffeur pick them up and drive them here to Hightstown. I gathered all of the flowering cosmos left. Bella (the kitchen maid) received a cable saying her brother was wounded fighting in France, taken to a hospital in England and died there.”
That was just one day’s news as reported by Kate Roosevelt in her diary entry dated October, 18, 1916. Her daughter, Dorothy Roosevelt Geer and good friend, Eva McAdoo made a quick train trip from the city to enjoy a fall get-away at the family farm, Merdlemouth, in Hightstown, New Jersey. Eva McAdoo and the Roosevelts had a lot in common.
William McAdoo
Miss McAdoo’s father, William McAdoo, was chief magistrate of New York City. From 1904 to 1905, he was the city’s Police Commissioner, a post Kate’s cousin, former President Theodore Roosevelt held from 1895 to 1897. William McAdoo, an Irish immigrant, was a Democrat and the Roosevelts were Republicans but that didn’t stop their relatives, Eva and Dorothy from being friends. Although differing in their political affiliations, the McAdoos and Roosevelts had many things in common. Honesty and civic stewardship were among them. When Chief Magistrate William McAdoo passed away in 1931 New York City newspapers reported that he had never let any of his influential offices affect his finances, as evidenced by his leaving his widow and daughter with an inheritance of a mere $5,000. The 1910 Federal Census listed the family living in the Patterson Hotel at 58 West 47th Street in New York City
Union Workers Rally
Like father, like daughter, Eva McAdoo was active in making the city a safer and more sanitary place to live and like Theodore Roosevelt’s confidant, social-reformer, Jacob Riis, she was sympathetic to female factory workers and tenement dwellers.
In Theodore Roosevelt’s autobiography he wrote, “During my years as New York’s Police Commissioner, Jacob Riis was closest to me. I was ignorant of the extent to which big men of great wealth played a mischievous part in our industrial, social and political life. But I was well-awake to the needs of making ours better.” Jacob Riis’ book, How the Other Half Lives was a real eye-opener, giving enlightenment and inspiration to social crusaders like Theodore Roosevelt and amateur advocates like Eva McAdoo.
Triangle Shirtwaist Factory
In January, 1911 just three months before the tragic fire at the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory on Greene Street in Lower Manhattan, Harper’s Bazaar ran a poignant piece on the Label Shop. An outgrowth of the Consumer’s League Movement and The Guild of Hand Industries, of which Eva McAdoo was treasurer, the Label Shop was located on the top floor of a small factory located at 4 West 28th Street. It operated as a salesroom. Only items made under clean and healthful conditions by members of the unions, paid a fair living wage were sold there. Every garment bore a label attesting to its originations and that is why the retail outlet was called “The Label Shop.”
Tenement Workers
The Harper’s Bazaar article stated, “Women of social prominence back the Label Shop. Displayed with the labeled garments, is the handwork of the women of the tenements who are being guided and helped by the settlement workers. The tenements of New York City are full of women who have brought with them to this country both the skill and the habits of industry that produce these marvels of beautiful handiwork. In their effort to adjust themselves to the bewildering new conditions here, most of these skilled workers are swept into the factories and sweatshops or else they continue to work at their own handicrafts in their tenements homes, selling their products to exploiting purchasers for the merest pittance. It is natural that the settlements located in the midst of foreign populations should make some attempts to help these workers and give them a fair chance. But all settlements which have conducted small industries in the effort to conserve and develop the skill of our foreign-born women have had to face a serious problem in marketing their products. This is why the Guild has united with the Label Shop and is there exhibiting the products of its women workers who produce Irish Lace, portieres (hanging curtains placed over a door-less entry to a room, usually made of velvet or brocade and derived from the French word for entrance, porte), and cushion covers. The exhibit is most interesting and will make a strong appeal to women who appreciate novelty and are ready to help a most deserving effort to teach these women of the tenements how to make a decent living under fair conditions.”
Dorothy Roosevelt Geer and her cousin, Eleanor Roosevelt, along with their friend, Eva McAdoo and many other socially aware women in New York City were actively involved in the “Settlement Movement,” encouraged by the example of their elders. Kate Roosevelt was no doubt proud of her young widowed daughter, Dorothy, and the life she led after the untimely death of her husband, Langdon Geer, in 1914.
Flanders Field Poster
Dorothy’s entourage included members of the social set, but she also hob-knobbed with politically and civic-minded women who spent many hours rolling bandages for the troops overseas and knitting warm socks for soldiers trapped in soggy trenches on the Western Front.
New York City was a swirl of men and women involved in the “Preparedness Movement,” aimed at getting America ready for its marching orders. By now the war in Europe had been churning out dead soldiers and fatherless children for more than two years and on this day in 1916, its steely shadow hovered over Hightstown, New Jersey and pierced through the peaceful mood at Merdlemouth when Kate’s Irish maid, Bella, got word her brother was one of the casualties of war.
As a hush fell over the farm on this fall day Kate Roosevelt was found gathering the last of her pink cosmos and digging up the roots of her coral colored geraniums while red poppies were sprouting up over the graves of fallen soldiers buried in Belgium’s Flanders Fields.
Sharon Hazard’s Dowager’s Diary appears on Thursday.
Photo One:
Tenement Workers
Lewis Hines Photo
Public Domain
Photo Two:
William McAdoo
United States Government Photo
Photo Three:
Union Workers Rally
National Archives
Photo Four:
Triangle Shirtwaist Factory
Library of Congress
Photo Five:
Tenement Workers
Lewis Hines Photo
Public Domain
Photo Six:
Flanders Field Poster
Department of National Defense, Ottawa
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