Ellen Wilson Memorial Prospectus for Endowment

Title

Ellen Wilson Memorial Prospectus for Endowment

Creator

Ellen Wilson Memorial

Identifier

WWP19583

Date

1914 August 25

Description

A prospectus for endowment of the Ellen Wilson Memorial Fund.

Source

Eleanor Wilson McAdoo Papers, University of California, Santa Barbara

Publisher

Woodrow Wilson Presidential Library & Museum

Subject

Wilson, Woodrow, 1856-1924--Correspondence

Contributor

Woodrow Wilson Presidential Library & Museum staff

Language

English

Text

The Ellen Wilson Memorial
INCORPORATED
___

HONORARY PRESIDENT
Mrs. Thos. R. Marshall

HONORARY VICE-PRESIDENTS 
Mrs. William Jennings Bryan
Mrs. Lindley M. Garrison
Mrs. Thomas W. Gregory
Mrs. Albert S. Burleson
Mrs. Josephus Daniels
Mrs. Franklin K. Lane
Mrs. David F. Houston
Mrs. William C. Redfield
Miss Agnes Wilson
__

ADMINISTRATIVE BOARD
Mrs. W. S. Elkin,
          Chairman
Mrs. Peterson Arkwright
                 Vice-Chairman
Mrs. Thomas H. Latham,
          Secretary
Mrs. Archibald Davis,
          Treasurer
Mrs. Hoke Smith
Mrs. Bolling H. Jones
Mrs. Frank S. Ellis
Mrs. Nellie Peters Black
Mrs. Harris E. Kirk
Mrs. Robert L. Foreman
Mrs. B. I. Hughes
Mrs. H. B. Wey
Mrs. Samuel M. Inman
Mrs. Wilmer L. Moore
Mrs. John B. Knox
Mrs. Charles P. Crawford
Mrs. James S. Akers
Mrs. Seaborn Wright
Mrs. Philip Weltner
Mrs. Hugh Bancker
Mrs. Alfred E. Buck

Memorial Committee 
___

ALABAMA
Mrs. John B. Knox
Anniston

ARKANSAS
Mrs. Fred Allsop
600 Gaines Street
Little Rock

FLORIDA
Mrs. Thomas P. Denham
109 Lomax Street
Jacksonville

GEORGIA
Mrs. H. C. Cunningham
222 E. Gaston Street
Savannah

KENTUCKY
Mrs. Edmond S. Delong
Lexington

LOUISIANA
Mrs. Ella F. Hardie
1411 Jackson Avenue
New Orleans

TENNESSEE
Mrs. David Fentriss
1885 Harbert Street
Memphis

TEXAS
Mrs. E. T. Rotan
1503 Columbus Street
Waco

VIRGINIA
Mrs. W. C. Marshall
212 E. Frederick Street
Staunton

WEST VIRGINIA
Mrs. Stewart W. Walker
"The Pillars"
Martinsburg

MARYLAND
Mrs. Harris E. Kirk
502 Cathedral Street
Baltimore

MISSISSIPPI
Mrs. Charlton H. Alexander
Jackson

MISSOURI
Mrs. Wade Childress
5934 Clemens Avenue

NORTH CAROLINA
Mrs. R. J. Reynolds
Winston-Salem

OKLAHOMA
Mrs. Kibben Warren
Shawnee

SOUTH CAROLINA
Miss Euphemia McClintock
Presbyterian College for Women
Columbia

THE ELLEN WILSON MEMORIAL
___

WHY do you love a little child?
Because it is helpless. The more helpless and needy it is, the more firmly it grips the heart. If it is a child of poverty, we pity it; but we have hope, for America offers its educational advantages to the poor as well as to the rich.

     This is true of the waifs in our great cities, and the children of the humble in town and country, EXCEPT the children of the purest-blooded Anglo-Saxon stock in America-the secluded highlanders in our Southern mountains.

     The richest vital asset in America is these three million Anglo-Saxon mountaineers. They went into the mountains before and just subsequent to the Revolutionary War.

     Thomas Nelson Page says of them: "In their virtues and in their vices, in their knowledge and in their point of view, they are substantially that in which their ancestors were 135 years ago." Another, who knows them well, says: "I expect to see the day come when the mountain regions of the South will be as peculiar a joy and glory to America as old Scotland is to Great Britain."

     There is hardly a county in all that great section which can not furnish more unquestioned candidates for membership in chapters of Sons of The American Revolution, Daughters of The American Revolution and Colonial Dames than can be found on Fifth Avenue or in the Black Bay District.

     Their mountains have shut them in, and the tides of development and education have swept past them and around them.

     WHILE the statesman of the White House was busy with the cares of his great office his devoted companion was led to think of this splendid and neglected element in the life of the nation.

     With a womans unerring intuition her heart was enlisted in the uplift of the children of these stranded millions. When she saw her vision she was not disobedient to it, but threw herself with sacrificial earnestness into its call.

     It is a far cry from the White House and DuPont Circle and the wide Potomac to the black mountains and the lonely valleys and the limpid streams that rush under dark pines and rhododendrons.

     The Lady of the White House could forget state occasions and social duties while her heart made long pilgrimages to sympathize with the poor children of the dark valleys and the gloomy outlook.

     She loved them and her heart yearned for their welfare.

     She surrendered her heart to her Master in a passion to serve them.

     It was given to her to see the vision of their need, and to taste somewhat of the joy of ministering to it.

     Many boys and girls were having their opportunity for education, and many weary teachers were heartened in their lonely life by Mrs. Wilsons generous interest in them.

     With her heart inspired by this noble task, she fell asleep, leaving its completion to others who love needy little children.

     IT is now proposed that the women of America undertake the fulfillment of Mrs. Wilsons dream as a memorial to her. To that end a movement has been launched to establish an endowment to be known as "The Ellen Wilson Fund for the Christian Education of Mountain Youth."

     The proposal has received the unqualified approval of President Wilson and his family, and "The Ellen Wilson Memorial" has been incorporated under the laws of Georgia with headquarters in Atlanta.

     To insure the safe and proper investment of the fund, the charter provides that it shall be held in trust by The Executive Committee of Home Missions of the Presbyterian Church in the United States, Incorporated, the income from which shall be turned over to a non-denominational board of women to administer.

     In accordance with President Wilsons wish, the benefits of the fund will be available for students without reference to denomination or school attended, provided it is a Christian school.

     The men and women of the nation who honor the memory of Ellen Wilson, and are interested in the educational and moral uplift of the people of the mountains, are now invited to assist in the creation of "The Ellen Wilson Fund" as a permanent tribute to her beautiful life.


(COPY)
THE WHITE HOUSE
Washington D.C.
August 25, 1914

My dear Mrs. Hughes:
    My daughter Margaret has handed me your kind letter of August 15th. We have had a little family conference, and I want to say for my daughters as well as for myself how deeply we appreciate the action of the little conference you held at Montreat, and how glad I am to make the suggestions you ask for. My own judgment would be that it would be best to raise a fund which would be an endowment, the interest of which should be used to pay the way through school of mountain boys and girls--because I know that this is what Mrs. Wilson would have done if she had had the means and opportunity. She was paying for the education of several herself, from year to year.
     It might be called the Ellen Wilson Fund for the Christian Education of Mountain Youth.
     I cannot say how much I am touched by this action of the ladies concerned. It gives me a certain kind of joy.
     Cordially and sincerely yours,

(signed) Woodrow Wilson

Mrs. B. I. Hughes,
Rome. GA. 

Original Format

Letter

Files

http://resources.presidentwilson.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/D70087.pdf

Citation

Ellen Wilson Memorial, “Ellen Wilson Memorial Prospectus for Endowment,” 1914 August 25, WWP19583, Eleanor Wilson McAdoo Collection at the University of California-Santa Barbara, Woodrow Wilson Presidential Library & Museum, Staunton, Virginia.