"Like Any Other Girl"

The name of Frances Elizabeth Willard, longtime (1879-98) president of the National Woman's Christian Temperance Union, is held dear by all teetotalers. She dried up Evanston, Ill. so thoroughly that to this day you have to drive several miles west of town to a row of beer-saloons or push south into adjacent Chicago to get a drink. From 1859 to 1874 Miss Willard spent most of her time in Evanston, first as a student at Northwestern Female College (now part of Northwestern University), later on the faculty of Evanston College for Ladies (then as now also part of the university), finally becoming the college's president and professor of esthetics. But it was her student days, not her anti-saloon activities, that brought Prohibitionist Willard into the news last week.

Because of fire hazard, Northwestern co-eds are prohibited from smoking in their sorority houses. In the course of agitation for the ban's removal, Jean Van Evera, woman's editor of the Daily Northwestern, pored over the back files of the student publication. As a result of her search, Editress Van Evera was able to give the world a hitherto unknown bit of Willardiana:

"According to the files, a preceptress came into Miss Willard's room and saw smoke curling up from a bureau drawer. Pulling open the drawer, she was horrified to find a half-burned cigaret. Miss Willard was apparently just like any other girl."

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