WORLD WCTU:

WORLD WCTU CONVENTION 2007
Indianapolis, Indiana

[Provided by The Banner, Vol. IX, Issue 21, Sept., 12, 2007; Knightstown, IN]

Contact Sarah Ward at sfward@embarqmail.com

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August 11, 2007 9:30:07 PM PDT

Good Morning Ladies:

My name is BG (Ret) Richard Keith Pierce and I am trying to obtain some information on two ladies - one of whom I was informed by my mother (who has since passed to her reward) was an officer in the California WCTU during the 1930's. I am finally getting around to completing my family's genealogy after 35 years in the military and I am hoping I can impose upon your kind offices to check your records to see if either of the following ladies are listed as active in the WCTU during the 1920's and 30's.

The first is Mattie Robinson, (my Great Grandmother) Born about 1848 in Vermont and Living in Long Beach during the big earthquake.

The other lady is Belle Depew Pierce (my Grandmother) Born in Michigan in 1868 and living with Mattie Robinson in Long Beach in 1930 (according to the 1930 census)

Any information you might provide would be greatly appreciated.

Most Sincerely,

Richard Keith Pierce
Brigadier General, USA (Ret)
rpierce04@dslextreme.com

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2007
Oratorical Contest

From: dpdepew@earthlink.net

Sent: Thu, 1 Mar 2007 8:35 PM

Subject: God bless you all in the Oratorical Contest

"God bless you all in the Oratorical Contest!"

David and Patricia Depew

["This from the son of a recent past State President and his wife." - Paul Scott]

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"From: ewittenme2@yahoo.com
Subject: historical question for the library
Date: November 20, 2006 11:23:12 AM PST
To: wctusocal@sbcglobal.net

I am working on a research paper and was wondering if you would be able to me the names of the ladies who belonged to the WCTU in Santa Monica, CA around 1885 / 1890.

Thank you for your help!
Eve Wittenmyer

(coincidentally, the first national president of the WCTU was Annie Turner Wittenmyer, 1874-1879) :)"

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February 28, 2006 4:03:53 PM PST

To Whom It May Concern,
 
     I am a seventeen year old male from Ventura, California and am looking to join the WCTU, or more specifically the YTC. Information on how I may go about this would be much appreciated and also information regarding the dues, meetings, and other details of the sort would be very helpful. Thank you!

(The email address is being withheld due to this student's age.)

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From: ARKARBACH@cs.com
Subject: Helen M. Gerrells Stoddard
Date: December 6, 2005 10:22:09 AM PST
To: wctusocal@sbcglobal.net

I am a local historian in Fort Worth, Texas, and am preparing a paper on Fort Worth Women and Social Change from 1880-1940. Helen M. Gerrells Stoddard resided in Fort Worth for several years while teaching at Fort Worth University and then as President of the Woman's Temperance Union of Texas. She was instrumental in passing of legislation in our state for children's and women's rights and establishing a woman's college, now Texas Woman's University which has some of her papers.

She moved to California in 1907 because of ill health but continued her work with W. C. T. U. there in San Diego County and as president of the State organization (1920), according to one biographical encyclopedia housed in our local library. Sources here in Texas have her living in La Mesa and Ramona, and dying in California in January 1941, and buried in San Diego. To the contrary, I have found her death certificate here in Texas and news articles in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram with a death date of December 31, 1940, in Dallas, Texas, and listing her as a resident of Brownwood, Brown County, Texas (about 35 miles from her family's home in Indian Gap, Texas) and that she had been living with her daughter in law Mrs. Stella B. Stoddard about 3 years before going into a medical facility in Dallas.

Of course, my paper is focused on her Texas years but I am interested in verifying the California information in sources here. If you have any summary or sources or photos of Mrs. Stoddard, I would appreciate knowing about them and would be glad to supply a biography from my work here.

TWU Woman's Collection does have a copy of Rhonda Jane Jones' thesis Up Rugged and Isolated Paths: Helen M. Stoddard as President of the Texas Woman's Christian Temperance Union, 1891-1907 (San Jose State University).

Ruth H. Karbach, 3058 Ryan Place Drive, Fort Worth, TX 76110 817-924-9653

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From: ARKARBACH@cs.com
Subject: Re: Stoddard was well known! 1920 Socal State WCTU Pres.
Date: December 7, 2005 3:20:35 PM PST
To: wctusocal@sbcglobal.net

Thanks for all the documents and photo! They were really helpful. It is wonderful to obtain a primary sources to confirm information. Y'all (as we say in Texas) have done a wonderful job of preserving your history.

Stella B. Stoddard, who was the head of the scientific temperance instruction and narcotics department for San Diego County W. C. T. U., was Helen M. Stoddard's daughter-in-law. I am glad you shared information with the graduate student.

Here's some more sources [on HELEN M. STODDARD]:

(1) There is a master's thesis at San Jose State University, 1995, by Rhonda Jane Jones, "Up Rugged and Isolated Paths: Helen M. Stoddard as President of the Texas Woman's Christian Temperance Union, 1891-1907," that I am looking forward to reviewing at Texas Woman's University's Woman's Collection.

(2) As far as contemporary sources, Helen Stoddard's private secretary and State press woman for Texas W. C. T. U., Fanny L. Armstrong, compiled the book To the Noon Rest: The Life, Work and Addressees of Mrs. Helen M. Stoddard (Butler, Indiana: L. H. Highley, 1909). Copies are at Texas Christian University Library and the Genealogy and Local History Section, Central Library or the Fort Worth Public Library. I have the FWPL one on special loan as it is a rare book; however, I think the TCU one may be available for interlibrary loan if the graduate student has not located one.

(3) The University of Texas at Austin has a scrapbook of the Texas W.C.T.U. from the relevant time period, and the Southwest Collection, Texas Tech University at Lubbock, has the periodical of the Texas W. C. T. U. "The White Ribbon" in their collection from the Canadian, Texas W.C.T.U. which starts in 1904.

If you wish to contact the archivist for the Helen M. Stoddard Papers at Texas Woman's University, she is Ann McGuffin Barton, Library Asst., TWU Library, P.O. Box 425528, Denton, TX 76204-5528 Phone 940-898-3752, 940-898-3745 Fax. ABarton@twu.edu Ann is incrediably helpful and dedicated to preserving women's history.

Again, thank you for being so responsive and providing such good material.
Ruth H. Karbach

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USE-IS-ABUSE:

(Also see the links at the end of the Contact Section.)

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"Relaxed Attitudes Toward Alcohol And Youth
May Increase Risk Of Binge Drinking In College"

"Should parents allow their teenage children to drink alcohol? Restaurants in Germany can legally sell alcohol to a teenager after his sixteenth birthday, and French children drink wine with dinner in the home starting at an early age. But U.S. parents who try to follow this relaxed European example, believing it fosters a healthier attitude towards alcohol, should be careful about giving alcohol to their children -- it may increase the likelihood that they binge drink in college.

That's the latest finding of researcher Caitlin Abar of the Prevention Research and Methodology Center at Pennsylvania State University. At this year's meeting of the Society for Prevention Research, she suggested that parents practice a zero-tolerance policy in the home and said that there is no scientific basis to the common belief that prohibiting alcohol turns it into a "forbidden fruit" and encourages abuse.

In 31 states, parents can legally serve alcohol to their underage children. Though U.S. teenagers drink less often than adults, they tend to drink more at a time -- on average, five drinks in a sitting -- according to Ralph Hingson of the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism. About 87 percent of college students try alcohol, and 40 percent say that they regularly engage in some type of binge drinking.

To see if parents prohibiting alcohol might be an underlying cause of binge drinking, Abar surveyed almost 300 college freshmen and compared their drinking habits to their parents' attitudes towards alcohol. Those students whose parents never allowed them to drink -- about half of the group -- were significantly less likely to drink heavily in college, regardless of gender.

Moreover, "the greater number of drinks that a parent had set as a limit for the teens, the more often they drank and got drunk in college," said Abar. Whether the parents themselves drank, on the other hand, had little effect on predicting their children's behaviors.

Further research is needed to confirm the preliminary study, said Abar. For one thing, she did not separate students who specifically drank with their parents at meals from those whose parents allowed their children to drink both inside and outside of the house.

A previous study in 2004 by Kristie Foley of Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center in North Carolina showed that teenagers who received alcohol from their parents for parties were up to three times more likely to binge drink within a month, while those who drank only with the family were less likely to binge. So the context in which a parent provides alcohol may be
key.

The difference could also be due to some other factor -- parents who prohibit their children from drinking may simply provide more structure in general, for example.

Furthermore, the sample of college students is not necessarily representative of the entire U.S. population, said Alexander Wagenaar, a social epidemiologist at the University of Florida in Gainesville who has charted the effects of raising the drinking age for nearly three decades. The survey group in Abar's sample was composed almost entirely of white students who lived on campus.

Wagenaar finds the data convincing, though, because previous research uncovered a similar effect in low-income African-American and Hispanic students. A 2007 study of 1,388 children by Kelli Komro of the University of Florida showed that schoolchildren who were permitted alcohol in the home by their parents in sixth grade were up to three times more likely to get drunk and almost twice as likely to drink heavily (five or more drinks) at ages 12-14.

Researcher Margaret Kerr of Orebro University in Sweden discussed her own experimental evidence in favor of prohibiting alcohol in the home. She and her colleagues have designed a no-drinking intervention program that, in a pilot study published in a scientific journal earlier this year, cut teen drunkenness by 35 percent."

[From ScienceDaily, June 11, 2009]

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“Kids See Smoking as Riskier than Alcohol or Other Drug Use”

“About 70 percent of 12- to 17-year-olds see great risk in smoking a pack of cigarettes or more daily, compared to 40 percent who saw great risk in binge drinking and about 34 percent who perceived great risk in smoking marijuana monthly, according to research from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA).

The report, drawn from findings in the annual National Survey on Drug Use and Health, also found that roughly half of adolescents believed that using cocaine monthly or trying LSD once or twice was very risky.
Researchers said that while risk perception was relatively constant across age groups when it come to smoking, it varied more widely in regards to other substances.

"We are on the right track with cigarette smoking and need to keep raising awareness among teens about the dangers of other substances," said SAMHSA administrator Pamela S. Hyde. "Understanding that perception of harm is a strong predictor of potential substance use among young people can help guide the development of substance prevention messages."

[January 1, 2010; from jointogether.com]

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"Binge Drinking Affects Even Sober Brain, Study Finds

"August 14, 2009

Research Summary

Self-reported binge drinkers performed worse on cognitive tests compared to non-bingers, even when they were sober, the Los Angeles Times reported Aug. 11.

Researchers at the University of Santiago de Compostela in Spain said the findings hinted that binge drinking could affect the brain in ways similar to that observed among alcoholics.

"We found that healthy young university students -- meaning those with no alcohol use disorder, alcohol dependence or associated psychiatric disorders -- who engaged in binge drinking showed anomalies during the execution of a task involving visual working memory, despite correct execution of the task, in comparison with young non binge drinkers. They required greater attentional processing during the task in order to carry it out correctly," said researcher Alberto Crego. "Healthy adolescents and young people who partake in intermittent consumption of large amounts of alcohol -- otherwise known as binge drinking -- even only once or twice a week, and who do not display chronic alcohol consumption or alcohol dependence may nonetheless suffer alterations at the electrophysiological level in attentional and working memory processing."

The study, which compared 42 binge drinkers to 53 other students, was published online in the journal Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research.

This article summarizes an external report or press release on research published in a scientific journal. When available, links to the sources are provided above." [from jointogether.com]

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"Alcoholism Among Pre-Teens Often Unnoticed, Untreated

"July 26, 2009
Email . . . News Summary

Most alcoholics start drinking during their teen years, but the disease can also strike those who begin using alcohol at a younger age -- and the problem often goes unrecognized, experts say.

The San Francisco Chronicle reported July 16 that Mary Brennan of suburban Chicago began drinking at age 10 with friends of her older brother; by 15, she was bringing vodka to school in Gatorade bottles and getting drunk every day. Her father, a single parent, didn't recognize the problem, even after she overdosed and nearly died.

The underage-drinking rate in the U.S. has remained steady in recent years, but some research indicates that youths are starting to drink at a younger age. One study, from the Partnership for a Drug-Free America, concluded that about 10 percent of nine-year-olds had consumed more than a sip of alcohol. And research from the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism indicates that children who begin drinking before age 15 are four times more likely to have drinking problems than those who start drinking at age 21 or later.

"A third of kids ages 12 to 17 had their first drink before 13," said Susan Foster, director of policy research for the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse (CASA) at Columbia University. "That's about 6.4 million kids, many more than there have been historically. Very young drinkers are a huge concern."

"We've received calls from parents of kids as young as 8," said Cole Rucker, CEO and cofounder of the Echo Malibu treatment center. "Every year, alcohol use shows up in younger and younger kids."

Young drinkers often get started with alcohol use by getting drinks from friends or family liquor cabinets. Polls have shown that youths ages 13 and up say it is easy to get alcohol from adults -- and sometimes their own parents, who may themselves have drinking problems.

"The traditional thinking is that risk factors for alcohol abuse show up in adolescence," said Robert A. Zucker, Ph.D., director of the Addiction Research Center at the University of Michigan. "But, actually, they can show up earlier -- in children 9 or younger, even in preschoolers."

Few treatment programs exist for very young alcoholics, who rarely get adequate services, such as intensive inpatient care."

[from jointogether.com]

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"Alcohol's Effect on the Brain is Rapid, Detrimental

"June 22, 2009
Research Summary

Researchers at Heidelberg University in Germany have found that it takes only six minutes for a change in brain cells to occur after drinking the equivalent of about three glasses of beer or two glasses of wine, Science Daily reported June 15.

Researchers gave 15 healthy subjects (eight male and seven female) enough alcohol to produce a blood alcohol level of 0.05 to 0.06 percent -- sufficient to impair driving but not severe intoxication.

Using magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS), the researchers found that the concentration of creatine, a substance that protects brain cells, decreased as the amount of alcohol increased. Chloine, a component of cell membranes, was also reduced. Lead author Armin Biller of Heidelberg's Department of Neuroradiology said that the reduction in chloine probably indicated that alcohol triggered changes in the composition of cell membranes.

The researchers also found that the day after the subjects had consumed alcohol, their brain metabolism had reverted to what it had been prior to the experiment. However, Armin warned that, "The brain's ability to recover from the effect of alcohol decreases or is eliminated as the consumption of alcohol increases. The acute effects demonstrated in our study could possibly form the basis for the permanent brain damage that is known to occur in alcoholics. This should be clarified in future studies."

The study found no differences between male and female subjects, suggesting that the brains of female and male subjects reacted to alcohol consumption the same way.

This study was published online in the Journal of Cerebral Blood Flow & Metabolism." [from jointogether.com]

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"Even Patients with Severe Liver Problems Benefit from Abstinence

"April 21, 2009
Email Research Summary

Abstinence from alcohol has a more profound effect on survival rates than the degree of cirrhosis among patients with alcohol-related liver disease, according to researchers who said that stopping drinking at any stage will benefit liver patients.

Science Daily reported April 15 that drinking status was the most important factor in determining the long-term survival of patients with alcohol-related liver disease. Patients who quit drinking within a month of being diagnosed with cirrhosis, for example, had a 72-percent chance of surviving for seven years, compared to 44 percent for those who continued to drink.

"This study clearly confirms the commonsense knowledge amongst hepatologists that the single most important determinant of long-term prognosis in alcohol-induced cirrhosis is for the patient to stop drinking," said lead researcher Nick Sheron of the University of Southampton and Southampton General Hospital in the U.K. "At the most simplistic level, the successful management of alcohol-induced liver disease comprises two components; firstly to keep the patient alive long enough for them to stop drinking and secondly to maximize their chances of continued abstinence."

The study was published in the May 2009 issue of the journal Addiction." [from jointogether.com]

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"A Drink a Day May Increase Your Cancer Risk

February 25, 2009

Consuming as little as one alcoholic drink per day may increase the risk of several types of cancer in middle-aged women, according to a new study published online yesterday in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute. The study involved more than 1.2 million British women, making it the largest study ever to look into the role of alcohol use in women's cancer risk. During the seven-year follow-up period, 68,775 women in the study were diagnosed with cancer. Cancer risk increased as the consumption of alcohol rose, and the kind of alcohol the women drank didn't seem to make a difference. Moderate drinking, the study suggests, accounts for about 13 percent of cancers of the breast, liver, rectum, and upper respiratory/digestive tract in women, HealthDay reports.

Alcohol consumption affects more than cancer risk; in fact, in some women, alcohol may protect against heart disease and fractures—if it's not abused. Researchers at Washington University in St. Louis reported last year that alcohol use and alcoholism are on the rise in women, though not in men."

[http://health.usnews.com/articles/health/2009/02/25/health-buzz-alcohol-use-and-cancer-risk-and-other-health-news.html]

 

 

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Cancer Risk Falls 70 Percent When Smokers Quit

March 27, 2007

A study of half a million adults concludes that quitting smoking lowers your risk of dying from lung cancer by 70 percent, researchers say.

The George Institute for International Health reported that the Asia-Pacific Cohort Studies Collaboration also found that the risk of dying from lung cancer was about 20 times higher among female smokers than among men.

"If interventions only focus on prevention, then 160 million current smokers will die before 2050, with the vast majority of deaths occurring in China," warned lead researcher Rachel Huxley, director of The George Institute's nutrition and lifestyle program. "There are huge numbers of lives to be saved through campaigns to alert current smokers to the dangers of their habit. Effective action in Asia would help to head off a significant part of the projected one billion deaths from smoking that will otherwise occur around the world this century."

The study was published online in the American Journal of Epidemiology.

Reference:
Huxley, R., et al. (2007) Impact of Smoking and Smoking Cessation on Lung Cancer Mortality in the Asia-Pacific Region. American Journal of Epidemiology, doi: 10.1093/aje/kwm002. [from jointogether.com]

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"What Alcohol Does to a Child
By CHRISTINE GORMAN
Posted Sunday, May 28, 2006

"Alcohol and pregnancy don't mix. Fortunately, most women who drink cut their consumption dramatically once they realize they are carrying, and the number of children who develop the severest alcohol-related effects is relatively small: from 0.5 to 2.0 per 1,000 live births in the U.S. But doctors still don't know what harm--if any--comes from light to moderate drinking during pregnancy, which is why they caution expectant mothers not to drink at all.

The wisdom of that advice grows with each new study on the topic, as a paper released last week reminds us. Just one drink a day (12 oz. of beer or 4 oz. of wine) during the first three months of pregnancy is associated with a 2-point drop in overall IQ by the time the child is 10, according to a report in the June issue of Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research. The effect shows up most clearly in certain visual tasks--like fitting pieces of a puzzle into an empty space--and was strongest among African-American children.

The apparent racial gap is puzzling--and ultimately inconclusive. Although other studies had shown similar effects of moderate drinking among pregnant Caucasian women, this one did not, says Jennifer Willford, a psychologist at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine and co-author of the report. The gap does not appear to reflect differences in income or drinking patterns, Willford says, since the two groups were comparable in this particular population. And in her previous research, Willford says, she has found problems in learning and memory among 14-year-olds--both black and white--whose mothers drank during pregnancy.

As you might expect, the effects on IQ and cognitive abilities became more pronounced if moms continued to drink throughout their pregnancy or consumed more alcohol. Conversely, the children of women who stopped drinking during pregnancy fared better than those of women who did not.

Of course, to stop drinking during pregnancy, you have to know that you're pregnant in the first place. But as another study in the same issue of Alcoholism points out, younger women are more likely to drink heavily than older women and are more fertile--and therefore more likely to become pregnant.

About 45% of pregnancies in the U.S. are unplanned, says Dr. Raul Caetano of the Dallas campus of the University of Texas School of Public Health, a co-author of the second paper. A month may pass before a woman even realizes she is pregnant. "If you want to drink and you are sexually active, the best thing to do is to use contraception," Caetano says. "That's what I say to my daughter." And the best time to quit drinking is from the moment you--and your partner--decide you would like to conceive a child.

From the Jun. 5, 2006 issue of TIME magazine"
[link sent by Alice Peterson]