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Sunday, April 2, 2023

Expansion of Durham Old Ladies' Home and Addition of Infirmary, Furnace, Worthwhile, Says Editor, April 1, 1923

The Old Ladies’ Home

It has been quite a while since we had occasion to refer to an impending campaign for raising funds for some local cause, but a campaign is to be staged this week which we believe will appeal to the people with a peculiar force. We refer to the coming effort to secure $25,000 for the Old Ladies’ Home, one of the most deserving institutions for which an appeal was ever made. Money is needed to extend the facilities of the Home so as to care for more of the wrinkled and trembling hands which are knocking at its doors and pleading for an opportunity to spend the few remaining years in peace and comfort.

The Old Ladies’ Home now has accommodations for approximately 20 inmates. For $25,000, the building can be so enlarged as to double the capacity, and in addition provide an infirmary and install a heating plan, the need of all of which is readily recognized.

That there is need for more room is shown by the report from the officials that during the past two years it was necessary to deny applications of 60 aged women who sought shelter there. The management of the Home had to say, with a heavy heart, you cannot enter, we have no room for you. That there is need for more room is so evident that it is unnecessary to dwell upon that phase. A heating system is needed. When the years weigh heavily, it is necessary that there be a generous supply of artificial warmth to supply the physical deficiencies in that respect. It is necessary that there be uniform heat, and that the vagaries of weather be carefully guarded against. That requires a proper heating system for the building, and the Home will be provided for in that respect out of the money to be secured in this week’s campaign. The need of an infirmary is also evident. Sickness invades the confines of the Home frequently, the very physical nature of the inmates constituting a standing invitation to it. The sick must be given the best care possible, and that can only be secured through proper provision such as afforded only in an infirmary.

The three needs briefly outlined here are real, and it takes no special appeal to reasonable men and women to impress upon them the importance of those needs. The sum asked is moderate, and the good that will do cannot be measured in dollars and cents. The campaign for the Home has more appeals than the average campaign. It appeals to sentiment, to duty, to religion, to business, in fact, to every good quality there is in humanity. Wednesday, Thursday and Friday are the days set aside to raise that sum, and we predict that the response will be exceedingly generous, for Durham people are noted for their generosity in behalf of worthy causes, and no cause ever presented here embodied more worth than that of the appeal for the Old Ladies’ Home.

From the editorial page of the Durham Morning Herald, April 1, 1923

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