Lee County, Illinois - Chapter 20, 1920

Doubtless the most enjoyable features of the war activities in Lee County, were the speaking campaigns conducted throughout the County, on behalf of the Liberty Loans, and the various charitable organizations.

Able speakeis addressed numerous meetings in each Township in the County, and proved conclusi\iiy that from the viewpoint of platform talent, Lee Count}' could rightfully claim a position in the front rank, as well as in all other features of the splendid war record which her citizens made.

The patriotic spirit engendered as a result of the first meetings held, increased perceptibly as the campaigns progressed, and some of the communities that were perhaps a trifle tardy about heeding the appeals made through other channels, rapidly responded to the eloquent and convincing arguments of the members of the speakers' bureau, and interest in the meetings and the results obtained, increased perceptibly as the work progressed and the organization became more proficient.

Reynolds Township in one of our last drives, adopted the unique method of getting results by holding a meeting on a certain Friday evening in each school house in the Township. A prominent citizen of the Township invited the speakers of the evening to his home for supper, where his good wife provided a most boiuitiful and sumptuous repast, and one of the most effective speakers, an earnest and devout member of the Catholic Church became so enthusiastic and so intt'vested in the work that he partook freely of a delicious pork roast, entirely oblividus and unmindful of the fact that by so doing he was infringing upon one of the establishc<l rules of his Church.

On this same evening, the local chairman of at least two meetings in the township, very thoughtfully and perhaps wisely, olitaincd subscriptions for the entire quota allowed to the school district, before introducing the s])cakers of the evening. If space permitted, much lUdic niifihl be related of the intcicstiiiii incidents of the various campaigns; of the Ijoi-rowiiin, witliout permission, of a Ford auto for a trip to a meeting at the Maytown Church on a stormy cveninii', and of its miring in the mud on the return trip late that night, and of tlic very s])icy antl entirely impolite conversation that evening between H. S. Dixon and M. J. Gannon after the chains, somewhat hastily and loosely adjusted, had torn both rear fenders from the car; of Clyde Smith, retiuning in great haste from the Reynolds C'hurch to a beautiful object of his affections in Dixon, and forgetting to stop at Franklin drove for Albert Rorst, who reached Dixon by train about three A. M. - how John Byers in a heated argument at Compton related a l)o>-hood experience of having his feet frosted by going barefooteii to a pasture in Lee County after the cows the morning following the Foin-th of July, and of Hon. J. P. Devine and H. C. Warner in a Ford auto floundering in the sand endeavoring to negotiate one of the sand hills in the southern part of the County, when flicv were finallv rescued hv a good farmer's wife and daughter who helped th<>ni ,,ut.

It is sufficient to say, however, that from the vicwiioint of all who participated, the efforts made were highly compensator\-. and will always afford most ] Icasant recollections of an agreeable service well performed.