WORK OF GRENFEIL MISSION DESCRIBED

Written for the Crimson by the Staff Selection Committee of the International Grenfell Association.

The students who volunteer for work with Dr. Grenfell's Mission must make formal application and be interviewed by the Staff Selection Committee before they are accepted. Those who are so fortunate have but a few days after school or college closes to make ready for the trip. By the last of June they sail for Down North--Newfoundland and Labrador.

The trip down is a get-to-gether party and by the time St. Anthony is reached, the Princeton, Yale and Harvard men have forgotten their college rivalry, all have become one unit and assumed the name of "Wops." Their work is mostly out-door labor. A new road to be built, vessels to be unloaded, launches and boats to be taken to other ports, patients to be carried from the boats to the hospital--such is the work of the "Wops."

The largest station is at St. Anthony, on the northeastern coast of Newfoundland, Here Dr. and Mrs. Grenfell make their home and from that station Dr. Grenfell starts with his hospital ship, the Strathcona, for his summer round of visits along the coast of Labrador. Each little village eagerly awaits his coming and from the moment his boat enters a harbor it is surrounded by scores of fishing smacks all clamoring for the Doctor. At St. Anthony is the Mission's Hospital, Orphanage, School, Industrial Shop, Co-operative Store and Guest House. It was at this station that last summer the "Wops", under Professor Gillespie of Princeton, excavated for the foundation for the new Orphanage This coming summer the Orphanage is to be built--and who is going to lend a hand? The Wops.

Men Sent to Various Places

Not all the volunteer students stop at St. Anthony. Some go to Pilley's Island, off the east coast of Newfoundland, others up to Battle Harbor, Harrington, or Indian Harbor.

These latter are the main stations on the Labrador Coast; between them are dotted smaller villages, sometimes with only a nurse in charge of the medical work. Indian Harbor is the most northern station of the Grenfell Mission and is in charge of Dr. Paddon.

The work of a day laborer may seem a rather arduous way to spend one's vacation but ask any of Dr. Grenfell's boys if the romance of the rocky coast with its northern lights, the open life and the satisfaction of having done something for the cause of bringing life and happiness to the frozen north does not more than counterbalance the tedious lifting or lame muscles which one is apt to receive after the first day's work.

When the first signs of autumn come and the little steamer coming down from the North steams into the harbor at St. Anthony, volunteer nurses, nurses-aids, medical students, secretaries and students hastily pack their bags, and go down the hill to the boat. With all on board, the little boat soon steams out of the harbor. Every one, declaring it the best summer they have ever spent, waves farewell to those who remain for the winter, at the same time saying, "We'll be back again next summer."