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Chicago Street Bridge |
Young Men's
Christian Ass'n |
The
building in the background of the postcard on the left is The YMCA (Young Men's Christian
Association). It was there that a young woman named Lucy Page Gaston took up her
tireless crusade against the evils of cigarette smoking. Gaston, a spinster
school teacher, was raised by her parents with a background of abolition and
temperance. Maintaining that cigarettes would lead to drinking and drinking
would lead to crime, Gaston used the YMCA to launch her Anti-Cigarette League in
1910. She maintained that the burning of the cigarette paper and the tobacco
created a gas which would have an adverse effect on the brain.
Gaston relied on others to help her make her case. Principal William Goble
attested that no one who smoked ever received a high school diploma from Elgin High School. Superintendent of Star Manufacturing Company attested
that "businessmen and corporations pick boys without yellow stain on their fingers"
Despite
all of her efforts, smoking rose from less than five million cigarettes in 1910
to over 73 million by the end of The First World War. Today, we know that
cigarette smoking is one of the leading causes of lung and throat cancer.
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