第53章 First Years as a Woman's Editor (4)

Bok had already learned, in his editorial experience, carefully to weigh a woman's instinct against a man's judgment, but the idea of raising babies by mail floored him.He reasoned, however, that a woman, and more particularly one who had been in a babies' hospital for years, knew more about babies than he could possibly know.He consulted baby-specialists in New York and Philadelphia, and, with one accord, they declared the plan not only absolutely impracticable but positively dangerous.Bok's confidence in woman's instinct, however, persisted, and he asked Doctor Coolidge to map out a plan.

This called for the services of two physicians: Miss Marianna Wheeler, for many years superintendent of the Babies' Hospital, was to look after the prospective mother before the baby's birth; and Doctor Coolidge, when the baby was born, would immediately send to the young mother a printed list of comprehensive questions, which, when answered, would be immediately followed by a full set of directions as to the care of the child, including carefully prepared food formule.At the end of the first month, another set of questions was to be forwarded for answer by the mother, and this monthly service was to be continued until the child reached the age of two years.The contact with the mother would then become intermittent, dependent upon the condition of mother and child.

All the directions and formule were to be used only under the direction of the mother's attendant physician, so that the fullest cooperation might be established between the physician on the case and the advisory department of the magazine.

Despite advice to the contrary, Bok decided, after consulting a number of mothers, to establish the system.It was understood that the greatest care was to be exercised: the most expert advice, if needed, was to be sought and given, and the thousands of cases at the Babies' Hospital were to be laid under contribution.

There was then begun a magazine department which was to be classed among the most clear-cut pieces of successful work achieved by The Ladies'

Home Journal.

Step by step, the new departure won its way, and was welcomed eagerly by thousands of young mothers.It was not long before the warmest commendation from physicians all over the country was received.

Promptness of response and thoroughness of diagnosis were, of course, the keynotes of the service: where the cases were urgent, the special delivery post and, later, the night-letter telegraph service were used.

The plan is now in its eleventh year of successful operation.Some idea of the enormous extent of its service can be gathered from the amazing figures that, at the close of the tenth year, show over forty thousand prospective mothers have been advised, while the number of babies actually "raised" by Doctor Coolidge approaches eighty thousand.Fully ninety-five of every hundred of these babies registered have remained under the monthly letter-care of Doctor Coolidge until their first year, when the mothers receive a diet list which has proved so effective for future guidance that many mothers cease to report regularly.Eighty-five out of every hundred babies have remained in the registry until their graduation at the age of two.Over eight large sets of library drawers are required for the records of the babies always under the supervision of the registry.

Scores of physicians who vigorously opposed the work at the start have amended their opinions and now not only give their enthusiastic endorsement, but have adopted Doctor Coolidge's food formule for their private and hospital cases.

It was this comprehensive personal service, built up back of the magazine from the start, that gave the periodical so firm and unique a hold on its clientele.It was not the printed word that was its chief power: scores of editors who have tried to study and diagnose the appeal of the magazine from the printed page, have remained baffled at the remarkable confidence elicited from its readers.They never looked back of the magazine, and therefore failed to discover its secret.Bok went through three financial panics with the magazine, and while other periodicals severely suffered from diminished circulation at such times, The Ladies' Home Journal always held its own.Thousands of women had been directly helped by the magazine; it had not remained an inanimate printed thing, but had become a vital need in the personal lives of its readers.

So intimate had become this relation, so efficient was the service rendered, that its readers could not be pried loose from it; where women were willing and ready, when the domestic pinch came, to let go of other reading matter, they explained to their husbands or fathers that The Ladies' Home Journal was a necessity--they did not feel that they could do without it.The very quality for which the magazine had been held up to ridicule by the unknowing and unthinking had become, with hundreds of thousands of women, its source of power and the bulwark of its success.

Bok was beginning to realize the vision which had lured him from New York: that of putting into the field of American magazines a periodical that should become such a clearing-house as virtually to make it an institution.

He felt that, for the present at least, he had sufficiently established the personal contact with his readers through the more intimate departments, and decided to devote his efforts to the literary features of the magazine.