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The experience of France differed only in degree from that of the other allied nations. To avoid a similar experience and not only give every crippled soldier the best possible chance to become self-supporting, but to insure that he avails himself of the opportunity thus afforded, the psychological and economic rehabilitation of every American incapacitated by his injuries for further military service will begin with and go on parallel with his physical rehabilitation, which, in turn, will be a process not merely of "patching up," but of the actual development to their utmost usefulness of all of the injured man's remaining physical powers.

The first reaction of the man who has lost a limb is utter despair. He is "done for," in his own estimation. "Nobody has any use for a cripple," is the way in which nine out of ten express it. Unless he is a man whose former occupation has been mental, not dependent upon his physical energies, he sees no ray of hope for his own future. Unless immediately rectified, this state of mind quickly becomes fixed and all but irremediable. So the first step toward rehabilitation, which will begin almost as soon as the injured man comes out from under the anesthetic, is what they are terming in the Surgeon General's office "cheer-up work." By every means that can be devised the cripple is to be convinced that his case is not hopeless, that he still has chances of becoming again a useful industrial unit -- perhaps a better chance than he has ever had before.

One of the most important means of instilling this vitally important lesson will be through the utilization of "cheer-up men," themselves cripples, who have lost arms, legs or sight, and who have, nevertheless, made good. Plans are complete for the employment of a large corps of these "cheer-up workers"; they are being enlisted through the aid of the Red Cross Institute, the National Association of Manufacturers, insurance companies dealing with industrial accidents, and from the ranks of Canadian and British soldiers who have suffered mutilation in this are and are again self-supporting civilians. Eventually, unless the war comes to a much earlier termination than Washington is figuring on, our own army will provide a supply of "cheer-up men" from the graduates of the reconstruction hospitals. These workers are to be attached to the base hospitals, the hospital ships that will bring the incapacitated soldiers back to America for treatment, and to the general special hospitals on this side.

Supplementing the work of the "cheer-up men," whose function is to demonstrate both orally and visually that a cripple is far from useless, will be books, pictures, motion pictures, and other exhibits calculated to inspire the will and stimulate the ambition of the injured man. In he Surgeon General's office a wonderful book is being compiled, under the direction of one of the most famous of American surgeons, in which the life stories of hundreds of maimed and crippled men who have overcome their handicaps are told in simple but convincing fashion. Profusely illustrated, copies of this book will be available for the perusal of every crippled soldier in the hospitals. Motion-picture films showing crippled men who have undergone almost every conceivable form of mutilation, performing useful work for good pay, with and without the use of artificial members, are being prepared by the Red Cross Institute and elsewhere for exhibition to the maimed soldier as early as he is able to see them.

To insure against the habit of idleness, provision is being made up for the employment of every crippled soldier at some form of work as soon as he is able to use any of his faculties. Special nurses, male and female, are being trained as "bedside teachers," to give the wounded man a start at employing his faculties before he is able to leave his cot. The things he does at first will necessarily be trivial in the results, but they will be required duties, gauged to the man's capacity and strength, and leading to his future career as a crippled civilian. Hus, the man who has lost his right hand will be taught to use his left for the things he was accustomed to do with his right: the stenographer who has lost a hand will learn to operate a typewriter with one hand -- not so difficult a feat as it may seem. As the cripple becomes a convalescent, able to leave his bed, more work will be required of him. By this time he will be on the hospital ship, on his way back to the United States, for every wounded soldier who cannot be quickly restored to active service will be sent back to this country as soon as he can be transported, for further treatment or discharge. On the hospital ship and in the reception hospital on Ellis Island there will be special officials whose duty it will be to ascertain all the available facts about each man's personal ability, previous occupation, earning capacity, social status, and similar data on which to base a judgment as to the particular form of re-education best adapted to his needs.