Mrs. Jack Swarens recently received from her mother, Bessie K. Monroe, an autographed copy of “The Badge of Honor,” an anthology of verse by contemporary American poets edited and published by Poetry House of New York.
One chapter of the book is devoted to the work of Mrs. Monroe, including a brief biographical sketch and a representative selection of her poetry.
Mrs. Monroe, whose home is at Hamilton, is by vocation a journalist and has acted as editor for the Ravalli Republican, has assisted on the editorial staff of the Western News of Hamilton and is correspondent in her region for the Associated Press.
According to “The Badge of Honor”, “Mrs. Monroe was born in 1888 in Montana, was married at 19 before she completed high school and is the mother of six grown children. Having ranged the forests of Idaho and Montana with her late husband, Mrs. Monroe feels implanted in her an ineradicable love of nature, whose moods she tries to perfect in verse. She is just as closely bound, she thinks, to her newspaper job and to the community of her residence .... Her verse has appeared previously in the Daily Missoulian ...”
Mrs. Monroe has visited here a number of times with her son-in-law and daughter.
Following is a selection from the work of Mrs. Monroe: