Personality and Last Days
done or how hard the work she had accomplished she would always clear up the room for an informal party Saturday night.
"And where did all the people come from? They were judges, doctors, North American Indians, Hindu philosophers, and what not. If there was a crank in town he would find his way to Clara B. Colby's Saturday evening. She was a mixer extraordinary. At about eleven o'clock she made coffee and, crowded around a long table, we talked on till midnight."
Her benevolence was unbounded. It is related of her that at one time when she occupied a single room at the W. C. T. U. building on Sixth street she heard a rapping at the outside door in the night. She went down and found a poor homeless woman there. She took her to her own room, and kept her over night, gave her a breakfast and helped her to go on her way in the morning. And this was not a rare instance of her helpfulness. She was always on the alert to aid those in need.
During her last winter in Washington in 1916 she roomed at 304 Indiana Avenue. During that season Washington was visited with a serious epidemic of grippe. Many of the tenants in the house were seriously sick. Mrs. Colby made herself a nurse, attendant and friend to each one, visiting them all daily, and ministering to their needs until at
