The Palatka daily news. (Palatka, Fla.) 1884-1888, 1886-09-29
GIRLS WHO CLERK.
A COMPLAINT WHICH ONE OF THEM
MAKES TO THE PUBLIC.
How Daughters and Wives of Well to Do
Men Take the Bread From the Mouths

Men Take the Bread From the Mouths
of Those Who Must Fight Their Own
Battles.
"Say, reporter" exclaimed a clerk in one
of the State street dry goods stores, IF you
have nothing else to write about, can't You
WELD your pen in our INTEREST,""
"Why, what's the matter!"
"Well, the matter is that the girls and
women who have fathers and husbands to
take care of them, come down town and work
for wages that are fast becoming standards,
and are slowly reducing to starvation Do
you see that pretty girl over there at the lace
counter! Well, she is JeweSs, and lives out
ON Sangamon street. Her father is a well to
do travelling man, and allows her clothes and
board. She expects to he married next year,
and is only working for money to spend in
extras for her toilet. She has been here
about two years. Some time ago the head of
the department called her to the office to dis
miss her because she firted so much. She
begged to be retained, and volunteered a re-
duction OF her salary. Then she was getting
SO, and ever since the reprimand she has re
ceived but IS. The result was a lot of us
were reduced, and if she offers to work for
81, presume we viii have to stand another
cut or go somewhere else.
"The firm is one of the best in the CITY,
We have chairs to sit during dull hours,
close at $50 every day and at noon Satur-
day, and get vacation every year But the
fact remains that the rich girls, who are
lucky enough to have homes of their own.
are actually cutting the threats of girls fixed
as / am. / get 50 n week and have no help
from any source whatever Ny car fare IS
co cents week, and my board and washing
amount to 81, so you can see that am a
long time buying dress or paying for
shoes. My condition is the same as hundreds
of others, but don't see any way of improv-
ing it until better fed girls get out of the
business. The firm won't help US Why
should it, These swell clerks come around,
ask for work, willing to accept small
wages and are able to make a good appear
ancc. They wear nice clothes, look pretty
and are hired. You can't blame the heads
for taking them, because it is an advantage
TO the store to be able TO boast of stylish
help and besides they attract customers
Il have frequently read in the papers sus-
picious accounts of finely dressed dry goods
clerks, but any charges that reflect adversely
on cur regulations are false, malciously
false There are none but the most respect
able women in this store, and when critics
say that such girl cannot afford to wear
jewelry, or that another is not able to wear
silk dresses, they don't know what they are
talking about. That girl over there in the
brown dratcte could not have paid for the
goods alone i'll less tn four weeks but the
fact is she didn't buy it at all. Her father al
| lows her a certain sum every month for
| clothes and she deyotes her salary to little
things, such as handkerchiefs, hosiery Per
| fumes, fans, parasols and things like that
mercy dime box she wears in her corsage.
| She is not Obliged to work, and whenever she
| Is indispoSed or has some social engagement
she stays at home. In the very cold winter
she doesn't come down, and if she gets caught
in a storm without umbrella or gossamer
she takes cab home.
"Now, can't you write all this down in your
paper, AMI get the customers, or some of the
local clubs that are always on the lookout for
reforms, TO drive these rich girls out of the
field, or keep them from running our chances of
livelihood!' That such a state of unjust COM
petition exists is incontrovertible. People hear
daily from the rostrum terrible phillippics
against capital as applied to the oppression Of
| the poor working girls, and the advocates of
woman's rights and woman's wrongs as set
forth by the w. c. T. o., are found arrayed
against expressions, but here is state of af-
| fairs which, reduced to its simplest form, wo-
man against woman. The vain pomp and
| love of dress is alluring, one can readily
understand, but it is hard to believe that
scores and hundred of women are degrading
| labor by working for starvation wages in
order to supply themselves with the iinery
women leave good homes TO take any sort Of
respectable employment by which their love
| of dress can be gratifed- Ii the down town
| counters do not invite Them they frequent
! factories where cravats and all sorts of worst
| ed goods are made, and where they are per-
| mittcd to take home work TO be finished ut
| their leisure.
"Some of these enemies of female labor
make buttonholes in cuffs and collars, en-
| broidcr initials on shirt tags, which is con-
slant industry in itself, or darn lace when a
| finer class of needlework is unattainable. An
other source of income is found among whole
sale houses, where these foolish women arc
less conspicuous, and where they gladly &c
| Dept So and IS week for trying on cloaks,
selling buttons, keeping stock or setting
watch crystals. These same figures are Of
| fered their unfortunate rivals, who are fire.
| quently driven to despair in trying to make
it keep soul and body together. Often these
unhappy, half starved girls complain and
threaten to leave, but their employers are
not scared, knowing that, in case of strike,
he can hire scores of girls in twenty-four
| hours to take their places.-Inter-Ocean