St. Paul daily globe., 1888-06-26
PROFESSIONAL NURSES.
1t Is Business in Which Profits
Are Larger Than in Most EN-
pIOYmentS for Women

The business of the trained nurse is
not yet overdone, though the chances
are that inside of four or five years its
palmy days may be past. Some of the
pretty, white-capped creatures who
graduated in the earliest classes from
the training schools and hospitals are
capitalists in modest feminine way
now. A tall brunette, who has
been at work seven or eight years, and
whose eyes are quick and touch sooth-
ing and deft beyond description, owns
three or four desirable corner lots,
which were bought with shrewd; in
sight into the direction of the city'S
growth, and are worth pretty penny
more than she paid for them to-day. A
second nurse who has distinguished
herself beyond the average, bought
out restaurant which doeSt a
thriving trade, the profits of
which would keep her if she did
not prefer to retain the old manager. a
dapper little Frenchman,in charge, and
pursue the calling in which she has sue
ceeded. The regular rate for the sery-'
ices of trained nurse is $40 to S24 and
board per week, and the demand is
brisk enough to employ them on an aY-
erage forty-five weeks out of the year.
Unusually skilled nurses sometimes get.
$50 OF s35 per week, while undergradu-
ates in their second years training are
permitted to go out at the rate OF
S16 week. What attracts many
women to the work is the fact
that in most of the hospitals they are
paid literally for their time while learn
ing. This practice is likely to be abol-
ished before long. however, as the man
ayers regard the training sufficient
recOmpenSe for services rendered. The
course varies from two years in Bellevue
and in the Brooklyn training school to
eighteen months in other institutions.
The nurses are recruited largely from
the ranks Of those who would other
wise be millinerS or dressmakers.
though many highly educated ladies
are found among them, attracted
by the work, which seems to them eS-
pecially feminine. Some of the younger
nurses become SO much interested in
the medical end of their duties that,
after graduating, they study medicine
and become practitioners. There is one
young girl iii Bellevue now who gradu-
ated from country college and came
to New York to teach and earn money
to pay her way through medical col
lege. She found that teachers wages
made her task an impossible one, and
went to the hospital to learn a
business that would pay better and
help her at the same time a GER
tain distance OH her road. Her course
is likely to he followed by other poor
but ambitious girls. The best paying
field which has opened before intelli
gent nurses with organizing and exec
utive ability, however, has been, after
perfecting themselves, to open training
schools on their own account in locali-
ties not supplied with such schools.
There are women who have gone all
over New York state and good distances
west establishing centers from
which go out devoted nurses. This
was the plan, though not conceived
with view to the financial return,
which brought Gen. Wade Hampton's
daughter to New York to obtain the
knowledge that would fit her to start
training schools in the South. She has
made one Of the best nurses ever seen
in hospital ward. The number of
nurses is not equal to the demand yet,
| but it is increasing so fast that the pro-
fession may be overcrowded, like most
departments of woman's work.