Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1888-11-21
FIELDS FOR woMAN's WORK.
What She Has Accomplished and What
She Can Do.

From the Chicago Herald.
For the unedueated and uncultivated woman
there is always work. 1t is only those who
cannot relinquish altogether the social posi-
ton, tastes and surroundings Of prosperity who
find employment hard to get In fine, il is the
woman reared as a lady who suffers from idle
ness. Both in America and Great Britain,
more women each year who are accustomed to
refined surroundings are forced out into the
busy avenues of the world to provide their own
sustenanee. There is little need for any edu-
Gated women to be long idle, or, except under
misfortune, to want for ordinary customs. II
she applies her capacities in the directions in
which her sex are best qualified to labor she
will have little trouble earning q living"
without engaging in domestic service. there
are many ways in which the educated woman
can make livelihood by domestic work. Her
superior intelligence will stand her in good
stead in this field and her productions be as
much higher in grade from the application of
her intelligence to her labor as is her mind to
that OF the ignorant woman.
In England societies have been formed for
the promotion of dressmaking, the manufac-
ture OF minor food products. horticulture,
poultry-raislng, Bookkeeping, dairy work and
many other kinds of labor for which women
are especially adapted. Under the protection
and countenance of these associations many
women of gentle birth and breeding have
entered the ranks OF associations long tabooed
as unfit for the contemplation of ladies" The
gentiewomen of the greatest republic on earth
should blush to let those of land of caste pre-
cede them in a marked democratic reform in
regard to their sex. A century ago women in
every rank of life earned money and were
proud of doing SO. Country gentlewomen,
assisted by their maids, made blankets. home
spun cloth. hose, and other things for the
market. Women of all classes found a
| domestic scope for their talent and industry
| Spinning an honorable way of making a
living in those days. Machinery took
that avocation away from women. Men,
| instead, have amassed great riches
as 'cotton-spinners" or wool spin
| ners. No one doubts that the changes in
| industries are for the benefit of the world at
large, but up TO the present stage OF develop
ment they are not directly beneficial to women
| workers. The changes in business wrought by
! advancing civilization have occasioned the
usurpation by men and machinery of occupa-
! lions wherein women were exclusively en-
| ployed in the past. Women have been forced
into new avenues OF employment. They have
| been driven into new channels by their neces-
| sites. A fallacious idea has thereby arisen
| that the women of the present day are acquir-
| Ing occupations originally intended for men
| Nothing is more absurd than to charge modern
womankind with the iniquity of crowding into
avocations for which the sex is untitled by na-
| ture. If women have become more OF less
| conspicuous in pathways once recognized as
| the distinct prerOgative of men, their own bold
! immodest pushing has not placed them there.
Instead. the alteration of social ways has de-
prived them to a certain extent of their legiti-
mate avocations and they have become ILL
paid clerks, solicitors, and have invaded the
precincts of professions for which the femin-
| Inc mental and physical composition is seldom
| fitted.
| But there is no valid reason why women
should not pursue many trades beneath their
| own home roofs and derive a fair compensation
| from the goods they might make. Cincn-
| natl woman markets the finest catsup in the
country, and has demand for all she can manu-
| facture. Homemade bread is hardly procur-
! able in Chicago. Numerous private establish
| mcnts and club houses are willing to pay good
prices for it. but it cannot be obtained. Yet
women are going up and down the length and
breadth of the city continually lamenting' that
| they can't get work.
Pickles OF fine variety, jellies. headcheese
sausage, a hundred things for tine table. can be
made at home, and there's always sale for any
thing good to eat.
The growing Of flowers is an excellent and
lucrative industry. Florists realize at least 100
| per cent OIL their sales. No healthier oceupa-
! ton for women could be devised than flower
| culture. Bookkeeping is another avocation in
| which some women have engaged with sue
! cess.
! There are any number Of domestic directions
| in which, if the educated women who have
! their hyings to earn would turn their earnest
endeGvors. they could readily reap incomes
! sufficient for all their needs.