St. Paul daily globe., 1888-05-13
Women Printers Who Can
Make as Good Wages as
Can the Men.
Eva Gay Aseertains 1t Is the
Union Organization Which
Does It.
Some Of the Difficulties and
Drawbacks a Girl Eneoun-
ters in Learning.
Peeuliarities of the Various
Offices as Seen Through
the Glass of a Girl.

Having often heard comp laintS from
writers about the intelligent (?) typo,
the laundering compositor and the like
remarks. seeming to indicate that COM
positors were below the average in in
telligence and ability, asked the rea-
son of this from girl compositor. To
my surprise she became quite indignant,
saying: "You don't know anything
about the business; if you did you'd
not make any such foolish remarks"
ventured to remind her that hadn't
any fault to find with compositors, but
had always heard people who were sup
posed to know about the matter making
such complaints and supposed there
must be reason for them.
"Yes, there is reason for their COM
plants, but not the one that you usually
hear" she replied.
"What's the real reason?"
''YOu just come down to the Office
where work and I'll give you prac-
tical lesson in typesetting, then you can
decide for yourself"
wasn't very busy and am always
ready to learn, so quickly accepted her
invitation for the next afternoon.
You want to bring big apron along
and pair of Spectacles, unless your
eyesight is pretty good" she laughingly
remarked as we parted.
LEARNING TO SET TYPE.
Next day promptly at o'clock l was
on hand with the apron, but didn't
think | needed the glasses.
My first mistake was to blunder into
the business Office and be promptly told
that the composing room was on the
next floor, in the rear of the building. l
found it after while, and my friend
was waiting for me.
L looked around the composing room;
it was dirty and there was an oppreS-
sive odor of lead, printers ink and ben
zine, but, as l afterwords found, these
are the leading characteristics of all
printing Offices. Along the wall were
racks, into which were fitted cases con-
tanning type. The compositOrs stood or
sat at these cases, and seemed very busy.
Where the racks were near the windows
they worked by daylight, farther away
they worked by gaslight.
My friend introduced me to the fore
man, saying: Here's girl who wants
to learn typesetting."
''All right! give her rule and stick"
there is a case over in the corner she
can have"
My friend, whom will call Amanda,
found the case for me, lighted the gas,
and said: Now I'll teach you the
boxes"
l found that what she called the
"cap" case contained the capital let
ters; they were arranged in little boxes
in nearly their regular order, but the
lower case, which contained the small
letters and punctuation marks, was
source of wonder and mystery to me.
"YOu see," explained Amanda, "the
letters that are most used are closest to
your hand and in the largest boxes" I
didn't see at all, but l didn't say so.
LEARNING THE BOXES.
s'Now, I'll tell you where to find the
different boxes and you can learn it III
about ten minutes if you pay atten-
tion," said she.
l did pay the best of attention, but
couldn't remember. For instance. it
did seem so strange to me that the Y, d
and W boxes should be side by side
when they weren't that way in the al
phabet. Amanda left me to learn the
case, and went back to her work. After
about fifteen minutes she came back
saying: Now, Eva, if you know where
to find the different letters, rll put you
to work."
'But l don't know where to find half
of them," objected.
"Well, you're rather stupid" was her
1cply. Ii HldTk UIle
boxes with chalk; then maybeuyou can
find letter when you see it written
over box"
thought that quite sensible ar
rangement, and didn't mind the smiles
and sarcastic remarks of the other
printers bit.
Amanda gave me a little box with a
handle on it, which she called ''stick,"
to hold in my left hand, and also thin
piece of steel which she called ''rule,"
and said it was to make the type slip
into place easier.
when do 1 begin to set type?" 1
asked impatiently.
"You can begin to learn right now"
she said.
Then she gave me lot of directions
about setting the type right side up,
how to put the spaces between words
and where the punctuation marks come
in" Don't tell me any more just now,"
l said, "Wait till learn this.''
She looked rather cOntemptuously at
| me and said, ''Why, what Pm telling
you is only the beginning; the devil
who doesn't pretend to set type at ali,
knows more than that"
| humbly reflected on my ignorance
and requested some ''copy'' to work on.
Amanda brought me little paragraph
| of about fifteen lines, clipped from some
other paper.
SOME GOOD COPY.
'Now, this is spelled and punctuated
all right" she said, ''all you have to do
is to set it exactly as it is in.the copy"
Now, was Just waiting to show her
how we'll l could spell and punctuate,
and here she was taking away all
chance to show my ability in that direc-
ton. However," thought l, 'I'll set
this up real quick and then ask her for
some writing like she is working on.''
| went bravely to work, but somehow
that type wouldn't go right, it fell down,
stood on it's head, was upside down, in
fact seemed to have an impish propen-
sity to go wrong in spite of my determina-
tion to set it correctly. Oh! the trials or
that afternoon! When l tried to space
out line it would fall to pieces: if |
worked busily and got line or two to
stand up straight, l would be sure to
discover that | had left out two or three
words, and there was all my work
to be done over again. The gas light
made my eyes ache, the sharp edges of
the type took the skin off my fingers, my
shoulders were as stiff as if I'd had the
rheumatism for about ten years. AT
last finished those fifteen lines, and
behold, it was 5 o'clock. l hadn't
thought it would take ME so long.
amanda" said |, this is finished /:
what will do with it?''
'.Read it and see how many mistakes
YOU made.''