Barton County democrat. [volume] (Great Bend, Kan.) 1885-1915, 1888-06-28

from good families. Many of them
are the widows of noted men, and some
OF our greatest statesmen have married
department clerks. Acknowledgement
Brewster's wife was the daughter of a
Secretary of the Treasury and he
married her from the departments.
Stephen A. Douglas married depart
ment clerk, and know daughters of
Governors and Generals employed in
the departments. Many of the ladies
of the departments go into the best
society of Washington. and there are
descendants of Jefferson and Tyler at
work in the departments here.
The sexes are mixed together in the
Government work, and the desks of
the ladies stand side by side with those
lady clerks are fine looking, and there
is one gray-haired lady of the Treasury
whose husband was Lieutenant-Gov-
ernor of Ohio, and the daughter of
Minister to Mexico works within the
same walls. There is a ine-looking
old lady in the Pension Office who
boasts of being a great-grandmother
and who was the first woman clerk
ever elected by Legislature in this
country.
The lady clerks of Washington dress
well. AS rule they keep themselves
posted on topics of general interest,
and they are good takers. Many of
them are employed in the Post-Office
Department, and they do the most of
the Dead-Letter Office business. Every
year about 100000 letters come to
the Dead-Letter Office. The ladies
look over these letters, decipher their
contents, and send them where they
should go. One set opens the letters,
another set reads and sorts them, and
another examines and redirects them
to their proper places. Every year
there is from $50, 900 to $40, 900 in these
letters, and year ago the letters which
came to the Dead-Letter Office con-
tanned drafts and money orders to the
amount of $1,500,000. Eighty-four
thousand letters contained postage
stamps and $4,000 contained articles
of merchandise. There are on the
average about $1,000 letters a day
which come into this Office, and the
women handle the most of this i'm
mense mail. They don't have time to
waste over the love letters, and the
sad stories they hear they are bound
not to reveal. It is in this office that
a woman must know how to keep a Sc
cret.
AS an instance of the pay of men
and women in the Government depart
ments, it was shown not long ago that
the men in the Dead-Letter Office re-
ceived on the average 81 day more
than the women, and this notwith-
standing the fact that the women did
the most of the work.
The women in the Government Print
ing Office and in the Bureau of En-
craving and Printing do all kinds of
work, dirty as well as clean. They
help manage the presses, their sleeves
are rolled up high above the elbows,
and their plump, round arms receive
many an ink spot during the day.
There are between 400 and 500 of them
in the Bureau of Engraving and Print
ing, and they do work behind parti-
ton of iron network, and every piece
of paper and every bill is counted.
Many of them clean off the presses or
push the sheets tG the printer, and
there is no better place in the United
States where one can study the beauti-
full anatomy of woman's arm than
here. 1t is the same in the Govern
ment Printing Office, where they feed
the presses, attend to binding ma
chimes, and do all kinds of work that
Il nd ic hof
in not few of these branches colored
women work side by side with white
women without clashing. The Gov
eminent Printing Office employs over
1000 women, and the printers among
these are paid by the hour, and some
of the women printers make as high
as $40 month.
There are over 100 pretty seed-send-
ers here, and these put up the seeds
for the Agricultural Department. They
make seed-bags, keep account of the
seeds which each Congressman gets,
and see that they go properly out.
There are some women telegraph OPP
orators in the departments and there
are some who do map draughting and
tracing. The male clerks of the de-
partment do all kinds of work. The
Government has salaried carpenters,
chemists, scientists, lawyers and ex-
perts of every kind. The army of pri-
vate secretaries and stenographers is
numbered by hundreds and the private
secretaries of chiefs get 81 800 year
and upward. Now every bureau has
its stenographer and the click of the
typewriter is heard in every room.
How do these clerks live?
Much like other salaried people the
world over. Some of the men and a
few of the women have saved money
and bought property in Washington,
some own houses, and some rent
houses. The majority, however, live
in nd A Of