The Newberry herald and news. (Newberry, S.C.) 1884-1903, 1889-03-21
THE WOMEN WHO WORK.
4 Picture Of Their Industrial Condition.
New York Sun. I

| IAO 4OuA Gu c"AuOdi 1cpO1G vi IllS NOlll-
missioner Of Labor, which is devoted
entirely to the condition Of working
women in the United States. The
compilation Of the statistics and infor-
nation embodieGin the volume are due
to the endeavor of two young women,
working with slight assistance from one
man, under the direction of Mr.. Carroll
D. Wright, Commissioner of Labor,
and with the purpose of presenting an
authentic picture of the industrial con-
dition Of working women of the day, to
furnish valuable addition to the his
tory of the times which should be
absolutely true, and to gather data for
it's scientific bearing upon social pro-
blems. When Mr.. Wright was in charge
of the Bureau of Statistic he conceived
the idea of making report of the
working women Of Boston with respect
to their:home as wellas shop conditions,
and to this end he had 1000 representa-
tive working women, not including the
semi-professional women, interviewed
personally. At his appointment as
Commissioner of Labor by President
Arthur he determined to extend his
investigations to other cities, and accor-
dinghy all the representative cities from
New England to the Mississippi River,
and as far south as New Orleans, as
well as the large cities on the Pacific
coast, where working women are con-
gregated in large numbers, have been
visited and the condition of their work
ing people very thoroughly looked into
and accurately reported. The gathering
of this Information required the great
est tact and sagacity, for working wo-
men are, as rule, extremely reserved,
too proud to confess their actual needs
and deprivations, suspicious of inter-
viewers, and antagonistic to anything
that suggests charitable interference,
fearful of compromising themselves,
and sometimes intimidated by employ
ers and superintendent. In spite of all
this. between ,020 and $4,000 women
have been interviewed and visited, not
only in the shops but at their homes,
and the bulk of the work has been
accomplished by the two women to
whom it was relegated.
They have together visited Boston,
Brooklyn, Buffalo, Newark. Cleveland,
Chicago, st. Paul, and st. Louis, Louis
vile, Cincinnati, Baltimore, Phiiadel-
phia, New Orleans, Atlanta, Savannah,
Charleston, New York, Indianapolis,
and Richmond, remaining from three
weeks to five months in each city,
according to the number of the working
women and the difficulty in obtaining
the desired information. They would
go into a strange city alone, pick up
such information as they could con-
corning its industries by consultation
Of the census and questioning the peo-
pie they met, and then proceed to
interview the employers, and if possible
to gain admittance to the workrooms.
This was frequently denied them, and
the addresses of the women also refused.
They would quietly visit another estab-
lishment, and sooner or later, were
sure to find some one who had worked
in the factory or shop to which they
had been refused admittance, and who
could tell them its condition, as we'll as
the addresses Of some of its employees.
Frequently, too, they found the en-
ployees and employers arrayed against
each other in most hostile relations,
and to gather the desired information
from both sides required infinite tact
and diplomacy. The days were thus
| devoted to the collecting of inforlna-
ton, the evenings to making out the
written reports of the same, and Sun
day were spent in visiting the working
people at their homes. Sometimes in
interviewing trade they would visit
every house in street, for operatives
in the same branch of labor are inclined
to group themselves in the same neigh
borhoods. Their interviews consisted in
learning the nativity, age, conjugal
relations age at which work was begun,
effect of work upon health, wages and
| hours, work previously done, if differ
ing from that engaged in at the time,
from every woman they visited. From
to 10 per cent, ofemployees in a shop
or factory were visited. When once the
working women became satisfied that
their inquiries came with kindly rather
than charitable or reformatory motives,
they walked freely and intelUgently on
the subject and allowed the figures to
be copied from their little pass books, in
which was the actual amount of wages
they received after all fines and other
expenses demanded by the employers
had been subtracted. Employers fire.
quently allowed their pay rolls to be
copied, and from the two accounts the
correct average will he made.
One of these remarkably bright and
interesting young women, who is from
the South and requests that her name
be withheld says as result of her two
years investigation:
"While I find many serious evils in
the working woman's condition. I
also find a brighter side than is por,,
larly believed to exist. Women's work
under a great disadvantage from want
of proper training. The least desirable
portions Of the work are assigned to
| them, and infinite number OF Influences