Barbour County index. [volume] (Medicine Lodge, Kan.) 1880-current, 1889-08-14
TooL-cHEsTs FOR GIRLS.
Let Them Have an Opportunitv to Ds
veIou Machanicnl f,aniua

Let Them Have an Opportunity to De-
vel0p Mechanical Genius.
Parents do not object to see saw and
hammer, gimlet and screw-driyef in their
sons hands at very tender age. They
look, says Wide Awake, upon tools as Q
boys birth-right But little girl is
hurriedly told in a Mortified tone to 'sput
them down, /" ''to not touch, % that she viii
cut herself or pound her fingers and ssget
hurt" generally
But the time is not far of when there will
be room IN the house set apart for their
workbench, and that bench and its tools will
be as free TO the daughters as the sons. In
their fashionable brass-hammering and
Wood-carving the girls have ssgot taste''
OF it. We may expect to yet see the carpen-
ter come tn give lessons as regularly as the
music teacher. Why notl That eight chill
dren out of ten would like 1t better there is
no doubt.
A dozen years hence certain branches of
many trades will be largely occupied by
women We shall see young women at
study and work in architects offices, in the
wallpaper designing rooms, mixing paints
and stains and finishes and freseo washes
We shall see the student at the Harvard
Annex emerge from her long companion
ship with the "higher Mathematics with
the 'plans and elevations" of house in
one hand and a ''bill of lumber" in the other
as "applied mathematics" At present the
training, in geometry, say, Is so unapplied
that the "sweet girl graduate' lays the tea
table with the cloth awry and the plates at
all angles and distances, and is serenely un-
aware that she has hung her water-color
craving crooked until some distressed oc-
cupant Of the room points it out.
The modern female hand and eye are so
far unframed that not one young woman in
i've can take shears and cut across q breadth
of goods unless she fold and crease the
cloth or ''slowly cut by thread"
For myself, have saved many q dollar
first and last by being "handy with tools /"
When was little girl and held a mortal
objection to allowing my older brother any
accomplishments which / had not, con-
ceived the brilliant idea, one summers
rainy day, Of making myself churn, which
was to be an exact reproduction in miniature
Of an old-fashioned instrument that my
grandmother used and called an ''up-and-
down. churn.
A gentleman called at our house and
found me under the shed diligently boring
hole into round piece of wood. Wishing
to make himself agreeable to me, suppose,
he inquired what was making. / replied
in the most matter-of-fact way, as if it were
the most common matter in the world for
seyen-year-old girls to manufacture house.
hold tools, ga churn," and great was my in
dignation when he went away laughing as
If he had heard the greatest joke in the
world. After that never met him, even after
/ had grown to the dignity of young lady
hood and trained gowns, but what he in
quired with most aggravating interest if
my churn was done.
1t never was, am bound to say; but I
learned my lesson just the same, and when
ever want nail driven in, shelf put up
or window-shade adjusted, do not wait
for carpenter. Instead, thank my stars
that ever practiced on churns and wooden
sewing machines; and if it were necessary
/ think could-with all the confidence
once began my churn-build house after q
fashion.