Evening capital journal. (Salem, Or.) 1888-1893, 1890-02-24
TooL-cHEsrs FOR GIRLS.
Let Them Have an Opportunity to De-
velop Mechanical (sen ma


PARENTS do not object TO see saw and
manner, gimlet and screw-driver 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 tore TO .uut
tnem down, "to not touch,n that she will
cut herself or pound her fingers and "get
hurt' generally.
But the time is not far off 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 ''got taste''
OF 1t. We may expect to yet see the carpen-
ter come to give lessons as regularly as the
music teacher. Why notl That eight chill.
dren out OF ten would like it 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 fresco 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 a 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 uu-
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 eve are so
far unframed that not one young woman in
five can take shears and cut across breadth
OF goods unless she fold and crease the
cloth or ''slowly cut by a thread"
For myself, have saved many dollar
first and last by being "handy with tools. Z"
When l was little girl and held mortal
objection to allowing my older brother any
accomplishments which had not, l 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, 1 suppose,
ne inquired what was making / replied
in the most matter-of- fact way, as if it were
the most common matter in the world for
seven-year-old girls to manufacture house
hold tools, "a churn," and great was my in
dignation when he went away laughing as
if he had heard the greatest joke in the
world. Afterthat never met him, even aftel
| had grown to the dignity of young lady
hood and trained gowns, but what he in.
quired with most aggravating interest il
my churn was done.
1t never was. am bound to say; but ]
learned my lesson just the same, and when.
ever want nail driven in, shelf put III
or window-shade adjusted, do not wal
for carpenter. Instead, thank my star,
that ever practiced on churns and woodet
ing-machrnes; and if it were necessar,
think L could-with all the confidence
once began my churn-build house after
fashion,