The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1900-12-13
WOMEN RAILROAD employees
MANY C1PABLE ONES IN TIE
SOUTH VEST.


make innovations tnal,CO Sdytle IeoSt
are rather startling" said an old Kan
sas City railroad man yesterday, III d
conversation with reporter
TITS only a few years since the South
ern Pacific saw the sudden collapse Of
what seemed a very promising expert
ment yet now it has another and IN
this case, too, the results so far are very
satisfactory
"Ten or a dozen years ago Old Char
lie Crocker,' as he was Familiarity called
by almost every employe of the SOUTH
ern Pacific, as a reward for partlcu-
larly daring and meritorious act, pre-
vailed on the directorate of the South
ern Pacific to educate a young girl.
She had lived almost all her life in the
mountains Of New Mexico, with almost
no associates except her father, an en-
gineer, and his fireman. She was a
railroad girl from top to toe, and her
knowledge of railroad craft enabled her
to avert what would have bee a most
frightful wreck. Her reward was an
education such as few girls in her sta
ton in life ever obtain. Everything
one Of the finest educational institu-
lions in the west could do was done for
lege term she was, at her own request,
given a postgraduate course in me-
chanical engineering. Her schooling
finished, she was given position in the
office of the superintendent OF motive
power at a nice salary which was
looked upon by the men in the offlce as
kind of pension. 1t was supposed
that she would in office parlance, hold
the chair and that her time would be
occupied by purely technical duties, but
the young woman soon proved she was
worth more than her salary. One day,
within a year of her graduation, she
submitted plans and specifications for
a new type of engine. There We're a
number of new ideas in the plans and
some decided improvements, and 1t was
just the thing the company had been
looking for Some of the best noun
tain passenger engines the Southern
Pacific ever had were built from that
set of plans.
ut was rude shock to the mascu-
line element in that office that the girl
should carry off the honors they
thought were safely their own, and
then they fell to wondering what this
phenomenal girl would do next. She
did what they all do if the right man
comes along. One day big official of
an eastern railroad came through the
office No one ever knew how it hap
pened, but the bright light Of the mo-
tive power staff snapped mechanics for
matrimony. An experiment with the
new woman was closed, and the first
lady mechanic was transformed into
1-l,, ;r,f 10 How Io,
mot until little over two years ago
did the staid old management take an
other plunge into officially unknown
waters. Then when Spanish treachery
raised the cry, Remember the Maine,
and all the patriotic instincts of the
sons of Uncle Sam were at boiling
point, o. E. Pease, the trainmaster at
Gila Bend, N. M, jumped out and put
his name on the muster roll of the First
territory cavalry Before he left he
wired his resignation and turned the
office over to his wife who, for years be-
fore her marriage, had been a telegraph
operator on the line. All her married
life she had been doing more or less of
the clerical work of the office. ella
Bend is a little place in the middle of
long division, lonesome as only coal
and water station in the Great Amerl-
can desert can be, and it was almost
impossible to keep q clerk there for any
length of time In the interval between
the departure of one clerk and the arri-
val of his successor Mrs. Pease learned
all the details of the Office work, and,
on the departure of her husband, it was
a very handy knowledge.
Just at that time the road was
rushed to it's utmost capacity by the
enormous government business it was
handling and every employee was work.
ing overtime. Mrs. Pease wired re-
peatedly that the office was without a
head, but no attention was paid to the
communications, and meantime she
handled the office like a veteran One
day the superintendent of the division
dropped into ella Bend. The acting
trainmaster was having an audience
with big engineer who had carelessly
run through an open switch. He sat,
grinning watcher, while the dainty lit
tlewoman made the engineer squirm
with her scathing comment on his neg
1ect and when she told the big fellow he
could take a thirty days vacation to
improve his eyesight the superintend-
ent was evidently satisfied that the A,
r.. M. was 'on to her job Before he
left he told her that the general mana
ger was so well suited with her conduct
of affairs that he had authorized her
permanent appointment to the office.
at was over a year after her appoint
ment that I came through GGila Bend,
and I sought the trainmaster's office. I
entered, but almost backed out again.
j thought I had got into some ones
family quarters. There was a carpet
on the floor and pretty white curtains
at the windows and everything was
suspiciously clean for a railroad office.
Before I could get out, however neat
little woman came to the railing from
behind a big desk and asked my BUSH
ness. | fuddled around like boy, but |
finally made her understand ] was
looking for the trainmaster. j hold
that position. What can / do for you?
regained my nerve and told her / was
looking for work in the train service
and pulled out bunch of letters and |
my card.
SHE looked the letters over, ana then |
said: "They are all right, but you are
too oldto enter our service as a new |
man; the age limit is thirty-five, and |
then, too see you wear glasses, You |
~ l. to,