The age-herald., 1900-10-07

the position is one that calls for so much patience and tact that it is only a woman who can fill it satisfactorily to the com panies.
 While this is true of the position of Cen tral," it is emphasized in the case of the telephone girl, for while the latter does not have the responsibility of keeping the telephone system in order, still 1t is gen. orally to her that the complaints first come and she then immediately communicates with Central The telephone girl must nec- essarily be alert She soon finds the ne- cessity of being patient and of not losing her temper. She has recognized the futillty of answering persons in their own coin, so to speak. She has her individual way of speaking, and she sticks to it. It is not that she has any favoriteS among the patrons of the company or that she wants to win any particular favor. She has simply made a study of her work. She Is no longer a novice. By her daily contact with people she has come to understand the world. The telephone girl is broad in her views. She has not the time for any thing but incessant work, but her work is in the nature of a school. It educates her liberaly. In a single hour she has been informed of many of the great events that are taking place in the world, while even the newspapers do not print the stories until the next day. Her work must neeeS- sarily be done conscientiously. She is re- quired to be clever, wide-awake, patient, quick and no prima donna ever relied on her voice as the important requisite to her success more than does the telephone girl It is her one vanity. She has long recog- nzed the value of gentle speech. It probably never occurs to her to speak uncivilly over tine telephone lines. This is her revenge wnen savage remarks are being addressed to her. She humiliates you by her com posture. The opportunities that come to her for studying human nature occupy but the space of a minute. The transmitter is a hashlight. The telephone girl reads you like book. The operators sit at what is known as the switch board" the lines of which extend into every portion of tht city. The telephone girls use q head phone which is confined by steel bands.
 am not going to attempt to describe 8 switch board. I recall that l hunted out several numbers with which I was most familiar and the mechanism of this won derful system was explained to me. I grasped that the hundreds of little red lights that flashed along the board signi- fled that the same number of persons wanted to talk at the same time. There was some part of the mechanism that was called Answering Jack" but it had no significance with any special reason. Along the board little visuals were blinking con- stantly, and indicated that conversations were ended. In other words these visuals that blink emphasize that such and such number was not busy"
 There was not a moment when connec- tions were not being made or when lines were not being disconnected. What num- ber," went up and down the line and back again. The rountine is bewildering. Two thousand connections were made in single hour. Twenty thousand were made in a sing.e day. Such record means remarka- ble alertness on the part of the operators.
 It calls for tireess energyI It results in tired bodies and tired brains. Twenty thousand connections for one day means practically the same number for each sue ceeding day The telephone system, per feet in it's mechanism, lessening labor, say ing time, yet demands in it's operation the touch of hundreds and thousands of level- headed, physically strong and intelligent young women. Sitting day after day at tine switch board communicating with aii classes of people, in touch with the very life of the city itself, the young woman in the telephone exchange is deserving of the greatest consideration. She has learned to be consderate and it is her right to ex- pect this quality from others The outside
 world knows of her collectively. But she is an individual, young, pretty, clever and charming.
 The telephone girl experiences in her days work annoyances that would drive