The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1902-10-05
IN
REAL LIFE :
The Story
Of Six Young
Jewesses

I TO write down in Russian in q book the
experiences I had during the day. my
struggles and the SnUbs and rebuffs. II
was heartbreaking. that search for
work Ny journal would make a book
so big" said Miss Serber. holding her
fingers several inches apart
When ct length she did get paying
employment. still in the old necktie line.
she received as her first weeks wages
S1-25. But she was very quick 10 pick
up knowledge and rapid and skillful in
using her fingers, and by that time she
could speak little English. The truth
is that during ali these weeks OF stair
climbing and heart aching and waiting
she had been steadily and regularly at
tending night school 10 learn the Ian
guage-
l soon learned TO finish off the neck
ties, and this part of the work was Civ
en- 10 me. AT first received 5 cents a
dozen for the ties. but I worked very
fast and turned out thirty dozen a dav.
Then the mistress said was making
too much money. and she would cut
me down to 3 cents a dozen
theresa. the second sister, had even
drearier experience and even less
luck" though after a time those
dauntless girls succeeded in lettering
the family fortunes A third sister he
gan her career of work in an artificial
flower establishment. Most interesting
Of all 1t is TO note how the spirit of
hope and ambition that was in them
kept driving them up step by step 10 a
better social plane.
1 was not happy among the people 7
was thrown with" continued Miss Ser
Der. I did not belong there
Inc nrst step out of il for the sisters
came when a friend taught the in
domitable Alice to make infants cIoaks
better class Of sewing people was
employed on these. and the paw was
better. The girl was now able to earn
from SO to So week. Yet there was
the everlasting but" She had to work
all day long in a dark room nv pas
light. which presently began to tell on
her eyes Nevertheless all this time She
went to an evening school. She took a
first university course while vet she
was making neckties for hei living and
none Of her classmates SUSPECTED tba
capable student was a factor. sewing
girl.
Al length in the cloakshop the ambi-
tious girl felt her wings grown strong
She spread them and sailed out of fac
tory life forever. She now understood
the infants cloak making industrv
thoroughly. She herself went 10 the
manufacturers and took contracts for
work. She and Theresa sewed at home
all day. When Elizabeth. Eugene. So
phia and Rebecca, the sisters who were
still in school because they were too
young to work. came home in the after
noon, they took their places in the sew
ing room and helped the elder sisters as
they could. The result was that these
girls had from the childrens cloak
making industry an income Of S35 to $40
a week. II sounds like a made up sto-
~, but it is not.
Next Alice resolved that she would
be numbered among American women
lawyers. She continued on. making Z
cloaks. studying law. She was gradu-
ated in 1897, was shortly afterward ad-
mitted 10 the bar and opened her office /
for practice in 1898. Beginning without 4
a cent of money or knowledge of anv
trade, without understanding a word of Z
English, without any friends outside of .
her own family. who were poor and as
ignorant of the ways Of our world as
she was. this undaunted girl in eight
years from the time she landed here
from Russia found herself a rising
young American lawyer. She is in gen
eral practice, but has numerous crimi- .
nal cases, in which she is eminentIy
successful. She frequently pleads in
court before judge and jury. 1t made !