Freeland tribune. (Freeland, Pa.) 1888-1921, 1903-05-13
WOMEN IN THE POSTAL SERVICE.


w Oulen pay Il luOSl p'it
in the administration of the affairs
of Uncle Sans greatest business en-
| terprise. In no other field of Govern
| mental activity nor in no private in
| dustry are there employed anything
| like so many members of the fair
| sex as now help to conduct the United
| States Post Office Department. The
women engaged in the great public
| communicative system and those who
| are dependent upon them for support
would form good-sized city. More
over, no other sphere open to feminine
| workers embraces so completely every
| portion of the domain beneath the
Stars and Stripes. There are hundreds
| of women employed in the immense
building at the National Capital, which
constitutes the headquarters of the
postal system, but they have co-work-
ers in almost every town and village
| and hamlet in the land and within
| the past few months the field of op-
erations has been broadened and post.
women are now penetrating the rural
districts, carrying letters and papers
and parcels to country residents pre-
viously so isolated as to have been
practically beyond the reach Of mail
| privileges.
Some of the highest salaried women
employed in the. world, are in the ser
vice of the Post Office Department at
Washington. More than a third of
these women are past middle life and
fully one-fourth OF them are over
| &o;I -;x
| and a half hours each day in the struc-
ture which forms the heart of the
| postal system, are number of women
each over seventy years of age, who
receive salaries ranging from 5000 to
| $1,000 a year. Included in this army
| of women, however, are some of the
most skilled workers of either sex to
be found anywhere in the world-the
famous "blind readers" of the Dead
Letter Office.
The experts at the Dead Letter Of
flee at Washington-and they are al
most without exception women-per-
form some of the most difficult and
most interesting tasks in the whole
range of human endeavor. 1t is their
duty to take charge of the six million
pieces of mail matter which every
| year go astray because improperly di-
rected, or for some other similar rea-
son. and see that these waits OF the
mail bags get to their proper destina-
ton, or, if that be impracticable, to
return them if possible TO the senders.
| To decipher addresses that would be
absolutely unintelligible to the average
person and supply deficiencies where
insufficient or wholly erroneous ad-
dresses are given, requires talent OF
the highest order, combined with ey-
perience, and some of the women who
are employed in this wonderful identi-
fcation bureau are as nearly indis-
pensable as it is possible for any
worke to be in this world.
The principal expert in deciphering
tangled chirography and putting mis-
directed letters on the right track is
Mrs. Patti Lyle Collins, of Mississippi,
and she has as first assistant Miss Caro-
line Childs. So great is the skill of
these two women that they handle all
the particularly difficult specimens.
Naturally, in view of the great guam
tity of stray pieces of mail which
come to them they cannot do more
than glance at each address and if its
Interpretation does not suggest itself
promptly, the waif is put aside for in
vestigation at leisure. All the women
engaged in this line of work must of
necessity possess some knowledge Of
almost all language, for foreigners
very frequently embody fragments OF
their own languages in the addresses
of their letters, and the familiarity
with geography, which is essential.
would astound by its scope any student
or traveller.
| In Washington are over twelve
dred women who, although they are
not on the payroll of the Post Office
Department, in reality spend consid'
cradle portion of their time in the
service of the postal system. These
are the feminine employees of the
Bureau of Printing and Engraving
who print and gum the millions of
postage stamps used in the United
States every year. All the United
States postage stamps printed each
year would if placed end to end, en-,
circle the globe nearly four times, ana
the major part of the work of prepar-
ing these miles of postage stamps for
use is entrusted to women.
The stamps are printed in sheets of
four hundred, and although the opera
ton of the hand presses on which the
printing is done is performed by men,
each pressman has feminine assist
ant who lifts the printed sheet from
the press and replaces it with a blank
sheet Of paper. Here another class Of
skilled feminine workers are employed
the women whose task it is to detect
flaws in the newly printed sheets of
stamps. These operatives turn the
sheets of stamps, as one would the
leaves of a book, almost more rapidly
than the unframed can follow, yet tho
smallest speck in this mass of futter
ing leaves would be instantly detected
nnI 4bn fo,,Itr shoot of c+o n,,1r will,