Wauwatosa news. [volume] (Wauwatosa, Wis.) 1900-1948, 1907-09-21
The Woman Wage Garner.

The woman wage Garner is today the
nations most serious sociological prob
lem. its most insidious menace. From
tbe ranks of these women, future states
men. law makers and law breakers will
spring, and millions of future mothers
are being trained for the pitiless warfare
of wage earners rather than for the
gentler but more potent art of home
making
When the editor of The Woman $
Home Companion commissioned me to
write this series of articles, | turned first
70 a clergyman of national fame for con
6rmation or refutation of my theory that
the woman wage Garner had attained the
dignity of a sociological problem.
My dear madam" said the clergyman
blandly, Il think this bugaboo of women
il business and their influence on our
national life should be laid. Really, there
is nothing in it! The vast majority of
women continue to marry and manage
households just as their mothers did be-
fore them. The American home life
remains intact.
you have woman secretary" | sug-
gested
"Ah, yes" he replied, tapping his eye
glass on his thumb nail refiectively
But this is an exceptional case-and
very sad Daughter of an old parish
ioner who died suddenly, leaving his aft
fairs in very bad shape. This girl is
helping to support her mother and sis
ters'
And she receives the same salary as
her predecessor. a young MANI
Precisely. Why not? She is fully as
capable"
And therefore must have been trained
for her work as a stenographer What
sort of education is she giving her Sis
ters?"
He did not know. We made INQUIRIES
One is preparing to be bookkeeper The
other is already at work in a fashionable
millinery shop.
We'll, WE'LL remarked the clergyman
Il am sadly disappointed. | thought the
girls were going to college or something
of that sort
1T is an institutional church, and the
heXt question was:
Your parish visitor is a woman?'
oh certainly. A college graduate, es-
pecially trained for the work; but that is
quite different. She is deeply interested
in charities"
On salary of twelve hundred a
year?"
Well, you understand there is much
routine work, accounts, books, and all
that sort of thing. A woman must be
trained; she must have more than ordi-
nary intelligence"
In other words she must be thor
0ugh business woman as well as 3 church
member. and give her undivided attention
to her duties"
Precisely. She is an exceptional young
woman
Is she? Can it be possible that the
reverend gentleman does not know that
all over the United States, in offices,
shops and stores, are other intelligent
Young women similarly trained as de
pendable business machines? This girl
is not the exception, but the rule.
And your guild for girlsY'
tlourIshing excellently, under the di-
fecuon of one of our deaeonnesses. You
really ought to drop in some evening.
accepted the invitation-to learn that
tae guild has membership of over 100
giFis, stenographers, typewriters. book
Keepers, illustrators, saleswomen, stu
uehts of art and music. The majority
u these girls have drifted to New York
from other cities or towns in search of
work or instruction. Only a few live
life.
And yet the clergyman did not con-
Siuer that these young strangers within
us gates presented a sociological prob
ZEN worthy of the attention of the
church and state!
in Greater New York alone half a mill
non girls and women are partly or who'll
~ self supporting. Half a million wom-
gu or one-hfth the population, are I'M
Hef business and not domestic influences.
ANNA Steese Richardson in Woman's
Home Companion.