The St. Mary banner. (Franklin, Parish of St. Mary, La.) 1889-1931, 1908-04-18

Intelligent women. Only a few IN
the business. No capital required.
The above may sound like get
rich-quick scheme, but it isn't; it is
a genuine proposition, with all sorts
of possibilities. Searching out data
for clubwomen who have neither the
facilities nor the time to do the work
themselves is the idea in nutshell.
New York City. with its unexcelled
advantages, is the place to do the
work, and the entire country is the
field from which patrons may be
drawn. No other work in which
women mo engage offers greater
possibilities-to the right women
and no other work is pleasanter or
more remnnerative.
Naturally, this work is for women
who live in the smaller cities and viii
lagos, where there are few or no IL
braries. For them the writing of
club paper is a momentous affair.
Old encyclopedias are pored over,
private libraries are ransacked and
every one of the inadequate and
available sources of information is
drawn upon. The days of the woman
who has been selected to enlighten
her sister members of the club or
society are filled with anxiety and
the nights with torment.
Even in cities where there are ex-
cellent Libraries ready to give up
their store of information, few wom-
en- know how to get at the material
for which they are searching. Usu-
ally the woman who is planning to
write a paper puts it off until about
a week before the date set for the
meeting Then she goes to the
library, finds a book on her subject
and reads for several days. This
leaves her only time for the one
book, however, and therefore she is
prepared to quote from only one
authority. She writes and rewrites
until she is often too nervous when
the day arrives even to attend the
meeting at which she had planned
to be one of the enlightening perfor-
mers. That woman is not so anxious
to get on the program again.
In New York City there are thirty
eight free circulating libraries and
two great reference libraries, all of
which are packed from floor to CELL
ing with Information waiting for the
intelligent and trained searcher.
There is no subject which cannot be
run down and buried in facts.
The woman who goes into this
data collecting business, however.
must become familiar with the vari-
Gus libraries. Some of them special
ize, and she will save precious time
by learning at the outset of her
career where the most may be found
on certain subjects. If she should
begin a search for music. for in
stance, she would find at the Lenox
Library the finest collection of music
and the literature of music in this
Here, also. is the headquar-
tiers for country, town and family
affording a rich field for
women in the work of looking up
data.
AT the AStOr LIBRARY Is the largest
of files of magazines. dating
back in many instances to the first
issue. These are the most fertile of
all fields for the club woman's data.
Here she can find the meat of the
subject without wading through hum
dreds of pages of irrelevant matter.
With the aid OF Poo:e's Index to peri
odicals and the cumulative index to
the same a great storehouse Of knowl-
edge is opened.
A feature worth remembering in
this connection is the fact that at the
Aston Library is a great collection |
Of programs of women's club meet |
ings sent there from all parts of the
country. Browning clubs, musical
societies, mothers clubs, coc.;ng