Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1910-07-10


the last five years has had an imposing place
on the avenue, where during the busy season
she employs sometimes as many as thirty
workwomen. Each year now she goes
abroad to get in touch with Paris styles. We
live in an apartment that costs as much
year as | used to earn, and both our children
are abroad being educated at European
boarding schools which are attended by the
children of those great folk whose names we
used to know only through the Sunday
newspapers.
And l. / am still bookkeeper, a middle
aged unsuccessful bookkeeper, sometimes
employed, more often not! The last place |
held, during the illness of its regular incum-
bent, lasted three months; but 1T paid me
only eighteen dollars week, and that en-
ployment ended over month ago. Yet l
live in outward physical comfort, with three
excellent meals day, pensioner OF my Sue
cessful business wife, paying my own per
sonal expenses when | can-letting my wife
pay them when | cannot.
7 OOKING at the situation from the broad
- point of view, considering not only my
own condition but that of the many thou
sands of Business Women's Husbands, am
| forced to the conclusion that modern bust
ness conditions offer better opportunity for
wOman's success than for mans. The inva-
sion of the trust in all lines of mems occupa-
| tions has made the man employee a mere
machine, has eliminated the human relation
between employer and employee, has greatly
reduced the opportunities for man without
capital to advance and become independent.
| On the other hand, the increase in the num-
| Der of wage earning women has given women
more money to spend for themselves and on
| themselves than they ever had before.
The result &c that vast number of small
| businesses that cater to feminine needs and
| fancies have sprung up. There are along the
principal avenues of all the big cities now
| hat shops, tea rooms, art stores, Jewelry
shops, candy stores, gown establishments,
| linen shops, and score of other varieties, all
run by women and catering to women. AS
| yet no master of finance has undertaken to
combine them. 1t is open competition,
where any smart, industrious woman, how
ever limited her capital, can have fair pros
pect of success. Perhaps it will always be
so; for doubt if ever the masculine minds
| that invent trusts can grasp the matter Of
| supplying the feminine caprice as well as
women can.
| The effect of this development of business
on domestic life to my mind is certain to be
deplorable. l know that it has been in my
own case In the earlier days of my married
life, while was still the business head of the
| family, my wife took an interest, or at least
seemed to take an interest, in my business
affairs, in the little matters of Office gossip
such as every man carries to his home. We
seemed then to have many ideas and pleas
ures in common. 1t is not SO nowadays. l
confess that have no interest, and am not
even able to simulate interest. in my wife's
millinery shop. She has long ceased to at
tempt to discuss her affairs with me. Natu-
rally her business takes up so much of her
time that she has little leisure or desire to
read the books that in years gone by were
an important part of our amusement.
| Whatever sentiment there was in our rela
tons has long since vanished. | cannot help
but feel that she, glorying in her own success,
must despise me as a failure, though be-
leve she tries hard not to show it. On the
other hand, know that her contact with the
world has taken from her much of the femi
nine charm of manner that first attracted
me to her. We spend as few of our evenings
together as we can. She goes often to the
theater, sometimes with party of other
business women, sometimes with couples she
has met in business or on steamers in her an
nual trips abroad. Frequently friends come
in in the evening-my wife's friends; for
have few of my own. Failure makes few
friendships. Those evenings | generally
~, nv, ROOM, raoJ;pu