The Washington herald., 1912-12-09

Awhile ago read a mans criticism OF
| woman and her work in the home. he
declared that she lacked system, that she
did things in a roundabout way, and did
not make her minutes count She lost
time by not getting her tools together
lost force by too much stepping about
and she had not yet learned how to appor-
ton her work.
II may be so; it may be so.
But don't you sometimes, very many
times, think that man is guilty Of over
systematizing his work?
Don't you always think he oversteps
the limit, when he sacrifices everything
to the saving of time?
II saves time. lots and lots OF II, in the
factory and the busy shop, when a work
er is assigned one little spiritless task
that is just an ugly part Of a beautiful
whole, and told to keep at it from morn
ing until night, year in, year out, until
he is perfectly proficient. There Is no
wasted time, no lost energy, no inef1-
cheney, all a perfected human automaton;
but the worker-what of him?
Jacob Riis tells of little boy he once
saw down in a tobacco factory in North
Carolina. He stood by a machine into
which the tobacco was poured through a
bags with which smokers are very IA
miliar. Somewhere on its way a pair of
steel fingers reached down for a revenue
stamp, placed 1t on. and then reached
down for another. 1t was all very per-
feet and a marvel of mechanical skill.
But where the bags came out little lad
was sitting. and he caught them as they
passed along and with a single twist
tied two yellow cords that closed them
= L.
Riis says, never anything else, day after
day, and year after year. And in the in
dustrial grind he became just a part Of
the machinery, with nothing TO arouse
his interest. nothing to feed his intellect,
tying knots and nothing more.
Yes, the system is all very fine, but II
is pretty hard on the boy.
And it is hard on the boys and the
girls, the men and the women, in every
place under the sun where the saving of
time and the making of money are made
supreme over human lives.
This craze for the saving of time does
not always stop with the shops. and the
factories. 1t goes into places where
workers are supposed to use their minds
rather more than their hands, and the
systematizing process gets in its un-
wholesome touch to such an extent that
the same grinding process is in evidence
there too, the same spiritless work.
1t is true that one person can accom-
plsh more work by specializing, as they
caH it, than by being assigned one COM
plete thing and being made responsible
for it from start to finish. And maybe
that single task is done better for the
constant repetition, but somehow when
the single tasks of the different workers
are all pieced together, there is not
perfect whole. The tasks as tasks are
we'll done, but the spirit is missing, and
some time the Specializing" enthusiasts
will realize that there is something more
important than mere speed.
In a large and very busy Office where
many men and women are employed, one
'oung woman was set the task of fold |
ng circulars not so long ago. She folded |
hem well and she folded them nimbly |
rom o'clock until and she folded |
hem for many days. But the supervisor |
u the work seemed to think there were |
more that she might fold. and when he !