The Appeal. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn. ;) 1889-19??, 1912-01-20

othef one OF a dozen tasks common to every
munty in this busy age. On the other hand,
however, Uncle Sam has on his payroll number
of women who have odd duties. Some of the
tasks, indeed, novel, that Uncle Sam had
to train his workers for their performance
and there are, scattered here and there in the
ranks of the army of feminine workers. women
experts or specialists who have absolutely unique
Observation-Disclosures of their crafts who have no
rivals anywhere in the world.
For instance there is woman in the employ
OF the department Of state who stands preemi-
nent as a manuscript DOCTOR manuscript
surgeon Never heard of such a thing did you?
Well, 1t is a very important line of work for all
that there is not wide market for her services
and it is form of endeavor that is almost inva
liable to Uncle Sam, who likes to preserve intact
all the historical manuscripts and documents
which have had bearing upon the history of
our nation Before the government had recourse
to the services Of this "restorer" many of the
most valuable documents CREATES, presidential
proclamatons, etc. were fast going to ruin Age
handling and frequent foldings that broke the
paper had, indeed. already played havoc with
many precious relic. After this ingenious WON
an took hold she accomplished wonders in mend
Ing the ravages of time. She patched and pasted
and smoothed out wrinkles and the result is that
many Of these treasured mementoes are to all
appearances. literally good as new.
very interesting line of work in which Uncle
Sam has recruited corps of especially adept
nary practice most bookbinding nowadays is done
by machinery. That is the way it is done at
the government printing office where there is
maintained one of the biggest bookbinding plants
IN the country. However, the government has
some books that it desires to have bound with
the costliest materials and with greater care
than can be bestowed upon the machine-made
product. This hand-Work is performed for the
most part by women and some of the morocco
bound volumes which they have turned out in
recent years would arouse all sorts of enthusiasm
were they to be exhibited at any of those expo
sitions of women's handicraft which are held
from time to time.
The whole process of making Uncle Sans pa
per money and postage stamps is full of odd
tasks and many of them performed by wom-
en-. The women-hundreds of them-assist in
printing the precious product and they have an
ideal field in which to develop their superior
deftness of lingering in the counting and recount
Ing OF the money in the making The newly
printed currency is counted no less than half a
hundred times ere Uncle Sam sends 1t out to the
people, and women do most of this enumeration.
They also examine the sheets of money and
stamps for the tiny defects of printing, and this
requires keenness of vision almost unbelievable
in its accuracy.
When the soied currency tattered and torn,
is sent back to Uncle Sam as unfit for further
usefulness, it Is other women at the treasury
department who have to count it and check up
the returns Connected with this oface-the re-
dempton division, are a few women whose work
Is perhaps the most miraculous of all the won
der-tasks performed by the women at Washing
ton Their forte is to identify the denomination
OF partially destroyed bills which no ordinary
individual would regard as anything more than
waste paper Currency that has been chewed
by dogs, notes that have been torn into bits and
even charred paper money that has been all but
consumed by the flames is taken in hand by these
wizards and In ninety-nine cases out of hun
dred they manage to ascertain the denomination
of the damaged bit of pulp or paper and Uncle
Sam reimburses the unfortunate owner
In line with the detective work Of these monev
sleuths is the intuition (you cannot call It any