The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1915-12-18
Fair Workers Adept as Machin-
lists and Mechanics.
European Strife Threatens In
dustrial Revolution Here.
LABOR famine BRINGS CHANGE
Immigration at Low Ebb; Men
Scarce; War Orders to Go.
Cleveland, Riding Crest of
Prosperity, Likes Innovation.

CIevels nd o., Dec. $50 many
hundreds of women machinists and
mechanics have been developed in this
and other American industrial centers
since the European war doomed BUSH
ness and cut off immigration, that the
American woman's invasion of the
mechanical trades threatens to vie
with the invasion of the same field
by women in Europe
Thousands of women have been en-
ployed for years on light mechanical
tasks in this country. but skilled wo-
men mechanics manipulating giant
steel lathes. punches. drills, trimming
presses and other heavy machinery, is
believed to be an industrial innovation
in America.
This at least, is true in Cleveland,
which. with other cities, is riding the
crest of the prosperity wave started
by huge war orders from the allies.
The cause is twofold: there is a labor
shortage and women are more eff
cient in certain mechanical work.
Will They Stick?
Whether women will continue their
invasion of jobs formerly filled by men
is. many manufacturers say, one of the
big factors to be reckoned with after
the war is over.
Such Is the belief expressed by Ed
fsar +. Adams, superintendent of
Cleveland hardware manufacturing
company one of the largest of its kind
women mechanics have begun a per-
n.anent invasion of mems places in
factories.
As women and girls have suppIanted
men at typewriters, behind depart
1nent store counters and in the textile
and canning industries, so will they
take mems places at all machines
where dexterity and considerable mus
Gle is needed. Adams believes At
first these women workers will be re-
cruited mostly from those immigrant
races, whose women are accustomed
to manual labor in the fields.
Labor Shortage in Factory Town.
Due to the labor shortage here,
where 3.0OO skilled mechanics are
needed. and to the decrease in immi-
grafton, Adams declared he was en-
ploying as fast as he could find them,
women constitutionally fitted to oper-
ate machines; and that other employ
trs ere doing the same. At drilling,
punching and trimming presses.
A6ams's company now employs 100
women. They are running machines
Iof merly operated by men and doing
better work, Adams says
These women. recruited from the
ranks OF Polacks. Lithuanians, Slavs
and Hungarians. average s1.75 per day
for eight hours work. Some of them
are married, their husbands working
in other parts of the shops. Others
get married and keep on working.
Inspection of the rooms where the
women were employed showed good
light, heat and ventilation. Foremen
We're close by to adjust any machine
that might get out of order.
Comparing conditions surrounding
the women employees at the heavy
machines, with a hundred stenOgraph-
ers in a nearby office, Adams said
women trades-workers got a greater
financial return for their efforts be-
cause. unlike the stenogra pliers, they
had no social standard to maintain.
''Every employer takes away a part
of the wage he pays a stenographer,
because he requires her to dress neat
~ and properly" Adams said. I'VE
don't care how our women machin-
lists dress. However. they dress very
we'll as a class. their standard of liv-
have very respectable bank accounts.
.'Stenographers do well to keep
clear of the credit man"