The Birmingham age-herald., 1917-07-15
SEWING GIRLS OF PARIS CONDUCT
 STRIKE IN NEW WAY
The Midinettes Show That Bludgeons Are Not Only Weapons to Win Labor
 Contentious

Paris, June 20-( -(Correspondence.)- .)-The
 sewing girls of Paris have set a new fashion in the conduct of strikes and added dignity to nickname that had be-
 come more or less familiar. They have shown that hob-nailed boots and bud geons are not the only effective means
 of persuasion in labor contentious.
 The "midinette'' strike is already a
 precedent though it ended only recently. Several other strikes modelled after 1t have succeeded since and others are in process of settlement. Never again, in all probability, will the condition of working women in Paris be what 1t was before and what it had been during the
 war, with thousands of girls working
 10 hours a day for from 30 to 40 cents. The strike was called the midinette" strike, though in the beginning it was purely dressmakers' strike. The midi
 nettes' are not only sewing girls, but milliners, feather workers, embroiderers, and other workers who trip out into the Rue de la Paix, Avenue de IOpera, and other streets of Paris every noon from the hundreds of houses whose business is to clothe women elegantly and luxuri- ousy.
 
 midi or noon is the hour when they to be seen by twos, threes and even :, fours, arm in arm, hurrying away to cIeameries, lunch counters or cheap res taurants for a modest meal or, weather permitting, to the public squares and gardens to share lunch on park bench and feed crumbs to the sparrows. The second syllable nette, is nothing more than a diminiutive that fits them quite well. The combination, s'midinette" might be translated little noon girl" The buildings from which these noon girls come are the centers of fashion for the world. In these buildings are created each season the styles that are worn in New York and London-even Berlin. They are generally vast and al- ways sumptuous with majestic liveried porters at the doors and smartly dressed footmen inside.
 Elegantly dressed saleswomen re- ceive customers in showrooms that re- semble fashionable salons, with deep soft carpets, antique furniture, prince l ly tapestries and rare objects of art. Everything in these rooms and in the | fitting rooms suggests high prices, | yet on the other side of the partI- tions that divide the show and fitting rooms from the work shop there were, 1 before the strike. girls working 10 hours to earn the equivalent of 30 l cents.
 Although thousands of these girls were working for a bare existence in
 these palaces of fashion, yet to their I inborn taste and skill were due the l development of those houses and the I reputation of Paris as the center of 1 fashion. The proof of it is that dress making concerns with a Parisian rep
 utation have tried to do elsewhere and
 with other help what they did in Paris l with the aid of the 'midinettes," and 1 failed
 A great many American women have l paid hundreds of dollars for dresses made in these establishments, but the | American woman does not suspect that 1 the ''midinette" who made her rich l gown for a little less than living I wages has made one like it for her
 self at night of the same pattern and l quite as perfect in cut and fit, but
 of less rich material bought with I money saved from her lunch allow
 ance. Few look forward to an inn l provement in their situation unless | fortune sends a husband.
 l If the husband never is found she makes fun even out of that. At the
 fete of Saint Catherine on November | 25 each year, "midinettes" who have reached their twenty fifth year and l pass into the category of "old maids" | eti v ACeSu pJ eAAcii SOiAil 1oSo nHu SOIlC- l times by their employers. It is one of l the merriest fetes of the year in Paris ', The milliners of Paris, benefiting I from the success of the sewing girls
 strike. gained their point in less than I half the time. The "trimmers," the best paid employees in this trade, earned before the strike SIS a month in the retail trade. Hereafter they will re- | ceive about s6 a month more.
 1 The victims of 'ssweatshops" also l benefit from the new schedule