The Richmond palladium and sun-telegram., 1919-09-11
True Stories of Successful Women
BY Edith Moriarty

of the lightest, frothiest. most roman
tic Of summer novels instead OF the
subject of business life story.
She is living illustration OF the
piquant little blue-eyed, blond-haired
bit OF femininity who meets the hero
in the first chapter Of any best seller
and marries in the last, And being only
twenty-four she may yet be copy for
the love-story writer.
1t is not the success of Peggy which
Is surprising her friends, for any girl
who could complete the chemistry
course at Cornell in the required time
would surely never be a failure. but
it is the kind Of work that Peggy
chose which makes them turn to one
another and say, Peggy Risdon, of all
people"
When Peggy finished high school
she prepared for college because it
seemed to be the thing to do. That Is,
most of her friends were going and
then her parents had always talked
about her college life in such a way
that it never occurred to her that any
one did anything else after leaving
high school except attend some sort
of university.
In her characteristic manner she
spent far more time planning the
| wardrobe for her first year and choos-
ing stationery and room furnishings
than she did in picking the college
and selecting her courses.
Danced Through School.
Why she took chemistry that first
year Is somewhat of a problem and
when asked about it she puckered up
| her brow and said that she thought
| it must have been compulsory the first
year. 1t seemed to be the one sub
ject which she liked and after the first
year she specialized in it, not because
she wanted to be a chemist, but be-
cause it was the only subject which
| she really enjoyed.
She was far from the leading light
| in any of her classes, but when 1t
came to a dance, a spread, a play or
social gathering Of any kind, she
was usually the most popular girl
: there. Her roommate declared that
she danced her way through school,"
Peggy was graduated from Cornell
at the beginning of the war year. The
first Job she tried was in social well
fare work. She left her home and
went to a distant city to work for
| their welfare federation as head of the
mothers pension bureau.
She got the position in the face Of
! many difficulties, for the head Of the
! federation thought she was too young
| in the first place, too inexperienced in
the second place and then he tartly
! remarked during the first interview
! that he did not think that chemistry
was exactly the essential training for
the head of a mothers pension bu-
! reau After six months trial Peggy
! wrote home and told her parents that
! she agreed perfectly with the head of
! the federation and that she could
! think of at least a half dozen other
! reasons for her desire to change to
! some other kind Of work
! Get "Government" Job.
! In the next mail her parents receiv-
ed another letter telling them that she
was working for the government 1t
was three months before they found
out what Peggy was really doing They
, had been lima ginning all kinds of Red
, Cross work, Liberty loan work, cler-
, ical work and other ordinary war Jobs,
ard 50 their surprise may be imagined
when they received a letter stating
/ that Peggy's government job was in
/ New I,
! tra1 lines, which were now controlled
by the government. She had purpose
! ly left them in ignorance of her real
job until she was sure that she was
making good.
After her decision to leave social
welfare work she noticed an adver
tisement in the daily papers for a
trained chemist in the laboratories OF
the New York Central lines She
visited the railroad Offices to find out
what kind OF place it was and found
out that one Of the men whose job
it was to test the oils and paints used
by the company was leaving for the
army and that the place needed to be
| filled Immediately. She asked for a
chance at the place, but found it even
harder to get this job for which she
had been trained than it was to get the
welfare position.
They gave her very little hope, ir
fact almost refused outright to ever
consider her, and then after two weeks
of waiting they finally sent for her
The head of the laboratory told hel
that she would only be hired temper
arily or until the war was over at the
most.
He tried to impress upon her thai
1t was not the job for a woman and
that il would be better for her not to
take it at all than to start 1T and ther
leave in a week or two because the
work was too dirty.
He also told her that she could no.
expect to step into the place of the
man who left and that she would have
to start in at the bottom while eacl
of the other men in the department
were promoted a step in order to fill
the breach.
:, Is Promoted Rapidly.
In spite Of the little encouragement
she got she determined to take the
Place and make good and so she de
cided that she would not tell he,
family and her friends until she wa!
reasonably sure that she was there tt
stay at least for the duration of thu
war
1t took her only three months tt