New Britain herald., 1930-02-21
HARVARD 'GOOD|ES
 WANT JOBS AGAIN
0usted SCrubWOnen Face Desti-
 tuition Following Economy Move

e"A0h oAAN hAhO 'SoAoLhJ INV "
 Cambridge, Mass, Feb. 21.-This is the story of 20 old scrubwomen, the ones Harvard university. the richest institution in the United states, fired rather than raise their wages ? cents an hour.
 The years, naturally enough, have left these women stopped and tired and gray. But that is not the only toll. Along with the dirt and dust of Widener Library. where they work ed, they have swept away thelr pride.
 Dismissed without notice. with out fault or complaint Of their own, without additional pay or any pen sion, they still want their jobs back. All but two, anyway. whom ncccs- sty has not yet taught humility.
 Four of the 20, in fact, again are employed by the university. But the Misses Taylor, Sullivan, Donlan and Nalloy are ''chambermaids" now, with pay checks even smaller than before. Defiantly they ask; We gotta live. haven't we?"
 Still Without Work
 Harvard's business administration 10 the contrary, students and resi- dents of Cambridge know the wom- cn have 10 live. And that is why some others of the score arc not in more des- peratc need today. Two have been given a little work in homes of pro- fcsSors. seven spend an hour or more each day tidying up apart ments maintained by prosperous college men. Still others have found odd jobs now and then. 4 few have no work at all.
 Mrs. Katherine Donahue. for in stance, white-haired, shrill-voiced and Irish from her snowy hair to her stubby shoes, was the dean of Harvard scrubwomen. Thirty three years I vas there," she said. Longer than president or profes- sors. And what do I get for it? get fired, on the Saturday before Christ mas.
 No, ] haven't found a job yet and l wasn't offered any. But l won't starvo. I'm able, and d good worker.
 I'd go back if I could. S25, 900 a year they was spendin' on the li- o00' says the new boss. But they cant keep it clean for that. l been back to look. Already you ought to sec the dirt of it."
 i Mrs. Donahuc. like the others 1 only wants a job. There is no ma terial comfort for these women Of l the dust cloth in knowing that for 1 nearly nine years Harvard Univcr- | sity was violating a. law, or ignor- 1 ing it, or cvadng it. They arc not | interested in any specific indictment of Harvard's conduct. Increase or | getting regular work.
 Not one of them could explain to you that on February 1, 1921, the | Massachusetts state minimum wage commission. in accordance with ar act of 1912. decrecd that female building cleaners should be paid al least 37 cents an hour. But each oi them could tell you that her scrub. bins and sweeping and dusting al Widener library got her only g cents an hour, and eventually SUM- mary dismissal.
 Harvard University. now in its 294th year, has listed assets oi more than sS0,00O,0o0.
 The increase due to the 20 scrub women under the uItimatum of the Massachusetts minimum wage com mission would have amounted to II cents a day for each of them, or : total of s12 a week. Harvard wasnr willing to pay that s12; it preferred to employ men, who do not come under the provisions Of the wage law.
 Yet the university has just spen about s25,0Oo for new athletic equipment.
 Once it paid $40 each for made to-measure shoulder pads for it gridiron men.
 A locker building burned recent ly, with the loss of some sport equipment and many treasurct trophies. Within 4S hours, seVera hundred thousand dollars were rais cd to rebuild it.
 "Scrubwoman Fund.-
 Yet when slotted cans were plaCct in stores near the campus for con tributions 10 the scrub woman fund" they remained almost cmpt and were quietly removed.
 Mrs. Emma Traitor was luckic than the other women in rcCciVin aid When Harvard discharged hc1 stortly before Christmas, she wa living in dark, dingy rooms behin the parsonage Of the Rev. William II. Duvall, pastor of the East Cam bridge M. r.. church. He proteste her plight in letter to Presiden A. Lawrence Lowell of Harvard an out of that letter grew the entir "sCrubwoman scandal
 Reverend Duvau received gift totalling s56 for Mrs. Trafton. Bu that is gone now and when tn correspondent found her she Wa huddied in a little pile of househol effects. She was moving from he alley apartment to still smaller an cheaper rooms. With her is 13 year-old son. born about the tim her husband died, and an eide daughter. who is too ill to work. "All those 13 years l worked a Harvard" she said. Except month when I was in the hospita. It was d charity ward. l didn't ge any pay. I was fired before Christ mas.
 Il soc where Mr. Lowell. th