590 
"Ghe RURAL. NEW-YORKER 
April 20, 191S 
The Spirit of Adventure. —There is 
a beaiitifnl human impulse called the 
“spirit of adventure” which is responsible 
for most of the big things done in the 
world. It is the impulse which has guid¬ 
ed explorers, and it has been responsible 
for most of the great “succe.sses” of life. 
It is especially strong now, when war has 
removed some of the old restrictions and 
set free new forces. Patriotism, in its 
best sense, brings with it the will to dare 
anything; to attempt things that have 
been considered wild, impossible dreams. 
No doubt you, the country girl, have felt 
it, and have longed to be in New York, 
right “in the midst of things,” and there 
Work for Girls in New York City 
What Chance Has the Untrained Worker? 
Looking for the City Boom 
is no question but that it is an interest¬ 
ing place to be. I am writing this, not 
to discourage that spirit—it is too pre¬ 
cious—but to tell you some of the condi¬ 
tions .you would meet if you came hei’e 
just now. I take it for granted that you 
have finished your country school course, 
perhaps have gone to a local high school, 
but that you have no especial training for 
any particular work. This being true, 
you would find the following possibilities 
open if you came here. 
PossiiJiLiTiES IN Housework.— You 
might be a houseworker; that is, a cook, 
a waitress, a chambermaid, or a general 
maid-of-all-work. Cooking would require 
The Busy Restaurant Waitress 
either a very marked natural gift or else 
a course of training, for a family that can 
afford to employ a cook is usually one 
that entertains, and that demands varied 
and well-cooked dishe.s. You would have 
to know how to manage a gas or an elec¬ 
tric range, as well as a coal range; you 
would have to know how to prepare all 
kinds of soups, how to I’oast, broil and 
bake meats, fowl, game and fish; how to 
prepare salads, desserts, pastries and bev¬ 
erages. Different vegetables would have 
to be served with different sauces and 
dressings, all of which you would have to 
prepare. 
“The Second Girl.” —Usually the wait¬ 
ress is called the “second girl,” and in 
addition to waiting on table she answers 
the door and telephone bells, takes care of 
the sweeping and dusting of the down¬ 
stairs rooms, keeps the china and silver 
clean and polished, takes care of the 
table linen—washing and ironing—car¬ 
ries trays upstairs if there are w’omen 
or guests who breakfast in bed, and often 
takes care of the upper rooms as well. At 
table she must always be neat and clean, 
she must serve quickly and quietly, be 
alert for the hostess’ least sign, and know 
just the order in which food is to be 
served. .Some families supply waitresses 
with caps and aprons; in others the girls 
buy them themselves. As chambermaid 
in a private house you would have to take 
entire care of the bedrooms and bath¬ 
rooms, changing the linen, doing the 
sweeping and dusting, and keeping every¬ 
thing ’ immaculate and in order, includ¬ 
ing clothes closets. As a general maid 
you would have to combine all these 
tasks, and while families who keep only 
one servant do not demand the kind of 
service which families demand when there 
are sevei’al, yet the w'ork is apt to be 
harder and the hours less regular. 
^YAGE.s.—As a cook you might receive 
anywhere from .$7 to .$15 a week. As a 
waitress, .$0 or .$7, which is about the 
amount i)aid chambermaids al.so; and as 
a maid-of-all-w6rk you might get as much 
as .$.”5 a month. In all these cases you 
would find that your hours began at 6 to 
6..S0 in the morning and lasted until 8 or 
0, or even later at night, with one after¬ 
noon and one evening off each week. You 
would have to entertain your friends in 
the kitchen, and your own room, which 
you would probably have to share with 
another servant, would be apt to be the 
smallest and highest room in the house, 
furnished with the left-overs and dis¬ 
cards of other rooms. You will have but 
few chances to meet people or make 
friends, and you are very likely to be 
homesick for the free air and kindly 
neighboi-s at home, where you can “hold 
up your head with the best.” Country- 
bred girls rarely take well to the status 
of “servant,” which is strongly marked 
in the city. In case of illness you would 
be sent to a ward in a hospital, and doc¬ 
tors’ and dentists’ fees here are much 
larger than at home. 
Hotel Work. —Rut perhaps housework 
does not appeal to you. You want com¬ 
panionship in your work—which is nat¬ 
ural. In fact, that is one of the main 
reasons why houseworkers are scarce. I 
have one positive injunction, however. 
Don’t apply for work in a hotel. For 
many reasons a hotel is not the place for 
a country-bred gild. There are plenty of 
older women, used to the city, who are 
glad to take these places. Rut if loneli¬ 
ness appals you, there is laundry work, 
restaurant work, factory work, store 
work, and the sewing and millinery 
trades. 
The Laundry. —In a laundry you may 
be either a washer, 'which may mean run¬ 
ning a machine in a steam laundry or 
working by hand in a hand laundry; an 
ironer, or a checker and mender. Wash¬ 
ers are paid from $0 to $12 a week; iron- 
ers $10 and $11; checkers and menders 
$6 and $7. Hours are fi-om 7..30 to 6 or 
G.30. 
Restaurant Workers. —In a restau¬ 
rant you may be either a cleaner, a dish 
washer, a waitress or a cashier. Cleaners 
work nine hours a day for $S or .$9 a 
week. The work is hard, most of the 
scrubbing being done on hands and knees, 
and the soap powders used being very 
hard on the hands. Dishwashers work 
the same number of hours for $7 or $8 a 
week, in .small, hot kitchens or pantries. 
Waitres.ses work nine hours for .$8 or $10 
a -week, and tip.s, which may amount to 
$4 or $5, but a waitress should be abso¬ 
lutely strong and healthy and she must 
have good feet. There is not much de¬ 
mand for ca.shiers, and they receive $9 
to $12 a week. 
Factories.— There is a big field in 
factory work, ranging from candy and 
biscuits all the way through pencils, 
paper boxes, games, buttons, shoes, hos¬ 
iery, gloves—practically everything that 
is worn and used. Wages are about the 
same in all these industries, ranging from 
$7 a week for beginners to $12 and $15 
for piece-workers. Women who run 
power machineiT are sometimes paid as 
much as .$25 to .$.30 a week, but that is 
only after they have served a long ap¬ 
prenticeship. One observer tells me that 
she has never seen a W’oman getting 
these wages under 28 or 30 years of age. 
Store Work. —Then there is store 
work, which may be cither as a wrapper, 
a messenger, stock, or sales. Wrappers 
get $7 a week and are subject to being 
fined for being late, and the cost of lost 
or broken articles is deducted from their 
wage, if they are responsible for losing 
or breaking. Messengers begin at $5 a 
week, and are u.sually girls of 14 or 1.5. 
Stock girls get .$8; later, -when they know 
their stock thoroughly, sometimes as much 
as $12 or $15. Sales girls begin at .$8, 
usually, and work up to $12, unless they 
can sell hats or suits or dres-ses and 
coats, when they can make $18 or .$20. 
All store workers are fined if late, and 
for losing or breaking articles. 
Sewi.ng Trades.— In what are called 
the “.sewing trades” are included the 
making of dresses and underwear, etc., 
by machinery, as well as making laces 
and embroideries, flowers, feathers, braids 
and trimmings, spangles and millinery. 
Girls may serve an apprenticeship for 
millinery trade with a wage of $2 or .$.3 a 
week, and after several years be earning 
$.30 or $35 a week, if they can copy well 
and have “style.” Running a sewing 
machine in a dress or underwear factory 
pays from $6 or $7 to $9 or $10 a week. 
The trimmings are very poorly paid, and 
are uncertain, becau.se of changes in 
styles, and ought not to be considered by 
a girl who wants to work her way up to 
a real position. Many women take flow¬ 
ers and feathers home aivl work on them. 
Li\tng Expenses. —Now that you 
know what you can make, let us see how 
it must be spent. First of all, you must 
have a room and food. You m.ay find a 
room in one of the hotels for girls which 
will charge you from $.5 to $7.50 a week 
for a room and two meals a day, or in 
the Young lYomen’s Chri.stian Associ.a- 
tion at about the same rate. Your car¬ 
fare will be at least 10 cents a day, and 
your laundry will cost from ,3.5 cents to 
$1 a ■week, unless you do it yourself, after 
work. Your lunches will cost from 1.5 
cents for a glass of milk and a sandwich 
up to whatever you want to pay. If you 
go out in the evening to a lecture or a 
concert you will have another 10 cents 
carfare, even if the entertainment is free. 
If you want a room in a private house 
you may be able to get one, by sharing it 
with another girl, for $2 a Aveek, and you 
Avill have to provide your own meals and 
have your laundry done outside. I do 
not know of any livable places in the 
city Avhere a room can be got for less 
than $3 a week for a girl alone, and 
you cannot cook or wash in any of these 
rooms. 
City Prospects. —Summing it all up, 
I should say that unless you have rela¬ 
tives or friends with whom you can stay, 
and enough money and clothes to la.st 
you six months at least, it would be bet¬ 
ter not to come to New York now. 
Perhaps when peace comes conditions will 
be better, but we are in the midst of 
war now. If you have friends, however, 
and a good stock of clothing and enough 
money to last until you have begun to 
earn enough to support you, you can 
find work, at something. The advan¬ 
tages of living here are the free lectures, 
such as are gh*en at Cooper Union and 
in the public schools; the concerts, also 
free; night schools; libraries; and the 
sense of being where things are “going 
on.” You need not expect, however, to 
make friends soon, because you will find 
everyone busy and hustling, and you are 
apt to be very lonely and homesick. Re 
sure of your courage, your Avill and your 
funds. 
The M’orkcr Behind the Counter 
Home Opportunities. —How about op¬ 
portunities you may have overlooked right 
at home? Surely some of your acquain¬ 
tances have been drafted from the neigh¬ 
borhood, if they did not enlist. Is there 
not a place there for you? Can you har¬ 
ness and hitch up a horse and drive it? 
There may be a store or a bakery or a 
laundry that would be glad to give you a 
job driving a wagon. It may be a new 
departure for your locality, but unless 
you have enough pluck to tackle that 
kind of a job at home you have no biisi- 
ne.ss in a city at any rate. If you are 
strong enough to be on your feet nine 
hours a day carrying trays in a restau- 
.1 Ycic Trade—the Woman Cur Conductor 
rant, or running a machine in a factory, 
you are also strong enough to do a lot 
of farm work that won’t be half as hard 
on you as waiting on tables or working 
in a dusty factory. If you have enough 
money to bring you here and to keep you 
for awhile, why not invest it in a pig or 
a cow, or rent some land and grow veg¬ 
etables, or start a laundry in your own 
nearest town, or bake better pies than 
your bakery can supply? 
I know, dear girl, that doesn’t satisfy 
the longing for big things, but let that be 
your form of patriotic service, the quench¬ 
ing of that longing, just for a little 
while. MTien the war is over, then we’ll 
see. NORA C. SMITIIEMAN. 
