Many Years Ago,*We Lived on 11Th. Avenue, a Thoroughfare Connecting.Ythe South and Vest Sides
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(1 ) rs<i. Many years ago,*we lived on 11th. Avenue, a thoroughfare connecting.ythe South and Vest sides. It'was in the midst of the homes of the working people. I saw hundreds of boys and girls barely 14 years of age trudging back and forth from their work in factories. I wondered especially about the little girls, what kind of homes they would preside over, how they would rear healthy and happy families, with so little time for prepatation for their life's duties. i y I was also interested in another group, children of desperately poor immigrants on the lower West Side, who were obliged, at the earliest possible moment, to earn their bit to help provide food and shelter for their families. To help these people adjust themselves to their new svirroundings, a neighborhood house - The Fifth Street Settlement - was established. We had many social and recreational activities and taught sewing, cooking, manual training and other industrial arts, but of course in a limited way. O) At stated times, we held exhibitions. A number of Public School Women Principals were inter ested in our work. t>J Q •sAJ-fr^^A- <Z- J Miss Loerfler asked me) Jf^come) to her school, Fridays, after schodl hours,"to give her Teachers our Normal Course so they in turn could teach their pupils. Later, she got permission from the School Board to do this work Friday afternoons during school hours. Miss Emma Luebke soon followed suit, and Teach ers and Pupils at both Schools were kept busy and happyadoing excellent work. (4) Miss Francis Wettstein, Principal of the School for the Deaf, was much concerned about the future of her handicapped pupils and •asked us to allow her girls to come over to The Settlement and continue their sewing course after graduation, so they could be better prepared to earn their living, THEN -- we spoke and dreamed of the necessity of having a Trade School for Girls. Later, while Mr. Kander was in the Legislature we lived in Madison and I attended the University. One day, while in class, I received a long distance call from Milwaukee . (5) I rushed down to the phone to find it was only a Committee from the Womans' School Alliance, begging me to allow my name to be placed in nomination for School Director. Much relieved that nothing was wrong at home I said: " Is That all - well - Yes." I went back to my class room and soon forgot all about it. A few days later, one of my classmates handed me a newspaper and there staring me in the face was a horrible picture of myself with headlines in big black letters ANOTHER WOMAN RUNNING FOR SCHJDOL BOARD. Much embarrassed, I hoped sincerely that I would not get the nomination. (6, But in August 1907, at the first meeting of the School Board elected by the people, twelve dignified men and three timid women, Mrs. Chas. W. Norris, Mrs. Annie Gorden Whitnall and myself, were seated at their desks. I soon learned that the men were more con cerned about the education of the boys than that of the girls. So one day some time later, I told Mr. Pearse, our Supt., of the necessity of establishing a Trade School for Girls. He seemed very much impressed, and promised to do all he could to further the project. an When in May of the next year, Miss Wettstein was given leave of absence to study Schools for the Handicapped abroad, he instructed her to bring back reports also of the work done in Trade Schools for Girls. She returned in Oct. 1908 with glowing accounts of the Schools and samples of the work done. ^yTy^y^ Miss Wettstein and I conferred with Senator Stout of the Stout Manual Training School and he was of the opinion that a Trade School was more necessary for girls than for boysty Through his influence, the Trade School appropriation, was also made available for a Trade School for Girls. (8? And then on January 5th., 1909 I handed"In the first formal resolution for the establish ment of a Trade School for Girls. Tne Boys' Trade School had been in existanee several years and comp^ints were coming in from all sides through the newspapers and tax payers about the big overhead; and from the Labor Organizations fearing that the skilled graduates would ultimately cause the older workers to lose their jobs. Mrs. Norris and I then then talked it over with Mr. Fred Sivyer, Pres. of the Trade School Committee and he felt they had all f they could do to manage the Boys School ( 19) NO boy was'admitted to the Boys1 School under 16 years of age or without some High School education. But boys who once go to work and earn money, seldom quit work.to go back to eek© school, hence the attendance at the Boys' Trade School was so small. So we were determined to make the age of ad mission for girls 14 years, before they went to I attended the Trade School Committee meetings regularly from Jan. 5, 1909 to June 1st. 1909, trying to convince the men that a Girl's Trade School was necessary. (TO) There were thousands of women already employed •in industry and we were eager to train girls not only to battle with the world, but to equip them to become efficient and economical home makers and intelligent Mothers. 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