Only recently have girls been prepared for the textile
trades, though they have always worked in these, first in the home and
since then in the factories. Still less is any preparation thought
of for the numberless occupations that necessity and a perpetually
changing world are all the while driving girls to take up. There were
in 1910, 8,075,772 women listed as wage-earners in the United States.
Would it not be as well, if a girl is to be a wage-earner, that
she should have at least as much opportunity of learning her trade
properly, as is granted to a boy?
Setting aside for the moment the fact that girls are already engaged
in so many callings, it is poor policy and worse economy to argue that
because a girl may be but a few years a wage-earner, it is therefore
not worth while to make of her an efficient, capable wage-earner. That
is fair to no one, neither to the girl herself nor to the community.
The girl deserves to be taken more seriously. Do this, and it will
then be clear that a vocational system wide enough and flexible enough
to fit the girl to be at once a capable mother-housekeeper, and a
competent wage-earner, will be a system adequate to the vocational
training of the boy for life-work in any of the industrial pursuits.
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