Knocked From Her Perch

Bay of Plenty Times, Volume LXXI, Issue 13773, 16 October 1942, Page 3

Knocked From Her Perch

,IS “GLAMOUR GIRL” LOSES HER CROWN ! OF POPULARITY

WOMAN IN OVERALLS HERALDED AS THE NEW “STAR”

American "glamour girl’ is about to have her popularity crown Tiie ‘ j the woman in overalls. The transition may not be as rapid USUrP fen C e officials would like to have it, but it is bound to come unless de . e " ends before another year is over, says Mary Hornaday in the rhHstian Science Monitor. Rihit now.,women are still debating whether men like to see them ks s uc h superficial discussions will be forgotten in the months inS3 p when more and more women find them the most efficient garb to come, operating machines. Short skirts, full blouses, and flowing bobs get caught in wheels and Open-toed shoes pick up loose filings. French heels trip over P ’ n( i tools. Slack suits and low-heeled oxfords are almost a necessity in factory jobs. The metamorphosis in women s dress will be accompanied by an even ter change in the nation’s thinking about women and jobs outside [lie home. The Census Bureau is now estimating that 6,000,000 women ill he needed to industry to replace men drawn into military service m \ to increase production of war materials. Many of them will be „ mar riecl women with children. They will go into the fields to harvest vegetables. They will run buses. They will clerk in grocery stores. They may deliver mail.

Take Mrs B, the mother of 5-year-old Sally. Her husband is already employed at an airplane assembly plant. His chiefs have approached her about taking a job.

“How would I know how to drive a rivet or use one of these machines?” she asked them.

“Besides,” she wanted to know, “who’d take care of Sally? If I wnt to work, pretty soon my husband would have to quit his job and begin washing dishes.”

Government labour advisers hear these arguments over and over They know most of the answers ,too.

Nursery schools are being set up in connection with most of the big defence plants, where mothers can leave their children in good hands Plant authorities are usually willing her to be home at the time her fam

;o give a woman the shift that allows iy needs her most.

One consideration that has been keeping many married -women from working has now been eliminated. Women haven’t said much about this publicly, but they reasoned that their husbands might be drafted if they were self-supporting. The Government fixed that by its decision to draft dependents whose wives can get along on a joint allowance from their soldier husbands and Social Security.

caring for her grandchildren and seeing that they get their lunch while their mother is off at her job in a war plant in a neighbouring town.

Because they change rapidly, on the number of women who have already taken war jobs are not reliable. Even in airplane plants where they are going ahead most rapidly, they have not yet come up to their World War I average, one woman to three men. Their time is coming, though. Ford officials have announced that they are planning to employ 12,000 to 15,000 women in the new Willow Run bomber plant. Other factories are making proportionate strides in putting on women.

For months, now, various Government bureaus have been clearing the wy for the employment of more women. The Women’s Bureau of the Department of Labour and the U.S. Employment Service have been sendm» factories lists of jobs that women can do just as well as and, in seme cases, better than men.

Keeping pace with the recruiting of women for factory jobs will be the development of the new uniformed Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps and the Women’s Naval Reserve, slated soon to be giving women their first opportunity to join up with the Army and Navy for such behind-the-lines jobs as telephone operating, cooking, decoding, radio and stenography.

Government-aided vocational classM have been ordered thrown open 10 " cmeu on a basis of equality with men - The War Production Board ims set a wage policy of equal pay for equal work.

Some factories that are ready and ' i,iln 5 t° hire large numbers of won'en com Piain that they can’t get eni ; * n °fher places, women with aill 'n s , and those thrown out of , hy shutdowns in radio faclle>. silk mills, and other “non--entiai civilian industries, have £ ’ lna ble to find jobs, frequently Ouse 0 f employer prejudice asail «t women. J e «iise the present picture of woEcwJ n f, eteuce j°bs is spotty, manijjjt'.. a ' U V> McNutt, hare decided s horta Way mee tiug labour is „ h 18 011 a local basis. That a J. hey have vetoed the plan for men'. °^,T icle registra tion of woafter Buch a regis- “ r ea ta tlieory

Women who understand how to run a tractor or pick and pack apples or do other farm jobs can be expecting special calls from harried farmers in need of help to harvest crops to feed the United Nations. Fancy titles such as “farmerettes” and “Women’s Land Army” will be scorned by local employment officials faced with the job of recruiting women for the long, hard labour entailed in farm work.

Transportation .will offer another broad field for women war workers. They are already driving school buses in some sections of the country, directing airplane reservations at large airports, and getting a foothold in other jobs that traditionally belong to men. The Office of Defence Transportation in Washington has appointed Miss Dorothy Sells, a former Bryn Mawr College professor, to get women and jobs together in the transportation industry just as Miss Thelma McKelvey is doing for general war industry in her war Production Board job. Men may not like slacks on 'women. Many women wouldn t choose them either. Neither would they desert theii homes for the rigours of factoiy, farm, or military life, if the choice were left to them. In this war, in the months to come, tastes and, desires will count less and less. Output will be everything.

ej j n Br ‘ Utt acte d on lessons learnPlan f* 1111 Wken turned down il°a 0 ( ff 01 a na tion-wide registraVol| Jiitarv° meU ' Britain lea med that live pc' I ®^ s ti , ation was not effec!(ivacce H!‘ y -* f to ° far iu dually 16 me le '"'omen were sho 66 ' len the man•m, n-or,,„ r f" 6 became really seri- , * ” en 1311 to be drafted; A ler icnn ■°lk, | 0 _ ' ornen > and their menlhe Mea ’ Senerall y shrink back at io!) s. h*i,.^ meU I)eing drafted for Cials insist ~ Ulction Board offifr °Pi hoinpc f*” Com Pulsory removal ° C | et ' ence Jobs is not ‘ <l)o Pr S ]j ’ at ieast until the S>tha„ .? Se grows a great deal n . 11 11 >8 to-day. K? i°re tii mav 6 War is over - Grand- ? b ' s he l eVen have her regular ?s,e rity nJ y UOt have the Anger ? ires anri Sary f ° r Work ’ with C0 ‘ ~ ln otruments, but, than / eia,;)ly more about »4 iob °c:r r ' siie '" ay i. tai ne o] . s a Power sewing S 0 ; soldiers- unimay had her niche in