LOOKING AT LIFE

Evening Post, Volume CXXIII, Issue 117, 19 May 1937, Page 16

LOOKING AT LIFE

WOMEN IN LONDON

AMBASSADORS OF COMMERCE

"Strolling in the City recently, I learned that more and more women are filling With distinction high executive posts in finance, industry, and 'big business' (writes Percy Cater in the London "Daily Mail"). They have invaded even the Temples of Mammon, ,so long regarded as sacred to men only. "For instance, there is a certain financial house in the City. Should you have business .to discuss with one of its chiefs, you would assume that the talk would be with a man, standard City type. But, if your call was sufficiently important, it is quite likely that you would find your ; interview taking place with Miss Gordon Holmes.

"Miss Holmes, tall, ■ handsome, of commanding presence, was once a clerk. Her technical knowledge of business „ and finance, aided by outstanding'qualities of courage and decisiveness, has enabled her to achieve a notable career. She is joint managing director of the National Securities Corporation, Ltd., and is also on the' board of a Hungarian bank, the City Savings Bank Company of Budapest, and a director of the Guardian Securities. Company, and the Savings Bank of Bihar. ■

"Her work takes her frequently to the Continent, for discussions with bankers and business chiefs in the great cities. She takes her own car (motoring is her chief hobby, but she is so busy that she has to combine her pastime with working trips).

"She has a girl chauffeur who knows the Continental roads as well as she knows those of Britain. This young lady is" so, pretty that she would attract notice, e^an if a 'chauffeuse' were not, even now, somewhat attentioncompelling. "Miss Holmes, an intense feminist, believes in employing as many women as possible. At her London headquarters she has a large staff of girls, thus demonstrating her belief in the business efficiency of her sex. "And you do not have to -lock far to find other women, directing other important enterprises. In electrical engineering there is Miss Monica Maurice, who trained first at her, father's works near Leeds and afterwards in Germany. "She returned to this country with an extensive engineering knowledge, and is in charge of a department of the family business which is concerned with the hiring out to collieries of miners' lamps. "She does not stay in the office, or even in the works. She dons overalls, descends mine shafts, and tramps to the coal-face to see the lamps under working conditions. Recently she was appointed a woman Companion Member of the Institution of Electrical Engineers, an honour . conferred only once before. ; WOMAN FEOFFEE. "Miss Nora Miller is.in the publicity business, and is associated with the spending of many thousands a year. Her post! is an important one, and she has held it for a considerable time. "Her commercial capacity, and funds which she provided, created a private venture, a small factory, giving work to people who some years ago were likely to lose their jobs as the result of a closing-down. '■ ( "Then' there is Mrs. Rosalind Messenger, who has become the first woman feoffee of Bungay, an office which apparently places one in the line of succession for Town ' Reeve, or Mayor. ' "Mrs. Messenger is a director of the district electrical company, and looks after the commercial side. "Among the many important American business women who . frequently visit London, have you heard of Mrs. Macßerty? . , "My reason for alluding to her is that she possesses something which is still accounted rather singular in a woman —the mathematical sense. Mrs. Macßerty is co-director, with her husband, of a big engineering works in the United States, and she can be entertaining her guests in,the drawingroom one minute and give an engineering quotation over the transatlantic telephone the next. "I do not suggest that she can work out all the mechanism of freights and costings on the spur of the moment, but she has prepared and handy every single item, and the people on ; tne other side know that they are talking to a real expert. "The women of the world are organising. Not for Women's Rights. Of course,, you never can tell, but up to now they are definitely non-militant. And they are indubitably the foes of sentiment, by which I mean that they do not think that ,a woman should be given any special consideration in business because she is a woman. "Anyway, there is an International Federation of Business and Professional Women,, and the British organisation is just getting under way. Miss Caroline Haslett, director of the Electrical Association for Women, is British vicepresident of the International Federation.

"Many women travel the world today by sea and rail, road and sky. as ambassadors of trade and commerce. The federation enables those of.similar interests to meet each other, and generally smooths the path."