GREAT SOCIAL WORKER

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22512, 1 September 1936, Page 11

GREAT SOCIAL WORKER

DAME ANDERSON DEAD FRIEND OF FACTORY HANDS (Received August 31, 5.5 p.m.) LONDON, August 30 The. death has occurred of Dame Adelaide Mary Anderson, noted social worker and publicist. Damo Anderson, who was born in Melbourne in 1863, was the daughter of the late Mr. Alexander Gavin Anderson, and was educated at Queen's College, Harley Street, and Girton College, Cambridge. After finishing her studies she went to Germany and France, and on returning to England won the Moral Sciences Tripos at Cambridge and afterwards the Gamble Gold Medal at Girton College. All her life Dame Anderson devoted herself to the furtherance of happiness, hygiene and health among people who had little chance to help themselves. Shtf made her mark quickly, and her judgment and advice were sought eagerly. In 1897 Dame Adelaide became Principal Lady Inspector of Factories to the Home Office. She had been an inspector of factories prior to that. When a commission was appointed, mostly of men, to go into the very vexed and intricate question of child labour, the Municipal Council of the International Settlement of - Shanghai sent for her, and subsequently she was appointed by that council to represent it on this important committee, which had every angle of child labour to discuss and consider. Dame Adelaide was one of the members of the delegation in China which decided the destiny of the Boxer indemnity, and she was also a member of another delegation to China in 1926. In 1932 she was appointed a member of tho Universities' China Committee in London, and her work on that committee was recognised as being most valuable. Tn 1922 Dame Adelaide published "Women in the Factory: An Administrative Adventure, 1893-1921." She also wrote "Humanity and Labour in China: An Industrial Visit and its Sequel, 1923-1926-1928." One of her brothers. Mr. Walter Gavin Anderson,, spent the last years of his life in Auckland. Dame Adelaide Anderson was a source of hope and inspiration to manufactory employees in England and Scotland, and her knowledge and advice, freely available at all times, made an indelible mark on the social progress of the Tjiiitecl Kingdom. In 1918 she was personally decorated with the C.B.E. bv the late King in the presence of Queen JTarv.