OCR Text |
Show cital given in their honor, Professor J. J. McClellan organist. The music rendered included Guilmont's "Third Organ Sonata," the popular "Baccherini Minuet," Mendelssohn's "SpringSong," "Schubert's Litany," Batiste's "Communion in G" and These were the overture to Lohengrin. in the most all given excellent style and There were also rapturously received. two celebrated vocalists, Miss Emma Lucy Gates and Mr. Heber S. Goddard. Miss Grates sang the "Ave Maria" from the "Cavaleria Rusticaua," and responded to an encore with "Sing Sweet Bird." Mr. Goddard sang, in his very best style, Nevin's "Divine Redeemer." The ride to Saltair was the next part of the program fcr the entertainment of the celebrated guests. At 2:15 the party were aboard the train and headed for Saltair, a very cheerful company chatting and making acquaintance with the visitors. There were many more of the strangers than of the Salt Lake people; among these, however, were President Brigham Young and wife and Attorney General Breeden and wife, also President Bathsheba W. Smith and Mrs. Joseph F. Smith, wife of the President of the Church, and members of the General Board of the Relief Society and of the Y. L. N. M. I. A. Mrs. Wm. Tod Helmuth, President of the National Council of Women, Mrs.T.StJohn'sGaffney Honorary President of the National Council of Women, and her daughter, Jayta Humphreys, and their special friends were the principal members of the party, for whom we had arranged, but we were very pleased indeed to meet the newly elected President of the General Federation Mrs. Denison, of New York, and also Mrs. of the Cynthia W. Alden, President-GenerSunshine Society, was with the party, and was gladly welcomed by us. A few of the bdies enjoyed a bath in the Lake, though the temperature was very cold. The other membeis of the party walked about talking and admiring the beautiful scenery until the call for train. In the evening an elaborate reception was held at the residence of Mr. and Mrs. Alonzo E. Hyde to which all the ladies were invited The parlors and dining room were profusely though tastefully decorated with flowers and trailing vines, lovely lilacs, white and lavender, and on the table were delicate vases filled with carnations, adding beauty and brilliancy to the The young girls who served the picture. ices and cake were daintily attired in light fabrics and made their part of the program charmingly interesting. Mrs. Helmuth and Mrs. Gaffaey stood to receive the entire evening with Mrs. Hyde, the hostess, and Mrs. Bathsheba W. Smith, Mrs. E. B. Wells, Mrs. Maria Y. Dougall and Mrs. The guests were Susa Young Gates. President Joseph F. Smith and wife, also President Anthon H. Lund, Apostle John Henry Smith and Apostle Heber J. Grant and wife, Secretary Hammond and wife and other noted people of the city. The ladies left early in order to take the train. Since then news has reached here that Dr. Wm. Tod Helmuth died suddenly in New York City while his wife was en route the telegram reaching Mrs. Helmuth at Denver. We extend to Mrs. Helmuth our most sinceie sympathy in her sad bereavement and pray the Lord to bless and comfort her and give her strength to endure his trying ordeal. al WOMAN'S EXPONENT io9 CHICAGO SWEAT SHOPS. Chicago, and about three per cent worked at the garment trade under the most terrible conditions. And at that time thirty were reported to come to their work Ironi homes where there had been contagious diseases smallpox and diphtheria. The garments they were making were sent as usual to wholesale dealers and department stores. of these Nearly Italians were employed only part of the year, the average time of employment weeks out of the being about thirty-on- e fifty-twAnd the number of hours' work per day varied from eight to sixteen. The rate of pay per hour is something unbelievable Many worked for five cents an hour and never was the rate higher than twenty five cents an hour. The most thorough investigation ever made of the "sweatshops" of Chicago has been completed under the auspices of the University of Chicago The department of sociology assigned Miss Nellie Mason Auten, a graduate student, to the task, and after many months of labor she has made a remarkably thorough report on the conditions of the men and women in the sweatshops of the garment trade in Chicago, and summarizing clearly the prices paid by contractors and wholesale One of her most startling statedealers. ments is that wages of these employees are steadily falling. Miss Auten is a graduate of Wellesley College, who came to Chicago to carry on her studies in economics and sociology, and her interest in vital questions concerning industrial conditions led her to consent to undertake a personal investigation of the sweatshops, where is carried on the making of boys' and mens' suits, cloaks and other garments. Miss Auten says that she recognizes the ethical questions involved in the situation, but that she has presented visible conditions rather than any solution of the problem, and it is her presentation of the subject which makes her work of value to society, and especially to Chicago. "Sweating" is the unpleasantly suggestive term applied to the work done for some tailor or wholesaler under conditions which allow a maximum amount of work per day to be performed for a minimum wage, and under which the ordinary rules of health and comfort are disregarded. And "sweatshops" are usually tenement houses, kitchens or bedrooms "in which the head of the family employs outsiders." Miss Auten says that "in Chicago at the present time conditions are not so bad as they might be," and then she goes on to say' that many of the sweatshops are in the back tenements or stables, where there is practically no yard space and no possibility of sunshine or fresh air. In one case which Miss Auten discovered on the Northwest Side there was "a court fifteen or twenty feet square surrounded on all sides by buildings four stories high. Heaps of dirty snow lay massed on the ground, too much shut off from the sun to melt and disappear. The only entrance to the court was by narrow sidewalks along the front tenement. The narrow spaces between the four buildings only served to make the court' more dismal. One felt almost as if shut up in some dungeon of an earlier age, and breathed a sigh of relief on returning to the freer air and outlook of the street." Seldom did she find proper sanitary accommodations, and often in the coldest weather, she found the rooms stiflingly Some of the close but entirely unhealed. are shops are in basements, where the evils even more exaggerated because of the bad air and worse darkness. IN NATIONAL GROUPS. The garment trade is divided between five nationalities the Italians, Scandinavians, Bohemians, Jews and Poles and each nationality has its own territory and usually its own peculiar development of the sweating system. The I tali ins stand lowest in the scale of living and scale of wages; they are "more than squalid and filthy and more crowded In 1897 nationalities." other the of any in Italians be to were 6,773 there reported three-fourth- s o. SEVEN CENTS A DAY. One Italian woman worked ten hours a day, six days in the week, and mace 40 s cents per week (a rate of of a an cent hour) and she could make $2 1 a Another woman, a pants finisher year. worked eleven hours per day and made 30 cents a week. Many of the workers made less than a dollar a week, many more were earning less than $100 a year, and in many families the whole income was from $100 to $200. The Swedes in the garment tride live, for the most part, on the North Side; and two-third- conditions are not so extreme because of the unions, which help to keep up the wages. Miss Auten reviews the demand made by the union a nine hour ds.y; the Saturday half holiday in July and August; a fixed scale cf wages for piece work or for work by the week ($8 or $10 for women and $12 or $15 for pressers and .) These demands were granted for the year March 1, 1900 to March 1, 1901. The Custom Vest Tailor's Protective Association has a membership of thirty contractors and they do not employ any n men. These contractors or middlemen, are in turn the employees of wholesalers and department store owners, as well as of the custom tailors, and last winter the contractors sent a petition to their employers asking a rise in the prices paid for vests, because of the rise in the price of silk and because cf the demands made upon them in turn by their employees. The petition was granted and everything ran smoothly. Miss Auten visited a cooperative tailor shop, where several tailors shared in the expenses, though each one was working for a different merchant tailor. She says, each one pays $3 a month rent, and about $1 a week for silk, car fare and other incidentals. In the busy months each man makes two coats a week by working from twelve to sixteen hours a day, and earns One of them, a from $8 to $13 a week. Finlander, said it was not unusual for a man to work all night to fill a special The eyes of three of the six men order. in the shop were much inflamed and their backs were bent." The custom and journeymen tailors as a rule work in their own homes and provide their machines. The Bohemians are probably second to the Swedes. They live in the district on the south and west by Eighbounded teenth Street and Blue Island Avenue the hand-sewers- non-unio- Ninety-fiv- e old "Sixth Ward." percent of the shops front on the alley, without light in the back, and many are over or |