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+The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Woman's Part, by L. K. Yates
+
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+
+
+
+Title: The Woman's Part
+       A Record of Munitions Work
+
+
+Author: L. K. Yates
+
+
+
+Release Date: December 29, 2011  [eBook #38437]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+
+***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WOMAN'S PART***
+
+
+E-text prepared by David Edwards and the Online Distributed Proofreading
+Team (http://www.pgdp.net) from page images generously made available by
+Internet Archive (http://www.archive.org)
+
+
+
+Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this
+      file which includes the original illustrations.
+      See 38437-h.htm or 38437-h.zip:
+      (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/38437/38437-h/38437-h.htm)
+      or
+      (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/38437/38437-h.zip)
+
+
+      Images of the original pages are available through
+      Internet Archive. See
+      http://www.archive.org/details/womanspartarecor00yate
+
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: THE MANUFACTURE OF 4.5-INCH CARTRIDGE CASES: OPERATING THE
+DRAWING PRESS]
+
+
+THE WOMAN'S PART
+
+A Record of Munitions Work
+
+by
+
+L. K. YATES
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+New York
+George H. Doran Company
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+
+  CHAPTER                                             PAGE
+
+     I. THE ADVENT OF WOMEN IN ENGINEERING TRADES        7
+        SHARING A COMMON TASK                            9
+        DILUTION                                        11
+        HEROISM IN THE WORKSHOP                         12
+
+    II. TRAINING THE MUNITION WORKER                    14
+        THE QUINTESSENCE OF THE WORK                    15
+        THE INSTRUCTIONAL FACTORY                       17
+        FIRST STEPS IN INDUSTRIAL LIFE                  18
+
+   III. AT WORK--I.                                     20
+        SHELLS AND SHELL CASES                          21
+        IN THE FUSE-SHOP                                23
+        CARTRIDGES AND BULLETS                          25
+
+    IV. AT WORK--II.                                    28
+        THE MAKING OF AIRCRAFT                          28
+        OPTICAL INSTRUMENTS                             30
+        IN THE SHIPYARDS                                33
+
+     V. COMFORT AND SAFETY                              37
+        WELFARE SUPERVISION                             37
+        PROTECTIVE CLOTHING                             41
+        REST-ROOMS AND FIRST AID                        42
+        WOMEN POLICE                                    43
+
+    VI. OUTSIDE WELFARE                                 45
+        RECREATION                                      45
+        MOTHERHOOD                                      47
+        THE FACTORY NURSERY                             48
+
+   VII. GROWTH OF THE INDUSTRIAL CANTEEN                52
+        GENERAL PRINCIPLES                              54
+        THE WORKER'S OASIS                              55
+
+  VIII. HOUSING                                         57
+        BILLETING                                       58
+        TEMPORARY ACCOMMODATION                         59
+        PERMANENT ACCOMMODATION                         61
+
+
+
+
+ILLUSTRATIONS
+
+
+  THE MANUFACTURE OF 4.5-INCH CARTRIDGE CASES:
+  OPERATING THE DRAWING PRESS                         _Frontispiece_
+
+                                                                PAGE
+
+  TURNING THE COPPER BAND OF A 9.2-INCH HIGH-EXPLOSIVE SHELL      16
+
+  DRILLING SAFETY-PIN HOLE IN FUSE                                16
+
+  INSPECTING AND GAUGING FUSES                                    17
+
+  TURNING THE OUTSIDE AND FORMING THE NOSE-END OF A 9.2-INCH
+  HIGH-EXPLOSIVE SHELL                                            17
+
+  ASSEMBLING FUSES                                                20
+
+  COOLING SHELL FORGINGS                                          20
+
+  OPERATING A LUMSDEN PLAIN GRINDER: RE-FORMING 8-INCH
+  HIGH-EXPLOSIVE CUTTERS                                          21
+
+  ENGRAVING METAL PARTS FOR COMPASSES                             28
+
+  COLOURING AEROPLANE PLANES                                      28
+
+  CHIPPING AND GRINDING BLADES OF CAST IRON PROPELLER WITH
+  PORTABLE TOOLS                                                  29
+
+  WOMAN ACTING AS MATE TO JOINER MAKING SEA-PLANE FLOATS          29
+
+  CUTTING FRAYED-EDGE TAPE                                        36
+
+  BRAZING TURBINE ROTOR SEGMENT                                   36
+
+  MOUNTING CARDS FOR DRY COMPASSES                                37
+
+  TREADLE POLISHING-MACHINES, FOR SMOOTHING LENSES                37
+
+  SLITTING AND ROUGHING OPTICAL GLASS                             44
+
+  VIEW OF CANTEEN KITCHEN                                         44
+
+  WEIGHING FERRO CHROME FOR ANALYSIS                              45
+
+  BALSAMING LENSES                                                52
+
+  MAKING INSTRUMENT SCALES                                        53
+
+  PAINTING A SHIP'S SIDE IN DRY DOCK                              60
+
+  GENERAL VIEW OF WOMEN AT WORK ON AIRCRAFT FABRIC                61
+
+  THE CANTEEN                                                     61
+
+
+
+
+THE WOMAN'S PART
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I: THE ADVENT OF WOMEN IN ENGINEERING TRADES
+
+SHARING A COMMON TASK--DILUTION--HEROISM IN THE WORKSHOP
+
+
+In a period of titanic events it is difficult to characterize a single
+group of happenings as of special significance, yet at the end of the war
+it is likely that Great Britain will look back to the transformation of
+her home industries for war purposes as one of the greatest feats she has
+ever accomplished. The arousing of a nation to fight to the death for the
+principle of Liberty is doubtless one of the most stirring of spectacles
+in the human drama; it has repeated itself throughout history; but it has
+been left to this century to witness in the midst of such an upheaval the
+complete reorganization of a nation's industry, built up slowly and
+painfully by a modern civilization for its material support and utility.
+
+Before the outbreak of hostilities Great Britain was supplying the world
+with the products of her workshops, but these products were mainly those
+needed by nations at peace. The coal mines of Northumberland, the
+foundries of the Midlands, the cotton mills of Lancashire were aiding vast
+populations in their daily human struggle, but the demand of 1914 for vast
+requirements for war purposes found Great Britain unprepared. The
+instantaneous rearrangement of industries for war purposes, possible to
+Germany by reason of forty years of stealthy war preparations, was out of
+the question for a nation that neither contemplated nor prepared for a
+European conflagration. Eight or nine months had to elapse before the
+people of Great Britain were aroused to the realities of modern warfare.
+
+It was then only that a large public became aware that the Herculean
+struggle was not merely a conflict between armies and navies, but between
+British science and German science, between British chemists and German
+chemists, between British workshops and the workshops of Germany. The
+realization of these facts led to the creation of the Ministry of
+Munitions in May 1915 and the rapid rearrangement of industries and
+industrial conditions. Before the war, three National factories in Great
+Britain were sufficient to fulfil the demand for output for possible war
+purposes; to-day, there are more than 150 National factories and over
+5,000 Controlled Establishments, scattered up and down the country, all
+producing munitions of war. The whole of the North Country and the whole
+of the Midlands have, in fact, become a vast arsenal.
+
+Standing on an eminence in the North, one may by day watch ascending the
+smoke of from 400 to 500 munition factories, and by night at many a point
+in the Midland counties one may survey an encircling zone of flames as
+they belch forth from the chimneys of the engineering works of war. The
+vast majority of these workshops had previously to the war never produced
+a gun, a shell, or a cartridge. To-day, makers of agricultural and textile
+machinery are engaged on munitions, producers of lead pencils are turning
+out shrapnel; a manufacturer of gramophones is producing fuses; a court
+jeweller is engaged in the manufacture of optical instruments; a maker of
+cream separators has now an output of primers. Nor is this all. New
+industries have been started and languishing trades have been revived.
+
+The work of reorganization has been prodigious, and when the history of
+Britain's share in the war comes to be written in the leisured days of
+peace, it is unlikely that the record will transmit to a future generation
+how much effort it has taken to produce the preponderance in munitions now
+achieved. With the huge task of securing an adequate supply of raw
+material has gone hand in hand the production of a sufficiency of suitable
+machinery and machine tools, the equipment of laboratories for chemical
+research, the erection, or adaptation, of accommodation in which to house
+the new 'plant', and the supply of a continuous stream of suitable labour.
+In face of the growing needs of the Navy and Army this labour question has
+been a crucial test; it is a testimony to the 'will to win' of the whole
+people that the problem from the outset has found its solution. As soon as
+the importance of the demand for munitions workers was widely understood,
+a supply of labour has continuously streamed into the factory gates. There
+are now 2,000,000 persons employed in munitions industries--exclusive of
+Admiralty work--of which one-third are women.
+
+The advent of the women in the engineering shops and their success in a
+group of fresh trades may be accounted as an omen of deep significance.
+Women in this country have, it is true, taken their place in factory life
+from the moment that machinery swept away the spinning-wheel from the
+domestic hearth, and it is more often the woman mill-hand, or factory
+'lass', who is the wealthier partner in many a Lancashire home. Women
+before the war, to be sure, took part in factory life where such
+commodities as textiles, clothing, food, household goods, &c., were
+produced, but by consensus of opinion--feminine as well as masculine--her
+presence in Engineering Works, save on mere routine work, or on a few
+delicate processes, was considered in the pre-war period as unsuitable and
+undesirable.
+
+
+_Sharing a Common Task_
+
+At the outbreak of hostilities, a few of the most far-sighted employers,
+contemplating a shortage of labour through the recruitment of men for
+military service, hazarded the opinion that women might be employed on all
+kinds of simple repetition work in the Engineering Shops. Further than
+that even the optimist did not go. There was also no indication that women
+would be willing to adventure into a world where long hours and night-work
+prevailed, from which evils they were protected in the days of peace by
+stringent Factory Acts. Events have proved that the women of Great Britain
+are as ready as their menfolk to sacrifice comfort and personal
+convenience to the demands of a great cause, and as soon as it was made
+known that their services were required, they came forward in their
+hundreds of thousands.
+
+They have come from the office and the shop, from domestic service and the
+dressmaker's room, from the High Schools and the Colleges, and from the
+quietude of the stately homes of the leisured rich. They have travelled
+from far-off corners in the United Kingdom as well as from homesteads in
+Australia and New Zealand, and from lonely farms in South Africa and
+Canada. Every stratum of society has provided its share of willing women
+workers eager from one cause or another to 'do their bit'.
+
+Even in the early days of the advent of women in the munitions shops, I
+have seen working together, side by side, the daughter of an earl, a
+shopkeeper's widow, a graduate from Girton, a domestic servant and a young
+woman from a lonely farm in Rhodesia, whose husband had joined the
+colours. Social status, so stiff a barrier in this country in pre-war
+days, was forgotten in the factory, as in the trenches, and they were all
+working together as happily as the members of a united family.
+
+Employers and former employees likewise often share a common task in the
+workshops of the war. At Woolwich, for example, a lady of delicate
+upbringing could, at one period, have been seen arriving at the Arsenal in
+the early hours of each morning, accompanied by her former maid, both
+being the while 'hands' in the employ of the State. It is well known in
+certain circles how Lady Scott, the widow of the famous Antarctic
+explorer, put aside all private interests to take up work in a munitions
+factory, how Lady Gertrude Crawford became an official, supervising
+women's work in shipyards, and how Lady Mary Hamilton (now Mrs. Kenyon
+Slaney), the eldest daughter of the Duke of Abercorn, and Miss Stella
+Drummond, daughter of General Drummond, have won distinction as workers in
+'advanced' processes of munitions production.
+
+These are but a few distinguished names amongst a crowd of women of all
+degrees of society who have achieved unexpected success in work to which
+they were entirely unaccustomed. Amongst this nameless multitude,
+attention has been called from time to time to the remarkable feats in the
+engineering and chemical trades, in electrical works, and in the
+shipyards, of kitchen-maids and of dressmakers, of governesses and
+children's nurses.
+
+The underlying motives, all actuated by war conditions, which have turned
+the tide of women's work into new and unfamiliar occupations, are,
+however, more diverse than is generally supposed. Unquestionably, the two
+main driving forces have been patriotism and economic pressure, and of
+these patriotism, the love of country, the pride of Empire, accounts for a
+large proportion of women recruits. Yet there are other motives at work:
+the old human forces of family love and self-sacrifice, pride, anger,
+hatred, and even humour. I have questioned workers at the lathes and in
+doping rooms, in Filling Factories, and in wood-workers' shops, and find
+the mass of new labour in the munitions works is there from distinctive
+individual reasons. It is only by the recognition of all these forces that
+successful management of a new factor in the labour problem is possible.
+An indication of the life-history of one or two individual munitions
+workers may exemplify the point.
+
+There is the case of a girl tool-setter in a factory near London. She is
+the only child of an old Army family. When war broke out, she realized
+that for the first time in many generations her family could send no
+representative to fight the country's battles. Her father was an old man,
+long past military age. The girl, although in much request at home, took
+up work in a base hospital in France, but at the end of a year, when
+broken down from over-strain, was ordered six months' rest in England.
+Recovery followed in two months, and again, spurred by the thought of
+inaction in a time of national peril, she entered a munitions factory as
+an ordinary employee. After nine months' work she had only lost five
+minutes' time.
+
+Another factory worker is a mother of seven sons, proud-spirited,
+efficient, and accustomed to rule her family. The seven sons enlisted and
+she felt her claim to headship was endangered. She entered a munitions
+factory and, to soothe her pride, sent weekly to each son a detailed
+account of her industrial work. At length, the eldest son wrote that he
+thought his mother was probably killing more Germans than any of the
+family. Since then, she says, she has had peace of mind.
+
+In another factory, in the West of England, there is an arduous munitions
+maker who works tirelessly through the longest shifts. Before her entry
+into the industrial world she was a stewardess on a passenger-ship. The
+vessel was torpedoed by a German submarine, and she was one of the few
+survivors. Daily she works off her hatred on a capstan lathe, hoping, as
+she tells the visitors, some day to get equal with the unspeakable Huns.
+
+Then there is a typical case of a wife who has learned some of life's
+little ironies through her work on munitions production. Her husband, an
+old sailor, worked for the same firm before the war. He used to come home
+daily and complain of the hardness of his lot. It was 'a dog's life', he
+constantly reiterated, and his wife was careful to make reparation at
+home.
+
+War broke out and the naval reserve man was recalled to sea. The firm were
+put to it, in the labour shortage, for a substitute, and invited the
+wife's aid. Having heard so much of the hardships of the work, she
+refused, but after some persuasion agreed to give the job a trial. At the
+end of a week, she surmised the task was not so hard as she contemplated;
+after a month had passed she realized the position. The job had been a
+capital excuse to ensure forgiveness for domestic short-comings. The wife
+awaits her husband's return with a certain grim humour.
+
+Having arrived in the engineering trades, actuated by whatever motives,
+the woman munitions maker has more than justified the hopes of the pioneer
+employers who sponsored her cause. As soon as organized labour agreed that
+trade union rules and pre-war shop practice should be suspended for the
+duration of the war, women were rapidly initiated in the simple repetition
+processes of shell-making and shell-filling. Machinery was adapted to the
+new-comers, and the skilled men workers were distributed amongst the
+factories to undertake the jobs possible only to experienced hands.
+
+
+_Dilution_
+
+Thus, the principle of dilution, as old as Plato's _Republic_, which as a
+theory was reintroduced to British students by Adam Smith, has widely come
+into practice through the urgency of the war. Women have been successfully
+introduced into a new group of occupations, men have been 'upgraded', so
+that many semi-skilled men have become skilled; and the skilled men have
+been allocated entirely to employment on skilled jobs.
+
+Once introduced to the munitions shops, women soon mastered the repetition
+processes, such as 'turning', 'milling' and 'grinding', as well as the
+simpler operations connected with shell-filling. The keenest amongst them
+were then found fit for more 'advanced' work where accuracy, a nice
+judgment, and deftness of manipulation are essential. Such are the
+processes connected with tool and gauge-making, where the work must be
+finished to within the finest limits--a fraction of the width of a human
+hair; such are the requirements for the work of overlooking, or inspection
+of output; and such are the many processes of aeroplane manufacture and
+optical glass production, upon which women are being increasingly
+employed.
+
+They are also undertaking operations dependent on physical strength, which
+in pre-war days would have been regarded as wholly unsuitable to female
+capacity. War necessity has, however, killed old-time prejudice and has
+proved how readily women adapt themselves to any task within their
+physical powers. One may, for example, to-day watch women in the shipyards
+of the North hard at work, chipping and cleaning the ships' decks,
+repairing hulls, or laying electric wire on board H.M. battleships. High
+up in the gantry cranes which move majestically across the vaulted factory
+roof, one may see women sitting aloft guiding the movement of the huge
+molten ingots; in the foundries, one may run across a woman smith; in the
+aeroplane factories, women welders work be-goggled at the anvils.
+
+An engineering shop is now sometimes staffed almost entirely by women
+'hands', and it is no uncommon sight to find in the centre of the shop
+women operators at work on the machines; at one end a group of women
+tool-setters, and at another women gaugers who test the products of this
+combined women's labour. In the packing-rooms the lustier types of women
+may be seen dispatching finished shells, and on the factory platforms
+gartered women in tunic suits push the loaded trollies to waiting
+railway-trucks for conveyance to the front. One of the most surprising
+revelations of the war in this country has, indeed, been the capacity of
+women for engineering work, and to none has the discovery been more
+surprising and more exhilarating than to the women themselves.
+
+
+_Heroism in the Workshop_
+
+The work has, in fact, called for personal qualities usually thought to be
+abnormal in women. The women in the engineering shops have disproved any
+such surmise. Where occasion has demanded physical courage from the
+workers, the virtue has leaped forth from the average woman, as from the
+average man. Where circumstances call for grit and endurance, there has
+been no shirking in the factories by the majority of the operators of
+either sex. The heroism of the battlefields has frequently been equalled
+by the ordinary civilian in the factory, whether man or woman. Sometimes
+incidents of women's courage in the works have been reported in the press
+as matters for surprise. They are merely typical instances of the spirit
+that animates the general mass of the workers in Great Britain.
+
+A few examples may be added in illustration. On a recent occasion, a woman
+lost the first finger and thumb of her left hand through the jamming of a
+piece of metal in a press. After an absence of six weeks, she returned to
+work and was soon getting an even greater output than before.
+
+Another instance relates to a serious accident in an explosives factory,
+when several women were killed and many were injured. Within a few days a
+considerable number of the remaining female operators applied and were
+accepted for positions in the Danger Zone at another factory. Another
+incident is reported from some chemical works in the North. The key
+controlling a valve fell off and dropped into a pit below, rendering the
+woman in charge unable to control the steam. An accident seemed imminent
+and the woman, in spite of the likelihood of dangerous results to herself,
+got down to the pit, regained the key and averted disaster.
+
+In a shipyard on the North-East coast, a woman of 23 years had been
+engaged for some time in electric-wiring a large battleship. One day, when
+working overhead, a drill came through from the deck, piercing her cotton
+cap and entering her head. She was attended to in the firm's First Aid
+room and sent home. To the surprise of every one concerned, she returned
+to work at 6 a.m. on the following day, and laughingly remarked that she
+was quite satisfied that it was better to lose a little hair than her
+head.
+
+In the trivial accidents which are, of course, of more frequent
+occurrence, the women display similar calmness and will stand
+unflinchingly while particles of grit, or metal, are removed from the
+eyes, or while small wounds--often due to their own carelessness--are
+dressed and bound. The endurance displayed during the early period of
+munitions production, when holidays were voluntarily abandoned and work
+continued through Sundays, and in many hours of overtime, was no less
+remarkable in the women than in the men. Action is continuously taken by
+the Ministry of Munitions to reduce the hours of overtime, to abolish
+Sunday labour, and to promote the well-being of the workers, but without
+the zeal and courage of the women munitions makers the valour of the
+soldiers at the Front would often be in vain.
+
+As the Premier remarked in a recent speech: 'I do not know what would have
+happened to this land when the men had to go away fighting if the women
+had not come forward and done their share of the work. It would have been
+utterly impossible for us to have waged a successful war, had it not been
+for the skill and ardour, enthusiasm and industry, which the women of the
+country have thrown into the work of the war'.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II: TRAINING THE MUNITION WORKER
+
+THE QUINTESSENCE OF THE WORK--THE INSTRUCTIONAL FACTORY--FIRST STEPS IN
+INDUSTRIAL LIFE
+
+
+When, in answer to the demand for shells and more shells, factories were
+built, or adapted to the requirements of war, it was soon found that a
+supply of suitable labour must be ensured, if the maximum output was to be
+maintained. The existing practice of the engineering shops, by which a boy
+arrived by gradual steps, counted in years, from apprenticeship to the
+work of a skilled operator, was obviously impossible where an immediate
+demand for thousands of employees of varying efficiency had to be
+fulfilled. The needs of the Navy and Army further complicated the problem
+by the withdrawal of men of all degrees of skill from factory to
+battlefield.
+
+The discovery of an untapped reservoir of labour in women's work, and the
+adaptation of a larger proportion of machines to a 'fool-proof' standard,
+certainly eased the situation, yet the problem remained of the immediate
+provision of workers able to undertake 'advanced', as well as simple work,
+in the engineering shops. Factory employers were from the outset alive to
+the situation, and at once adopted measures for the training of new-comers
+within their shops, but harassed as the managers were by the supreme need
+for output, it was hardly possible to develop extensive schemes for
+training within the factory gates. Hence, arose a movement throughout the
+United Kingdom among the governing bodies of many institutions of
+University rank, among Local Education Authorities, and among various
+feminist groups, to make use of existing Technical Schools and
+Institutions for the training of recruits in engineering work.
+
+The effort was at first mainly confined to the instruction of men in
+elementary machine work, and the London County Council may fairly claim to
+have acted as pioneer in this connexion. Yet, as early as August 1915, a
+group of women connected with the National Union of Women's Suffrage
+Societies (of which Mrs. Fawcett, widow of a former Postmaster-General, is
+the president) decided to finance a scheme for the training of women
+oxy-acetylene welders, converting for this purpose a small workshop run by
+a woman silversmith.
+
+It was soon observed by the Ministry of Munitions that these sporadic
+efforts--sometimes successful beyond expectation, and sometimes failing
+for want of funds, or for lack of intimacy between training-ground and
+factory employer--must be co-ordinated, if they were to tackle
+successfully the growing task imposed by war conditions. The conception of
+a Training Section for factory workers within the Ministry of Munitions
+arose, took root. The section was established in the early autumn of 1915.
+
+In the October of that year, authority to finance approved training
+schemes throughout the country was given to the new department. Some fifty
+colleges and schools, undertaking independent schemes, were then brought
+into touch with the Ministry, and steps were taken to develop the existing
+systems. Equipment was thereby improved, recruiting of students
+stimulated, and a scheme for the payment of maintenance during
+training--such as the Manhattan Schools in New York had previously
+introduced to social investigators in this country--was established. The
+extension of the courses of training from instruction in simple processes
+to such advanced engineering work as lead-burning, tool-setting, and
+gauge-making soon followed, and was accompanied by necessary theoretical
+instruction in the methods of calculation of fine measurements.
+
+
+_The Quintessence of the Work_
+
+For these advanced classes, men alone were at first eligible as students,
+women being only instructed at the outset in elementary parts of the work.
+In the early days, the women were invited 'to do their bit', by learning
+how to bore, how to drill, how to plane, how to shape, and above all, how
+to work to size. The chief battle of the Training Centre with regard to
+the instruction of women was then, and still remains, the implanting of a
+feeling for exactitude in persons accustomed to measure ribbons or lace
+within a margin of a quarter of a yard or so, or to prepare food by a
+guess-work mixture of ingredients. I remember, at the beginning of a
+course of training for women, how an instructor at a large metropolitan
+Centre remarked that 'ninety-nine per cent. of the new students do not
+know what accuracy means', and he detailed how difficult it was to instil
+into their mind 'that quintessence of their work'.
+
+Scientific methods of tuition, helped no doubt by women's proverbial
+patience, have, however, enabled the lesson to be learned after a few
+weeks' intensive training. The courses last but six to eight weeks and, at
+the conclusion of the carefully graduated tasks, it is not too much to
+say that the success of the women has been, in an overwhelming number of
+cases, surprising both to teachers and pupils.
+
+I have before me a batch of letters from factory employers, written in the
+early period of the training schemes. They all bear testimony to the value
+of the outside instruction. One manager notes how the trained women from
+the Schools were able 'to become producers almost at once'; another states
+that the drafting of the women students from School to factory has enabled
+the work of munitions to be carried on 'with greater expedition than would
+otherwise have been the case', and yet another, with a scarcely concealed
+note of astonishment, relates that his students were able to be engaged at
+once on 'all kinds of machinery, capstan lathes, turning lathes, milling
+and wheel cutting machinery'.
+
+This discovery of the employer, of the potentialities of women's work in
+the engineering trades, soon led to a development of the instruction of
+female students in the Training Centres; more advanced machine work was
+added to the curriculum, as well as tuition in aeroplane woodwork and
+construction, in core-making and moulding, in draughtsmanship and
+electrical work, in optical-instrument making, including the delicate and
+highly-skilled work of lens and prism making.
+
+New Training Centres are constantly being opened in provincial areas, the
+instruction being adapted to the needs of local factories. There are now
+(December, 1917) over forty training schools for engineering work in Great
+Britain, as well as nine instructional factories and workshops, and the
+proportion of women to men trained in all the processes may be reckoned
+roughly as two to one.
+
+The system of instruction is based, in some of the Centres, on the general
+principle that the School undertakes the preliminary work of tuition in
+the simpler engineering processes; the Instructional Factory, or workshop,
+specializing in the more skilled processes, acts as a clearing-house for
+promising students from the schools. The urgency of warfare does not,
+however, permit the application of any hard-and-fast rules. I have seen
+specimens of some of the most 'advanced' work produced in a School;
+indeed, the delicate work of lens polishing and centring, the intricacies
+of engineering draughtsmanship, the precise art of tool-setting and
+gauge-making have become specialisms of the Schools in certain localities.
+
+[Illustration: TURNING THE COPPER BAND OF A 9.2-INCH HIGH-EXPLOSIVE SHELL]
+
+[Illustration: DRILLING SAFETY-PIN HOLE IN FUSE]
+
+[Illustration: INSPECTING AND GAUGING FUSES]
+
+[Illustration: TURNING THE OUTSIDE AND FORMING THE NOSE-END OF A 9.2-INCH
+HIGH-EXPLOSIVE SHELL]
+
+As I write, the face of an eager girl of 21 years recurs to memory. She
+was showing me, the other day, a master gauge produced at a School in the
+Eastern counties. 'I made it all myself,' she said joyfully, 'dead exact,
+and all the other gauges of this size in the School are made from it. I
+have just been appointed assistant instructor in gauge-making.' When it is
+recalled that the deviation in the measurements of a gauge is only
+tolerated within such limits as a 3/10000 part of an inch, the production
+in a School of a master gauge, 'dead exact' in all its dimensions, is a
+proof that the student has already gone some way in the mastery of the
+craft of the engineer.
+
+
+_The Instructional Factory_
+
+On the other hand, the Instructional Factory is often forced by war
+conditions to enrol raw recruits who seem likely material for the urgent
+needs of surrounding factories. In such cases, the candidate is placed on
+trial for a week or two in the Instructional Workshop, as in the School.
+If, at the close of the period of probation, she is deemed unsuitable, she
+is advised at that preliminary stage to return to her former occupation.
+
+Speaking generally, the rejects are extraordinarily few, and although it
+would be premature to draw definite conclusions, the experience of the
+Training Section suggests that there is considerable latent capacity for
+engineering work in a large number of women. A tour of the Instructional
+Workshops emphasizes the point; everywhere, women may be seen mastering in
+the short intensive course the one advanced job for which each is being
+trained. In the Instructional Workshop, the atmosphere of a School is
+exchanged for that of a factory, the conditions of a modern engineering
+shop being reflected within its precincts. Thus the students 'clock on and
+off' on arrival and on departure, observe factory shifts, work on actual
+commercial jobs, obtain their tools from an attached store, and so on. The
+work varies in these Instructional Factories as in the engineering shop of
+the commercial world.
+
+In one section of such a hall of tuition you may see the women intent on
+the production of screws, or bolts, or nuts; in another part, such objects
+as fuse needles may be in the course of manufacture. You stop to see the
+magic which is answerable for the birth of the tiny factor which shall
+detonate the explosive, and you are amazed to find that a fuse needle
+requires six tools for its production and eight to nine gauges for testing
+the accuracy of its measurements. Or, you may perhaps pause before a
+machine which is turning out tiny grub screws. To see a rod of steel offer
+itself, as it were, to the rightful instruments on a complicated machine
+to impress the thread and slit, to watch it proceeding on its way until a
+tiny section is divided and a complete screw is handed over to a tray
+outside the machine, is, to the uninitiated, a miracle in itself.
+
+To see the whole of these complicated processes guided and operated by a
+smiling girl makes one hopeful for the national industries of the future.
+Setters-up of tools are at work in another section of the same
+Instructional Factory and at other machines are students grinding,
+milling, or profiling.
+
+You may then visit another Instructional Factory to find that aircraft is
+the specialty. I recall one such training-ground in a bay of an aeroplane
+factory. There the girls learn almost every part of aircraft production,
+from the handling of the tiny hammers used on the woodwork for the body
+and wings, to the assembling, or putting together the tested parts. In
+this training factory, a system prevails of lectures by the practical
+instructors on the use of necessary tools; questions from the students are
+encouraged at the close of the lecture, and, I was informed, when on one
+occasion I was one of the audience, that the saving of the instructor's
+time by the adoption of this method was beyond expected results.
+
+Again, you may visit an Instructional Factory where foundry work is
+included in the curriculum, or where advanced machine work is a feature. I
+have stood in one Instructional Workshop where some 600 machines were
+whirring simultaneously, and where the spirit of energy and goodwill of
+both students and instructors seemed as tangible as the metal objects
+produced. In this institution all the accomplished work is for production;
+night as well as day shifts are worked, and the needs of our armies, or
+those of our Allies, are frankly discussed with the operators. There is no
+occasion for other incentive: raw recruits, students from the Schools,
+discharged soldiers from the Front, men unfit for active service, all
+these denizens of the training-shop vie with each other to produce a
+maximum output.
+
+It speaks volumes for this workshop that in spite of the continual changes
+of operators--each set of students remaining only for a course of six to
+eight weeks--it is entirely maintained on a commercial basis. To reach
+such a standard in these circumstances is to imply that the heroism of the
+workshop has become an ingrained habit in operators and staff.
+
+
+_First Steps in Industrial Life_
+
+I remember watching in this training-ground the manufacture of small
+aero-engine parts, exact in dimensions to within the smallest limits of
+tolerance. I put a query as to the wastage of material in such an
+operation, when handled by comparative new-comers. 'Scrapping from this
+process', replied the production manager with pride, 'does not exceed a
+total average of one per cent.' The women at work at the time had come
+from the most varied occupations. A large proportion had never worked
+outside their own home, others were domestic servants, cooks, housemaids,
+and so on, others were dressmakers from small towns, and one, I recall,
+was an assistant from a spa, where she had been engaged handing out
+'waters' to invalids. 'It is not the rank of society from which the
+student is drawn that matters,' remarked an instructor; 'it is the
+personality of the individual that counts.'
+
+Every care has been taken by the Ministry of Munitions to make it easy for
+women of all classes to participate in their schemes of instruction. The
+middle class girl who has never undertaken independent work, the woman who
+has always lived and worked within the shelter of her own home,
+undoubtedly felt in many cases debarred from entering industrial life. The
+necessity of living away from her family, in order to enter a
+Training-School, the absence of home conditions in school or factory, the
+dread of an entirely masculine superintendence, all helped to strengthen
+artificial barriers between potential students and the needed engineering
+work. The Training Section, watching the development of its schemes,
+became aware of the necessity of making arrangements for students from the
+Welfare point of view, and an organization has thus developed by which the
+first steps in industrial life are made easy for the most apprehensive of
+new-comers.
+
+Girl students by rail are met by a responsible woman official and are
+accompanied to suitable lodgings, or to hostels. In the event of pressure
+in accommodation, the new student is introduced to temporary apartments,
+or to a 'Clearing Hostel', where she awaits in comfort a vacancy. In the
+large Training Centres, a woman supervisor is in charge. She makes all
+arrangements as to the provision of meals, rest-rooms, cloak-rooms,
+First-Aid centres, and so on, and is ready to advise the women students on
+all points relating to their personal interests.
+
+Women students are also enabled to wear a khaki uniform, as members of the
+Mechanical Unit of the Women's Legion, a privilege found to be of distinct
+value to girls unaccustomed to steering an independent course in the more
+boisterous streams of life. The appreciation of the students of the
+safe-guarding of their individual desires crops out in unexpected places.
+In a handful of correspondence from students, one gleans such remarks as
+the following:
+
+    'Mrs. H. never spares herself any trouble as long as she can make
+    things pleasant for me, she considers it her "war work" to make
+    munition workers happy, and it is very nice to meet people that
+    appreciate what we are doing for our country.'...
+
+    'We were met at the station by the works motor. All at once we turned
+    up an avenue of lime-trees and drew up at the door of our country
+    estate. It is a real lovely house and we revel in the glories of fresh
+    air, lawns and gardens, good beds and well-spread tables. We cross a
+    field to the works. Dinner and tea await us when we get here, and
+    there is a well-stocked vegetable garden to give us fresh vegetables,
+    so we all feel indeed that our lines are fallen in pleasant places,
+    and we are very grateful.'
+
+In these ways a bridge has been built by the Ministry of Munitions between
+the normal life of the women in this country and the work in the munitions
+factory.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III: AT WORK--I
+
+SHELLS AND SHELL CASES--IN THE FUSE SHOP--CARTRIDGES AND BULLETS
+
+
+Arrived in the munitions factory, the new-comer, whether from a Government
+Training Centre, or from another occupation, is given two or three weeks'
+trial on the task she has come to undertake. Only a very small proportion
+of the women offering their services--one experienced manager puts it at 5
+per cent.--are found unsuitable, and these are discharged during the
+probationary period.
+
+Except in the case of those who have received a preliminary training, or
+of those who have merely transferred their energies from other factory
+work, the average woman has, at the initial stage in the munitions shops,
+to overcome an instinctive fear of the machine. Occasionally, the fear is
+intensified into an unreasoning phase of terror. 'One has to coax the
+women to stay with such as these,' said one understanding foreman,
+pointing to a monster machine with huge-toothed wheels. 'We don't ask a
+woman to sit alone with these at first, for she wouldn't do it, so we put
+a man with her, and let her sit and watch a bit, and after a while she
+loses her fear and won't work anything else, if she can help it.'
+
+The women, in fact, soon get attached to the machines they are working, in
+a manner probably unknown to the men. 'I've been here a year on this
+machine, and I can't do near so well on any other,' is a remark many a
+girl has made to me as I have watched her on a difficult job. From time to
+time, a girl will even confess that she 'can't bear to think of some one
+on the night-shift working _her_ machine'. An understanding has arisen
+between the machine and the operator which amounts almost to affection. I
+have often noticed the expression of this emotion in the workshops; the
+caressing touch of a woman's fingers, for instance, as a bore is being
+urged on to the job on the machine. This touch, which cannot be taught, or
+imparted, enables the operation to be started in the most effective method
+possible, and goes to the making of an excellent and accurate worker.
+
+The femininity of the worker has, however, its drawbacks, and for the sake
+of successful handling of women in the munitions factory, it is as well
+that these psychological points should be noted. If, for example, a
+machine is out of gear, or if the operation is held up for any other
+cause, the women munition makers will sometimes behave in an unreasonable
+manner, quite bewildering to a foreman accustomed only to dealing with
+men. The temporary cessation of work may make only a slight money
+difference to the woman operator by the end of the week: 'not enough to
+fuss about,' as the foreman judges. But the woman nevertheless often
+_does_ fuss, because in her eyes the wages do not loom so large as the
+interruption to her work. She 'hates standing-by', she will say, for she
+cannot express the emotion of which she is but dimly conscious, that a
+woman's deep instinct is to give freely of her fullness, and it frets her
+very soul to be balked in the middle of a job.
+
+[Illustration: ASSEMBLING FUSES]
+
+[Illustration: COOLING SHELL FORGINGS]
+
+[Illustration: OPERATING A LUMSDEN PLAIN GRINDER: RE-FORMING 8-INCH
+HIGH-EXPLOSIVE CUTTERS]
+
+Other initial obstacles in the employment of 'new' female labour in the
+factories result from the exchange of the manifold duties of the woman in
+her own home for repetition work performed in the company of hundreds of
+other human beings. These difficulties are, however, soon overcome, and
+the new-comer, generally speaking, rapidly becomes one of a large and
+merry company. The whirr of the wheels and the persistent throb of the
+machinery may at first distract her, but after a short time the factory
+noises are unnoticed, save as an accompaniment to her thoughts, her
+laughter, or her song. I have indeed met in the England of to-day nothing
+more inspiriting, outside the soldiers' camps, than the women munition
+workers at work or at play.
+
+In August 1916, there were some 500 different munitions processes upon
+which women were engaged. To-day, they are employed upon practically every
+operation in factory, in foundry, in laboratory, and chemical works, of
+which they are physically capable. Within the limits of this publication
+it is not possible to follow them into every field of their endeavours,
+yet a glance at their work in a few typical products may give some slight
+indication of women's contribution to Britain's effort in the World War.
+
+
+_Shells and Shell Cases_
+
+Of the numbers of operations that go to the making of a shell, women now
+undertake every process, in some works, including even the forging of the
+billets in the foundry. It was the urgent need of a greatly increased
+output of shells in 1915 which led to the widespread introduction into the
+engineering shops of female labour, and the women have repaid this unique
+opportunity by their unqualified success. So rapid, and so marked, has
+been their progress in shell production that by the spring of 1917 the
+official announcement was justified, that, by March 31 of that year,
+Government contracts for shells of certain dimensions would only be given
+where 80 per cent. of the employees were women.
+
+At first, the women were mainly engaged in simple machine operations, such
+as boring, drilling, and turning, or in filling the shells. They are, at
+present, working hydraulic presses, guiding huge overhead cranes,
+'tonging', or lifting the molten billets, 'setting', or fitting the tools
+in the machines, inspecting and gauging, painting the finished shell
+cases, making the boxes for dispatch of the finished product, and trucking
+these when finally screwed up and ready for exit from the factory to the
+Front. It is not possible to describe here in detail women's entire
+contribution to the production of a shell, but, from foundry to railway
+truck, she has become an alert and promising worker.
+
+In the foundry, her appearance is as yet exceptional, yet in the North
+country it is no unusual sight to find a woman in the cage suspended from
+the overhead travelling crane, operating its protruding arm. Now, she will
+pick up with the clumsy iron fingers a pig of iron and thrust it into the
+glowing depths of a furnace, or she will lift the red-hot billet and bring
+it to the hydraulic press, where it is roughly hollowed into its
+predestined shape.
+
+In the shell shop proper you may watch the woman operator on some scores
+of processes; at one machine, she may be attacking the centre of the
+billet with a revolving nose, at another she may be 'turning' the outside
+of a shell. The shavings curl off in this process like hot bacon rind and
+fall in iridescent rings around her: blue, purple, peacock, or gleaming
+silver. Or, you may watch the woman worker 'threading' the shell, a
+process by which the screw threads are provided, into which the nose of
+the shell is afterwards fitted; or, you may stand and marvel at the skill
+of the worker who so deftly rivets the base-plate into the shell's lower
+end. But, perhaps, the most attractive operation to the visitor to the
+shell shop is the fitting and grooving of the shell's copper band, a
+process which leaves the machine and worker half-hidden in the glory of
+sunset tints, as the copper scrap falls thickly from the machine.
+
+At every stage, the shell is gauged and tested, examined and re-examined,
+since accuracy is the watch-word of its production. Sometimes, the
+machine-operator will gauge her own product; at other stages, the shell
+passes into the hands of women overlookers of the factory, the final tests
+being made by Government 'viewers'. The inside, as well as the outside of
+the shell is submitted to such inspection, and you may see women peering
+into the interior of the shells, aided by the light from a tiny electric
+bulb, mounted on a stick. This contrivance is thrust successively into
+rows and rows of shells.
+
+Women are now exclusively used for the painting of the shells, a process
+accomplished, not by means of a brush and paint-pot, but by the operator
+playing a fine electrically-worked syringe on to the surface of the shell.
+This process is undertaken in what is often called 'the butcher's shop',
+the shells, in pairs, being swung up on a rope into a compartment where
+the operator works from behind a protective iron screen.
+
+In the Filling shops, women's devotion to their work has been proved once
+and again. Whether the process undertaken be in company of a few comrades,
+or in isolated huts where lonely vigils are kept over stores of
+explosives, the munition-girls are hardly known to flinch in their duty.
+
+Sometimes, they have volunteered to work throughout the night when
+air-raids are in progress, at other times, women-workers have returned to
+the Danger Zone immediately after some bad experience there; and, in every
+case, the woman worker in the Filling Factory cheerfully sacrifices much
+which she holds dear in life. It may signify but little to a man to give
+up his small personal possessions whilst at work in the danger areas, but
+to many a woman worker it means much, that she may not wear a brooch, or a
+flower, while on duty, and that her wedding-ring, the only allowable
+trinket, must be bound with thread while she works. Her tresses, which she
+normally loves to braid, or twist into varying fashions, must also be left
+hairpinless beneath her cap. She must relinquish her personal belongings
+before going to her allotted task; no crochet-hook or knitting-pin may
+accompany her into the zone where friction of steel, or hard metal, might
+spell death to a multitude of employees. Yet this sacrifice of
+individuality is given freely by the woman in the Filling shop, and she is
+still merry-hearted and blithe as she fills the small bags with deadly
+powder, or binds the charge which shall fire the shell.
+
+When the shell is finally filled and passed 'O.K.', or perfect, it is a
+woman who packs it into its box and who wheels it on a truck, sometimes
+for a mile or more over narrow platforms, to hand it to another woman who
+stacks it into the waiting railway-wagon. Any one who has watched
+throughout the production of a shell in a factory of to-day can only echo
+a well-known author's recent salute: 'Hats off to the Women'.
+
+
+_In the Fuse Shop_
+
+The fuse, that small and complicated object which explodes the shell, is a
+war-product now largely produced by women's labour. A few inches in
+length, it requires some hundreds of operations for its manufacture, even
+if the initial processes on the metal are excluded from the count. In
+section, it looks like a complicated metal jig-saw puzzle of exquisite
+finish and cohesion: viewing it externally, a child might mistake it for a
+conjurer's 'property', a bright metal egg, or roll often surrounded by a
+metal ring marked with time measurements.
+
+The care and accuracy necessary for the production of this small object
+can hardly be imagined by the uninitiated: it is measured and re-measured
+in every diameter, since on its perfection depends the life of the gunner
+and his team. The fuse shop is usually characterized by its cleanliness
+and quietude. I recall one such shop stretching far away into distance
+both in length and breadth. Under its roof some 1,500 women were at work.
+Conversation could be held in any part of the shop, undisturbed by the
+usual factory noises. The fuse parts are, indeed, so small that the
+machinery is necessarily light, and in such a shop it is dexterity and
+accuracy that tell, rather than physical strength.
+
+Rows of graceful women and girls were standing at their machines, and I
+recall how their overalls and caps of varied hues made a rainbow effect,
+as one watched from a distant corner. Some were in cream colour and some
+in russet-brown, or apple green, the caps sometimes matching the overall
+and sometimes offering a strong contrast. A splash of purple, or a deep
+magenta, mingled with the head-dresses of softer hue, for in this shop,
+away from the Danger Zone, no insistence was made on uniformity of factory
+costume. Other women, wearing a distinctive armlet, were passing in and
+out between the rows of workers, now stopping and bending over a machine,
+now making some bright remark to the operator, as a ripple of laughter
+indicated, or again, pointing out in sterner wise some danger, or some
+error in the job. These itinerary women are the overlookers, who since the
+war have perfected themselves in their special job and can now supervise
+the operators.
+
+At long tables, other women were sitting; some quite elderly and
+grey-haired, some mere girls. They were measuring with small gauges parts
+of the fuse, some the size of a good-sized bead. There are 150 different
+gauges authorized for the measurement of one type of fuse, and in practice
+even more are used, to ensure perfection of accuracy. I stood spell-bound
+at one of these gauging tables and watched the examination of small screws
+and flash plugs. There were six little squares of felt on the table, on
+which the examiner placed rejects, classified according to the detected
+flaw. The work proceeded with the utmost dispatch, the 'accepted' or
+'perfect' heap growing as if by magic.
+
+At another table, a girl was testing springs of about an inch long. If any
+of these showed the smallest fraction too much length after being
+submitted to a given pressure, they were put aside as 'scrap'. At yet
+another table, tiny fuse needles were being examined for length,
+thickness of phlange, and accuracy of point, and on a high flat desk,
+near a machine, I noticed seventeen different gauges were ranged for the
+examination of the percussion end of the fuse-body, one ten-thousandth
+part of an inch being the limitation or variation allowed in such parts.
+
+When all the parts have been examined they are passed to other tables for
+assembling, or putting together. In this operation almost superhuman care
+is required, and the work is reserved for the best operators and
+time-keepers as a reward for long service. 'Assembling' is regarded as the
+plum of the fuse-room. The operators are well aware of the importance of
+the task, as they stow away in the time fuses the pea-ball, pellet,
+spring, stirrup, ferrule, and other components of the fuse. The needle is
+fixed by blows from a small hammer, and at length the fuse is completed
+and passes out of the room of its creation to receive its 'filling' from
+other hands.
+
+
+_Cartridges and Bullets_
+
+The production of cartridges and bullets is another branch of munitions
+production in which women are mainly employed. These objects, which, when
+completed, are together no longer than a ball-room pencil, make in their
+manufacture no great demand on physical strength.
+
+On entering a cartridge and bullet shop, one is at once struck with its
+individuality. There is more stir and movement than in a fuse-room, but
+less of the imperiousness of the machinery than in the shell or gun shop.
+There is in the cartridge and bullet room still the whirr of wheels and,
+above that, the deep constant throb of the driving-force, that makes
+conversation almost inaudible to the new-comer. But beneath this bass
+accompaniment, one can hear the lesser sounds belonging to the cartridge
+and bullet-room alone. There may be the buzz of the circulating gas
+machines--which resemble miniature merry-go-rounds--the tap, tap, of the
+cartridges as they are thrown out of the machine into a box below, and the
+tinkle of bullets as they are poured into weighing machines, or on to
+tables, or into huge barrels, such as are used on the wharves for the
+transport of herrings.
+
+A cartridge and bullet-shop sometimes is as animated and as picturesque as
+an open-air market under a southern sky. I remember such a shop where the
+girls were in various factory costumes, some at the machines in khaki and
+some in cream-coloured overalls and caps; some, who were 'trucking', or
+removing the product in boxes, were in cream trouser-suits, with smart
+head-dresses fashioned from brightly-coloured oriental handkerchiefs. In
+between the rows of girls men in dark suits were passing to and fro, now
+stopping to examine, or alter a machine and now taking up a box of
+bullets and pouring out its glittering contents like a silver stream, so
+that the output from each worker might be weighed and assessed.
+
+Through an open door, at one side of the shop, one could see other men,
+like stern magicians, dropping cartridges into vats of acid, and just to
+the side of the vats I caught sight of two girls vigorously shaking a sack
+of cartridges, hot from the furnace. As they shook, they sang an army
+refrain: 'Take me back to dear old Blighty,' with a chorus of laughter. At
+the extreme end of the shop, near the door whence the product made its
+exit, were long narrow tables, piled with bullets, reminding one of a haul
+of silver sprats on the quay-side. These were the inspecting tables where
+the bullets receive minute attention from women viewers.
+
+The women's work in the bullet-shop is of extraordinary interest to the
+onlooker, although many of the processes must be infinitely more
+monotonous, from the worker's standpoint, than operations in other
+munitions productions. The elongation of the little metal vessel,
+resembling an acorn-cup, into a full-length cartridge, or bullet,
+necessitates many operations in which the dexterity of human fingers and
+the ingenuity of the machine both come into play. In the shop I recall, in
+one machine employed for semi-annealing, the cartridge was being 'fed'
+into a metal revolving plate. This passed behind an asbestos screen into a
+double row of gas jets, where the semi-annealing or hardening process was
+being accomplished. The dexterity of the operators was so great that one
+woman was often feeding two machines, apparently without effort, and never
+missed placing the cartridge into the correct aperture in the revolving
+plate.
+
+In another process, I watched young girls sitting round a table and
+placing bullets into circular apertures in small trays, resembling
+solitaire-boards. Many of the girls were working with such speed that it
+was impossible to follow the movements of their fingers, but they,
+unconscious of their prowess, worked with averted heads, smiling in
+amusement at the visitor's astonishment.
+
+In yet another operation, it was the machine that held one's attention.
+The operator was feeding cartridges into a metal band which slipped out of
+view while the process of 'tapering' was performed. When finished, a metal
+thumb and index finger appeared, which delicately picked up the
+cartridges, one by one, and threw them aside. The displaced cartridge then
+hopped out of the machine into a box at the side of the machine.
+
+Entranced by the many mysteries in the production of cartridges and
+bullets in the shop I am recalling, I had not noticed that the
+tea-interval had arrived, and suddenly found that the work-room was almost
+empty of human beings. Only two girls remained. They were sitting sewing,
+whilst they devoured thick slices of bread and butter out of a newspaper
+packet. The woman inspector, who was my guide, turned sharply. 'What are
+you doing here?' she said, 'Eating your tea in the workshop, instead of
+outside, or in the canteen. Be off at once into the fresh air.' Then, with
+the indignation fading out of a good-humoured face: 'What next?' she said.
+
+Looking out of the open door at the streams of bright and happy girls
+laughing, singing, dancing, and running, as only healthy youth can do in
+the midst of these dark days of war, I seemed to see other and brighter
+days ahead stretching out into the years of the future, when the workfolk
+would all taste a fuller joy in life. With renewed hope, I gave her back
+her challenge: 'Well! and what next?'
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV: AT WORK--II
+
+THE MAKING OF AIRCRAFT--OPTICAL INSTRUMENTS--IN THE SHIPYARDS
+
+
+_The Making of Aircraft_
+
+The production of aircraft, undertaken in this country on a large scale
+only since the outbreak of the war, has fallen more naturally into the
+hands of women. The work is for the most part light, and the new
+factories, often erected in open country, are bright, airy, and largely
+free from the noise of machinery. Added to these special attractions to
+the woman worker, there is apparently a distinct appeal to the youth of
+both sexes and to women of all ages in anything connected with the art of
+flying.
+
+It is no secret that our output of aircraft is steadily increasing, and
+that during 1917 it has been doubled. In one factory in London, the output
+has been trebled within three months; in Lancashire, there are instances
+in which it has been doubled, and other areas show an improved production
+varying from 25 to 50 per cent. Yet the increased demand for labour for
+this work has always been immediately answered, and there is a steady flow
+into the factories of the best type of women workers from every class of
+society. Here and there, one already meets a woman who, during the short
+period of the war, has risen to be manager or partner in an aircraft
+factory. Unconsciously, such a one emphasizes the fact that the mastery of
+the element of the future is likely to be an affair of both the sexes.
+
+A visit to any aeroplane factory repeats the hint, and reveals the
+extraordinary versatility of skill latent in women, which can well be
+applied to this form of industry. 'Women _must_ have been cabin'd,
+cribbed, and confined before the war', said a foreman in taking me over
+his shop in an aircraft works. 'Look what they can do at this kind of job,
+and yet many of them are ladies, from homes where they sat about and were
+waited upon.' The wonder of it cannot fail to impress a visitor, since
+only four years ago women were allowed to undertake in aircraft
+construction merely those parts which convention deemed suitable for
+feminine fingers: such processes, for instance, as the sewing of the wings
+by hand, or by machine, or the painting of the woodwork.
+
+[Illustration: ENGRAVING METAL PARTS FOR COMPASSES]
+
+[Illustration: COLOURING AEROPLANE PLANES]
+
+[Illustration: CHIPPING AND GRINDING BLADES OF CAST IRON PROPELLER WITH
+PORTABLE TOOLS]
+
+[Illustration: WOMAN ACTING AS MATE TO JOINER. MAKING SEA-PLANE FLOATS]
+
+To-day, they undertake almost every other process both at the carpenter's
+bench and in the engineering shop, and the chief impression you carry away
+from a stroll through such a factory is that the women are thoroughly at
+home in the work. The operations are often so clean that the workers'
+overalls and caps of the daintiest shades of pink, blue, white, and
+heliotrope, remain fresh; the material for aeroplane parts is usually so
+light that the handling of it presents no difficulty to a slip of a girl.
+When within the works, the visitor is constantly stimulated to the thought
+that the hand which rocks the cradle should obviously be the one to make
+the air-machine.
+
+One expects, of course, women's familiarity with the occupation in the
+room where the fine Irish linen is cut out and fashioned into wings. One
+is not surprised at the facility with which the measuring and cutting out
+are accomplished, and, maybe, an emotion of admiration arises, similar to
+that evoked by the contemplation of old tapestries, when one watches the
+hand-sewing of a seam in a wing of some 10 feet in length. Not a stitch of
+the button-holing of such a seam deviates by a hairbreadth from its
+fellows. Such work has, however, been women's province through the ages.
+
+But a new sensation is awakened in the carpenter's shop where women are
+working with dexterity at the bench, handling woodwork like the men, now
+dealing with delicate wooden ribs, or again, fashioning propellers out of
+mahogany or walnut with such nicety that there is not the slightest
+deviation between the dimensions of a pair. In the room where the linen is
+stretched over the wooden ribs, I have seen women working with tiny
+hammers, giving fairy blows that never miss their mark on tiny nails.
+
+It is with fascination that a visitor stands by be-goggled women as they
+undertake the welding of metal joints by the oxy-acetylene process. Here,
+conscientiousness is a vital quality in the operator, since an undetected
+flaw in the weld, as a works foreman recently remarked, 'might easily send
+an airman to Kingdom Come'. For this process, women of education are more
+often selected.
+
+It is with awe that you watch the women at work on the metal parts of the
+aeroplane, drilling, grinding, boring, milling on the machine, or
+soldering tiny aluminum parts for the fuselage, and in each process
+gauging and re-gauging, measuring and re-measuring. Women also work on
+aero-engines, and help in the manufacture of the magneto, the very heart
+of the machine. They even undertake special processes, which before the
+war were only entrusted to a select body of men. I stood one day, for
+example, watching a woman splicing steel rope, a process undertaken in
+pre-war days by sailors. She was working with extraordinary speed and
+unconcern, and had learned the job in three or four days. Before then, she
+told me, she had been her employer's cook.
+
+But the most alluring scene of all is the assembling of aircraft. The
+infinite number of separate parts are now ready; they have been tested by
+factory overlookers and retested by Government inspectors. The greatest
+care is taken in these examinations: it is the only possible insurance of
+the lives of the brave youths on their journey above the clouds. All the
+workers know this, and the seriousness of the job is reflected on their
+faces. But now all the parts are ready and to hand in the Erecting
+shop. Then wings and propeller are added to body, the engine and
+leather-upholstered seats introduced, the electric apparatus fitted up,
+the compass, ammunition box and other instruments and weapons placed in
+position.
+
+The aeroplane is at length complete, and stands in the hangar like some
+great bird, with outstretched pinions, awaiting its first flight into the
+Unknown. Women undertake every process of this assembling, and have
+acquired familiarity with all the parts. This was put to the test recently
+in a certain works when a woman operator was directed to dismantle a
+machine. Without hesitation, she stripped the complex network of the
+structural stay-wires and the control wires, and then re-assembled them,
+correct in every particular, at the first attempt.
+
+
+_Optical Instruments_
+
+Of the many industries developed by the war, the production of optical
+instruments offers a striking example of rapid progress. Before 1914, the
+optical glass industry of Europe was largely in the hands of Germany and
+Austria, and the outbreak of hostilities meant the total closing of that
+market to the Allies. The lack of optical instruments thus occasioned was
+at first a source of grave national peril, since optical glass provides,
+as it were, eyes for both Navy and Army. The eyes of the guns are the
+range-finder, the director, the sighting telescope, periscope, prism
+binoculars, and other instruments for observing fire and correcting the
+aim; the tank would be blind without its periscope, and observations are
+made from aircraft by means of photographic cameras and lenses.
+
+At sea, the tale is repeated; the submarine requires at least one eye, and
+the submarine chaser needs many, while, by means of optical instruments,
+the naval gunner can fire at a target which is about 15 to 20 miles away.
+The very health of the army depends, in great measure, on optical glass,
+since the Royal Army Medical Corps fights malaria and other diseases due
+to parasites, which must be magnified by a microscope a thousand times
+before they can be identified. Hence, the solution of the problem of
+optical munitions was a vital matter in the early days of the war.
+
+With characteristic energy, Great Britain set to work and soon restored a
+languishing trade. The task was enormous; the industry had to be revived
+from its very foundations. The production of the peculiar types of glass
+required for optical instruments in itself presented a formidable
+obstacle, even its principal ingredient, a special quality of sand, being
+formerly derived mainly from Fontainebleau and Belgium. But by widespread
+investigation efficient substitutes were soon discovered, the problem of
+mixing the ingredients was at length solved, formulæ for special glasses
+devised, and we are now producing large quantities of optical glass of
+perfect quality. The production of the raw material was, however, only a
+first step in obtaining an adequate supply of optical instruments.
+
+Numbers of delicate processes stand between the rough glass and the
+finished implement. The glass must be cut, ground, and curved exactly to
+the requisite design, which in itself takes many days of high mathematical
+computation; it must be smoothed and polished, cleaned with meticulous
+care, and adjusted to a nicety in the particular instrument for which it
+is fashioned. The difficulties and pitfalls are incalculable; from start
+to finish the glass obeys no fixed laws, but answers only to the skilled
+handling of the scientist and craftsman. 'Optical glass is the mule of
+materials', comments a recent writer with sincerity.
+
+The absence of requisite labour for what was practically a new industry
+was a serious menace, and it is to the credit of Englishwomen that, as
+soon as the need for their services in this direction was made known, they
+stepped without hesitation into this unfamiliar and highly skilled
+industry. Their success therein is remarkable, and many, from such
+callings as high-class domestic service, kindergarten instruction, music
+teaching, blouse and dressmaking, have achieved a wonderful record in the
+delicate and highly technical processes of lens-smoothing and polishing
+and in the production of prisms of faultless polish and cut.
+
+There is, I take it, no more interesting munitions development than in
+factories where these lenses and prisms are produced. The work is so fine
+and so delicate that one feels it might be more suitably transferred for
+manipulation to elves, or fairy folk, who might undertake the various
+processes standing at a large-sized toad-stool. But with the stern reality
+of war upon us, willing feminine fingers have had to be trained to handle
+these lenses, the smallest of which, when ranged in trays, resemble a
+collection of dewdrops, and the largest of which would easily fill the
+port-hole of an ocean-liner.
+
+Optical glass when it comes into the workshop has the appearance of small
+blocks of rough ice of a greyish hue. These blocks are roughly sliced and
+cut into shape by a rotating metal disk charged with diamond dust. The
+prisms and lenses in their initial stage are then handed on to women, who
+complete the work on their surfaces. Each process has its particular lure
+for the interested visitor. You may watch the slices of glass being shaped
+into prisms by handwork against the tool; you may follow these embryo
+prisms through the various processes of smoothing and polishing until a
+small magnifying prism is obtained for use in a magnetic compass, or until
+a large prism is completed suitable for a submarine periscope. You may
+follow the creation of a lens from the roughing and grinding of the glass
+slices with emery, or carborundum, until the approximate shape is given,
+or you may follow a later process of sticking the smaller lenses on to
+pitch, so that they may form a single surface for smoothing and polishing.
+
+Again, you may watch the superlatively difficult operation of centring a
+lens. This task is necessary to ensure the polished surfaces of the lens
+running perfectly true and it requires a skilled touch and a trained eye
+to undertake it satisfactorily.
+
+In a shop in a certain optical munitions factory I met the first woman who
+worked a centring machine in that area. She was formerly a housemaid, and
+told me that, at first, all the men had discouraged her from the job and
+had said it was 'impossible for a woman to do such work'. But she 'stuck
+it'--so she said--and in a few weeks, to her own surprise and the men's
+dismay, this peculiarly skilled job became familiar to her. 'Now I feel I
+am doing something,' she said in triumph. This sentiment was echoed by
+another worker in that factory who was accomplishing the surprising task
+of 'chamfering', or putting a tiny bevel onto the edge of a lens.
+
+The large lenses measure only 2 inches in diameter; the smaller ones are
+about the size of a threepenny bit, and every operation, whether grinding,
+trueing, smoothing, polishing, or centring, must be accomplished with the
+utmost care. Even the final process in the manufacture of the lens or
+prism, 'wiping off', is fraught with responsibility to the operator.
+'Wiping off,' or cleaning the lens, can only be done with a silken duster,
+for the finished glass, like a dainty lady, will tolerate the touch of
+nothing coarse.
+
+In cases where the glass is graticulated, or marked with fine lines for
+measurement purposes, the task of 'wiping off' is of extraordinary
+difficulty; in the opinion of at least one foreman with whom I have
+discussed this question, the operation is only perfectly successful when
+performed by a girl's fingers. It is of supreme importance that no speck
+of dirt or hint of grease from a finger-mark be left on the glass when
+finally adjusted, or the instrument would become a source of danger to the
+user. No wonder that the feeling of the optical instrument workshop
+expresses itself in the words: 'Cleanliness is more than godliness at this
+job.'
+
+The completed glass at length reaches the stage where it is set in its
+instrument, be it periscope, dial-sight, telescope, and so on. Although
+the most exact measurements have been observed both in the metal part and
+on the glass, small adjustments are necessary; for the fit must be so
+perfect that even if the metal case suffers shell-shock, the glass must
+still not rattle. But it is the metal alone which is submitted to
+alteration, and it is wonderful how women have been able to obtain
+sufficient dexterity to make these infinitesimal changes in the metal
+parts. One can see a mere girl undertaking such a task by giving the metal
+three or four delicate strokes from a file so fine that it would not hurt
+a baby's skin. Meantime, the lens or prism is finally examined (also by
+women) for size, scratches, and other imperfections, and is then
+re-cleaned. Girls and women take a full share in the production of the
+metal parts for the optical instruments and also assemble, or collect the
+parts, for the adjustment of the glass, but so far they do not generally
+adjust or test the completed instrument.
+
+The operations used in the production of optical instruments for war
+purposes are, of course, similar to those required in the manufacture of
+implements used in peace-time, such as opera-glasses, telescopes,
+microscopes, surveying instruments, photographic and cinematograph
+apparatus, &c., and it is expected that women who have entered the new
+war-time industry will happily find themselves, when peace dawns, in
+possession of a permanent means of livelihood in a skilled occupation.
+
+
+_In the Shipyards_
+
+'Ships, ships, and still ships': such is the main need of the Allies in
+this, the fourth year of the war. To answer this demand, every dockyard in
+the country is working at the highest pressure. Into this work, strange as
+it may seem to those familiar with the rough-and-tumble life of a
+shipyard, women have penetrated and have so far surmounted all obstacles
+in the tasks to which they have been allocated.
+
+At first, dilution in shipyards was looked upon as a hazardous experiment.
+The work is mostly heavy and clumsy, and the type of men undertaking it,
+splendid fellows enough in their physique and general outlook, are mainly
+accustomed to dealings with the boisterous elements and with men comrades
+of their own pattern. Their attitude towards women, it was feared, would
+make for trouble immediately that the other sex was introduced as
+fellow-workers. Even the most optimistic amongst shipbuilders were aghast
+at the idea of women working shoulder to shoulder with men on board ship.
+Yet here and there a pioneer employer has arisen, and the experiment has
+been tried. It is succeeding unquestionably.
+
+I have been into the shipyards and seen the amazing sight and am convinced
+of its expediency, at all events as a war-time measure. Special care must,
+of course, be taken in the planning and the supervision of women's work on
+board ship, but given the right type of inspectress, charge hand, and
+workers, there is no reason why women should not, in increasing numbers,
+fill the gaps in the shipyards, as in the factories. The women chosen to
+undertake such tasks are well aware of the service they are rendering to
+the nation at this juncture, and to the women workers the first day on
+board ship is one of supreme happiness. 'They are so excited when they
+actually get on board,' said a dockyard inspectress to me recently 'that
+they forget all about the difficulties and objections to the work.' It is
+well that this is so, for it is not too easy for the novice to move about
+below, even on a big battleship.
+
+I was taken over one where the women were working. It was in a big yard
+crammed with shipping of every kind--so full that one could echo the words
+of the old Elizabethan, who said of a crowd: 'There was not room for a
+snail to put out its horns.' A stiff breeze was blowing, and the sea
+beyond ran full and blue. The great battleship along the dock lay serene
+and stately, bearing, as it were, with grim humour the meddlesome tappings
+and chippings of impertinent human beings, who presumed to furbish her up.
+There were men on the conning-tower, busy with paint-pots, and there was a
+tangle of ropes and pots on the upper decks where the guns were biding
+their time. Men were calling lustily to each other, and were darting here
+and there as brisk and wholesome as the breeze.
+
+'We go down here,' said the inspectress, pointing to a ladder as steep as
+the side of a house. She bounded down with the ease of an antelope.
+Another ladder, and yet another. The inspectress seemed to have forgotten
+their steep incline and I was left, a helpless landlubber, cautiously
+descending step by step. When I joined her in the engine-room she was
+already deep in conversation with one of her staff. And then I noticed the
+secret aid to her agility. All the women aboard ship were dressed in
+trouser suits. The suits, of blue drill for the supervisors, and of a
+similar material in brown for the labourers, were made with a short tunic,
+and the trousers were buckled securely at the ankle. A tight-fitting cap
+to match completed the smart workmanlike costume which permits of perfect
+freedom of movement in confined places. Without such a costume it would be
+hardly possible for women to work on board.
+
+The women workers on this particular battleship were engaged in renewing
+electric wires and fittings, a job which requires a good deal of care and
+accuracy. On the lower deck, they were fitting up new cables and were
+perched in high places, here 'sweating in' a distribution box, there
+marking off the position for the wires. Others were drilling holes, others
+again were 'tapping', or making a thread in the holes. In the engine-room
+the women were busy stripping worn-out electric wiring and were working by
+the light of tall candles, as merry as a party preparing a Christmas tree.
+
+Everywhere the women were working in pairs, an arrangement found
+especially advisable on board. Behind a small iron door we found one
+couple working on a fire-control in a nook where the entrance of a single
+visitor caused bad overcrowding. 'These are my mice', said the
+inspectress; 'they always get away into the cupboard-jobs, and very well
+they work there too. But we have to maintain a strict discipline on board,
+far stricter than anything known in the factories.'
+
+No talking, I was informed, is allowed in that dockyard, during the
+working hours on board, between the sailors or men labourers and the women
+and there is constant supervision of the women employed. These work on
+board in parties of 20-22, each party being under the care of a charge
+hand. When the staff included three charge hands for supervision on board,
+an inspectress was appointed for this special branch of the work. The
+system seems to work well, and I noticed how the men and women had
+evidently accepted each other as comrades. Coming into a secluded gangway
+a man-labourer, who had finished his job, was unconcernedly shaving before
+a square of mirror, while two or three women just beyond went on, just as
+unconcernedly, tap, tapping at the electric fittings. There was no
+chaffing, no 'larking', between the men and women, but a sense of
+comradeship, such as one notices in a Co-education School.
+
+The women on electric-wiring receive, in that dockyard, one month's
+instruction on dummy bulk-heads before going on board; their
+instructors--expert men--accompany them to the number of two to every
+party of twenty or so, and remain with them for ten to twelve months.
+After that, the women are able to work without an instructor, and I was an
+eyewitness to this arrangement on a cargo vessel, where electric wiring
+was also being undertaken.
+
+Besides the work on board, women in dockyards are employed in the various
+engineering shops where almost every description of construction and
+repair work for vessels is undertaken. I have seen numbers of women at
+work in such an electrical department, winding armatures, making parts for
+firing-gear, polishing, or buffing and repairing electrical apparatus, &c.
+The work in such a repair section is full of interest and variety. From
+day to day the operators receive consignments of electrical apparatus
+damaged on board by the elements, or worse. Great dispatch is needed, and
+the women work with the utmost zeal and efficiency. I noticed them
+undertaking such varying operations as lackering guards for lamps and
+radiator fronts, repairing junction and section boxes, fire-control
+instruments, automatic searchlights, &c., and they were turning out their
+work, the foreman said, just like men. In the constructional department,
+women are now employed in making bulkhead pieces, or metal-work of various
+kinds, in oxy-acetylene welding, and occasionally in the foundry.
+
+When it is recollected that before the war only elderly women--the
+grandmothers--were, generally speaking, employed in the dockyards, and
+those only on such ornamental tasks as flag-making or upholstery for
+yachts, it is hardly credible that the granddaughters are now working
+successfully on intricate processes and even at jobs where physical
+strength is a qualification. 'We can hardly believe our eyes,' said a
+foreman recently, 'when we see the heavy stuff brought to and from the
+shops in motor lorries driven by girls. Before the war it was all carted
+by horses and men. The girls do the job all right though, and the only
+thing they ever complain about is that their toes get cold.' 'They don't
+now', said a strapping young woman-driver, overhearing the conversation.
+'We've got hot-water tins.' Then, in a low voice, for my ears alone, 'I
+love my work, it's ever so interesting.'
+
+It is this note that one finds above all, amongst the women in the
+dockyards. The spirit of the sea, the almost forgotten heritage of an
+island population, has been stirred once more, and the sight of the good
+ships in harbour thrills the woman-worker, as the man, with a sense of
+independence, freedom, and love for 'this England, ... this precious stone
+set in the silver sea'.
+
+No wonder that Englishwomen find their work in the dockyards 'ever so
+interesting'.
+
+[Illustration: CUTTING FRAYED-EDGED TAPE]
+
+[Illustration: BRAZING TURBINE ROTOR SEGMENT]
+
+[Illustration: MOUNTING CARDS FOR DRY COMPASSES]
+
+[Illustration: TREADLE POLISHING-MACHINES, FOR SMOOTHING LENSES]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V: COMFORT AND SAFETY
+
+WELFARE SUPERVISION--PROTECTIVE CLOTHING--REST-ROOMS AND FIRST AID--WOMEN
+POLICE
+
+
+The problems arising from the sudden employment of thousands of women in
+the factories have obviously been connected not only with the technical
+training of the workers and with the adaptation of machinery to their
+physical strength. Something had to be done, and that without delay, to
+ensure the comfort and safety in the workshops of these new-comers to
+industrial life.
+
+In the first great rush for an increased munitions supply, war emergency
+dictated the temporary suppression of the Factory Acts. There was no demur
+within the factory gates. Women worked without hesitation from twelve to
+fourteen hours a day, or a night, for seven days a week, and with the
+voluntary sacrifice of public holidays. Their home conditions in a vast
+number of cases offered no drop of consolation. Many of these women were
+immigrants from remote corners of the Empire, or from faraway towns and
+villages of the United Kingdom. Housing accommodation in crowded
+industrial areas, or in a thinly populated countryside, was strained to
+breaking-point. Undaunted, these workers--many of whom had previously led
+an entirely sheltered life--rose before dawn to travel long distances to
+the factory, and returned to take alternative possession with a
+night-shift worker of a part share of a bedroom. The shameful conditions
+to which the factory children were subjected at the period of the
+Industrial Revolution seemed about to return.
+
+
+_Welfare Supervision_
+
+Such a state of things could not be tolerated, and Mr. Lloyd George, then
+Minister of Munitions, grasped the situation. 'The workers of to-day', he
+said, 'are the mothers of to-morrow. In a war of workshops the women of
+Britain were needed to save Britain; it was for Britain to protect them.'
+Measures were immediately adopted to improve the conditions of the workers
+in the factory. A Departmental Committee was appointed to consider all
+questions relating to the health of munition workers, and at the Ministry
+of Munitions, on their recommendation, a Welfare and Health Department was
+established, charged with 'securing a high standard of conditions for all
+workers in munitions factories and more especially for the women and
+juvenile employees'. Since then, step by step the machinery is being set
+in motion for improving the conditions of life of munition workers.
+
+Yet Welfare work in the factory is no new thing in England. In pre-war
+days it had not, it is true, reached as widespread a development as in the
+United States, but as long ago as 1792 it was in practice in this country
+under another name. It is recorded of that period of one David Dale, whose
+factory was a model to his contemporaries, that he 'gave his money by
+shovelfuls to his employees' to find that 'God shovelled it back again.'
+From the early part of the nineteenth century, sporadic attempts were
+successfully made to improve the conditions of the factory workers over
+and above the requirements of legislation, and before 1914 a number of
+enlightened factory owners had won renown by the practice of Welfare work
+within their precincts. The seal of official sanction has, however, only
+been gained since the war, through the influx of women into munitions
+trades.[1]
+
+The Health of Munitions Workers Committee has, since its inception,
+investigated at factory after factory such questions as the employment of
+women, hours of labour, Sunday labour, juvenile employment, industrial
+fatigue, canteen equipment, the dietary of workers. It has published its
+conclusions in memoranda, stripped bare of officialism, so as to reveal
+with frankness facts acquired by scientists in touch with reality.
+
+Working in connexion with this Committee is the Welfare and Health
+Department of the Ministry of Munitions. It follows closely the
+suggestions of the experts, its Welfare officers moving up and down the
+country, now offering a suggestion to the management of a factory, and
+again, assimilating some practical experiment in Welfare work, originated
+by a progressive factory-directorate. Thus, a pooling of ideas is being
+effected, and isolated experiments of value are now being propagated
+throughout the country.
+
+But possibly one of the most valuable tasks of the Welfare and Health
+Department is the selection and training of candidates for the work of
+Welfare Supervision in the factories. A panel of approved candidates is
+kept in readiness, so that a busy factory-manager may have at hand a
+choice of Welfare workers who will, if necessary, undertake the entire
+supervision of the personal interests of his female, or juvenile staff.
+These officers, after engagement by the factory management, are
+responsible solely to the firms that employ them and not to the Ministry
+of Munitions. In establishments where T.N.T. (Tri-nitro-toluene) is
+handled, the presence of a lady Welfare Supervisor is compulsory; in all
+National factories such an officer is recognized as a necessary part of
+the staff; and in Controlled Establishments, where a number of female
+operators are employed, the management is officially encouraged to make
+such an appointment.
+
+In many cases, engineering shops are for the first time employing female
+operators, and the management depute with relief all questions as to the
+personal requirements of the 'new labour' to the lady superintendent; in
+other instances, such matters as the engagement of the employees, canteen
+arrangements, and so on, are placed in the hands of other officials.
+Hence, the duties of the lady Welfare Supervisor differ from factory to
+factory. Generally speaking, the supervisor, or lady superintendent within
+the factory is made responsible for some, or all, of the following
+matters:
+
+1. She aids, or is entirely responsible for, the selection of women,
+girls, and boys for employment.
+
+2. The general behaviour of the women and girls inside the factory falls
+under her purview.
+
+3. The transfer of a woman employee from one process to another is
+suggested by the Welfare Supervisor where health considerations make such
+an alteration advisable.
+
+4. She is consulted on general grounds with regard to the dismissal of
+women and girls.
+
+5. Factory conditions come under her observation, and reports are made,
+when necessary, to the management, on the cleanliness, ventilation, or
+warmth of the establishment.
+
+6. The necessity of the provision of seats is suggested, where this is
+possible.
+
+7. In large factories, where the canteen is under separate management, the
+Welfare Supervisor reports as to whether the necessary facilities are
+available for the women employees. In smaller factories, the Welfare
+Supervisor may be called upon to manage the canteen.
+
+8. While not responsible, except in small factories, for actual attention
+to accidents, the Welfare Supervisor works in close touch with the factory
+doctors and nurses. She also helps in the selection of the nurses, and
+should see that their work is carried out promptly. She supervises the
+keeping of all records of accidents and illness in the ambulance room, and
+of all maternity cases noted in the factory. She keeps in touch with all
+cases of serious accident or illness and with the Compensation Department
+inside the works.
+
+9. She supervises cloak-rooms and selects the staff of attendants
+necessary for these.
+
+10. The protective clothing supplied to the women at work comes under her
+supervision.
+
+In large establishments where the female and juvenile staff is counted by
+the thousand, these multifarious duties are necessarily divided among many
+individuals, and the Welfare work within the factory (Intra-mural Welfare,
+as it is now termed) develops into a Department. A typical example of such
+an evolution may be seen at the Royal Arsenal, Woolwich. In pre-war days,
+the female staff numbered 125; to-day some 25,000 women are there at work.
+
+The Welfare supervision is happily in charge of a super-woman. In addition
+to her manifold duties she has trained a staff of assistants who, like
+herself, spare no effort to promote the health and happiness of those
+under their care. I have stood many an hour in this super-woman's office
+and watched her, surrounded by a throng of workers, fitting new-comers
+into vacancies, listening to reasons from others for a desired
+transference, or advising as to work, or meals, health, or recreation. No
+girl was refused a hearing, however trivial the difficulty, and a
+grievance as to the colour of a factory cap was discussed with as much
+attention with one employee as the causes of a 'shop' disagreement was
+with another complainant. I have accompanied her on visits through the
+works (the entire tour would take almost a week to accomplish), and have
+noted the diplomacy with which a suggested improvement in ventilation, or
+a needed cloak-room alteration, was discussed with the official in charge,
+and carried through. I have seen the faces of rows of workers light up as
+this modern Florence Nightingale passed through their shop, and have
+walked through the Danger Zone amazed at the arrangements for the
+protection of the worker.
+
+What is true of the life in such large concerns as Woolwich Arsenal, or
+His Majesty's Factory, Gretna, is typical on a large scale of the
+development of Welfare work in many a munitions factory throughout the
+kingdom. Protective clothing has been universally adopted, ambulance-rooms
+and rest-rooms have been opened, cloak-room accommodation improved,
+canteens established, sane recreation encouraged, and the protection of a
+women-police service introduced. In short, an atmosphere is being
+introduced by which the old-time barrier between employer and employed is
+being helped to disappear.
+
+
+_Protective Clothing_
+
+So much has been accomplished since the advent of women in the munitions
+factories with regard to protective clothing for the worker that the
+subject might well fill a chapter to itself. A separate Department in the
+Ministry of Munitions now concerns itself solely with its supply, and is
+continually experimenting with improvements in aprons, gloves, boots,
+caps, and tunics. Cotton overalls are now generally worn by the women
+employees and much thought has been given to the production of these
+garments in suitable materials and design. They are made with firmly
+stitched belts and with inset pockets, so as to avert accidents by contact
+of loose ends in the machinery, and are more often in the popular shades
+of khaki, or brown, with scarlet facings, or dark blue faced with crimson.
+But there is no set rule either as to colour, or design, so long as the
+principle of protection is followed.
+
+Caps, which at first were much disliked by the workers, have at length
+found general favour, not, it is true, by reason of the immunity they
+offer against accident, but because they have been fashioned so as to add
+'chic' to the wearer. They are usually of the 'Mob,' or 'Dutch' variety,
+and match the overall in colour and texture; they are all designed so that
+there is no pressure round the head. Sometimes, the cap of safety has been
+skilfully used as a mark of distinction, and one may see, in a shop
+staffed by women, the operators at the machines in khaki headgear, the
+setters-up of machines in scarlet caps, and the overlookers or inspectors
+of the product in bright blue head-dress.
+
+For wet and dusty work there are trouser suits in cotton, woollen, or
+mackintosh, or tunic suits with knee breeches and leggings, or gaiters.
+Mackintosh coats are also provided for outdoor work in shipyards, or for
+trucking and lorrying, or for overhead crane-work within the factory.
+
+Acid-proof and oil-proof aprons are now furnished for certain operations,
+and for other processes specially prepared gloves are supplied. The
+varieties in workshop gloves are now very great; they are made in such
+materials as india-rubber, canvas, or leather, or a union of these three,
+or in teon-faced canvas or teon-faced leather. Some are cuffless; others,
+for work in acids, have turned-up cuffs, and others again are gauntlets
+reaching the elbow. In every case, the process for which they are provided
+is minutely studied, and the fashion adopted is dictated by utility.
+
+Footgear has also received a considerable amount of attention, and there
+are now available Wellington boots, or half-Wellingtons, for outdoor work,
+or wooden clogs for processes in the shops where the flooring is apt to
+become persistently wet.
+
+But, possibly, factory fashions receive most care when designed for
+wearers in Filling shops. For these, suits in wool lasting-cloth are found
+satisfactory, the most popular and smartest being in cream-colour, faced
+with scarlet. Fire-proofed blue serge overalls and asbestos coats with
+caps of the same material are also employed in certain of these factories.
+For work in the Danger Zone no metal fasteners are permissible, and the
+coat, or overall, is cut so as to protect the neck and throat from contact
+with the powder used in the process.
+
+Boots and shoes for this type of work are also specially designed. No iron
+must enter into their composition, the soles being either machine-sewn, or
+riveted with brass. Sometimes, cloth and india-rubber over-shoes are the
+chosen footwear of the Danger Zone, and in this case the fasteners must
+also be free from iron. These precautions are no mere fad, but essential
+safeguards where friction between a fragment of iron and a combustible
+powder might lead to an explosion. Respirators, and in some cases veils,
+are also needful accessories of the Filling factory, and these too are
+provided for the workers.
+
+A complete factory uniform has thus evolved since the war: it is a model
+of suitable clothing for industrial work. Arising from within the
+workshops to meet essential needs, these fashions are not only free from
+vulgarity, or eccentricity, but have a distinct beauty of their own. It is
+unlikely that women, once accustomed to the comfort and cleanliness of
+such garments, will desire to return to the discredited habit of tarnished
+finery worn at work.
+
+
+_Rest-Rooms and First Aid_
+
+Ambulance and First-Aid work within the factory was not unusual even in
+pre-war days. Since the development of munitions production it has become
+almost a commonplace, and from December 1, 1917, its provision has been
+obligatory in blast furnaces, foundries, copper-mills, iron-mills, and
+metal works. Where T.N.T. is handled, the employment of at least one
+whole-time medical officer is compulsory, if the employees number 2,000,
+and, if in excess of that figure, at least one additional medical officer
+must be employed. The professional work of these doctors is supervised by
+the medical officers of the Welfare and Health Department, who also in a
+similar way supervise the safety of workers employed upon the manufacture
+of lethal gases.
+
+The extra expense involved in the provision of such safeguards is by no
+means unproductive. In one factory, for example, it has been estimated
+that 2,500 hours were saved in a single week by prompt attention to minor
+ailments; in another factory, where the firm meets all smaller claims for
+Workmen's Compensation, it was found that in a period of eighteen months
+following the establishment of a First-Aid organization, a credit balance
+of nearly £500 accrued to the management after all expenses connected with
+the factory doctor and the nurses had been defrayed.
+
+Tribute should be paid to the medical staff for their share in the triumph
+of First-Aid work within the munitions factory, for without their
+extraordinary devotion the record of misadventure would undoubtedly be
+higher. One hears from time to time how, in a temporary breakdown of such
+a staff, a single worker will hold the fort. A typical case is recorded in
+the press as I write. It tells of a young nurse who worked shifts of
+twenty-four hours at a stretch, for a fortnight, during the absence of her
+colleagues.
+
+The development of the factory rest-room and cloak-room has also been a
+marked feature in the munitions factories where women are employed.
+Formerly, it was usual to see the women workers' outdoor garments hung
+round the workshop walls; to-day, in numbers of munitions works, the
+women's cloak-rooms are provided with cupboards where hot pipes dry wet
+boots and clothing, where each girl has her own locker with lock and key,
+and where the maximum of wash-hand basins supplied with hot and cold water
+are set up. In T.N.T. workshops compulsory washing facilities are even
+more elaborate. Bath-rooms are available, as well as a generous supply of
+towels, and face ointment, or powder, are supplied as preventatives to any
+ill effects from handling explosives.
+
+Inside the workshops the spirit of reform is equally apparent; seats are
+provided where possible, and lifting-tackle, or sliding boards, are
+introduced to minimize strain when dealing with heavy weights. Sometimes,
+one hears how such improvements, suggested for the women employees, are
+extended to the men. At a certain engineering works, for example, where in
+pre-war days women had never been employed, it was suggested by a
+Government official that seats should be supplied for the women. The
+management looked askance. It would be 'such a bad example to the
+apprentices', it was said. The point was, however, pressed, and after a
+short time the suggestion materialized. The manager then stated, with
+surprised satisfaction, that the seats 'seemed to renew people', and he
+had accordingly extended the improvement to the men.
+
+
+_Women Police_
+
+One of the most recent developments in the protection of women in the
+factories is the employment of women police. In the summer of 1916, when
+it was found necessary to obtain further control and supervision of the
+women employees in munitions works, Sir Edward Henry, the Chief
+Commissioner of Police, recommended that the Ministry of Munitions should
+apply to the Women Police Service for a supply of trained women police.
+This request has now created an extensive development of such work, and
+to-day women police are undertaking numerous duties in munitions works.
+They check the entry of women into the factory; examine passports; search
+for such contraband as matches, cigarettes, and alcohol; deal with
+complaints of petty offences; assist the magistrates at the police court,
+and patrol the neighbourhood of the factory with a view to the protection
+of the women employed.
+
+As many of the works have been erected in lonely places, and as the shifts
+are worked by night as well as by day, it can easily be imagined what a
+safeguard to the young employee is the presence of these female guardians
+of the peace. Even within the precincts of the factory, the security
+assured by the patrolling police-women is of great importance, since many
+of the factories are built on isolated plots extending perhaps six miles
+from barrier to barrier, and within these boundaries women are often
+employed in isolated huts, should they be engaged on the production of
+explosives. The preventive work of the women police is, in these areas,
+incalculable.
+
+In such ways, Welfare work has taken root in the factories of Britain, and
+in the words of Mr. Lloyd George, 'it is a strange irony, but no small
+compensation, that the making of weapons of destruction should afford the
+occasion to humanize industry. Yet such is the case.'
+
+[Illustration: SLITTING AND ROUGHING OPTICAL GLASS]
+
+[Illustration: VIEW OF CANTEEN KITCHEN]
+
+[Illustration: WEIGHING FERRO CHROME FOR ANALYSIS]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI: OUTSIDE WELFARE
+
+RECREATION--MOTHERHOOD--THE FACTORY NURSERY
+
+
+_Recreation_
+
+The gift in the early days of munitions development of several thousands
+of pounds from an Indian prince, the Maharajah of Gwalior, for the benefit
+of munitions employees, helped to focus attention from the outset on their
+needful recreation. The necessity for a maximum output, bringing in its
+train long shifts, overtime, and a minimum of holidays, at first left
+scant leisure at the munition girl's disposal, yet it was at once apparent
+that some effort must be made to render that leisure healthful and
+invigorating. As soon as the Welfare Supervisors took up their positions
+in the factories and came into living touch with the needs of the women
+employed, requests found their way to the Ministry of Munitions for grants
+for recreation purposes from the Maharajah's fund.
+
+At first, 'a piano for the recreation-room or canteen' was the more
+general appeal; for, strangely enough, after the long hours in the
+engineering shops the normal munitions girl craves most, not for passive
+amusement, such as 'the pictures', but for free movements of her own body.
+Above all, she desires to dance, or to enjoy the rhythm of physical drill,
+or, in the summer, to swim or dive, or to chase a ball in one or other of
+the popular team games. Within doors, the piano provides, as it were, a
+spring-board from which she can jump into a leisure-time atmosphere of
+merriment; it is the send-off to her dance, the guide to her song, and the
+backbone to the joy found in the united action of physical drill.
+
+The piano once provided in canteen, or recreation-room, you will find the
+munition girl footing it in the dinner-hour, or tea-interval, or in any
+other period when she is off duty. So long as the tune be bright, the
+merry-hearted munition-maker will dance the old dances, or the more
+complicated modern steps, as her mood suggests.
+
+From self-taught dancing, the desire for a more perfect expression in
+movement is a natural evolution, and in certain cases grants from the
+Maharajah's fund have defrayed the fees of dancing mistress, or sports
+instructor. Sums from the same source have been paid to assist the
+organization of a club, for the provision of a recreation-room, for the
+erection of swings and see-saws, for the installation of a swimming-bath,
+for tools and seeds for factory girls' gardens, for dramatic
+entertainments, for lectures for the instruction of apprentices, and in
+Ireland, for the enlargement of schools for children of women munition
+workers.
+
+Side by side with these endeavours, other efforts to promote sane
+amusement for munition makers have been fructifying. Many an enlightened
+factory employer, studying the problem of woman-labour within his own
+works, has come to the conclusion that 'if women are called upon to work
+continuously, especially at repetition jobs, their pleasure in life must
+be kept alive'. Being business men, they have soon turned the theory into
+practice, and have encouraged, started, and financed recreation schemes
+for their own employees.
+
+In Sheffield, for example, successful dramatic entertainments have been
+given, the actors and actresses emerging from the engineering shops; near
+Birmingham, a firm has provided a cinema, an orchestra, and a dancing-room
+for their workpeople, and on Saturday evenings, free conveyance in an
+omnibus is arranged for those workers resident in outlying hostels and
+married quarters.
+
+At Norwich, another firm has appointed a woman recreation officer to teach
+the girls physical drill, dancing, tennis, and other games. Dances and a
+fancy-dress ball have been organized there, and in the summer, tennis,
+bowls, and cricket are played in a large recreation ground. These are but
+a few instances, typical of the growing understanding amongst employers in
+this country of the value of playtime to a women's staff.
+
+Outside the factory other agencies have been at work, voluntarily
+attempting to provide rest and refreshment for the women whose sacrifices
+for the war are so great and so patiently endured. Such bodies as the
+Young Women's Christian Association or local Civic Associations have
+opened recreation clubs--sometimes for girls only and sometimes
+'mixed'--where concerts, dramatic entertainments, and lectures are given,
+and classes in useful arts or games are held. Women from the aristocracy
+and working women, civic authorities and the clergy, have joined hands
+throughout the country to help forward this effort for the physical,
+spiritual and intellectual recreation of the munitions worker.
+
+The very spontaneity and eagerness of the movement have naturally led here
+and there to overlapping, and in the spring of 1917 it was found advisable
+to co-ordinate local streams of goodwill and energy. A branch of the
+Welfare and Health Department of the Ministry of Munitions was thus
+established to keep in touch with all agencies outside the factory which
+deal with schemes regarding recreation, sickness, maternity-cases,
+crèches, housing, and transit facilities. Extra-mural Welfare officers
+have since been appointed to undertake such duties in various localities.
+These act as _liaison_ officers between existing associations of every
+denomination in a given district, and centralize all outside efforts for
+the protection and relaxation of the munition women of that area.
+
+The Welfare officer at first surveys carefully the needs of the district,
+and institutes an inquiry as to provisions for their satisfaction. If
+necessary, a conference is then called of individuals and representatives
+of local bodies dealing with these matters, and sub-committees are
+appointed for each part of the work. When the numbers of women workers are
+comparatively small in a given area and no adequate provision has been
+made for their recreation, a central club is often opened. In other
+localities, existing clubs, or institutions, are adapted to new
+requirements, or new ones are added, according to local needs. Where night
+shifts are worked in the local factories, it is usual to arrange the open
+hours of the club to suit the workshop leisure hours. Thus, a club may be
+open from 6 to 8 a.m.; at midday, for two hours, and again from 4.30 to
+9.30 p.m. In such cases, it is often necessary to employ paid club
+managers, as well as local voluntary help.
+
+The clubs, however, vary, both in scope and management, the general
+principle followed by the Welfare officer being to ensure provision for
+recreation, and then to leave the administration to local effort.
+Encouragement is given by the Ministry of Munitions to employers of
+Controlled Establishments and to the management of National factories to
+help forward the movement for recreation for their staffs by allowing
+Treasury grants out of excess profits to be made towards approved schemes.
+In many districts the grants are 'pooled' for recreation purposes for the
+whole area. Recreation for the munition worker thus rests on a secure
+basis. In the winter months, dancing, physical drill, theatricals, games,
+and classes are in full swing in the principal munitions areas, and in the
+summer, outdoor sports are encouraged, as well as the tending of vegetable
+plots and flower gardens.
+
+
+_Motherhood_
+
+A more difficult task falling to the 'Outside Welfare' officer is the
+supervision of maternity cases arising among munition workers. The
+all-important question of motherhood necessarily crops up in the factories
+where hundreds of thousands of women are in daily employment. Numbers of
+them are wives of men hard at work in war industries at home; others are
+war-widows, and while the illegitimate birth-rate has not gone up
+disproportionately in munitions areas, the unmarried mother, from time to
+time, presents a special problem.
+
+The care of the expectant mother necessarily begins within the factory
+gates. We have so far no published conclusions from an authoritative
+survey of this question, such as Dr. Bonnaire (Chief Professor of
+Midwifery at the Maternity Hospital, Paris) has provided for France, yet
+scientific investigations and experiments undertaken by the Health of
+Munition Workers' Committee are in progress. As far as possible, the women
+Welfare Supervisors within the works keep their management informed of
+maternity cases as they are noted, and, where possible, the expectant
+mother is placed on lighter work.
+
+No woman known to be in that condition is, after a certain period, kept on
+at night work, nor is she allowed to work in an explosives factory, nor
+yet to handle T.N.T. 'We send the girl to the doctor and we act on his
+advice. If we can keep her, we always take her off night work and heavy
+machines and where there is a good deal of exertion,' is a report typical
+of the procedure in such cases in many factories. 'It is too risky for an
+expectant mother to stay on at all,' is a characteristic opinion from a
+Filling Factory; and from a high-explosives factory comes the verdict that
+an expectant mother should, after a certain period, be discharged from the
+works in view of the occasional occurrence there of small explosions. Such
+maternity cases are, when possible, transferred, through local agencies,
+to lighter national work outside the factory.
+
+
+_The Factory Nursery_
+
+Closely connected with the safeguarding of motherhood is the case of the
+munition workers' children of pre-school age. After two months' interval
+from the baby's birth, many of the maternity cases from the factory return
+to their previous work, and the infant must, in the mother's absence, be
+nursed by others. A similar condition applies to the work of other mothers
+whose labour is required for munitions production.
+
+It sometimes happens that in a given area the call to the munitions
+factories has been answered by practically all the available women in the
+neighbourhood whose home ties are light, and the local labour reserve is
+found amongst the women with one or two young children. If these women are
+to offer their services, it is essential that their young family should
+not be neglected. Sometimes, the mothers are able to make their own
+arrangements and a 'minder', either a relative, or a neighbour, is
+forthcoming, but, generally speaking, such a plan is not satisfactory in a
+locality where every active individual is undertaking urgent war work.
+
+Thus has arisen in many districts the claim that a nursery for munition
+workers' children should be established. A local association, or an
+individual, often finds it possible to finance such a scheme; in other
+cases, monetary aid is required and obtained from the Ministry of
+Munitions. In the latter circumstances, the Ministry of Munitions,
+co-operating with the Board of Education, grants 75 per cent. of the
+approved expenditure on the initial provision and equipment of the
+nursery, as well as 7_d._ a day for each attendance of a child, the
+balance of the expenses being met partly by fees (varying from 7_d._ to
+1_s._ a day, or from 7_s._ 6_d._ to 9_s._ 6_d._ a week) charged to the
+mothers, and partly by contributions from the local originators of the
+scheme.
+
+Where night shifts are worked, the munition workers may claim night
+accommodation for their children; arrangements are also made to board the
+infants by the week. In the schemes approved by the Ministry it has
+generally been found possible to adapt existing buildings, but where no
+suitable accommodation is available within reasonable distance of the
+mothers' homes a new building is erected.
+
+Such a nursery has been erected near Woolwich and provides a useful model
+for this country. It is a long low building of bungalow type, surrounded
+by a small garden. The main room, the babies' parlour, is a long apartment
+enclosed on two sides by a verandah, and on the third, by a wide passage
+well ventilated at each end. The room itself is full of light and air,
+there is plenty of play room, and no awkward corners to inflict bruises
+unawares. A lengthy crawl brings a baby-boarder into the sunshine of the
+verandah and the safe seclusion of its play-pens, and a longer crawl and a
+hop is rewarded by entrance into the surrounding garden, where a
+delectable sand-pit is a permanent feature.
+
+Brightly-coloured flowers enliven the garden in spring and in summer and
+attract bird and insect visitors, companions often more interesting to a
+two-year-old than the most sprightly of humans. Mattresses occupy part of
+the floor space of the nursery, and at night-time are developed into
+full-fledged beds. At one end of the room are cupboards let into the
+walls, at the other, furniture fashioned for the needs of each 'two feet
+nothing'. There, instead of being perched on a high chair to feed with
+giants from an elevated table-land, the infant visitor sits on a miniature
+arm-chair at a table brought to the level of childhood. The low tables
+are, in fact, kidney-shaped and hollowed on the inside, so that a nurse,
+or attendant, seated in the centre, may feed half a dozen children in
+turn. The toddler's dinner in this retreat recalls the feeding time in a
+nest. A smiling nurse in the centre feeds, turn by turn, her open-mouthed
+charges whose satisfaction is expressed in human 'coos'.
+
+Another room in this delightful babies' house is devoted to infants: a
+brigade in cots, of which the advance-guard, during fine weather, invade
+the verandah. The daintiness of the room with its blue curtains and
+cot-hangings and the chubby satisfaction of the cot-dwellers must be a
+constant inspiration to the visiting working mothers. Spotless kitchens
+for the preparation of the children's meals are situated in the rear of
+the nurseries; there is also an isolation room where suspect infectious
+cases are detained, and a laundry with an indefatigable laundress. The
+bathing room, fitted with modern appliances, is in many respects
+excellent. The whole establishment is warmed by a central-heating
+installation, the radiators being well protected with guards.
+
+It may not always be possible, through lack of funds, to reproduce these
+ideal conditions, but where the accommodation is less and the ground space
+more limited, every care is taken that the factory nursery shall have an
+ample provision of fresh air. Efforts are also made to obtain as much
+local support as possible.
+
+In some districts, the whole of the clothing provided at the nursery is
+made by the little girls from a neighbouring Elementary School. At Acton,
+Middlesex, for example, I was shown piles of the daintiest little
+underwear, diminutive shoes and charming cotton frocks, all made in the
+sewing classes at their school, by pupils of eleven to thirteen years of
+age. The boys of the local manual schools--not to be outdone--contributed
+to this nursery all the carpentry for the cots for the elder babies. These
+small beds, fashioned out of hessian cloth, swung on long broom poles,
+with a wooden board at head and foot, seemed of a particularly economical
+and practical pattern.
+
+The factory nursery is certainly gaining popularity as a war-time measure;
+as a permanency in peace times it is recognized that there are some
+objections to its establishment. An alternative scheme, even in the war
+period, is being mooted. The suggestion is made that babies should be
+'billeted', or boarded out in the munitions area amongst women who are not
+employed outside their home. Supervision of the baby boarders, it is
+thought, might be undertaken by inspectors under the Local Authority. This
+scheme might, it is true, largely prevent the congregation of many
+children in one nursery and the resultant danger of the spread of
+contagious infantile disease. On the other hand, the proposal, if
+accepted, might open the doors to overcrowding in thickly populated areas
+and to the neglect of the baby boarder, undetected by a local
+inspectorate, already overstrained by war-time conditions. The scheme is,
+however, only at the discussion stage, as I write.
+
+In any case, the care of the munition workers' children is attracting
+considerable public attention, since in spite of the war, or because of
+it, the importance of the health and well-being of the ordinary
+individual, and more especially of the young, is becoming part of the
+creed of the average citizen.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII: GROWTH OF THE INDUSTRIAL CANTEEN
+
+GENERAL PRINCIPLES--THE WORKER'S OASIS
+
+
+'Money hardly counts; it is labour we have to consider nowadays', recently
+remarked the managing director of a large munitions works. It is this new
+conception that has given impetus to the development of the industrial
+canteen, now a feature of the munitions factory. In the opinion of Mr.
+John Hodge, M.P., Minister of Pensions, who since the war has acted for a
+long period as Minister of Labour, canteens in the engineering shops were
+'necessary from the start', and one of the earliest investigations of the
+Health of Munition Workers' Committee was on the subject of the provision
+of employees' meals. The results of the inquiry are embodied in three
+valuable White Papers.[2]
+
+I have since been into many canteens connected with munitions works, and
+so far I have not met a factory manager who has regretted their
+introduction. Yet, only three or four years ago, the average employer
+would have told you that a dinner brought by a worker in a newspaper, or
+tied up in a red handkerchief, stored in the works, heated anywhere, and
+eaten near the machines, was 'quite all right': and, as for the boys in
+the factory, it was considered shameful to 'coddle them'; if necessary, a
+factory lad should 'eat his dinner on a clothes line'.
+
+To-day, when the utmost ounce of energy is needed from man and woman, and
+boy and girl, wherever munitions production is concerned, it is recognized
+that the quality and quantity of the workers' food matters, and that even
+the surroundings where the meal is partaken of counts in the conservation
+of the essential reserve of human energy and power of will. Thus, the best
+type of industrial canteen is designed not only 'to feed the brute', but
+to rest his mind. This is especially the case in certain Filling
+Factories, where immunity from ill-effects from the handling of T.N.T. has
+been found to depend largely on the physical fitness of the workers. In
+such factories, as well as in establishments where women are employed on
+night shifts, the provision of canteens is obligatory on employers and,
+indeed, recent legislation (the Police, Factories, &c. (Miscellaneous
+Provisions) Act, 1916) has empowered the Home Secretary to require the
+occupiers of workshops and factories to make arrangements, where
+necessary, for the supply of meals for their employees. In the stress of
+warfare, when the demand for a maximum output is necessarily the
+pre-occupation of the factory manager, it was, however, recognized that
+the canteen must be State-aided. A Canteen Committee was therefore
+appointed under the Central Control Board (Liquor Traffic). The work of
+this committee is twofold: it aids the factory management to open its own
+canteen or canteens, and it supervises and helps approved dining-rooms
+managed by voluntary bodies. In the first case, the expense for any
+necessary canteen is entirely borne by the Government, if the factory is a
+'National' one. In Controlled Establishments, the employer is allowed to
+charge the cost of the canteen as 'a trade expense', a concession by which
+the State practically bears the expense out of funds which would otherwise
+reach the Exchequer. In the case of canteens provided by voluntary bodies,
+such as the Young Men's Christian Association, the Young Women's Christian
+Association, the Church Army, the Salvation Army, the National People's
+Palace Association, Ltd., &c., the Board pays half the capital
+expenditure, where approved.[3]
+
+[Illustration: BALSMING LENSES]
+
+[Illustration: MAKING INSTRUMENT SCALES]
+
+The efforts of these voluntary bodies have been of the utmost service,
+especially at the outset of munitions production on a vast scale, when the
+factory proprietors, or directors, were unable to devote even a fraction
+of their time to matters not obviously connected with output. The devotion
+of the unpaid workers in the voluntary canteen has through the turmoil of
+war hardly received due recognition, but it is no less than that of the
+nurses in the military hospitals, or of the munitions workers themselves.
+Women of aristocratic families, accustomed to personal service from a
+large staff of domestic servants, and entirely unused to physical labour,
+as well as women hard-worked in their own homes or in livelihood
+occupations, have, since the need of the canteen was declared, come, by
+day and by night, to undertake the arduous duties of cooking and scrubbing
+for vast numbers of working-people. _Mr. Punch's_ delightful illustration,
+'War, the Leveller', where the rough scullery-maid from the slums is
+depicted issuing the emphatic order to the well-bred marchioness, 'Nah
+then, Lady Montgummery Wilberforce, 'urry up with them plates',[4] is by
+no means a fancy picture of the hither side of canteen-life.
+
+In one factory, substantial meals have been provided daily by 17
+voluntary assistants for some 1,200 workers; in another locality, the food
+of 2,000 to 3,000 munitions employees has been arranged by 23 volunteers;
+and in another establishment, 6,000 workers have been provided with
+standing-up refreshments by 17 voluntary helpers. The rapid growth of the
+canteen system during the past fifteen months, accompanied by the
+increasing difficulties of catering for vast numbers under war-time
+conditions, has, however, led to the transference of numbers of voluntary
+canteens to the care of the factory management.
+
+
+_General Principles_
+
+Industrial canteens differ from one another in many respects, partly
+because there was at first no fund of common experience in this country
+from which to draw, and partly because hours of work, tastes and customs
+in industrial areas vary considerably. Hence, methods of administration
+and catering, found possible or popular in one canteen, are sometimes a
+complete failure when tried in other districts. In one canteen, with a
+seating capacity for 2,000 women, I found that three gallons of pickles
+were sold in pennyworths daily; in another district, the popular taste ran
+in the direction of jam tarts. Yet, even with the small store of
+experience so far accumulated, certain general principles at least as
+regards site, construction, equipment, and administration of the canteen
+have been evolved. For instance, as regards site, a gloomy dining-room is
+never popular. If possible, a garden outlook should be arranged, and at
+the least, the canteen walls should be of a restful colour. It seems
+obvious that if pictures are introduced, they should be varied and bright,
+yet I have seen one canteen of which the walls were covered at intervals
+with reproductions of the same uninteresting print.
+
+Another obvious point, too often neglected, is the insurance of good
+ventilation in canteen and kitchen. The dining-room should, if possible,
+provide separate accommodation for men and women, and should have a
+buffet-bar and serving-counter with separate hatchments for different
+items of the menu. Again, it is a matter of common consent that the
+'ticket system' of payment for the food handed over the counter is the
+best. Ticket-offices, where the 'checks' are obtainable for cash, should
+be carefully placed with regard to entrance doors, serving-counters and
+dining-tables, so that the minimum time is expended in preliminaries by a
+_clientèle_ who has but a strict dinner-hour at its disposal. In a
+well-organized canteen I have seen over a thousand workers seated and
+served within ten minutes of the announcement of the dinner-hour within
+the factory shops.
+
+In the larger canteens, developments, as may be expected, run chiefly
+along the lines of labour-saving appliances. Electric washing-up machines,
+electric bacon-cutters, as well as electric bread-cutters, tea-measuring
+machines, counter hot-closets for warming food brought by employees may
+now be seen in many kitchens where the needs of thousands of diners must
+be considered.
+
+But it is perhaps in the smaller concerns that the development of the
+industrial canteen is most assured. Experiments can there be more easily
+tried, and if necessary, discarded, where the customers are counted by
+hundreds, rather than by thousands. From a tour of canteens, I select a
+couple of such instances. The other day I happened, during the
+dinner-hour, to be in a new munitions factory concerned with the
+production of magnetos, aero-engines, electric switches, and so on, work
+undertaken by men and women, boys and girls. The manager of this works has
+studied the labour question up and down the country, and has set down his
+conclusions, not on minute sheets, but in the bricks and mortar of new
+buildings, in green lawns and flower beds bright with colour, and in
+allotments round his shops.
+
+
+_The Worker's Oasis_
+
+The canteen is a feature of the place. It stands apart from the factory, a
+long low building, one side looking on to a tennis court and the other on
+to homely but delightful vegetable plots. The workers' dining-room is
+divided down the centre: one side for the men, the other for the women. A
+serving-table, but no partition-wall, separates it from the kitchen,
+which, in its turn, is divided by further serving-tables from mess-rooms
+for the engineers and staff employees. The kitchen, in reality a series of
+ovens, stoves, and steamers, is a revelation of labour-saving appliances,
+heated by electricity. On the day of my visit there was not the slightest
+odour of cooking from these various utensils, although hot meals for some
+250 persons were in preparation.
+
+The factory hooter 'buzzed'. The dinner hour, the workers' oasis, had
+arrived, yet there was no clatter of dishes, or bustle of serving-maids,
+in the canteens. An atmosphere of repose was as manifest as in a
+well-appointed reception-room of some stately English home. The workers
+evidently react to these conditions, and standing at the back of the
+kitchen I was quite unaware of the diner's entry. 'When do the people come
+in?' I asked from my shelter behind a huge steamer where puddings were
+rising to the occasion. 'A hundred men are already seated and served', was
+the amazing reply. They had entered through a side door leading out of the
+garden, had there purchased a 'check' for the value of the dinner
+required, and presenting the 'check' at the serving-counter, had received
+their portion, piping hot from the hot shelves fitted beneath.
+
+Picking up the necessary cutlery from an adjoining table, the customers
+had seated themselves at any special small marble-topped table of their
+fancy. Waitresses, some voluntary workers garbed in rose-coloured overalls
+and mob-caps, and some staff employees in white or blue uniforms, moved
+about amongst the tables, supplying small wants. Through the open windows
+floated the scent of hay and flowers; it seemed almost ludicrous to
+connect the scene with war and the manufacture of its engines of
+destruction. The quality of the food was excellent and the variety great.
+A dinner hour spent in such a canteen is a refreshment to both body and
+soul of the employees.
+
+In another instance, the firm have handed over the canteen and its
+management to a workers' committee upon which the managing director also
+sits. I noticed in this canteen various devices worthy of imitation, where
+catering is undertaken for large numbers. The method adopted, for example,
+of dividing the serving-counter into hatchments for the various items on
+the menu, and separating by rails the floor-space in front of each
+compartment, seems to economize both the time and patience of the
+customers. The note of economy with efficiency is emphasized in this, as
+in many canteens, and I was shown with pride some 'little brothers' on an
+adjoining piece of land--pigs that were fattening on the canteen 'waste'.
+
+These developments, started in munitions areas during the urgency of
+warfare, will, without doubt, have permanent importance in the days of
+peace, and it is probable that the munition workers' canteen, doubtingly
+adopted by employers some two years ago, is symptomatic of a revolution in
+the home life of the industrial worker, as well as of new methods of
+economy in the national supply of fuel and food.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII: HOUSING
+
+BILLETING--TEMPORARY ACCOMMODATION--PERMANENT ACCOMMODATION
+
+
+Of the indirect problems arising from a prolific output of munitions the
+most acute has undoubtedly been the affair of the housing of the workers.
+The opening of a new factory, or the conversion of existing works to the
+needs of the State, often involve the transference of thousands of
+workers, and in some cases the districts to which the stream of
+immigration is directed are already congested, and already suffering from
+inadequate housing accommodation.
+
+In one town in the North, for example, the population has since 1914
+increased by immigration from 16,000 to 35,000; in another town, where the
+1911 census showed a population of 107,821, an unexaggerated estimate
+gives the figure for the end of 1917 as 120,000; in other munition areas a
+similar inflation of population has taken place. The housing problem has
+been further complicated by the almost total prohibition of building
+during the war period, save for Government purposes.
+
+The effect of these conditions in the early days of the war was, as may be
+imagined, highly unsatisfactory to the residents in certain munition
+areas, as well as to the immigrant work-people. Overcrowding became rife;
+lodgers were at the mercy of unscrupulous landladies, and all the evils
+associated with bad housing conditions began to make their appearance.
+Then the Ministry of Munitions came to grips with the question, and
+although it remains a thorny subject, the activities of the Department may
+be fairly said to have accomplished a miracle in some areas in the housing
+of the munition workers.
+
+The infinite variety of local conditions, as well as the humanness of the
+workers, obviously complicate the matter, and while it has been found
+possible to synthesize the factory system of a given area, no stereotyped
+regulations can conceivably be produced to cover the accommodation of its
+employees. The problem is therefore attacked piece-meal, each local
+proposition being decided on its own merits. A broad guiding principle
+has, however, been educed wherever the housing situation occasioned by the
+output of munitions demands State intervention. In the first place, it is
+decided whether the needed accommodation can be met in part, or
+altogether, by existing houses--a system now sanctioned by the Billeting
+Act of May 1917. Secondly, when it is found necessary to provide further
+housing room, consideration is given as to whether new buildings shall be
+of a temporary or of a permanent type.
+
+
+_Billeting_
+
+Chronologically, an authorized system of billeting munition workers has
+been the latest development in the State housing schemes, but even in the
+early days of the war this arrangement existed in embryo. Local committees
+were then appointed which, with the aid of the Employment Bureaux,
+compiled lists of suitable lodgings for immigrant women workers. From the
+earliest war period, too, provision was made to meet young women
+new-comers at railway stations and to place them, if necessary, in
+temporary unimpeachable lodgings, until permanent accommodation was
+available. This scheme has now developed into the regularized activities
+of a Billeting Board (established August 1917), working under powers given
+by the Billeting Act. Under this enactment, compulsory billeting is
+provided for, but in practice is not adopted, sufficient facilities having
+so far been forthcoming from voluntary sources.
+
+The Billeting Board works in hearty co-operation with local authorities
+and individuals, and has met with extraordinary success. In the first
+instance, two executive members of the Board proceed to a congested
+munitions area and, with local aid, institute an inquiry as to whether
+billeting can be successfully carried out. In such areas as the Clyde, or
+Woolwich, billeting would, for example, be out of the question, but in
+other localities, such as Barrow and Hereford, where public opinion ran
+that there was no further accommodation even for a stray cat, the Board
+has yet found suitable billets for 900 persons in Barrow and 1,200 in
+Hereford.
+
+The question of transit, it is true, is intimately connected with the
+housing problem, and through the action of the Billeting Board it has in
+many cases been possible to remove difficulties of locomotion, and hence
+to bring further accommodation within reach of the factories. The Board
+has also been enabled to form local committees on which sit
+representatives of each housing interest (e. g. landlady, locality,
+lodger), and it has authority to recover rent from defaulting tenants.
+
+These, and other powers, have resulted in throwing many additional
+apartments on to the market. Yet difficulties remain in the administration
+of the Act in that the industrial workers are under no discipline such as
+that applied to soldiers, and there is no local authority to compel a
+munitions worker either to go into a given billet, or to remain there
+when placed. The goodwill of the locality and of the employees has,
+however, been so great that the system works smoothly, and from August
+1917 to December 31, 1917, 3,000 to 5,000 munition workers have been
+placed in existing houses. In a congested district where lodging
+accommodation is exhausted, the Billeting Board reports on the need for
+further houses, and at such centres as Barrow and Lincoln new houses are
+now being erected on their recommendation.
+
+
+_Temporary Accommodation_
+
+Excluding the utilization of local lodgings and the adaptation of existing
+buildings such as Poor-Law structures, Elementary Schools, charitable
+institutions, three distinct types of provisional accommodation for
+munition workers have made their appearance: temporary cottages, hostels,
+and colonies. The temporary cottage corresponds fairly closely to the
+ordinary type of permanent industrial cottage, save that the former is
+built of wood or concrete and is usually one story instead of two; it
+contains three to five rooms, and is rented on the basis of about 5_s._
+6_d._ to 7_s._ 6_d._ per week for a three-roomed abode.
+
+Generally speaking, these rooms are allocated to married rather than to
+single women; sometimes the wife, as well as the husband, works in the
+neighbouring factory, but more usually the wife, housed in the temporary
+cottage, remains at home, housekeeping for the man worker. The unmarried
+girls and women workers in crowded districts are generally accommodated in
+hostels, or in colonies, the term used for a group of hostels. The hostel,
+which is designed to accommodate from 30 to 100 persons, is provided with
+its own kitchen, dining-room, and common-room, and to a certain extent
+life therein approximates to that of a large family.
+
+The Colony, or group of hostels, has been found convenient where a large
+number of women must be housed. Each hostel, or hutment, in the group is
+arranged for the sleeping accommodation of 100-130 persons, the
+dormitories being divided into cubicles (some single, some double),
+accommodation for bath-rooms being always made in these dormitory blocks.
+Under the Colony system, meals are usually partaken of in a separate
+building or buildings. The residents from all the hutments also meet in
+the recreation-room and in the laundry, common to all.
+
+Experience, however, teaches that each hostel should have its own common
+room and that a Colony should not shelter very large numbers. About 500
+girls, in five hostels, seems to be the ideal number for effective
+home-making, yet we have large housing schemes for the accommodation of
+many thousands which are at present answering their purpose as a war-time
+measure. For the management of the Colony an exceptionally capable lady
+superintendent is needed, into whose hands usually falls the selection of
+the hutment matrons and their staffs, as well as the canteen managers and
+their subordinates. In the most developed Colonies a recreation officer is
+often appointed.
+
+I recall a visit to one of the largest Colonies for munition workers in
+the Midlands. The scheme embraces the housing and feeding of some 6,000
+women, drawn from every part of the United Kingdom, indeed, possibly from
+every corner of the Empire. The staff, in all, comprises some 300 persons.
+Perfect harmony reigned, and the girls seemed thoroughly at home in their
+novel surroundings. Each girl can claim a separate cubicle, which is
+divided from the adjoining compartment by a wall and door. Here and there,
+indeed, the arrangement was varied and two friends--terrified at sleeping
+alone--had secured permission to pool their bedrooms and to arrange a
+double sleeping-room and dressing-room.
+
+The cubicle system is, notwithstanding, much appreciated by the woman,
+who, working in company of hundreds of her fellows, and sharing perhaps a
+common life for the first time, rejoices in the possession of some spot in
+which to express her inner self. In some cubicles in that Colony a desire
+for beauty asserted itself and the walls were gay with prints from
+illustrated papers; in others, dainty coloured curtains had been
+introduced and the locker was covered with a cloth to match. In another
+room, the owner had evidently a taste for embroidery, and all the toilet
+accessories bore this feminine touch. But, generally speaking, the chief
+feature I noticed in that, as well as in other Colonies where the cubicle
+system prevails, was the cleanliness and order of the apartments. A taste
+for purity is infectious, and it is unlikely that girls, having once come
+under an influence that induces them to leave their sleeping apartment
+immaculate before going to work before dawn, will ever again tolerate slum
+conditions.
+
+The many problems involved in the housing of these girls of various types
+are indeed almost lost sight of by the visitor, but, as a lady
+superintendent once reminded me, there are difficulties inherent in the
+job. Some girls will arrive with uncleanly habits, even when the medical
+officer has sorted out those unclean in person; others will, at first,
+show signs of violent antipathies and strange fears, and there is always
+the need for upholding an atmosphere of religious and racial toleration.
+In the Midlands Colony a system has been adopted of placing the bedrooms
+of girls from one part of the United Kingdom in the same corridor, the
+Irish in one wing, the Scotch in another, and so on, but in the other
+parts of the country I have found perfect harmony where such
+classification is not observed.
+
+[Illustration: PAINTING A SHIP'S SIDE IN DRY DOCK]
+
+[Illustration: GENERAL VIEW OF WOMEN AT WORK ON AIRCRAFT FABRIC]
+
+[Illustration: THE CANTEEN]
+
+The feeding of the hostel residents presents its own difficulties,
+especially in these days of war. In some hostels and colonies, such as the
+one in the Midlands, the residents take their meals in their own canteen;
+it being possible to supply the needs of a shift in the interval from
+work. In other hostels, arrangements are made by which meals can be had
+either at the hostel or the factory canteen.
+
+In these days of fluctuating food prices, it is difficult to indicate the
+cost of up-keep of a munition-workers' hostel, but, in general, it has not
+been found practicable to put the hostel on an entirely self-supporting
+basis. This is especially the case in the Government establishments, where
+the return on expended capital is at present only sought in increased
+munitions output.
+
+
+_Permanent Accommodation_
+
+At first sight, the provision of temporary accommodation alone may appear
+the obvious method for the housing of munition workers. Cheaper and more
+rapid construction is obtainable by this method, and existing buildings
+may be adapted. But if, in an area of pre-war housing shortage, there is
+good prospect of permanent manufacturing activity, it is more often
+decided that permanent, rather than temporary, structures are provided.
+
+It may be of interest to note the methods that have been adopted by the
+State in the provision of permanent accommodation. These may be detailed
+under four heads:
+
+1. In a certain number of cases loans have been made to Public Utility
+Societies for the construction of dwellings for munition workers. Such
+loans are conditioned after the manner already made familiar to the public
+by Garden Suburb and other Associations.
+
+2. Loans have been made directly to certain individual firms to enable
+them to house their immigrant employees. These loans have been issued at
+the current rate of interest--usually 5 per cent.--and run, generally
+speaking, for a period of forty years.
+
+3. In a few exceptional cases, certain private firms--now Controlled
+Establishments--are permitted to charge a part of the increase on the cost
+of building (due to war conditions) to that portion of the firm's profits
+which would otherwise have gone to the Exchequer.
+
+4. A contribution is, in some instances, made by the State to certain
+local authorities of a part of the capital cost of building. In all cases
+this contribution is less than the estimated increase due to war
+conditions.
+
+The type of permanent building erected by such means is that which
+characterizes many of our newer industrial districts, namely a two-story
+brick cottage, containing two or three bedrooms, a living-room and a
+kitchen, a bath, in some cases a bath-room. Sometimes a complete village
+or township has arisen, as it were from the earth, to shelter the working
+population who have so willingly left their homes to further the common
+cause by land and sea. In another instance, a large National factory has
+been erected on an isolated waste in the North country. The workers come
+from long distances, and not only need accommodation, but some reasonable
+provision for recreation and the amenities of life.
+
+Beyond the great high road sweeping on to Scotland, some one- or
+two-roomed cottages, a village shop or two, and a few more imposing
+residences there was, in June 1915, nothing but bogland in the immediate
+neighbourhood of the site of this new factory. The landscape presented a
+view of coarse grass and brackish water; beyond that, beach and sea, and a
+horizon bounded by rugged mountains, capped in winter by snow. It needed
+courage, as well as genius, to undertake the transformation of such a
+desolate waste into surroundings which should offer a lure to industrial
+workers. But the work has been done in silence, quickly as well as
+efficiently, with imagination, as well as thoroughness, and with an eye to
+the future destiny of the place.
+
+By July 1915, the first huts were occupied, and by December 1917, when I
+was a privileged visitor, there had arisen a thriving busy township and a
+village some five miles beyond. Excellent railway communication between
+township, village, and factory has been established, many good roads have
+been built, there are permanent cottages, churches, a school, shops, a
+staff club, an institute, a large entertainment hall, a cinema house, and
+a central kitchen, providing cooked meals for all the workers in the
+factories, and raw food-stuff for hostels and huts. Little gardens
+surround the houses big and small, temporary or permanent, and allotments
+are in great request, and there is also provision for outdoor recreation,
+such as bowls, tennis, cricket, &c. The permanent brick cottages are built
+in blocks of twelve, which are now thrown together to form a hostel. The
+construction is so planned that ultimately these cottages can be
+re-separated for family use.
+
+There is housing accommodation for over 6,000 women operators, which was
+practically all in use. The task of supervising the home conditions of
+this army of women falls into the hands of a lady Welfare Superintendent,
+who keeps all the complicated machinery of hostels, huts, and lodgings in
+running order. The possibilities in the housing of industrial women away
+from their own homes have, I believe, never been so clearly demonstrated
+as in this town on the marshes. The lady superintendent who has pioneered
+this movement is of the opinion that its success is bound up with the fact
+that the hostels are limited to the accommodation of from 70 to 100 girls
+in each. Other key-notes to the prevailing happiness of the women
+residents are, I gathered, that a minimum number of rules are enforced and
+that the women are treated as responsible human beings. The elder women
+are often housed in bungalows under the care of a housekeeper-cook, and
+they greatly enjoy the greater independence and the appeal to their
+individuality possible in such surroundings.
+
+The hostels, at the time of my visit, were in most hospitable mood. It was
+the eve of Christmas, and festivities, tempered to war-time needs, were
+the order of the day. The sound of a piano and singing outside a certain
+hostel suggested a frolic within. We entered, the lady superintendent and
+myself. The lower floor had been converted into reception-rooms and supper
+was laid out on tables decorated with spoils from the hedge. Gleaming red
+berries and glistening holly-leaves were on walls and brackets and here
+and there a sprig of mistletoe placed in suitable places for 'auld lang
+syne'. There were present young men, as well as girls, and a lively game,
+'the Duke of York', was in progress.
+
+Suddenly the singing and accompaniment came to a sudden halt and the whole
+of the company trouped in from adjoining rooms. A young girl came forward.
+'We wish to take this opportunity', she said, 'of thanking our matron and
+our secretary for the most happy time we have had under this roof. We do
+it now because we hope not to be here next year, but instead to be
+welcoming our boys home from the Front'. It was a simple, spontaneous
+expression of the general emotion of the hostel residents in that area.
+
+Everywhere I found a similar joy of life among the workers: in the
+Institute clubs, where both girls and men were reading, studying, singing,
+and dancing; in the cinema hall, where the ever-popular 'movies' were
+taking place; and in the big recreation hall, where a weekly 'social' was
+being held. There, two girls provided the band, to which other girls
+danced with girls, or with men in khaki, or with factory workers in
+civilian dress. There was a healthy comradeship between girls and men and,
+when the hour of parting came there were leave-takings of which no one
+could be ashamed. Laughter and jollity in plenty, and snatches of song up
+and down the darkened streets, as group after group found its way home,
+but self-respect and dignity noticeably present.
+
+In a new town, emerging during the hurry and bustle of the war, amongst
+new occupations, at which women needs must wear a masculine costume, we
+have at least accomplished this: that the spirit of home-life, of joy,
+and of love has not been discouraged: rather has it been fostered, or
+rekindled, in these unaccustomed homes provided by the State. Indeed, many
+of the girls passing through this strange war-time adventure have
+assuredly gained by their pilgrimage precisely in those qualities most
+needed by the wives and mothers of the rising generation.
+
+It was an inspiring glimpse into a new industrial world, a portent, maybe,
+of the time to come. The words of a golden sonnet welled up:
+
+  Then felt I like some watcher of the skies
+    When a new planet swims into his ken;
+  Or like stout Cortez when, with eagle eyes,
+    He stared at the Pacific--and all his men
+  Looked at each other with a wild surmise--
+    Silent, upon a peak in Darien.
+
+
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[1] Welfare work has since been officially extended to factories other
+than those engaged in munitions production by Clause 7 of the Police,
+Factories, &c. (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act (1916).
+
+[2] _Health of Munition Workers Committee_, Memorandum No. 3, Report on
+Industrial Canteens (Cd. 8133); Memorandum No. 6, Appendix to Memorandum
+No. 3, Canteen Construction and Equipment (Cd. 8199); Memorandum No. 19,
+Investigation of Workers' Food and Suggestions as to Dietary: Report by
+Leonard E. Hill, M.B., F.R.S. (Cd. 8798).
+
+[3] A Food Section of the Ministry of Munitions has since been established
+to carry on the work of the Central Control Board (Liquor Traffic).
+
+[4] _Punch_, September 6, 1916.
+
+
+
+***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WOMAN'S PART***
+
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diff --git a/38437-8.zip b/38437-8.zip
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+    "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd">
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+<head>
+<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1" />
+<title>The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Woman's Part, by L. K. Yates</title>
+    <style type="text/css">
+
+    p {margin-top: .75em; text-align: justify; margin-bottom: .75em;}
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+    body {margin-left: 12%; margin-right: 12%;}
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+    .pagenum {position: absolute; left: 92%; font-size: smaller; text-align: right; font-style: normal;}
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+</head>
+<body>
+<h1>The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Woman's Part, by L. K. Yates</h1>
+<pre>
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at <a href = "http://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a></pre>
+<p>Title: The Woman's Part</p>
+<p>       A Record of Munitions Work</p>
+<p>Author: L. K. Yates</p>
+<p>Release Date: December 29, 2011  [eBook #38437]</p>
+<p>Language: English</p>
+<p>Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1</p>
+<p>***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WOMAN'S PART***</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<h4>E-text prepared by David Edwards<br />
+    and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team<br />
+    (<a href="http://www.pgdp.net">http://www.pgdp.net</a>)<br />
+    from page images generously made available by<br />
+    Internet Archive<br />
+    (<a href="http://www.archive.org">http://www.archive.org</a>)</h4>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<table border="0" style="background-color: #ccccff;margin: 0 auto;" cellpadding="10">
+  <tr>
+    <td valign="top">
+      Note:
+    </td>
+    <td>
+      Images of the original pages are available through
+      Internet Archive. See
+      <a href="http://www.archive.org/details/womanspartarecor00yate">
+      http://www.archive.org/details/womanspartarecor00yate</a>
+	</td>
+  </tr>
+</table>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr class="full" />
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/cover.jpg" alt="" /></div>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p><a name="frontis" id="frontis"></a>&nbsp;</p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/frontis.jpg" alt="" /></div>
+<p class="caption">THE MANUFACTURE OF 4.5-INCH CARTRIDGE CASES:<br />OPERATING THE DRAWING PRESS</p>
+
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p class="center"><span class="giant">THE<br />WOMAN&#8217;S PART</span></p>
+<p class="center"><i>A Record of Munitions Work</i></p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p class="center"><small>BY</small><br />
+<span class="large">L. K. YATES</span></p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p class="center">NEW YORK<br />
+GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY</p>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr style="width: 50%;" />
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_iii" id="Page_iii">[Pg iii]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CONTENTS</h2>
+
+<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="5" summary="table">
+<tr><td><small>CHAPTER</small></td><td>&nbsp;</td><td align="right"><small>PAGE</small></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_I">I.</a></td><td><span class="smcap">The Advent of Women in Engineering Trades</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_7">7</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td>&nbsp;</td><td><span class="smcaplc">SHARING A COMMON TASK</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_9">9</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td>&nbsp;</td><td><span class="smcaplc">DILUTION</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_11">11</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td>&nbsp;</td><td><span class="smcaplc">HEROISM IN THE WORKSHOP</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_12">12</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_II">II.</a></td><td><span class="smcap">Training the Munition Worker</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_14">14</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td>&nbsp;</td><td><span class="smcaplc">THE QUINTESSENCE OF THE WORK</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_15">15</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td>&nbsp;</td><td><span class="smcaplc">THE INSTRUCTIONAL FACTORY</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_17">17</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td>&nbsp;</td><td><span class="smcaplc">FIRST STEPS IN INDUSTRIAL LIFE</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_18">18</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_III">III.</a></td><td><span class="smcap">At Work</span>&mdash;I.</td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_20">20</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td>&nbsp;</td><td><span class="smcaplc">SHELLS AND SHELL CASES</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_21">21</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td>&nbsp;</td><td><span class="smcaplc">IN THE FUSE-SHOP</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_23">23</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td>&nbsp;</td><td><span class="smcaplc">CARTRIDGES AND BULLETS</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_25">25</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_IV">IV.</a></td><td><span class="smcap">At Work</span>&mdash;II.</td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_28">28</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td>&nbsp;</td><td><span class="smcaplc">THE MAKING OF AIRCRAFT</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_28">28</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td>&nbsp;</td><td><span class="smcaplc">OPTICAL INSTRUMENTS</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_30">30</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td>&nbsp;</td><td><span class="smcaplc">IN THE SHIPYARDS</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_33">33</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_V">V.</a></td><td><span class="smcap">Comfort and Safety</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_37">37</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td>&nbsp;</td><td><span class="smcaplc">WELFARE SUPERVISION</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_37">37</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td>&nbsp;</td><td><span class="smcaplc">PROTECTIVE CLOTHING</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_41">41</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td>&nbsp;</td><td><span class="smcaplc">REST-ROOMS AND FIRST AID</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_42">42</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td>&nbsp;</td><td><span class="smcaplc">WOMEN POLICE</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_43">43</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_VI">VI.</a></td><td><span class="smcap">Outside Welfare</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_45">45</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td>&nbsp;</td><td><span class="smcaplc">RECREATION</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_45">45</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td>&nbsp;</td><td><span class="smcaplc">MOTHERHOOD</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_47">47</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td>&nbsp;</td><td><span class="smcaplc">THE FACTORY NURSERY</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_48">48</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_VII">VII.</a></td><td><span class="smcap">Growth of the Industrial Canteen</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_52">52</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td>&nbsp;</td><td><span class="smcaplc">GENERAL PRINCIPLES</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_54">54</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td>&nbsp;</td><td><span class="smcaplc">THE WORKER&#8217;S OASIS</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_55">55</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_VIII">VIII.</a></td><td><span class="smcap">Housing</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_57">57</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td>&nbsp;</td><td><span class="smcaplc">BILLETING</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_58">58</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td>&nbsp;</td><td><span class="smcaplc">TEMPORARY ACCOMMODATION</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_59">59</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td>&nbsp;</td><td><span class="smcaplc">PERMANENT ACCOMMODATION</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_61">61</a></td></tr></table>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_iv" id="Page_iv">[Pg iv]</a></span></p>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr style="width: 50%;" />
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_v" id="Page_v">[Pg v]</a></span></p>
+<h2>ILLUSTRATIONS</h2>
+
+<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="5" summary="table">
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">The Manufacture of 4.5-inch Cartridge Cases: Operating the Drawing Press</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#frontis"><i>Frontispiece</i></a></td></tr>
+<tr><td>&nbsp;</td><td align="right"><small>PAGE</small></td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Turning the Copper Band of a 9.2-inch High-explosive Shell</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_16">16</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Drilling Safety-pin Hole in Fuse</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_16">16</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Inspecting and Gauging Fuses</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_16">17</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Turning the Outside and Forming the Nose-end of a 9.2-inch High-explosive Shell</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_16">17</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Assembling Fuses</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_21">20</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Cooling Shell Forgings</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_21">20</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Operating a Lumsden Plain Grinder: Re-forming 8-inch High-explosive Cutters</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_21">21</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Engraving Metal Parts for Compasses</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_28">28</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Colouring Aeroplane Planes</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_28">28</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Chipping and Grinding Blades of Cast Iron Propeller with Portable Tools</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_28">29</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Woman Acting as Mate to Joiner Making Sea-plane Floats</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_28">29</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Cutting Frayed-edge Tape</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_36">36</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Brazing Turbine Rotor Segment</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_36">36</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Mounting Cards for Dry Compasses</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_36">37</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Treadle Polishing-machines, for Smoothing Lenses</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_36">37</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Slitting and Roughing Optical Glass</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_44">44</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">View of Canteen Kitchen</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_44">44</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Weighing Ferro Chrome for Analysis</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_44">45</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Balsaming Lenses</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_53">52</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Making Instrument Scales</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_53">53</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Painting a Ship&#8217;s Side in Dry Dock</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_60">60</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">General View of Women at Work on Aircraft Fabric</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_60">61</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">The Canteen</span></td>
+    <td align="right"><a href="#Page_60">61</a></td></tr></table>
+
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_vi" id="Page_vi">[Pg vi]</a></span></p>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr style="width: 50%;" />
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</a></span></p>
+<p class="center"><span class="giant">THE WOMAN&#8217;S PART</span></p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_I" id="CHAPTER_I"></a>CHAPTER I: THE ADVENT OF WOMEN IN ENGINEERING TRADES</h2>
+<p class="title">SHARING A COMMON TASK&mdash;DILUTION&mdash;HEROISM IN THE WORKSHOP</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p class="dropcap"><span class="caps">In</span> a period of titanic events it is difficult to characterize a single
+group of happenings as of special significance, yet at the end of the war
+it is likely that Great Britain will look back to the transformation of
+her home industries for war purposes as one of the greatest feats she has
+ever accomplished. The arousing of a nation to fight to the death for the
+principle of Liberty is doubtless one of the most stirring of spectacles
+in the human drama; it has repeated itself throughout history; but it has
+been left to this century to witness in the midst of such an upheaval the
+complete reorganization of a nation&#8217;s industry, built up slowly and
+painfully by a modern civilization for its material support and utility.</p>
+
+<p>Before the outbreak of hostilities Great Britain was supplying the world
+with the products of her workshops, but these products were mainly those
+needed by nations at peace. The coal mines of Northumberland, the
+foundries of the Midlands, the cotton mills of Lancashire were aiding vast
+populations in their daily human struggle, but the demand of 1914 for vast
+requirements for war purposes found Great Britain unprepared. The
+instantaneous rearrangement of industries for war purposes, possible to
+Germany by reason of forty years of stealthy war preparations, was out of
+the question for a nation that neither contemplated nor prepared for a
+European conflagration. Eight or nine months had to elapse before the
+people of Great Britain were aroused to the realities of modern warfare.</p>
+
+<p>It was then only that a large public became aware that the Herculean
+struggle was not merely a conflict between armies and navies, but between
+British science and German science, between British chemists and German
+chemists, between British workshops and the workshops of Germany. The
+realization of these facts led to the creation of the Ministry of
+Munitions in May 1915 and the rapid rearrangement of industries and
+industrial conditions. Before the war, three National factories in Great
+Britain<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</a></span> were sufficient to fulfil the demand for output for possible war
+purposes; to-day, there are more than 150 National factories and over
+5,000 Controlled Establishments, scattered up and down the country, all
+producing munitions of war. The whole of the North Country and the whole
+of the Midlands have, in fact, become a vast arsenal.</p>
+
+<p>Standing on an eminence in the North, one may by day watch ascending the
+smoke of from 400 to 500 munition factories, and by night at many a point
+in the Midland counties one may survey an encircling zone of flames as
+they belch forth from the chimneys of the engineering works of war. The
+vast majority of these workshops had previously to the war never produced
+a gun, a shell, or a cartridge. To-day, makers of agricultural and textile
+machinery are engaged on munitions, producers of lead pencils are turning
+out shrapnel; a manufacturer of gramophones is producing fuses; a court
+jeweller is engaged in the manufacture of optical instruments; a maker of
+cream separators has now an output of primers. Nor is this all. New
+industries have been started and languishing trades have been revived.</p>
+
+<p>The work of reorganization has been prodigious, and when the history of
+Britain&#8217;s share in the war comes to be written in the leisured days of
+peace, it is unlikely that the record will transmit to a future generation
+how much effort it has taken to produce the preponderance in munitions now
+achieved. With the huge task of securing an adequate supply of raw
+material has gone hand in hand the production of a sufficiency of suitable
+machinery and machine tools, the equipment of laboratories for chemical
+research, the erection, or adaptation, of accommodation in which to house
+the new &#8216;plant&#8217;, and the supply of a continuous stream of suitable labour.
+In face of the growing needs of the Navy and Army this labour question has
+been a crucial test; it is a testimony to the &#8216;will to win&#8217; of the whole
+people that the problem from the outset has found its solution. As soon as
+the importance of the demand for munitions workers was widely understood,
+a supply of labour has continuously streamed into the factory gates. There
+are now 2,000,000 persons employed in munitions industries&mdash;exclusive of
+Admiralty work&mdash;of which one-third are women.</p>
+
+<p>The advent of the women in the engineering shops and their success in a
+group of fresh trades may be accounted as an omen of deep significance.
+Women in this country have, it is true, taken their place in factory life
+from the moment that machinery swept away the spinning-wheel from the
+domestic hearth, and it is more often the woman mill-hand, or factory
+&#8216;lass&#8217;, who is the wealthier partner in many a Lancashire home. Women
+before the war, to be sure, took part in factory life where such
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span>commodities as textiles, clothing, food, household goods, &amp;c., were
+produced, but by consensus of opinion&mdash;feminine as well as masculine&mdash;her
+presence in Engineering Works, save on mere routine work, or on a few
+delicate processes, was considered in the pre-war period as unsuitable and
+undesirable.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p class="center"><i>Sharing a Common Task</i></p>
+
+<p>At the outbreak of hostilities, a few of the most far-sighted employers,
+contemplating a shortage of labour through the recruitment of men for
+military service, hazarded the opinion that women might be employed on all
+kinds of simple repetition work in the Engineering Shops. Further than
+that even the optimist did not go. There was also no indication that women
+would be willing to adventure into a world where long hours and night-work
+prevailed, from which evils they were protected in the days of peace by
+stringent Factory Acts. Events have proved that the women of Great Britain
+are as ready as their menfolk to sacrifice comfort and personal
+convenience to the demands of a great cause, and as soon as it was made
+known that their services were required, they came forward in their
+hundreds of thousands.</p>
+
+<p>They have come from the office and the shop, from domestic service and the
+dressmaker&#8217;s room, from the High Schools and the Colleges, and from the
+quietude of the stately homes of the leisured rich. They have travelled
+from far-off corners in the United Kingdom as well as from homesteads in
+Australia and New Zealand, and from lonely farms in South Africa and
+Canada. Every stratum of society has provided its share of willing women
+workers eager from one cause or another to &#8216;do their bit&#8217;.</p>
+
+<p>Even in the early days of the advent of women in the munitions shops, I
+have seen working together, side by side, the daughter of an earl, a
+shopkeeper&#8217;s widow, a graduate from Girton, a domestic servant and a young
+woman from a lonely farm in Rhodesia, whose husband had joined the
+colours. Social status, so stiff a barrier in this country in pre-war
+days, was forgotten in the factory, as in the trenches, and they were all
+working together as happily as the members of a united family.</p>
+
+<p>Employers and former employees likewise often share a common task in the
+workshops of the war. At Woolwich, for example, a lady of delicate
+upbringing could, at one period, have been seen arriving at the Arsenal in
+the early hours of each morning, accompanied by her former maid, both
+being the while &#8216;hands&#8217; in the employ of the State. It is well known in
+certain circles how Lady Scott, the widow of the famous Antarctic
+explorer, put aside all private interests to take up work in a munitions
+factory, how Lady Gertrude Crawford became an official, supervising<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span>
+women&#8217;s work in shipyards, and how Lady Mary Hamilton (now Mrs. Kenyon
+Slaney), the eldest daughter of the Duke of Abercorn, and Miss Stella
+Drummond, daughter of General Drummond, have won distinction as workers in
+&#8216;advanced&#8217; processes of munitions production.</p>
+
+<p>These are but a few distinguished names amongst a crowd of women of all
+degrees of society who have achieved unexpected success in work to which
+they were entirely unaccustomed. Amongst this nameless multitude,
+attention has been called from time to time to the remarkable feats in the
+engineering and chemical trades, in electrical works, and in the
+shipyards, of kitchen-maids and of dressmakers, of governesses and
+children&#8217;s nurses.</p>
+
+<p>The underlying motives, all actuated by war conditions, which have turned
+the tide of women&#8217;s work into new and unfamiliar occupations, are,
+however, more diverse than is generally supposed. Unquestionably, the two
+main driving forces have been patriotism and economic pressure, and of
+these patriotism, the love of country, the pride of Empire, accounts for a
+large proportion of women recruits. Yet there are other motives at work:
+the old human forces of family love and self-sacrifice, pride, anger,
+hatred, and even humour. I have questioned workers at the lathes and in
+doping rooms, in Filling Factories, and in wood-workers&#8217; shops, and find
+the mass of new labour in the munitions works is there from distinctive
+individual reasons. It is only by the recognition of all these forces that
+successful management of a new factor in the labour problem is possible.
+An indication of the life-history of one or two individual munitions
+workers may exemplify the point.</p>
+
+<p>There is the case of a girl tool-setter in a factory near London. She is
+the only child of an old Army family. When war broke out, she realized
+that for the first time in many generations her family could send no
+representative to fight the country&#8217;s battles. Her father was an old man,
+long past military age. The girl, although in much request at home, took
+up work in a base hospital in France, but at the end of a year, when
+broken down from over-strain, was ordered six months&#8217; rest in England.
+Recovery followed in two months, and again, spurred by the thought of
+inaction in a time of national peril, she entered a munitions factory as
+an ordinary employee. After nine months&#8217; work she had only lost five
+minutes&#8217; time.</p>
+
+<p>Another factory worker is a mother of seven sons, proud-spirited,
+efficient, and accustomed to rule her family. The seven sons enlisted and
+she felt her claim to headship was endangered. She entered a munitions
+factory and, to soothe her pride, sent weekly to each son a detailed
+account of her industrial work. At length, the eldest son wrote that he
+thought his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span> mother was probably killing more Germans than any of the
+family. Since then, she says, she has had peace of mind.</p>
+
+<p>In another factory, in the West of England, there is an arduous munitions
+maker who works tirelessly through the longest shifts. Before her entry
+into the industrial world she was a stewardess on a passenger-ship. The
+vessel was torpedoed by a German submarine, and she was one of the few
+survivors. Daily she works off her hatred on a capstan lathe, hoping, as
+she tells the visitors, some day to get equal with the unspeakable Huns.</p>
+
+<p>Then there is a typical case of a wife who has learned some of life&#8217;s
+little ironies through her work on munitions production. Her husband, an
+old sailor, worked for the same firm before the war. He used to come home
+daily and complain of the hardness of his lot. It was &#8216;a dog&#8217;s life&#8217;, he
+constantly reiterated, and his wife was careful to make reparation at
+home.</p>
+
+<p>War broke out and the naval reserve man was recalled to sea. The firm were
+put to it, in the labour shortage, for a substitute, and invited the
+wife&#8217;s aid. Having heard so much of the hardships of the work, she
+refused, but after some persuasion agreed to give the job a trial. At the
+end of a week, she surmised the task was not so hard as she contemplated;
+after a month had passed she realized the position. The job had been a
+capital excuse to ensure forgiveness for domestic short-comings. The wife
+awaits her husband&#8217;s return with a certain grim humour.</p>
+
+<p>Having arrived in the engineering trades, actuated by whatever motives,
+the woman munitions maker has more than justified the hopes of the pioneer
+employers who sponsored her cause. As soon as organized labour agreed that
+trade union rules and pre-war shop practice should be suspended for the
+duration of the war, women were rapidly initiated in the simple repetition
+processes of shell-making and shell-filling. Machinery was adapted to the
+new-comers, and the skilled men workers were distributed amongst the
+factories to undertake the jobs possible only to experienced hands.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p class="center"><i>Dilution</i></p>
+
+<p>Thus, the principle of dilution, as old as Plato&#8217;s <i>Republic</i>, which as a
+theory was reintroduced to British students by Adam Smith, has widely come
+into practice through the urgency of the war. Women have been successfully
+introduced into a new group of occupations, men have been &#8216;upgraded&#8217;, so
+that many semi-skilled men have become skilled; and the skilled men have
+been allocated entirely to employment on skilled jobs.</p>
+
+<p>Once introduced to the munitions shops, women soon mastered the repetition
+processes, such as &#8216;turning&#8217;, &#8216;milling&#8217; and &#8216;grinding&#8217;, as well as the
+simpler operations connected with shell-filling. The keenest<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span> amongst them
+were then found fit for more &#8216;advanced&#8217; work where accuracy, a nice
+judgment, and deftness of manipulation are essential. Such are the
+processes connected with tool and gauge-making, where the work must be
+finished to within the finest limits&mdash;a fraction of the width of a human
+hair; such are the requirements for the work of overlooking, or inspection
+of output; and such are the many processes of aeroplane manufacture and
+optical glass production, upon which women are being increasingly
+employed.</p>
+
+<p>They are also undertaking operations dependent on physical strength, which
+in pre-war days would have been regarded as wholly unsuitable to female
+capacity. War necessity has, however, killed old-time prejudice and has
+proved how readily women adapt themselves to any task within their
+physical powers. One may, for example, to-day watch women in the shipyards
+of the North hard at work, chipping and cleaning the ships&#8217; decks,
+repairing hulls, or laying electric wire on board H.M. battleships. High
+up in the gantry cranes which move majestically across the vaulted factory
+roof, one may see women sitting aloft guiding the movement of the huge
+molten ingots; in the foundries, one may run across a woman smith; in the
+aeroplane factories, women welders work be-goggled at the anvils.</p>
+
+<p>An engineering shop is now sometimes staffed almost entirely by women
+&#8216;hands&#8217;, and it is no uncommon sight to find in the centre of the shop
+women operators at work on the machines; at one end a group of women
+tool-setters, and at another women gaugers who test the products of this
+combined women&#8217;s labour. In the packing-rooms the lustier types of women
+may be seen dispatching finished shells, and on the factory platforms
+gartered women in tunic suits push the loaded trollies to waiting
+railway-trucks for conveyance to the front. One of the most surprising
+revelations of the war in this country has, indeed, been the capacity of
+women for engineering work, and to none has the discovery been more
+surprising and more exhilarating than to the women themselves.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p class="center"><i>Heroism in the Workshop</i></p>
+
+<p>The work has, in fact, called for personal qualities usually thought to be
+abnormal in women. The women in the engineering shops have disproved any
+such surmise. Where occasion has demanded physical courage from the
+workers, the virtue has leaped forth from the average woman, as from the
+average man. Where circumstances call for grit and endurance, there has
+been no shirking in the factories by the majority of the operators of
+either sex. The heroism of the battlefields has frequently been equalled
+by the ordinary civilian in the factory, whether man or woman. Sometimes
+incidents of women&#8217;s courage in the works have been<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span> reported in the press
+as matters for surprise. They are merely typical instances of the spirit
+that animates the general mass of the workers in Great Britain.</p>
+
+<p>A few examples may be added in illustration. On a recent occasion, a woman
+lost the first finger and thumb of her left hand through the jamming of a
+piece of metal in a press. After an absence of six weeks, she returned to
+work and was soon getting an even greater output than before.</p>
+
+<p>Another instance relates to a serious accident in an explosives factory,
+when several women were killed and many were injured. Within a few days a
+considerable number of the remaining female operators applied and were
+accepted for positions in the Danger Zone at another factory. Another
+incident is reported from some chemical works in the North. The key
+controlling a valve fell off and dropped into a pit below, rendering the
+woman in charge unable to control the steam. An accident seemed imminent
+and the woman, in spite of the likelihood of dangerous results to herself,
+got down to the pit, regained the key and averted disaster.</p>
+
+<p>In a shipyard on the North-East coast, a woman of 23 years had been
+engaged for some time in electric-wiring a large battleship. One day, when
+working overhead, a drill came through from the deck, piercing her cotton
+cap and entering her head. She was attended to in the firm&#8217;s First Aid
+room and sent home. To the surprise of every one concerned, she returned
+to work at 6 a.m. on the following day, and laughingly remarked that she
+was quite satisfied that it was better to lose a little hair than her
+head.</p>
+
+<p>In the trivial accidents which are, of course, of more frequent
+occurrence, the women display similar calmness and will stand
+unflinchingly while particles of grit, or metal, are removed from the
+eyes, or while small wounds&mdash;often due to their own carelessness&mdash;are
+dressed and bound. The endurance displayed during the early period of
+munitions production, when holidays were voluntarily abandoned and work
+continued through Sundays, and in many hours of overtime, was no less
+remarkable in the women than in the men. Action is continuously taken by
+the Ministry of Munitions to reduce the hours of overtime, to abolish
+Sunday labour, and to promote the well-being of the workers, but without
+the zeal and courage of the women munitions makers the valour of the
+soldiers at the Front would often be in vain.</p>
+
+<p>As the Premier remarked in a recent speech: &#8216;I do not know what would have
+happened to this land when the men had to go away fighting if the women
+had not come forward and done their share of the work. It would have been
+utterly impossible for us to have waged a successful war, had it not been
+for the skill and ardour, enthusiasm and industry, which the women of the
+country have thrown into the work of the war&#8217;.</p>
+
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr style="width: 50%;" />
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span></p>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_II" id="CHAPTER_II"></a>CHAPTER II: TRAINING THE MUNITION WORKER</h2>
+<p class="title">THE QUINTESSENCE OF THE WORK&mdash;THE INSTRUCTIONAL FACTORY&mdash;FIRST STEPS IN INDUSTRIAL LIFE</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p class="dropcap"><span class="caps">When,</span> in answer to the demand for shells and more shells, factories were
+built, or adapted to the requirements of war, it was soon found that a
+supply of suitable labour must be ensured, if the maximum output was to be
+maintained. The existing practice of the engineering shops, by which a boy
+arrived by gradual steps, counted in years, from apprenticeship to the
+work of a skilled operator, was obviously impossible where an immediate
+demand for thousands of employees of varying efficiency had to be
+fulfilled. The needs of the Navy and Army further complicated the problem
+by the withdrawal of men of all degrees of skill from factory to
+battlefield.</p>
+
+<p>The discovery of an untapped reservoir of labour in women&#8217;s work, and the
+adaptation of a larger proportion of machines to a &#8216;fool-proof&#8217; standard,
+certainly eased the situation, yet the problem remained of the immediate
+provision of workers able to undertake &#8216;advanced&#8217;, as well as simple work,
+in the engineering shops. Factory employers were from the outset alive to
+the situation, and at once adopted measures for the training of new-comers
+within their shops, but harassed as the managers were by the supreme need
+for output, it was hardly possible to develop extensive schemes for
+training within the factory gates. Hence, arose a movement throughout the
+United Kingdom among the governing bodies of many institutions of
+University rank, among Local Education Authorities, and among various
+feminist groups, to make use of existing Technical Schools and
+Institutions for the training of recruits in engineering work.</p>
+
+<p>The effort was at first mainly confined to the instruction of men in
+elementary machine work, and the London County Council may fairly claim to
+have acted as pioneer in this connexion. Yet, as early as August 1915, a
+group of women connected with the National Union of Women&#8217;s Suffrage
+Societies (of which Mrs. Fawcett, widow of a former Postmaster-General, is
+the president) decided to finance a scheme for the training<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span> of women
+oxy-acetylene welders, converting for this purpose a small workshop run by
+a woman silversmith.</p>
+
+<p>It was soon observed by the Ministry of Munitions that these sporadic
+efforts&mdash;sometimes successful beyond expectation, and sometimes failing
+for want of funds, or for lack of intimacy between training-ground and
+factory employer&mdash;must be co-ordinated, if they were to tackle
+successfully the growing task imposed by war conditions. The conception of
+a Training Section for factory workers within the Ministry of Munitions
+arose, took root. The section was established in the early autumn of 1915.</p>
+
+<p>In the October of that year, authority to finance approved training
+schemes throughout the country was given to the new department. Some fifty
+colleges and schools, undertaking independent schemes, were then brought
+into touch with the Ministry, and steps were taken to develop the existing
+systems. Equipment was thereby improved, recruiting of students
+stimulated, and a scheme for the payment of maintenance during
+training&mdash;such as the Manhattan Schools in New York had previously
+introduced to social investigators in this country&mdash;was established. The
+extension of the courses of training from instruction in simple processes
+to such advanced engineering work as lead-burning, tool-setting, and
+gauge-making soon followed, and was accompanied by necessary theoretical
+instruction in the methods of calculation of fine measurements.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p class="center"><i>The Quintessence of the Work</i></p>
+
+<p>For these advanced classes, men alone were at first eligible as students,
+women being only instructed at the outset in elementary parts of the work.
+In the early days, the women were invited &#8216;to do their bit&#8217;, by learning
+how to bore, how to drill, how to plane, how to shape, and above all, how
+to work to size. The chief battle of the Training Centre with regard to
+the instruction of women was then, and still remains, the implanting of a
+feeling for exactitude in persons accustomed to measure ribbons or lace
+within a margin of a quarter of a yard or so, or to prepare food by a
+guess-work mixture of ingredients. I remember, at the beginning of a
+course of training for women, how an instructor at a large metropolitan
+Centre remarked that &#8216;ninety-nine per cent. of the new students do not
+know what accuracy means&#8217;, and he detailed how difficult it was to instil
+into their mind &#8216;that quintessence of their work&#8217;.</p>
+
+<p>Scientific methods of tuition, helped no doubt by women&#8217;s proverbial
+patience, have, however, enabled the lesson to be learned after a few
+weeks&#8217; intensive training. The courses last but six to eight weeks and, at
+the conclusion of the carefully graduated tasks, it is not too much to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span>
+say that the success of the women has been, in an overwhelming number of
+cases, surprising both to teachers and pupils.</p>
+
+<p>I have before me a batch of letters from factory employers, written in the
+early period of the training schemes. They all bear testimony to the value
+of the outside instruction. One manager notes how the trained women from
+the Schools were able &#8216;to become producers almost at once&#8217;; another states
+that the drafting of the women students from School to factory has enabled
+the work of munitions to be carried on &#8216;with greater expedition than would
+otherwise have been the case&#8217;, and yet another, with a scarcely concealed
+note of astonishment, relates that his students were able to be engaged at
+once on &#8216;all kinds of machinery, capstan lathes, turning lathes, milling
+and wheel cutting machinery&#8217;.</p>
+
+<p>This discovery of the employer, of the potentialities of women&#8217;s work in
+the engineering trades, soon led to a development of the instruction of
+female students in the Training Centres; more advanced machine work was
+added to the curriculum, as well as tuition in aeroplane woodwork and
+construction, in core-making and moulding, in draughtsmanship and
+electrical work, in optical-instrument making, including the delicate and
+highly-skilled work of lens and prism making.</p>
+
+<p>New Training Centres are constantly being opened in provincial areas, the
+instruction being adapted to the needs of local factories. There are now
+(December, 1917) over forty training schools for engineering work in Great
+Britain, as well as nine instructional factories and workshops, and the
+proportion of women to men trained in all the processes may be reckoned
+roughly as two to one.</p>
+
+<p>The system of instruction is based, in some of the Centres, on the general
+principle that the School undertakes the preliminary work of tuition in
+the simpler engineering processes; the Instructional Factory, or workshop,
+specializing in the more skilled processes, acts as a clearing-house for
+promising students from the schools. The urgency of warfare does not,
+however, permit the application of any hard-and-fast rules. I have seen
+specimens of some of the most &#8216;advanced&#8217; work produced in a School;
+indeed, the delicate work of lens polishing and centring, the intricacies
+of engineering draughtsmanship, the precise art of tool-setting and
+gauge-making have become specialisms of the Schools in certain localities.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/img01.jpg" alt="" /></div>
+<p class="caption">TURNING THE COPPER BAND OF A 9.2-INCH HIGH-EXPLOSIVE SHELL</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/img02.jpg" alt="" /></div>
+<p class="caption">DRILLING SAFETY-PIN HOLE IN FUSE</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/img03.jpg" alt="" /></div>
+<p class="caption">INSPECTING AND GAUGING FUSES</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/img04.jpg" alt="" /></div>
+<p class="caption">TURNING THE OUTSIDE AND FORMING THE NOSE-END OF A 9.2-INCH HIGH-EXPLOSIVE SHELL</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+
+<p>As I write, the face of an eager girl of 21 years recurs to memory. She
+was showing me, the other day, a master gauge produced at a School in the
+Eastern counties. &#8216;I made it all myself,&#8217; she said joyfully, &#8216;dead exact,
+and all the other gauges of this size in the School are made from it. I
+have just been appointed assistant instructor in gauge-making.&#8217; When it is
+recalled that the deviation in the measurements of a gauge is only<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span>
+tolerated within such limits as a <span style="font-size: 0.8em;"><sup>3</sup></span>&frasl;<span style="font-size: 0.6em;">10000</span> part of an inch, the production
+in a School of a master gauge, &#8216;dead exact&#8217; in all its dimensions, is a
+proof that the student has already gone some way in the mastery of the
+craft of the engineer.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p class="center"><i>The Instructional Factory</i></p>
+
+<p>On the other hand, the Instructional Factory is often forced by war
+conditions to enrol raw recruits who seem likely material for the urgent
+needs of surrounding factories. In such cases, the candidate is placed on
+trial for a week or two in the Instructional Workshop, as in the School.
+If, at the close of the period of probation, she is deemed unsuitable, she
+is advised at that preliminary stage to return to her former occupation.</p>
+
+<p>Speaking generally, the rejects are extraordinarily few, and although it
+would be premature to draw definite conclusions, the experience of the
+Training Section suggests that there is considerable latent capacity for
+engineering work in a large number of women. A tour of the Instructional
+Workshops emphasizes the point; everywhere, women may be seen mastering in
+the short intensive course the one advanced job for which each is being
+trained. In the Instructional Workshop, the atmosphere of a School is
+exchanged for that of a factory, the conditions of a modern engineering
+shop being reflected within its precincts. Thus the students &#8216;clock on and
+off&#8217; on arrival and on departure, observe factory shifts, work on actual
+commercial jobs, obtain their tools from an attached store, and so on. The
+work varies in these Instructional Factories as in the engineering shop of
+the commercial world.</p>
+
+<p>In one section of such a hall of tuition you may see the women intent on
+the production of screws, or bolts, or nuts; in another part, such objects
+as fuse needles may be in the course of manufacture. You stop to see the
+magic which is answerable for the birth of the tiny factor which shall
+detonate the explosive, and you are amazed to find that a fuse needle
+requires six tools for its production and eight to nine gauges for testing
+the accuracy of its measurements. Or, you may perhaps pause before a
+machine which is turning out tiny grub screws. To see a rod of steel offer
+itself, as it were, to the rightful instruments on a complicated machine
+to impress the thread and slit, to watch it proceeding on its way until a
+tiny section is divided and a complete screw is handed over to a tray
+outside the machine, is, to the uninitiated, a miracle in itself.</p>
+
+<p>To see the whole of these complicated processes guided and operated by a
+smiling girl makes one hopeful for the national industries of the future.
+Setters-up of tools are at work in another section of the same
+Instructional Factory and at other machines are students grinding,
+milling, or profiling.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span>You may then visit another Instructional Factory to find that aircraft is
+the specialty. I recall one such training-ground in a bay of an aeroplane
+factory. There the girls learn almost every part of aircraft production,
+from the handling of the tiny hammers used on the woodwork for the body
+and wings, to the assembling, or putting together the tested parts. In
+this training factory, a system prevails of lectures by the practical
+instructors on the use of necessary tools; questions from the students are
+encouraged at the close of the lecture, and, I was informed, when on one
+occasion I was one of the audience, that the saving of the instructor&#8217;s
+time by the adoption of this method was beyond expected results.</p>
+
+<p>Again, you may visit an Instructional Factory where foundry work is
+included in the curriculum, or where advanced machine work is a feature. I
+have stood in one Instructional Workshop where some 600 machines were
+whirring simultaneously, and where the spirit of energy and goodwill of
+both students and instructors seemed as tangible as the metal objects
+produced. In this institution all the accomplished work is for production;
+night as well as day shifts are worked, and the needs of our armies, or
+those of our Allies, are frankly discussed with the operators. There is no
+occasion for other incentive: raw recruits, students from the Schools,
+discharged soldiers from the Front, men unfit for active service, all
+these denizens of the training-shop vie with each other to produce a
+maximum output.</p>
+
+<p>It speaks volumes for this workshop that in spite of the continual changes
+of operators&mdash;each set of students remaining only for a course of six to
+eight weeks&mdash;it is entirely maintained on a commercial basis. To reach
+such a standard in these circumstances is to imply that the heroism of the
+workshop has become an ingrained habit in operators and staff.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p class="center"><i>First Steps in Industrial Life</i></p>
+
+<p>I remember watching in this training-ground the manufacture of small
+aero-engine parts, exact in dimensions to within the smallest limits of
+tolerance. I put a query as to the wastage of material in such an
+operation, when handled by comparative new-comers. &#8216;Scrapping from this
+process&#8217;, replied the production manager with pride, &#8216;does not exceed a
+total average of one per cent.&#8217; The women at work at the time had come
+from the most varied occupations. A large proportion had never worked
+outside their own home, others were domestic servants, cooks, housemaids,
+and so on, others were dressmakers from small towns, and one, I recall,
+was an assistant from a spa, where she had been engaged handing out
+&#8216;waters&#8217; to invalids. &#8216;It is not the rank of society from which the
+student is drawn that matters,&#8217; remarked an instructor; &#8216;it is the
+personality of the individual that counts.&#8217;</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span>Every care has been taken by the Ministry of Munitions to make it easy for
+women of all classes to participate in their schemes of instruction. The
+middle class girl who has never undertaken independent work, the woman who
+has always lived and worked within the shelter of her own home,
+undoubtedly felt in many cases debarred from entering industrial life. The
+necessity of living away from her family, in order to enter a
+Training-School, the absence of home conditions in school or factory, the
+dread of an entirely masculine superintendence, all helped to strengthen
+artificial barriers between potential students and the needed engineering
+work. The Training Section, watching the development of its schemes,
+became aware of the necessity of making arrangements for students from the
+Welfare point of view, and an organization has thus developed by which the
+first steps in industrial life are made easy for the most apprehensive of
+new-comers.</p>
+
+<p>Girl students by rail are met by a responsible woman official and are
+accompanied to suitable lodgings, or to hostels. In the event of pressure
+in accommodation, the new student is introduced to temporary apartments,
+or to a &#8216;Clearing Hostel&#8217;, where she awaits in comfort a vacancy. In the
+large Training Centres, a woman supervisor is in charge. She makes all
+arrangements as to the provision of meals, rest-rooms, cloak-rooms,
+First-Aid centres, and so on, and is ready to advise the women students on
+all points relating to their personal interests.</p>
+
+<p>Women students are also enabled to wear a khaki uniform, as members of the
+Mechanical Unit of the Women&#8217;s Legion, a privilege found to be of distinct
+value to girls unaccustomed to steering an independent course in the more
+boisterous streams of life. The appreciation of the students of the
+safe-guarding of their individual desires crops out in unexpected places.
+In a handful of correspondence from students, one gleans such remarks as
+the following:</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>&#8216;Mrs. H. never spares herself any trouble as long as she can make
+things pleasant for me, she considers it her &#8220;war work&#8221; to make
+munition workers happy, and it is very nice to meet people that
+appreciate what we are doing for our country.&#8217;...</p>
+
+<p>&#8216;We were met at the station by the works motor. All at once we turned
+up an avenue of lime-trees and drew up at the door of our country
+estate. It is a real lovely house and we revel in the glories of fresh
+air, lawns and gardens, good beds and well-spread tables. We cross a
+field to the works. Dinner and tea await us when we get here, and
+there is a well-stocked vegetable garden to give us fresh vegetables,
+so we all feel indeed that our lines are fallen in pleasant places,
+and we are very grateful.&#8217;</p></div>
+
+<p>In these ways a bridge has been built by the Ministry of Munitions between
+the normal life of the women in this country and the work in the munitions
+factory.</p>
+
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr style="width: 50%;" />
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span></p>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_III" id="CHAPTER_III"></a>CHAPTER III: AT WORK&mdash;I</h2>
+<p class="title">SHELLS AND SHELL CASES&mdash;IN THE FUSE SHOP&mdash;CARTRIDGES AND BULLETS</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p class="dropcap"><span class="caps">Arrived</span> in the munitions factory, the new-comer, whether from a Government
+Training Centre, or from another occupation, is given two or three weeks&#8217;
+trial on the task she has come to undertake. Only a very small proportion
+of the women offering their services&mdash;one experienced manager puts it at 5
+per cent.&mdash;are found unsuitable, and these are discharged during the
+probationary period.</p>
+
+<p>Except in the case of those who have received a preliminary training, or
+of those who have merely transferred their energies from other factory
+work, the average woman has, at the initial stage in the munitions shops,
+to overcome an instinctive fear of the machine. Occasionally, the fear is
+intensified into an unreasoning phase of terror. &#8216;One has to coax the
+women to stay with such as these,&#8217; said one understanding foreman,
+pointing to a monster machine with huge-toothed wheels. &#8216;We don&#8217;t ask a
+woman to sit alone with these at first, for she wouldn&#8217;t do it, so we put
+a man with her, and let her sit and watch a bit, and after a while she
+loses her fear and won&#8217;t work anything else, if she can help it.&#8217;</p>
+
+<p>The women, in fact, soon get attached to the machines they are working, in
+a manner probably unknown to the men. &#8216;I&#8217;ve been here a year on this
+machine, and I can&#8217;t do near so well on any other,&#8217; is a remark many a
+girl has made to me as I have watched her on a difficult job. From time to
+time, a girl will even confess that she &#8216;can&#8217;t bear to think of some one
+on the night-shift working <i>her</i> machine&#8217;. An understanding has arisen
+between the machine and the operator which amounts almost to affection. I
+have often noticed the expression of this emotion in the workshops; the
+caressing touch of a woman&#8217;s fingers, for instance, as a bore is being
+urged on to the job on the machine. This touch, which cannot be taught, or
+imparted, enables the operation to be started in the most effective method
+possible, and goes to the making of an excellent and accurate worker.</p>
+
+<p>The femininity of the worker has, however, its drawbacks, and for the sake
+of successful handling of women in the munitions factory, it is as well
+that these psychological points should be noted. If, for example, a
+machine<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span> is out of gear, or if the operation is held up for any other
+cause, the women munition makers will sometimes behave in an unreasonable
+manner, quite bewildering to a foreman accustomed only to dealing with
+men. The temporary cessation of work may make only a slight money
+difference to the woman operator by the end of the week: &#8216;not enough to
+fuss about,&#8217; as the foreman judges. But the woman nevertheless often
+<i>does</i> fuss, because in her eyes the wages do not loom so large as the
+interruption to her work. She &#8216;hates standing-by&#8217;, she will say, for she
+cannot express the emotion of which she is but dimly conscious, that a
+woman&#8217;s deep instinct is to give freely of her fullness, and it frets her
+very soul to be balked in the middle of a job.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/img05.jpg" alt="" /></div>
+<p class="caption">ASSEMBLING FUSES</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/img06.jpg" alt="" /></div>
+<p class="caption">COOLING SHELL FORGINGS</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/img07.jpg" alt="" /></div>
+<p class="caption">OPERATING A LUMSDEN PLAIN GRINDER: RE-FORMING 8-INCH HIGH-EXPLOSIVE CUTTERS</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+
+<p>Other initial obstacles in the employment of &#8216;new&#8217; female labour in the
+factories result from the exchange of the manifold duties of the woman in
+her own home for repetition work performed in the company of hundreds of
+other human beings. These difficulties are, however, soon overcome, and
+the new-comer, generally speaking, rapidly becomes one of a large and
+merry company. The whirr of the wheels and the persistent throb of the
+machinery may at first distract her, but after a short time the factory
+noises are unnoticed, save as an accompaniment to her thoughts, her
+laughter, or her song. I have indeed met in the England of to-day nothing
+more inspiriting, outside the soldiers&#8217; camps, than the women munition
+workers at work or at play.</p>
+
+<p>In August 1916, there were some 500 different munitions processes upon
+which women were engaged. To-day, they are employed upon practically every
+operation in factory, in foundry, in laboratory, and chemical works, of
+which they are physically capable. Within the limits of this publication
+it is not possible to follow them into every field of their endeavours,
+yet a glance at their work in a few typical products may give some slight
+indication of women&#8217;s contribution to Britain&#8217;s effort in the World War.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p class="center"><i>Shells and Shell Cases</i></p>
+
+<p>Of the numbers of operations that go to the making of a shell, women now
+undertake every process, in some works, including even the forging of the
+billets in the foundry. It was the urgent need of a greatly increased
+output of shells in 1915 which led to the widespread introduction into the
+engineering shops of female labour, and the women have repaid this unique
+opportunity by their unqualified success. So rapid, and so marked, has
+been their progress in shell production that by the spring of 1917 the
+official announcement was justified, that, by March 31 of that year,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span>
+Government contracts for shells of certain dimensions would only be given
+where 80 per cent. of the employees were women.</p>
+
+<p>At first, the women were mainly engaged in simple machine operations, such
+as boring, drilling, and turning, or in filling the shells. They are, at
+present, working hydraulic presses, guiding huge overhead cranes,
+&#8216;tonging&#8217;, or lifting the molten billets, &#8216;setting&#8217;, or fitting the tools
+in the machines, inspecting and gauging, painting the finished shell
+cases, making the boxes for dispatch of the finished product, and trucking
+these when finally screwed up and ready for exit from the factory to the
+Front. It is not possible to describe here in detail women&#8217;s entire
+contribution to the production of a shell, but, from foundry to railway
+truck, she has become an alert and promising worker.</p>
+
+<p>In the foundry, her appearance is as yet exceptional, yet in the North
+country it is no unusual sight to find a woman in the cage suspended from
+the overhead travelling crane, operating its protruding arm. Now, she will
+pick up with the clumsy iron fingers a pig of iron and thrust it into the
+glowing depths of a furnace, or she will lift the red-hot billet and bring
+it to the hydraulic press, where it is roughly hollowed into its
+predestined shape.</p>
+
+<p>In the shell shop proper you may watch the woman operator on some scores
+of processes; at one machine, she may be attacking the centre of the
+billet with a revolving nose, at another she may be &#8216;turning&#8217; the outside
+of a shell. The shavings curl off in this process like hot bacon rind and
+fall in iridescent rings around her: blue, purple, peacock, or gleaming
+silver. Or, you may watch the woman worker &#8216;threading&#8217; the shell, a
+process by which the screw threads are provided, into which the nose of
+the shell is afterwards fitted; or, you may stand and marvel at the skill
+of the worker who so deftly rivets the base-plate into the shell&#8217;s lower
+end. But, perhaps, the most attractive operation to the visitor to the
+shell shop is the fitting and grooving of the shell&#8217;s copper band, a
+process which leaves the machine and worker half-hidden in the glory of
+sunset tints, as the copper scrap falls thickly from the machine.</p>
+
+<p>At every stage, the shell is gauged and tested, examined and re-examined,
+since accuracy is the watch-word of its production. Sometimes, the
+machine-operator will gauge her own product; at other stages, the shell
+passes into the hands of women overlookers of the factory, the final tests
+being made by Government &#8216;viewers&#8217;. The inside, as well as the outside of
+the shell is submitted to such inspection, and you may see women peering
+into the interior of the shells, aided by the light from a tiny electric
+bulb, mounted on a stick. This contrivance is thrust successively into
+rows and rows of shells.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span>Women are now exclusively used for the painting of the shells, a process
+accomplished, not by means of a brush and paint-pot, but by the operator
+playing a fine electrically-worked syringe on to the surface of the shell.
+This process is undertaken in what is often called &#8216;the butcher&#8217;s shop&#8217;,
+the shells, in pairs, being swung up on a rope into a compartment where
+the operator works from behind a protective iron screen.</p>
+
+<p>In the Filling shops, women&#8217;s devotion to their work has been proved once
+and again. Whether the process undertaken be in company of a few comrades,
+or in isolated huts where lonely vigils are kept over stores of
+explosives, the munition-girls are hardly known to flinch in their duty.</p>
+
+<p>Sometimes, they have volunteered to work throughout the night when
+air-raids are in progress, at other times, women-workers have returned to
+the Danger Zone immediately after some bad experience there; and, in every
+case, the woman worker in the Filling Factory cheerfully sacrifices much
+which she holds dear in life. It may signify but little to a man to give
+up his small personal possessions whilst at work in the danger areas, but
+to many a woman worker it means much, that she may not wear a brooch, or a
+flower, while on duty, and that her wedding-ring, the only allowable
+trinket, must be bound with thread while she works. Her tresses, which she
+normally loves to braid, or twist into varying fashions, must also be left
+hairpinless beneath her cap. She must relinquish her personal belongings
+before going to her allotted task; no crochet-hook or knitting-pin may
+accompany her into the zone where friction of steel, or hard metal, might
+spell death to a multitude of employees. Yet this sacrifice of
+individuality is given freely by the woman in the Filling shop, and she is
+still merry-hearted and blithe as she fills the small bags with deadly
+powder, or binds the charge which shall fire the shell.</p>
+
+<p>When the shell is finally filled and passed &#8216;O.K.&#8217;, or perfect, it is a
+woman who packs it into its box and who wheels it on a truck, sometimes
+for a mile or more over narrow platforms, to hand it to another woman who
+stacks it into the waiting railway-wagon. Any one who has watched
+throughout the production of a shell in a factory of to-day can only echo
+a well-known author&#8217;s recent salute: &#8216;Hats off to the Women&#8217;.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p class="center"><i>In the Fuse Shop</i></p>
+
+<p>The fuse, that small and complicated object which explodes the shell, is a
+war-product now largely produced by women&#8217;s labour. A few inches in
+length, it requires some hundreds of operations for its manufacture, even
+if the initial processes on the metal are excluded from the count. In
+section, it looks like a complicated metal jig-saw puzzle of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span> exquisite
+finish and cohesion: viewing it externally, a child might mistake it for a
+conjurer&#8217;s &#8216;property&#8217;, a bright metal egg, or roll often surrounded by a
+metal ring marked with time measurements.</p>
+
+<p>The care and accuracy necessary for the production of this small object
+can hardly be imagined by the uninitiated: it is measured and re-measured
+in every diameter, since on its perfection depends the life of the gunner
+and his team. The fuse shop is usually characterized by its cleanliness
+and quietude. I recall one such shop stretching far away into distance
+both in length and breadth. Under its roof some 1,500 women were at work.
+Conversation could be held in any part of the shop, undisturbed by the
+usual factory noises. The fuse parts are, indeed, so small that the
+machinery is necessarily light, and in such a shop it is dexterity and
+accuracy that tell, rather than physical strength.</p>
+
+<p>Rows of graceful women and girls were standing at their machines, and I
+recall how their overalls and caps of varied hues made a rainbow effect,
+as one watched from a distant corner. Some were in cream colour and some
+in russet-brown, or apple green, the caps sometimes matching the overall
+and sometimes offering a strong contrast. A splash of purple, or a deep
+magenta, mingled with the head-dresses of softer hue, for in this shop,
+away from the Danger Zone, no insistence was made on uniformity of factory
+costume. Other women, wearing a distinctive armlet, were passing in and
+out between the rows of workers, now stopping and bending over a machine,
+now making some bright remark to the operator, as a ripple of laughter
+indicated, or again, pointing out in sterner wise some danger, or some
+error in the job. These itinerary women are the overlookers, who since the
+war have perfected themselves in their special job and can now supervise
+the operators.</p>
+
+<p>At long tables, other women were sitting; some quite elderly and
+grey-haired, some mere girls. They were measuring with small gauges parts
+of the fuse, some the size of a good-sized bead. There are 150 different
+gauges authorized for the measurement of one type of fuse, and in practice
+even more are used, to ensure perfection of accuracy. I stood spell-bound
+at one of these gauging tables and watched the examination of small screws
+and flash plugs. There were six little squares of felt on the table, on
+which the examiner placed rejects, classified according to the detected
+flaw. The work proceeded with the utmost dispatch, the &#8216;accepted&#8217; or
+&#8216;perfect&#8217; heap growing as if by magic.</p>
+
+<p>At another table, a girl was testing springs of about an inch long. If any
+of these showed the smallest fraction too much length after being
+submitted to a given pressure, they were put aside as &#8216;scrap&#8217;. At yet
+another table, tiny fuse needles were being examined for length,
+thickness<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span> of phlange, and accuracy of point, and on a high flat desk,
+near a machine, I noticed seventeen different gauges were ranged for the
+examination of the percussion end of the fuse-body, one ten-thousandth
+part of an inch being the limitation or variation allowed in such parts.</p>
+
+<p>When all the parts have been examined they are passed to other tables for
+assembling, or putting together. In this operation almost superhuman care
+is required, and the work is reserved for the best operators and
+time-keepers as a reward for long service. &#8216;Assembling&#8217; is regarded as the
+plum of the fuse-room. The operators are well aware of the importance of
+the task, as they stow away in the time fuses the pea-ball, pellet,
+spring, stirrup, ferrule, and other components of the fuse. The needle is
+fixed by blows from a small hammer, and at length the fuse is completed
+and passes out of the room of its creation to receive its &#8216;filling&#8217; from
+other hands.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p class="center"><i>Cartridges and Bullets</i></p>
+
+<p>The production of cartridges and bullets is another branch of munitions
+production in which women are mainly employed. These objects, which, when
+completed, are together no longer than a ball-room pencil, make in their
+manufacture no great demand on physical strength.</p>
+
+<p>On entering a cartridge and bullet shop, one is at once struck with its
+individuality. There is more stir and movement than in a fuse-room, but
+less of the imperiousness of the machinery than in the shell or gun shop.
+There is in the cartridge and bullet room still the whirr of wheels and,
+above that, the deep constant throb of the driving-force, that makes
+conversation almost inaudible to the new-comer. But beneath this bass
+accompaniment, one can hear the lesser sounds belonging to the cartridge
+and bullet-room alone. There may be the buzz of the circulating gas
+machines&mdash;which resemble miniature merry-go-rounds&mdash;the tap, tap, of the
+cartridges as they are thrown out of the machine into a box below, and the
+tinkle of bullets as they are poured into weighing machines, or on to
+tables, or into huge barrels, such as are used on the wharves for the
+transport of herrings.</p>
+
+<p>A cartridge and bullet-shop sometimes is as animated and as picturesque as
+an open-air market under a southern sky. I remember such a shop where the
+girls were in various factory costumes, some at the machines in khaki and
+some in cream-coloured overalls and caps; some, who were &#8216;trucking&#8217;, or
+removing the product in boxes, were in cream trouser-suits, with smart
+head-dresses fashioned from brightly-coloured oriental handkerchiefs. In
+between the rows of girls men in dark suits were passing to and fro, now
+stopping to examine, or alter a machine and now taking up a box of
+bullets<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span> and pouring out its glittering contents like a silver stream, so
+that the output from each worker might be weighed and assessed.</p>
+
+<p>Through an open door, at one side of the shop, one could see other men,
+like stern magicians, dropping cartridges into vats of acid, and just to
+the side of the vats I caught sight of two girls vigorously shaking a sack
+of cartridges, hot from the furnace. As they shook, they sang an army
+refrain: &#8216;Take me back to dear old Blighty,&#8217; with a chorus of laughter. At
+the extreme end of the shop, near the door whence the product made its
+exit, were long narrow tables, piled with bullets, reminding one of a haul
+of silver sprats on the quay-side. These were the inspecting tables where
+the bullets receive minute attention from women viewers.</p>
+
+<p>The women&#8217;s work in the bullet-shop is of extraordinary interest to the
+onlooker, although many of the processes must be infinitely more
+monotonous, from the worker&#8217;s standpoint, than operations in other
+munitions productions. The elongation of the little metal vessel,
+resembling an acorn-cup, into a full-length cartridge, or bullet,
+necessitates many operations in which the dexterity of human fingers and
+the ingenuity of the machine both come into play. In the shop I recall, in
+one machine employed for semi-annealing, the cartridge was being &#8216;fed&#8217;
+into a metal revolving plate. This passed behind an asbestos screen into a
+double row of gas jets, where the semi-annealing or hardening process was
+being accomplished. The dexterity of the operators was so great that one
+woman was often feeding two machines, apparently without effort, and never
+missed placing the cartridge into the correct aperture in the revolving
+plate.</p>
+
+<p>In another process, I watched young girls sitting round a table and
+placing bullets into circular apertures in small trays, resembling
+solitaire-boards. Many of the girls were working with such speed that it
+was impossible to follow the movements of their fingers, but they,
+unconscious of their prowess, worked with averted heads, smiling in
+amusement at the visitor&#8217;s astonishment.</p>
+
+<p>In yet another operation, it was the machine that held one&#8217;s attention.
+The operator was feeding cartridges into a metal band which slipped out of
+view while the process of &#8216;tapering&#8217; was performed. When finished, a metal
+thumb and index finger appeared, which delicately picked up the
+cartridges, one by one, and threw them aside. The displaced cartridge then
+hopped out of the machine into a box at the side of the machine.</p>
+
+<p>Entranced by the many mysteries in the production of cartridges and
+bullets in the shop I am recalling, I had not noticed that the
+tea-interval had arrived, and suddenly found that the work-room was almost
+empty of human beings. Only two girls remained. They were sitting sewing,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span>
+whilst they devoured thick slices of bread and butter out of a newspaper
+packet. The woman inspector, who was my guide, turned sharply. &#8216;What are
+you doing here?&#8217; she said, &#8216;Eating your tea in the workshop, instead of
+outside, or in the canteen. Be off at once into the fresh air.&#8217; Then, with
+the indignation fading out of a good-humoured face: &#8216;What next?&#8217; she said.</p>
+
+<p>Looking out of the open door at the streams of bright and happy girls
+laughing, singing, dancing, and running, as only healthy youth can do in
+the midst of these dark days of war, I seemed to see other and brighter
+days ahead stretching out into the years of the future, when the workfolk
+would all taste a fuller joy in life. With renewed hope, I gave her back
+her challenge: &#8216;Well! and what next?&#8217;</p>
+
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr style="width: 50%;" />
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span></p>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IV" id="CHAPTER_IV"></a>CHAPTER IV: AT WORK&mdash;II</h2>
+<p class="title">THE MAKING OF AIRCRAFT&mdash;OPTICAL INSTRUMENTS&mdash;IN THE SHIPYARDS</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p class="center"><i>The Making of Aircraft</i></p>
+
+<p class="dropcap"><span class="caps">The</span> production of aircraft, undertaken in this country on a large scale
+only since the outbreak of the war, has fallen more naturally into the
+hands of women. The work is for the most part light, and the new
+factories, often erected in open country, are bright, airy, and largely
+free from the noise of machinery. Added to these special attractions to
+the woman worker, there is apparently a distinct appeal to the youth of
+both sexes and to women of all ages in anything connected with the art of
+flying.</p>
+
+<p>It is no secret that our output of aircraft is steadily increasing, and
+that during 1917 it has been doubled. In one factory in London, the output
+has been trebled within three months; in Lancashire, there are instances
+in which it has been doubled, and other areas show an improved production
+varying from 25 to 50 per cent. Yet the increased demand for labour for
+this work has always been immediately answered, and there is a steady flow
+into the factories of the best type of women workers from every class of
+society. Here and there, one already meets a woman who, during the short
+period of the war, has risen to be manager or partner in an aircraft
+factory. Unconsciously, such a one emphasizes the fact that the mastery of
+the element of the future is likely to be an affair of both the sexes.</p>
+
+<p>A visit to any aeroplane factory repeats the hint, and reveals the
+extraordinary versatility of skill latent in women, which can well be
+applied to this form of industry. &#8216;Women <i>must</i> have been cabin&#8217;d,
+cribbed, and confined before the war&#8217;, said a foreman in taking me over
+his shop in an aircraft works. &#8216;Look what they can do at this kind of job,
+and yet many of them are ladies, from homes where they sat about and were
+waited upon.&#8217; The wonder of it cannot fail to impress a visitor, since
+only four years ago women were allowed to undertake in aircraft
+construction merely those parts which convention deemed suitable for
+feminine fingers: such processes, for instance, as the sewing of the wings
+by hand, or by machine, or the painting of the woodwork.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/img08.jpg" alt="" /></div>
+<p class="caption">ENGRAVING METAL PARTS FOR COMPASSES</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/img09.jpg" alt="" /></div>
+<p class="caption">COLOURING AEROPLANE PLANES</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/img10.jpg" alt="" /></div>
+<p class="caption">CHIPPING AND GRINDING BLADES OF CAST IRON PROPELLER WITH PORTABLE TOOLS</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/img11.jpg" alt="" /></div>
+<p class="caption">WOMAN ACTING AS MATE TO JOINER. MAKING SEA-PLANE FLOATS</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span>To-day, they undertake almost every other process both at the carpenter&#8217;s
+bench and in the engineering shop, and the chief impression you carry away
+from a stroll through such a factory is that the women are thoroughly at
+home in the work. The operations are often so clean that the workers&#8217;
+overalls and caps of the daintiest shades of pink, blue, white, and
+heliotrope, remain fresh; the material for aeroplane parts is usually so
+light that the handling of it presents no difficulty to a slip of a girl.
+When within the works, the visitor is constantly stimulated to the thought
+that the hand which rocks the cradle should obviously be the one to make
+the air-machine.</p>
+
+<p>One expects, of course, women&#8217;s familiarity with the occupation in the
+room where the fine Irish linen is cut out and fashioned into wings. One
+is not surprised at the facility with which the measuring and cutting out
+are accomplished, and, maybe, an emotion of admiration arises, similar to
+that evoked by the contemplation of old tapestries, when one watches the
+hand-sewing of a seam in a wing of some 10 feet in length. Not a stitch of
+the button-holing of such a seam deviates by a hairbreadth from its
+fellows. Such work has, however, been women&#8217;s province through the ages.</p>
+
+<p>But a new sensation is awakened in the carpenter&#8217;s shop where women are
+working with dexterity at the bench, handling woodwork like the men, now
+dealing with delicate wooden ribs, or again, fashioning propellers out of
+mahogany or walnut with such nicety that there is not the slightest
+deviation between the dimensions of a pair. In the room where the linen is
+stretched over the wooden ribs, I have seen women working with tiny
+hammers, giving fairy blows that never miss their mark on tiny nails.</p>
+
+<p>It is with fascination that a visitor stands by be-goggled women as they
+undertake the welding of metal joints by the oxy-acetylene process. Here,
+conscientiousness is a vital quality in the operator, since an undetected
+flaw in the weld, as a works foreman recently remarked, &#8216;might easily send
+an airman to Kingdom Come&#8217;. For this process, women of education are more
+often selected.</p>
+
+<p>It is with awe that you watch the women at work on the metal parts of the
+aeroplane, drilling, grinding, boring, milling on the machine, or
+soldering tiny aluminum parts for the fuselage, and in each process
+gauging and re-gauging, measuring and re-measuring. Women also work on
+aero-engines, and help in the manufacture of the magneto, the very heart
+of the machine. They even undertake special processes, which before the
+war were only entrusted to a select body of men. I stood one day, for
+example, watching a woman splicing steel rope, a process <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span>undertaken in
+pre-war days by sailors. She was working with extraordinary speed and
+unconcern, and had learned the job in three or four days. Before then, she
+told me, she had been her employer&#8217;s cook.</p>
+
+<p>But the most alluring scene of all is the assembling of aircraft. The
+infinite number of separate parts are now ready; they have been tested by
+factory overlookers and retested by Government inspectors. The greatest
+care is taken in these examinations: it is the only possible insurance of
+the lives of the brave youths on their journey above the clouds. All the
+workers know this, and the seriousness of the job is reflected on their
+faces. But now all the parts are ready and to hand in the Erecting shop.
+Then wings and propeller are added to body, the engine and
+leather-upholstered seats introduced, the electric apparatus fitted up,
+the compass, ammunition box and other instruments and weapons placed in
+position.</p>
+
+<p>The aeroplane is at length complete, and stands in the hangar like some
+great bird, with outstretched pinions, awaiting its first flight into the
+Unknown. Women undertake every process of this assembling, and have
+acquired familiarity with all the parts. This was put to the test recently
+in a certain works when a woman operator was directed to dismantle a
+machine. Without hesitation, she stripped the complex network of the
+structural stay-wires and the control wires, and then re-assembled them,
+correct in every particular, at the first attempt.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p class="center"><i>Optical Instruments</i></p>
+
+<p>Of the many industries developed by the war, the production of optical
+instruments offers a striking example of rapid progress. Before 1914, the
+optical glass industry of Europe was largely in the hands of Germany and
+Austria, and the outbreak of hostilities meant the total closing of that
+market to the Allies. The lack of optical instruments thus occasioned was
+at first a source of grave national peril, since optical glass provides,
+as it were, eyes for both Navy and Army. The eyes of the guns are the
+range-finder, the director, the sighting telescope, periscope, prism
+binoculars, and other instruments for observing fire and correcting the
+aim; the tank would be blind without its periscope, and observations are
+made from aircraft by means of photographic cameras and lenses.</p>
+
+<p>At sea, the tale is repeated; the submarine requires at least one eye, and
+the submarine chaser needs many, while, by means of optical instruments,
+the naval gunner can fire at a target which is about 15 to 20 miles away.
+The very health of the army depends, in great measure, on optical glass,
+since the Royal Army Medical Corps fights malaria and other diseases<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span> due
+to parasites, which must be magnified by a microscope a thousand times
+before they can be identified. Hence, the solution of the problem of
+optical munitions was a vital matter in the early days of the war.</p>
+
+<p>With characteristic energy, Great Britain set to work and soon restored a
+languishing trade. The task was enormous; the industry had to be revived
+from its very foundations. The production of the peculiar types of glass
+required for optical instruments in itself presented a formidable
+obstacle, even its principal ingredient, a special quality of sand, being
+formerly derived mainly from Fontainebleau and Belgium. But by widespread
+investigation efficient substitutes were soon discovered, the problem of
+mixing the ingredients was at length solved, formul&aelig; for special glasses
+devised, and we are now producing large quantities of optical glass of
+perfect quality. The production of the raw material was, however, only a
+first step in obtaining an adequate supply of optical instruments.</p>
+
+<p>Numbers of delicate processes stand between the rough glass and the
+finished implement. The glass must be cut, ground, and curved exactly to
+the requisite design, which in itself takes many days of high mathematical
+computation; it must be smoothed and polished, cleaned with meticulous
+care, and adjusted to a nicety in the particular instrument for which it
+is fashioned. The difficulties and pitfalls are incalculable; from start
+to finish the glass obeys no fixed laws, but answers only to the skilled
+handling of the scientist and craftsman. &#8216;Optical glass is the mule of
+materials&#8217;, comments a recent writer with sincerity.</p>
+
+<p>The absence of requisite labour for what was practically a new industry
+was a serious menace, and it is to the credit of Englishwomen that, as
+soon as the need for their services in this direction was made known, they
+stepped without hesitation into this unfamiliar and highly skilled
+industry. Their success therein is remarkable, and many, from such
+callings as high-class domestic service, kindergarten instruction, music
+teaching, blouse and dressmaking, have achieved a wonderful record in the
+delicate and highly technical processes of lens-smoothing and polishing
+and in the production of prisms of faultless polish and cut.</p>
+
+<p>There is, I take it, no more interesting munitions development than in
+factories where these lenses and prisms are produced. The work is so fine
+and so delicate that one feels it might be more suitably transferred for
+manipulation to elves, or fairy folk, who might undertake the various
+processes standing at a large-sized toad-stool. But with the stern reality
+of war upon us, willing feminine fingers have had to be trained to handle
+these lenses, the smallest of which, when ranged in trays, resemble a
+collection<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span> of dewdrops, and the largest of which would easily fill the
+port-hole of an ocean-liner.</p>
+
+<p>Optical glass when it comes into the workshop has the appearance of small
+blocks of rough ice of a greyish hue. These blocks are roughly sliced and
+cut into shape by a rotating metal disk charged with diamond dust. The
+prisms and lenses in their initial stage are then handed on to women, who
+complete the work on their surfaces. Each process has its particular lure
+for the interested visitor. You may watch the slices of glass being shaped
+into prisms by handwork against the tool; you may follow these embryo
+prisms through the various processes of smoothing and polishing until a
+small magnifying prism is obtained for use in a magnetic compass, or until
+a large prism is completed suitable for a submarine periscope. You may
+follow the creation of a lens from the roughing and grinding of the glass
+slices with emery, or carborundum, until the approximate shape is given,
+or you may follow a later process of sticking the smaller lenses on to
+pitch, so that they may form a single surface for smoothing and polishing.</p>
+
+<p>Again, you may watch the superlatively difficult operation of centring a
+lens. This task is necessary to ensure the polished surfaces of the lens
+running perfectly true and it requires a skilled touch and a trained eye
+to undertake it satisfactorily.</p>
+
+<p>In a shop in a certain optical munitions factory I met the first woman who
+worked a centring machine in that area. She was formerly a housemaid, and
+told me that, at first, all the men had discouraged her from the job and
+had said it was &#8216;impossible for a woman to do such work&#8217;. But she &#8216;stuck
+it&#8217;&mdash;so she said&mdash;and in a few weeks, to her own surprise and the men&#8217;s
+dismay, this peculiarly skilled job became familiar to her. &#8216;Now I feel I
+am doing something,&#8217; she said in triumph. This sentiment was echoed by
+another worker in that factory who was accomplishing the surprising task
+of &#8216;chamfering&#8217;, or putting a tiny bevel onto the edge of a lens.</p>
+
+<p>The large lenses measure only 2 inches in diameter; the smaller ones are
+about the size of a threepenny bit, and every operation, whether grinding,
+trueing, smoothing, polishing, or centring, must be accomplished with the
+utmost care. Even the final process in the manufacture of the lens or
+prism, &#8216;wiping off&#8217;, is fraught with responsibility to the operator.
+&#8216;Wiping off,&#8217; or cleaning the lens, can only be done with a silken duster,
+for the finished glass, like a dainty lady, will tolerate the touch of
+nothing coarse.</p>
+
+<p>In cases where the glass is graticulated, or marked with fine lines for
+measurement purposes, the task of &#8216;wiping off&#8217; is of extraordinary
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span>difficulty; in the opinion of at least one foreman with whom I have
+discussed this question, the operation is only perfectly successful when
+performed by a girl&#8217;s fingers. It is of supreme importance that no speck
+of dirt or hint of grease from a finger-mark be left on the glass when
+finally adjusted, or the instrument would become a source of danger to the
+user. No wonder that the feeling of the optical instrument workshop
+expresses itself in the words: &#8216;Cleanliness is more than godliness at this
+job.&#8217;</p>
+
+<p>The completed glass at length reaches the stage where it is set in its
+instrument, be it periscope, dial-sight, telescope, and so on. Although
+the most exact measurements have been observed both in the metal part and
+on the glass, small adjustments are necessary; for the fit must be so
+perfect that even if the metal case suffers shell-shock, the glass must
+still not rattle. But it is the metal alone which is submitted to
+alteration, and it is wonderful how women have been able to obtain
+sufficient dexterity to make these infinitesimal changes in the metal
+parts. One can see a mere girl undertaking such a task by giving the metal
+three or four delicate strokes from a file so fine that it would not hurt
+a baby&#8217;s skin. Meantime, the lens or prism is finally examined (also by
+women) for size, scratches, and other imperfections, and is then
+re-cleaned. Girls and women take a full share in the production of the
+metal parts for the optical instruments and also assemble, or collect the
+parts, for the adjustment of the glass, but so far they do not generally
+adjust or test the completed instrument.</p>
+
+<p>The operations used in the production of optical instruments for war
+purposes are, of course, similar to those required in the manufacture of
+implements used in peace-time, such as opera-glasses, telescopes,
+microscopes, surveying instruments, photographic and cinematograph
+apparatus, &amp;c., and it is expected that women who have entered the new
+war-time industry will happily find themselves, when peace dawns, in
+possession of a permanent means of livelihood in a skilled occupation.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p class="center"><i>In the Shipyards</i></p>
+
+<p>&#8216;Ships, ships, and still ships&#8217;: such is the main need of the Allies in
+this, the fourth year of the war. To answer this demand, every dockyard in
+the country is working at the highest pressure. Into this work, strange as
+it may seem to those familiar with the rough-and-tumble life of a
+shipyard, women have penetrated and have so far surmounted all obstacles
+in the tasks to which they have been allocated.</p>
+
+<p>At first, dilution in shipyards was looked upon as a hazardous experiment.
+The work is mostly heavy and clumsy, and the type of men undertaking it,
+splendid fellows enough in their physique and general outlook,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span> are mainly
+accustomed to dealings with the boisterous elements and with men comrades
+of their own pattern. Their attitude towards women, it was feared, would
+make for trouble immediately that the other sex was introduced as
+fellow-workers. Even the most optimistic amongst shipbuilders were aghast
+at the idea of women working shoulder to shoulder with men on board ship.
+Yet here and there a pioneer employer has arisen, and the experiment has
+been tried. It is succeeding unquestionably.</p>
+
+<p>I have been into the shipyards and seen the amazing sight and am convinced
+of its expediency, at all events as a war-time measure. Special care must,
+of course, be taken in the planning and the supervision of women&#8217;s work on
+board ship, but given the right type of inspectress, charge hand, and
+workers, there is no reason why women should not, in increasing numbers,
+fill the gaps in the shipyards, as in the factories. The women chosen to
+undertake such tasks are well aware of the service they are rendering to
+the nation at this juncture, and to the women workers the first day on
+board ship is one of supreme happiness. &#8216;They are so excited when they
+actually get on board,&#8217; said a dockyard inspectress to me recently &#8216;that
+they forget all about the difficulties and objections to the work.&#8217; It is
+well that this is so, for it is not too easy for the novice to move about
+below, even on a big battleship.</p>
+
+<p>I was taken over one where the women were working. It was in a big yard
+crammed with shipping of every kind&mdash;so full that one could echo the words
+of the old Elizabethan, who said of a crowd: &#8216;There was not room for a
+snail to put out its horns.&#8217; A stiff breeze was blowing, and the sea
+beyond ran full and blue. The great battleship along the dock lay serene
+and stately, bearing, as it were, with grim humour the meddlesome tappings
+and chippings of impertinent human beings, who presumed to furbish her up.
+There were men on the conning-tower, busy with paint-pots, and there was a
+tangle of ropes and pots on the upper decks where the guns were biding
+their time. Men were calling lustily to each other, and were darting here
+and there as brisk and wholesome as the breeze.</p>
+
+<p>&#8216;We go down here,&#8217; said the inspectress, pointing to a ladder as steep as
+the side of a house. She bounded down with the ease of an antelope.
+Another ladder, and yet another. The inspectress seemed to have forgotten
+their steep incline and I was left, a helpless landlubber, cautiously
+descending step by step. When I joined her in the engine-room she was
+already deep in conversation with one of her staff. And then I noticed the
+secret aid to her agility. All the women aboard ship were dressed in
+trouser suits. The suits, of blue drill for the supervisors, and of a
+similar material in brown for the labourers, were made with a short tunic,
+and the trousers were buckled securely at the ankle. A tight-fitting cap
+to match completed<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span> the smart workmanlike costume which permits of perfect
+freedom of movement in confined places. Without such a costume it would be
+hardly possible for women to work on board.</p>
+
+<p>The women workers on this particular battleship were engaged in renewing
+electric wires and fittings, a job which requires a good deal of care and
+accuracy. On the lower deck, they were fitting up new cables and were
+perched in high places, here &#8216;sweating in&#8217; a distribution box, there
+marking off the position for the wires. Others were drilling holes, others
+again were &#8216;tapping&#8217;, or making a thread in the holes. In the engine-room
+the women were busy stripping worn-out electric wiring and were working by
+the light of tall candles, as merry as a party preparing a Christmas tree.</p>
+
+<p>Everywhere the women were working in pairs, an arrangement found
+especially advisable on board. Behind a small iron door we found one
+couple working on a fire-control in a nook where the entrance of a single
+visitor caused bad overcrowding. &#8216;These are my mice&#8217;, said the
+inspectress; &#8216;they always get away into the cupboard-jobs, and very well
+they work there too. But we have to maintain a strict discipline on board,
+far stricter than anything known in the factories.&#8217;</p>
+
+<p>No talking, I was informed, is allowed in that dockyard, during the
+working hours on board, between the sailors or men labourers and the women
+and there is constant supervision of the women employed. These work on
+board in parties of 20-22, each party being under the care of a charge
+hand. When the staff included three charge hands for supervision on board,
+an inspectress was appointed for this special branch of the work. The
+system seems to work well, and I noticed how the men and women had
+evidently accepted each other as comrades. Coming into a secluded gangway
+a man-labourer, who had finished his job, was unconcernedly shaving before
+a square of mirror, while two or three women just beyond went on, just as
+unconcernedly, tap, tapping at the electric fittings. There was no
+chaffing, no &#8216;larking&#8217;, between the men and women, but a sense of
+comradeship, such as one notices in a Co-education School.</p>
+
+<p>The women on electric-wiring receive, in that dockyard, one month&#8217;s
+instruction on dummy bulk-heads before going on board; their
+instructors&mdash;expert men&mdash;accompany them to the number of two to every
+party of twenty or so, and remain with them for ten to twelve months.
+After that, the women are able to work without an instructor, and I was an
+eyewitness to this arrangement on a cargo vessel, where electric wiring
+was also being undertaken.</p>
+
+<p>Besides the work on board, women in dockyards are employed in the various
+engineering shops where almost every description of construction<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span> and
+repair work for vessels is undertaken. I have seen numbers of women at
+work in such an electrical department, winding armatures, making parts for
+firing-gear, polishing, or buffing and repairing electrical apparatus, &amp;c.
+The work in such a repair section is full of interest and variety. From
+day to day the operators receive consignments of electrical apparatus
+damaged on board by the elements, or worse. Great dispatch is needed, and
+the women work with the utmost zeal and efficiency. I noticed them
+undertaking such varying operations as lackering guards for lamps and
+radiator fronts, repairing junction and section boxes, fire-control
+instruments, automatic searchlights, &amp;c., and they were turning out their
+work, the foreman said, just like men. In the constructional department,
+women are now employed in making bulkhead pieces, or metal-work of various
+kinds, in oxy-acetylene welding, and occasionally in the foundry.</p>
+
+<p>When it is recollected that before the war only elderly women&mdash;the
+grandmothers&mdash;were, generally speaking, employed in the dockyards, and
+those only on such ornamental tasks as flag-making or upholstery for
+yachts, it is hardly credible that the granddaughters are now working
+successfully on intricate processes and even at jobs where physical
+strength is a qualification. &#8216;We can hardly believe our eyes,&#8217; said a
+foreman recently, &#8216;when we see the heavy stuff brought to and from the
+shops in motor lorries driven by girls. Before the war it was all carted
+by horses and men. The girls do the job all right though, and the only
+thing they ever complain about is that their toes get cold.&#8217; &#8216;They don&#8217;t
+now&#8217;, said a strapping young woman-driver, overhearing the conversation.
+&#8216;We&#8217;ve got hot-water tins.&#8217; Then, in a low voice, for my ears alone, &#8216;I
+love my work, it&#8217;s ever so interesting.&#8217;</p>
+
+<p>It is this note that one finds above all, amongst the women in the
+dockyards. The spirit of the sea, the almost forgotten heritage of an
+island population, has been stirred once more, and the sight of the good
+ships in harbour thrills the woman-worker, as the man, with a sense of
+independence, freedom, and love for &#8216;this England, ... this precious stone
+set in the silver sea&#8217;.</p>
+
+<p>No wonder that Englishwomen find their work in the dockyards &#8216;ever so
+interesting&#8217;.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/img12.jpg" alt="" /></div>
+<p class="caption">CUTTING FRAYED-EDGED TAPE</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/img13.jpg" alt="" /></div>
+<p class="caption">BRAZING TURBINE ROTOR SEGMENT</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/img14.jpg" alt="" /></div>
+<p class="caption">MOUNTING CARDS FOR DRY COMPASSES</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/img15.jpg" alt="" /></div>
+<p class="caption">TREADLE POLISHING-MACHINES, FOR SMOOTHING LENSES</p>
+
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr style="width: 50%;" />
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span></p>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_V" id="CHAPTER_V"></a>CHAPTER V: COMFORT AND SAFETY</h2>
+<p class="title">WELFARE SUPERVISION&mdash;PROTECTIVE CLOTHING&mdash;REST-ROOMS AND FIRST AID&mdash;WOMEN POLICE</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p class="dropcap"><span class="caps">The</span> problems arising from the sudden employment of thousands of women in
+the factories have obviously been connected not only with the technical
+training of the workers and with the adaptation of machinery to their
+physical strength. Something had to be done, and that without delay, to
+ensure the comfort and safety in the workshops of these new-comers to
+industrial life.</p>
+
+<p>In the first great rush for an increased munitions supply, war emergency
+dictated the temporary suppression of the Factory Acts. There was no demur
+within the factory gates. Women worked without hesitation from twelve to
+fourteen hours a day, or a night, for seven days a week, and with the
+voluntary sacrifice of public holidays. Their home conditions in a vast
+number of cases offered no drop of consolation. Many of these women were
+immigrants from remote corners of the Empire, or from faraway towns and
+villages of the United Kingdom. Housing accommodation in crowded
+industrial areas, or in a thinly populated countryside, was strained to
+breaking-point. Undaunted, these workers&mdash;many of whom had previously led
+an entirely sheltered life&mdash;rose before dawn to travel long distances to
+the factory, and returned to take alternative possession with a
+night-shift worker of a part share of a bedroom. The shameful conditions
+to which the factory children were subjected at the period of the
+Industrial Revolution seemed about to return.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p class="center"><i>Welfare Supervision</i></p>
+
+<p>Such a state of things could not be tolerated, and Mr. Lloyd George, then
+Minister of Munitions, grasped the situation. &#8216;The workers of to-day&#8217;, he
+said, &#8216;are the mothers of to-morrow. In a war of workshops the women of
+Britain were needed to save Britain; it was for Britain to protect them.&#8217;
+Measures were immediately adopted to improve the conditions of the workers
+in the factory. A Departmental Committee was appointed to consider all
+questions relating to the health of munition workers, and at<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span> the Ministry
+of Munitions, on their recommendation, a Welfare and Health Department was
+established, charged with &#8216;securing a high standard of conditions for all
+workers in munitions factories and more especially for the women and
+juvenile employees&#8217;. Since then, step by step the machinery is being set
+in motion for improving the conditions of life of munition workers.</p>
+
+<p>Yet Welfare work in the factory is no new thing in England. In pre-war
+days it had not, it is true, reached as widespread a development as in the
+United States, but as long ago as 1792 it was in practice in this country
+under another name. It is recorded of that period of one David Dale, whose
+factory was a model to his contemporaries, that he &#8216;gave his money by
+shovelfuls to his employees&#8217; to find that &#8216;God shovelled it back again.&#8217;
+From the early part of the nineteenth century, sporadic attempts were
+successfully made to improve the conditions of the factory workers over
+and above the requirements of legislation, and before 1914 a number of
+enlightened factory owners had won renown by the practice of Welfare work
+within their precincts. The seal of official sanction has, however, only
+been gained since the war, through the influx of women into munitions
+trades.<small><a name="f1.1" id="f1.1" href="#f1">[1]</a></small></p>
+
+<p>The Health of Munitions Workers Committee has, since its inception,
+investigated at factory after factory such questions as the employment of
+women, hours of labour, Sunday labour, juvenile employment, industrial
+fatigue, canteen equipment, the dietary of workers. It has published its
+conclusions in memoranda, stripped bare of officialism, so as to reveal
+with frankness facts acquired by scientists in touch with reality.</p>
+
+<p>Working in connexion with this Committee is the Welfare and Health
+Department of the Ministry of Munitions. It follows closely the
+suggestions of the experts, its Welfare officers moving up and down the
+country, now offering a suggestion to the management of a factory, and
+again, assimilating some practical experiment in Welfare work, originated
+by a progressive factory-directorate. Thus, a pooling of ideas is being
+effected, and isolated experiments of value are now being propagated
+throughout the country.</p>
+
+<p>But possibly one of the most valuable tasks of the Welfare and Health
+Department is the selection and training of candidates for the work of
+Welfare Supervision in the factories. A panel of approved candidates is
+kept in readiness, so that a busy factory-manager may have at hand a
+choice of Welfare workers who will, if necessary, undertake the entire
+supervision<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span> of the personal interests of his female, or juvenile staff.
+These officers, after engagement by the factory management, are
+responsible solely to the firms that employ them and not to the Ministry
+of Munitions. In establishments where T.N.T. (Tri-nitro-toluene) is
+handled, the presence of a lady Welfare Supervisor is compulsory; in all
+National factories such an officer is recognized as a necessary part of
+the staff; and in Controlled Establishments, where a number of female
+operators are employed, the management is officially encouraged to make
+such an appointment.</p>
+
+<p>In many cases, engineering shops are for the first time employing female
+operators, and the management depute with relief all questions as to the
+personal requirements of the &#8216;new labour&#8217; to the lady superintendent; in
+other instances, such matters as the engagement of the employees, canteen
+arrangements, and so on, are placed in the hands of other officials.
+Hence, the duties of the lady Welfare Supervisor differ from factory to
+factory. Generally speaking, the supervisor, or lady superintendent within
+the factory is made responsible for some, or all, of the following
+matters:</p>
+
+<p>1. She aids, or is entirely responsible for, the selection of women,
+girls, and boys for employment.</p>
+
+<p>2. The general behaviour of the women and girls inside the factory falls
+under her purview.</p>
+
+<p>3. The transfer of a woman employee from one process to another is
+suggested by the Welfare Supervisor where health considerations make such
+an alteration advisable.</p>
+
+<p>4. She is consulted on general grounds with regard to the dismissal of
+women and girls.</p>
+
+<p>5. Factory conditions come under her observation, and reports are made,
+when necessary, to the management, on the cleanliness, ventilation, or
+warmth of the establishment.</p>
+
+<p>6. The necessity of the provision of seats is suggested, where this is
+possible.</p>
+
+<p>7. In large factories, where the canteen is under separate management, the
+Welfare Supervisor reports as to whether the necessary facilities are
+available for the women employees. In smaller factories, the Welfare
+Supervisor may be called upon to manage the canteen.</p>
+
+<p>8. While not responsible, except in small factories, for actual attention
+to accidents, the Welfare Supervisor works in close touch with the factory
+doctors and nurses. She also helps in the selection of the nurses, and
+should see that their work is carried out promptly. She supervises the
+keeping of all records of accidents and illness in the ambulance room, and
+of all maternity cases noted in the factory. She keeps in touch with all
+cases<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span> of serious accident or illness and with the Compensation Department
+inside the works.</p>
+
+<p>9. She supervises cloak-rooms and selects the staff of attendants
+necessary for these.</p>
+
+<p>10. The protective clothing supplied to the women at work comes under her
+supervision.</p>
+
+<p>In large establishments where the female and juvenile staff is counted by
+the thousand, these multifarious duties are necessarily divided among many
+individuals, and the Welfare work within the factory (Intra-mural Welfare,
+as it is now termed) develops into a Department. A typical example of such
+an evolution may be seen at the Royal Arsenal, Woolwich. In pre-war days,
+the female staff numbered 125; to-day some 25,000 women are there at work.</p>
+
+<p>The Welfare supervision is happily in charge of a super-woman. In addition
+to her manifold duties she has trained a staff of assistants who, like
+herself, spare no effort to promote the health and happiness of those
+under their care. I have stood many an hour in this super-woman&#8217;s office
+and watched her, surrounded by a throng of workers, fitting new-comers
+into vacancies, listening to reasons from others for a desired
+transference, or advising as to work, or meals, health, or recreation. No
+girl was refused a hearing, however trivial the difficulty, and a
+grievance as to the colour of a factory cap was discussed with as much
+attention with one employee as the causes of a &#8216;shop&#8217; disagreement was
+with another complainant. I have accompanied her on visits through the
+works (the entire tour would take almost a week to accomplish), and have
+noted the diplomacy with which a suggested improvement in ventilation, or
+a needed cloak-room alteration, was discussed with the official in charge,
+and carried through. I have seen the faces of rows of workers light up as
+this modern Florence Nightingale passed through their shop, and have
+walked through the Danger Zone amazed at the arrangements for the
+protection of the worker.</p>
+
+<p>What is true of the life in such large concerns as Woolwich Arsenal, or
+His Majesty&#8217;s Factory, Gretna, is typical on a large scale of the
+development of Welfare work in many a munitions factory throughout the
+kingdom. Protective clothing has been universally adopted, ambulance-rooms
+and rest-rooms have been opened, cloak-room accommodation improved,
+canteens established, sane recreation encouraged, and the protection of a
+women-police service introduced. In short, an atmosphere is being
+introduced by which the old-time barrier between employer and employed is
+being helped to disappear.</p>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span></p>
+<p class="center"><i>Protective Clothing</i></p>
+
+<p>So much has been accomplished since the advent of women in the munitions
+factories with regard to protective clothing for the worker that the
+subject might well fill a chapter to itself. A separate Department in the
+Ministry of Munitions now concerns itself solely with its supply, and is
+continually experimenting with improvements in aprons, gloves, boots,
+caps, and tunics. Cotton overalls are now generally worn by the women
+employees and much thought has been given to the production of these
+garments in suitable materials and design. They are made with firmly
+stitched belts and with inset pockets, so as to avert accidents by contact
+of loose ends in the machinery, and are more often in the popular shades
+of khaki, or brown, with scarlet facings, or dark blue faced with crimson.
+But there is no set rule either as to colour, or design, so long as the
+principle of protection is followed.</p>
+
+<p>Caps, which at first were much disliked by the workers, have at length
+found general favour, not, it is true, by reason of the immunity they
+offer against accident, but because they have been fashioned so as to add
+&#8216;chic&#8217; to the wearer. They are usually of the &#8216;Mob,&#8217; or &#8216;Dutch&#8217; variety,
+and match the overall in colour and texture; they are all designed so that
+there is no pressure round the head. Sometimes, the cap of safety has been
+skilfully used as a mark of distinction, and one may see, in a shop
+staffed by women, the operators at the machines in khaki headgear, the
+setters-up of machines in scarlet caps, and the overlookers or inspectors
+of the product in bright blue head-dress.</p>
+
+<p>For wet and dusty work there are trouser suits in cotton, woollen, or
+mackintosh, or tunic suits with knee breeches and leggings, or gaiters.
+Mackintosh coats are also provided for outdoor work in shipyards, or for
+trucking and lorrying, or for overhead crane-work within the factory.</p>
+
+<p>Acid-proof and oil-proof aprons are now furnished for certain operations,
+and for other processes specially prepared gloves are supplied. The
+varieties in workshop gloves are now very great; they are made in such
+materials as india-rubber, canvas, or leather, or a union of these three,
+or in teon-faced canvas or teon-faced leather. Some are cuffless; others,
+for work in acids, have turned-up cuffs, and others again are gauntlets
+reaching the elbow. In every case, the process for which they are provided
+is minutely studied, and the fashion adopted is dictated by utility.</p>
+
+<p>Footgear has also received a considerable amount of attention, and there
+are now available Wellington boots, or half-Wellingtons, for outdoor work,
+or wooden clogs for processes in the shops where the flooring is apt to
+become persistently wet.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span>But, possibly, factory fashions receive most care when designed for
+wearers in Filling shops. For these, suits in wool lasting-cloth are found
+satisfactory, the most popular and smartest being in cream-colour, faced
+with scarlet. Fire-proofed blue serge overalls and asbestos coats with
+caps of the same material are also employed in certain of these factories.
+For work in the Danger Zone no metal fasteners are permissible, and the
+coat, or overall, is cut so as to protect the neck and throat from contact
+with the powder used in the process.</p>
+
+<p>Boots and shoes for this type of work are also specially designed. No iron
+must enter into their composition, the soles being either machine-sewn, or
+riveted with brass. Sometimes, cloth and india-rubber over-shoes are the
+chosen footwear of the Danger Zone, and in this case the fasteners must
+also be free from iron. These precautions are no mere fad, but essential
+safeguards where friction between a fragment of iron and a combustible
+powder might lead to an explosion. Respirators, and in some cases veils,
+are also needful accessories of the Filling factory, and these too are
+provided for the workers.</p>
+
+<p>A complete factory uniform has thus evolved since the war: it is a model
+of suitable clothing for industrial work. Arising from within the
+workshops to meet essential needs, these fashions are not only free from
+vulgarity, or eccentricity, but have a distinct beauty of their own. It is
+unlikely that women, once accustomed to the comfort and cleanliness of
+such garments, will desire to return to the discredited habit of tarnished
+finery worn at work.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p class="center"><i>Rest-Rooms and First Aid</i></p>
+
+<p>Ambulance and First-Aid work within the factory was not unusual even in
+pre-war days. Since the development of munitions production it has become
+almost a commonplace, and from December 1, 1917, its provision has been
+obligatory in blast furnaces, foundries, copper-mills, iron-mills, and
+metal works. Where T.N.T. is handled, the employment of at least one
+whole-time medical officer is compulsory, if the employees number 2,000,
+and, if in excess of that figure, at least one additional medical officer
+must be employed. The professional work of these doctors is supervised by
+the medical officers of the Welfare and Health Department, who also in a
+similar way supervise the safety of workers employed upon the manufacture
+of lethal gases.</p>
+
+<p>The extra expense involved in the provision of such safeguards is by no
+means unproductive. In one factory, for example, it has been estimated
+that 2,500 hours were saved in a single week by prompt attention to minor<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span>
+ailments; in another factory, where the firm meets all smaller claims for
+Workmen&#8217;s Compensation, it was found that in a period of eighteen months
+following the establishment of a First-Aid organization, a credit balance
+of nearly &pound;500 accrued to the management after all expenses connected with
+the factory doctor and the nurses had been defrayed.</p>
+
+<p>Tribute should be paid to the medical staff for their share in the triumph
+of First-Aid work within the munitions factory, for without their
+extraordinary devotion the record of misadventure would undoubtedly be
+higher. One hears from time to time how, in a temporary breakdown of such
+a staff, a single worker will hold the fort. A typical case is recorded in
+the press as I write. It tells of a young nurse who worked shifts of
+twenty-four hours at a stretch, for a fortnight, during the absence of her
+colleagues.</p>
+
+<p>The development of the factory rest-room and cloak-room has also been a
+marked feature in the munitions factories where women are employed.
+Formerly, it was usual to see the women workers&#8217; outdoor garments hung
+round the workshop walls; to-day, in numbers of munitions works, the
+women&#8217;s cloak-rooms are provided with cupboards where hot pipes dry wet
+boots and clothing, where each girl has her own locker with lock and key,
+and where the maximum of wash-hand basins supplied with hot and cold water
+are set up. In T.N.T. workshops compulsory washing facilities are even
+more elaborate. Bath-rooms are available, as well as a generous supply of
+towels, and face ointment, or powder, are supplied as preventatives to any
+ill effects from handling explosives.</p>
+
+<p>Inside the workshops the spirit of reform is equally apparent; seats are
+provided where possible, and lifting-tackle, or sliding boards, are
+introduced to minimize strain when dealing with heavy weights. Sometimes,
+one hears how such improvements, suggested for the women employees, are
+extended to the men. At a certain engineering works, for example, where in
+pre-war days women had never been employed, it was suggested by a
+Government official that seats should be supplied for the women. The
+management looked askance. It would be &#8216;such a bad example to the
+apprentices&#8217;, it was said. The point was, however, pressed, and after a
+short time the suggestion materialized. The manager then stated, with
+surprised satisfaction, that the seats &#8216;seemed to renew people&#8217;, and he
+had accordingly extended the improvement to the men.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p class="center"><i>Women Police</i></p>
+
+<p>One of the most recent developments in the protection of women in the
+factories is the employment of women police. In the summer of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span> 1916, when
+it was found necessary to obtain further control and supervision of the
+women employees in munitions works, Sir Edward Henry, the Chief
+Commissioner of Police, recommended that the Ministry of Munitions should
+apply to the Women Police Service for a supply of trained women police.
+This request has now created an extensive development of such work, and
+to-day women police are undertaking numerous duties in munitions works.
+They check the entry of women into the factory; examine passports; search
+for such contraband as matches, cigarettes, and alcohol; deal with
+complaints of petty offences; assist the magistrates at the police court,
+and patrol the neighbourhood of the factory with a view to the protection
+of the women employed.</p>
+
+<p>As many of the works have been erected in lonely places, and as the shifts
+are worked by night as well as by day, it can easily be imagined what a
+safeguard to the young employee is the presence of these female guardians
+of the peace. Even within the precincts of the factory, the security
+assured by the patrolling police-women is of great importance, since many
+of the factories are built on isolated plots extending perhaps six miles
+from barrier to barrier, and within these boundaries women are often
+employed in isolated huts, should they be engaged on the production of
+explosives. The preventive work of the women police is, in these areas,
+incalculable.</p>
+
+<p>In such ways, Welfare work has taken root in the factories of Britain, and
+in the words of Mr. Lloyd George, &#8216;it is a strange irony, but no small
+compensation, that the making of weapons of destruction should afford the
+occasion to humanize industry. Yet such is the case.&#8217;</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/img16.jpg" alt="" /></div>
+<p class="caption">SLITTING AND ROUGHING OPTICAL GLASS</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/img17.jpg" alt="" /></div>
+<p class="caption">VIEW OF CANTEEN KITCHEN</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/img18.jpg" alt="" /></div>
+<p class="caption">WEIGHING FERRO CHROME FOR ANALYSIS</p>
+
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr style="width: 50%;" />
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span></p>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VI" id="CHAPTER_VI"></a>CHAPTER VI: OUTSIDE WELFARE</h2>
+<p class="title">RECREATION&mdash;MOTHERHOOD&mdash;THE FACTORY NURSERY</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p class="center"><i>Recreation</i></p>
+
+<p class="dropcap"><span class="caps">The</span> gift in the early days of munitions development of several thousands
+of pounds from an Indian prince, the Maharajah of Gwalior, for the benefit
+of munitions employees, helped to focus attention from the outset on their
+needful recreation. The necessity for a maximum output, bringing in its
+train long shifts, overtime, and a minimum of holidays, at first left
+scant leisure at the munition girl&#8217;s disposal, yet it was at once apparent
+that some effort must be made to render that leisure healthful and
+invigorating. As soon as the Welfare Supervisors took up their positions
+in the factories and came into living touch with the needs of the women
+employed, requests found their way to the Ministry of Munitions for grants
+for recreation purposes from the Maharajah&#8217;s fund.</p>
+
+<p>At first, &#8216;a piano for the recreation-room or canteen&#8217; was the more
+general appeal; for, strangely enough, after the long hours in the
+engineering shops the normal munitions girl craves most, not for passive
+amusement, such as &#8216;the pictures&#8217;, but for free movements of her own body.
+Above all, she desires to dance, or to enjoy the rhythm of physical drill,
+or, in the summer, to swim or dive, or to chase a ball in one or other of
+the popular team games. Within doors, the piano provides, as it were, a
+spring-board from which she can jump into a leisure-time atmosphere of
+merriment; it is the send-off to her dance, the guide to her song, and the
+backbone to the joy found in the united action of physical drill.</p>
+
+<p>The piano once provided in canteen, or recreation-room, you will find the
+munition girl footing it in the dinner-hour, or tea-interval, or in any
+other period when she is off duty. So long as the tune be bright, the
+merry-hearted munition-maker will dance the old dances, or the more
+complicated modern steps, as her mood suggests.</p>
+
+<p>From self-taught dancing, the desire for a more perfect expression in
+movement is a natural evolution, and in certain cases grants from the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span>
+Maharajah&#8217;s fund have defrayed the fees of dancing mistress, or sports
+instructor. Sums from the same source have been paid to assist the
+organization of a club, for the provision of a recreation-room, for the
+erection of swings and see-saws, for the installation of a swimming-bath,
+for tools and seeds for factory girls&#8217; gardens, for dramatic
+entertainments, for lectures for the instruction of apprentices, and in
+Ireland, for the enlargement of schools for children of women munition
+workers.</p>
+
+<p>Side by side with these endeavours, other efforts to promote sane
+amusement for munition makers have been fructifying. Many an enlightened
+factory employer, studying the problem of woman-labour within his own
+works, has come to the conclusion that &#8216;if women are called upon to work
+continuously, especially at repetition jobs, their pleasure in life must
+be kept alive&#8217;. Being business men, they have soon turned the theory into
+practice, and have encouraged, started, and financed recreation schemes
+for their own employees.</p>
+
+<p>In Sheffield, for example, successful dramatic entertainments have been
+given, the actors and actresses emerging from the engineering shops; near
+Birmingham, a firm has provided a cinema, an orchestra, and a dancing-room
+for their workpeople, and on Saturday evenings, free conveyance in an
+omnibus is arranged for those workers resident in outlying hostels and
+married quarters.</p>
+
+<p>At Norwich, another firm has appointed a woman recreation officer to teach
+the girls physical drill, dancing, tennis, and other games. Dances and a
+fancy-dress ball have been organized there, and in the summer, tennis,
+bowls, and cricket are played in a large recreation ground. These are but
+a few instances, typical of the growing understanding amongst employers in
+this country of the value of playtime to a women&#8217;s staff.</p>
+
+<p>Outside the factory other agencies have been at work, voluntarily
+attempting to provide rest and refreshment for the women whose sacrifices
+for the war are so great and so patiently endured. Such bodies as the
+Young Women&#8217;s Christian Association or local Civic Associations have
+opened recreation clubs&mdash;sometimes for girls only and sometimes
+&#8216;mixed&#8217;&mdash;where concerts, dramatic entertainments, and lectures are given,
+and classes in useful arts or games are held. Women from the aristocracy
+and working women, civic authorities and the clergy, have joined hands
+throughout the country to help forward this effort for the physical,
+spiritual and intellectual recreation of the munitions worker.</p>
+
+<p>The very spontaneity and eagerness of the movement have naturally led here
+and there to overlapping, and in the spring of 1917 it was found advisable
+to co-ordinate local streams of goodwill and energy. A branch of the
+Welfare and Health Department of the Ministry of Munitions was<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span> thus
+established to keep in touch with all agencies outside the factory which
+deal with schemes regarding recreation, sickness, maternity-cases,
+cr&egrave;ches, housing, and transit facilities. Extra-mural Welfare officers
+have since been appointed to undertake such duties in various localities.
+These act as <i>liaison</i> officers between existing associations of every
+denomination in a given district, and centralize all outside efforts for
+the protection and relaxation of the munition women of that area.</p>
+
+<p>The Welfare officer at first surveys carefully the needs of the district,
+and institutes an inquiry as to provisions for their satisfaction. If
+necessary, a conference is then called of individuals and representatives
+of local bodies dealing with these matters, and sub-committees are
+appointed for each part of the work. When the numbers of women workers are
+comparatively small in a given area and no adequate provision has been
+made for their recreation, a central club is often opened. In other
+localities, existing clubs, or institutions, are adapted to new
+requirements, or new ones are added, according to local needs. Where night
+shifts are worked in the local factories, it is usual to arrange the open
+hours of the club to suit the workshop leisure hours. Thus, a club may be
+open from 6 to 8 a.m.; at midday, for two hours, and again from 4.30 to
+9.30 p.m. In such cases, it is often necessary to employ paid club
+managers, as well as local voluntary help.</p>
+
+<p>The clubs, however, vary, both in scope and management, the general
+principle followed by the Welfare officer being to ensure provision for
+recreation, and then to leave the administration to local effort.
+Encouragement is given by the Ministry of Munitions to employers of
+Controlled Establishments and to the management of National factories to
+help forward the movement for recreation for their staffs by allowing
+Treasury grants out of excess profits to be made towards approved schemes.
+In many districts the grants are &#8216;pooled&#8217; for recreation purposes for the
+whole area. Recreation for the munition worker thus rests on a secure
+basis. In the winter months, dancing, physical drill, theatricals, games,
+and classes are in full swing in the principal munitions areas, and in the
+summer, outdoor sports are encouraged, as well as the tending of vegetable
+plots and flower gardens.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p class="center"><i>Motherhood</i></p>
+
+<p>A more difficult task falling to the &#8216;Outside Welfare&#8217; officer is the
+supervision of maternity cases arising among munition workers. The
+all-important question of motherhood necessarily crops up in the factories
+where hundreds of thousands of women are in daily employment. <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span>Numbers of
+them are wives of men hard at work in war industries at home; others are
+war-widows, and while the illegitimate birth-rate has not gone up
+disproportionately in munitions areas, the unmarried mother, from time to
+time, presents a special problem.</p>
+
+<p>The care of the expectant mother necessarily begins within the factory
+gates. We have so far no published conclusions from an authoritative
+survey of this question, such as Dr. Bonnaire (Chief Professor of
+Midwifery at the Maternity Hospital, Paris) has provided for France, yet
+scientific investigations and experiments undertaken by the Health of
+Munition Workers&#8217; Committee are in progress. As far as possible, the women
+Welfare Supervisors within the works keep their management informed of
+maternity cases as they are noted, and, where possible, the expectant
+mother is placed on lighter work.</p>
+
+<p>No woman known to be in that condition is, after a certain period, kept on
+at night work, nor is she allowed to work in an explosives factory, nor
+yet to handle T.N.T. &#8216;We send the girl to the doctor and we act on his
+advice. If we can keep her, we always take her off night work and heavy
+machines and where there is a good deal of exertion,&#8217; is a report typical
+of the procedure in such cases in many factories. &#8216;It is too risky for an
+expectant mother to stay on at all,&#8217; is a characteristic opinion from a
+Filling Factory; and from a high-explosives factory comes the verdict that
+an expectant mother should, after a certain period, be discharged from the
+works in view of the occasional occurrence there of small explosions. Such
+maternity cases are, when possible, transferred, through local agencies,
+to lighter national work outside the factory.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p class="center"><i>The Factory Nursery</i></p>
+
+<p>Closely connected with the safeguarding of motherhood is the case of the
+munition workers&#8217; children of pre-school age. After two months&#8217; interval
+from the baby&#8217;s birth, many of the maternity cases from the factory return
+to their previous work, and the infant must, in the mother&#8217;s absence, be
+nursed by others. A similar condition applies to the work of other mothers
+whose labour is required for munitions production.</p>
+
+<p>It sometimes happens that in a given area the call to the munitions
+factories has been answered by practically all the available women in the
+neighbourhood whose home ties are light, and the local labour reserve is
+found amongst the women with one or two young children. If these women are
+to offer their services, it is essential that their young family should
+not be neglected. Sometimes, the mothers are able to make their own
+arrangements and a &#8216;minder&#8217;, either a relative, or a neighbour, is<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span>
+forthcoming, but, generally speaking, such a plan is not satisfactory in a
+locality where every active individual is undertaking urgent war work.</p>
+
+<p>Thus has arisen in many districts the claim that a nursery for munition
+workers&#8217; children should be established. A local association, or an
+individual, often finds it possible to finance such a scheme; in other
+cases, monetary aid is required and obtained from the Ministry of
+Munitions. In the latter circumstances, the Ministry of Munitions,
+co-operating with the Board of Education, grants 75 per cent. of the
+approved expenditure on the initial provision and equipment of the
+nursery, as well as 7<i>d.</i> a day for each attendance of a child, the
+balance of the expenses being met partly by fees (varying from 7<i>d.</i> to
+1<i>s.</i> a day, or from 7<i>s.</i> 6<i>d.</i> to 9<i>s.</i> 6<i>d.</i> a week) charged to the
+mothers, and partly by contributions from the local originators of the
+scheme.</p>
+
+<p>Where night shifts are worked, the munition workers may claim night
+accommodation for their children; arrangements are also made to board the
+infants by the week. In the schemes approved by the Ministry it has
+generally been found possible to adapt existing buildings, but where no
+suitable accommodation is available within reasonable distance of the
+mothers&#8217; homes a new building is erected.</p>
+
+<p>Such a nursery has been erected near Woolwich and provides a useful model
+for this country. It is a long low building of bungalow type, surrounded
+by a small garden. The main room, the babies&#8217; parlour, is a long apartment
+enclosed on two sides by a verandah, and on the third, by a wide passage
+well ventilated at each end. The room itself is full of light and air,
+there is plenty of play room, and no awkward corners to inflict bruises
+unawares. A lengthy crawl brings a baby-boarder into the sunshine of the
+verandah and the safe seclusion of its play-pens, and a longer crawl and a
+hop is rewarded by entrance into the surrounding garden, where a
+delectable sand-pit is a permanent feature.</p>
+
+<p>Brightly-coloured flowers enliven the garden in spring and in summer and
+attract bird and insect visitors, companions often more interesting to a
+two-year-old than the most sprightly of humans. Mattresses occupy part of
+the floor space of the nursery, and at night-time are developed into
+full-fledged beds. At one end of the room are cupboards let into the
+walls, at the other, furniture fashioned for the needs of each &#8216;two feet
+nothing&#8217;. There, instead of being perched on a high chair to feed with
+giants from an elevated table-land, the infant visitor sits on a miniature
+arm-chair at a table brought to the level of childhood. The low tables
+are, in fact, kidney-shaped and hollowed on the inside, so that a nurse,
+or attendant, seated in the centre, may feed half a dozen children in
+turn. The toddler&#8217;s dinner in this retreat recalls the feeding time in a
+nest. A smiling nurse<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span> in the centre feeds, turn by turn, her open-mouthed
+charges whose satisfaction is expressed in human &#8216;coos&#8217;.</p>
+
+<p>Another room in this delightful babies&#8217; house is devoted to infants: a
+brigade in cots, of which the advance-guard, during fine weather, invade
+the verandah. The daintiness of the room with its blue curtains and
+cot-hangings and the chubby satisfaction of the cot-dwellers must be a
+constant inspiration to the visiting working mothers. Spotless kitchens
+for the preparation of the children&#8217;s meals are situated in the rear of
+the nurseries; there is also an isolation room where suspect infectious
+cases are detained, and a laundry with an indefatigable laundress. The
+bathing room, fitted with modern appliances, is in many respects
+excellent. The whole establishment is warmed by a central-heating
+installation, the radiators being well protected with guards.</p>
+
+<p>It may not always be possible, through lack of funds, to reproduce these
+ideal conditions, but where the accommodation is less and the ground space
+more limited, every care is taken that the factory nursery shall have an
+ample provision of fresh air. Efforts are also made to obtain as much
+local support as possible.</p>
+
+<p>In some districts, the whole of the clothing provided at the nursery is
+made by the little girls from a neighbouring Elementary School. At Acton,
+Middlesex, for example, I was shown piles of the daintiest little
+underwear, diminutive shoes and charming cotton frocks, all made in the
+sewing classes at their school, by pupils of eleven to thirteen years of
+age. The boys of the local manual schools&mdash;not to be outdone&mdash;contributed
+to this nursery all the carpentry for the cots for the elder babies. These
+small beds, fashioned out of hessian cloth, swung on long broom poles,
+with a wooden board at head and foot, seemed of a particularly economical
+and practical pattern.</p>
+
+<p>The factory nursery is certainly gaining popularity as a war-time measure;
+as a permanency in peace times it is recognized that there are some
+objections to its establishment. An alternative scheme, even in the war
+period, is being mooted. The suggestion is made that babies should be
+&#8216;billeted&#8217;, or boarded out in the munitions area amongst women who are not
+employed outside their home. Supervision of the baby boarders, it is
+thought, might be undertaken by inspectors under the Local Authority. This
+scheme might, it is true, largely prevent the congregation of many
+children in one nursery and the resultant danger of the spread of
+contagious infantile disease. On the other hand, the proposal, if
+accepted, might open the doors to overcrowding in thickly populated areas
+and to the neglect of the baby boarder, undetected by a local
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span>inspectorate, already overstrained by war-time conditions. The scheme is,
+however, only at the discussion stage, as I write.</p>
+
+<p>In any case, the care of the munition workers&#8217; children is attracting
+considerable public attention, since in spite of the war, or because of
+it, the importance of the health and well-being of the ordinary
+individual, and more especially of the young, is becoming part of the
+creed of the average citizen.</p>
+
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr style="width: 50%;" />
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span></p>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VII" id="CHAPTER_VII"></a>CHAPTER VII: GROWTH OF THE INDUSTRIAL CANTEEN</h2>
+<p class="title">GENERAL PRINCIPLES&mdash;THE WORKER&#8217;S OASIS</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p class="dropcap"><span class="caps">Money</span> hardly counts; it is labour we have to consider nowadays&#8217;, recently
+remarked the managing director of a large munitions works. It is this new
+conception that has given impetus to the development of the industrial
+canteen, now a feature of the munitions factory. In the opinion of Mr.
+John Hodge, M.P., Minister of Pensions, who since the war has acted for a
+long period as Minister of Labour, canteens in the engineering shops were
+&#8216;necessary from the start&#8217;, and one of the earliest investigations of the
+Health of Munition Workers&#8217; Committee was on the subject of the provision
+of employees&#8217; meals. The results of the inquiry are embodied in three
+valuable White Papers.<small><a name="f2.1" id="f2.1" href="#f2">[2]</a></small></p>
+
+<p>I have since been into many canteens connected with munitions works, and
+so far I have not met a factory manager who has regretted their
+introduction. Yet, only three or four years ago, the average employer
+would have told you that a dinner brought by a worker in a newspaper, or
+tied up in a red handkerchief, stored in the works, heated anywhere, and
+eaten near the machines, was &#8216;quite all right&#8217;: and, as for the boys in
+the factory, it was considered shameful to &#8216;coddle them&#8217;; if necessary, a
+factory lad should &#8216;eat his dinner on a clothes line&#8217;.</p>
+
+<p>To-day, when the utmost ounce of energy is needed from man and woman, and
+boy and girl, wherever munitions production is concerned, it is recognized
+that the quality and quantity of the workers&#8217; food matters, and that even
+the surroundings where the meal is partaken of counts in the conservation
+of the essential reserve of human energy and power of will. Thus, the best
+type of industrial canteen is designed not only &#8216;to feed the brute&#8217;, but
+to rest his mind. This is especially the case in certain Filling
+Factories, where immunity from ill-effects from the handling of T.N.T. has
+been found to depend largely on the physical fitness of the workers. In
+such factories, as well as in establishments where women are employed on
+night shifts, the provision of canteens<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span> is obligatory on employers and,
+indeed, recent legislation (the Police, Factories, &amp;c. (Miscellaneous
+Provisions) Act, 1916) has empowered the Home Secretary to require the
+occupiers of workshops and factories to make arrangements, where
+necessary, for the supply of meals for their employees. In the stress of
+warfare, when the demand for a maximum output is necessarily the
+pre-occupation of the factory manager, it was, however, recognized that
+the canteen must be State-aided. A Canteen Committee was therefore
+appointed under the Central Control Board (Liquor Traffic). The work of
+this committee is twofold: it aids the factory management to open its own
+canteen or canteens, and it supervises and helps approved dining-rooms
+managed by voluntary bodies. In the first case, the expense for any
+necessary canteen is entirely borne by the Government, if the factory is a
+&#8216;National&#8217; one. In Controlled Establishments, the employer is allowed to
+charge the cost of the canteen as &#8216;a trade expense&#8217;, a concession by which
+the State practically bears the expense out of funds which would otherwise
+reach the Exchequer. In the case of canteens provided by voluntary bodies,
+such as the Young Men&#8217;s Christian Association, the Young Women&#8217;s Christian
+Association, the Church Army, the Salvation Army, the National People&#8217;s
+Palace Association, Ltd., &amp;c., the Board pays half the capital
+expenditure, where approved.<small><a name="f3.1" id="f3.1" href="#f3">[3]</a></small></p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/img19.jpg" alt="" /></div>
+<p class="caption">BALSMING LENSES</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/img20.jpg" alt="" /></div>
+<p class="caption">MAKING INSTRUMENT SCALES</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+
+<p>The efforts of these voluntary bodies have been of the utmost service,
+especially at the outset of munitions production on a vast scale, when the
+factory proprietors, or directors, were unable to devote even a fraction
+of their time to matters not obviously connected with output. The devotion
+of the unpaid workers in the voluntary canteen has through the turmoil of
+war hardly received due recognition, but it is no less than that of the
+nurses in the military hospitals, or of the munitions workers themselves.
+Women of aristocratic families, accustomed to personal service from a
+large staff of domestic servants, and entirely unused to physical labour,
+as well as women hard-worked in their own homes or in livelihood
+occupations, have, since the need of the canteen was declared, come, by
+day and by night, to undertake the arduous duties of cooking and scrubbing
+for vast numbers of working-people. <i>Mr. Punch&#8217;s</i> delightful illustration,
+&#8216;War, the Leveller&#8217;, where the rough scullery-maid from the slums is
+depicted issuing the emphatic order to the well-bred marchioness, &#8216;Nah
+then, Lady Montgummery Wilberforce, &#8217;urry up with them plates&#8217;,<small><a name="f4.1" id="f4.1" href="#f4">[4]</a></small> is by
+no means a fancy picture of the hither side of canteen-life.</p>
+
+<p>In one factory, substantial meals have been provided daily by 17<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span>
+voluntary assistants for some 1,200 workers; in another locality, the food
+of 2,000 to 3,000 munitions employees has been arranged by 23 volunteers;
+and in another establishment, 6,000 workers have been provided with
+standing-up refreshments by 17 voluntary helpers. The rapid growth of the
+canteen system during the past fifteen months, accompanied by the
+increasing difficulties of catering for vast numbers under war-time
+conditions, has, however, led to the transference of numbers of voluntary
+canteens to the care of the factory management.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p class="center"><i>General Principles</i></p>
+
+<p>Industrial canteens differ from one another in many respects, partly
+because there was at first no fund of common experience in this country
+from which to draw, and partly because hours of work, tastes and customs
+in industrial areas vary considerably. Hence, methods of administration
+and catering, found possible or popular in one canteen, are sometimes a
+complete failure when tried in other districts. In one canteen, with a
+seating capacity for 2,000 women, I found that three gallons of pickles
+were sold in pennyworths daily; in another district, the popular taste ran
+in the direction of jam tarts. Yet, even with the small store of
+experience so far accumulated, certain general principles at least as
+regards site, construction, equipment, and administration of the canteen
+have been evolved. For instance, as regards site, a gloomy dining-room is
+never popular. If possible, a garden outlook should be arranged, and at
+the least, the canteen walls should be of a restful colour. It seems
+obvious that if pictures are introduced, they should be varied and bright,
+yet I have seen one canteen of which the walls were covered at intervals
+with reproductions of the same uninteresting print.</p>
+
+<p>Another obvious point, too often neglected, is the insurance of good
+ventilation in canteen and kitchen. The dining-room should, if possible,
+provide separate accommodation for men and women, and should have a
+buffet-bar and serving-counter with separate hatchments for different
+items of the menu. Again, it is a matter of common consent that the
+&#8216;ticket system&#8217; of payment for the food handed over the counter is the
+best. Ticket-offices, where the &#8216;checks&#8217; are obtainable for cash, should
+be carefully placed with regard to entrance doors, serving-counters and
+dining-tables, so that the minimum time is expended in preliminaries by a
+<i>client&egrave;le</i> who has but a strict dinner-hour at its disposal. In a
+well-organized canteen I have seen over a thousand workers seated and
+served within ten minutes of the announcement of the dinner-hour within
+the factory shops.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span>In the larger canteens, developments, as may be expected, run chiefly
+along the lines of labour-saving appliances. Electric washing-up machines,
+electric bacon-cutters, as well as electric bread-cutters, tea-measuring
+machines, counter hot-closets for warming food brought by employees may
+now be seen in many kitchens where the needs of thousands of diners must
+be considered.</p>
+
+<p>But it is perhaps in the smaller concerns that the development of the
+industrial canteen is most assured. Experiments can there be more easily
+tried, and if necessary, discarded, where the customers are counted by
+hundreds, rather than by thousands. From a tour of canteens, I select a
+couple of such instances. The other day I happened, during the
+dinner-hour, to be in a new munitions factory concerned with the
+production of magnetos, aero-engines, electric switches, and so on, work
+undertaken by men and women, boys and girls. The manager of this works has
+studied the labour question up and down the country, and has set down his
+conclusions, not on minute sheets, but in the bricks and mortar of new
+buildings, in green lawns and flower beds bright with colour, and in
+allotments round his shops.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p class="center"><i>The Worker&#8217;s Oasis</i></p>
+
+<p>The canteen is a feature of the place. It stands apart from the factory, a
+long low building, one side looking on to a tennis court and the other on
+to homely but delightful vegetable plots. The workers&#8217; dining-room is
+divided down the centre: one side for the men, the other for the women. A
+serving-table, but no partition-wall, separates it from the kitchen,
+which, in its turn, is divided by further serving-tables from mess-rooms
+for the engineers and staff employees. The kitchen, in reality a series of
+ovens, stoves, and steamers, is a revelation of labour-saving appliances,
+heated by electricity. On the day of my visit there was not the slightest
+odour of cooking from these various utensils, although hot meals for some
+250 persons were in preparation.</p>
+
+<p>The factory hooter &#8216;buzzed&#8217;. The dinner hour, the workers&#8217; oasis, had
+arrived, yet there was no clatter of dishes, or bustle of serving-maids,
+in the canteens. An atmosphere of repose was as manifest as in a
+well-appointed reception-room of some stately English home. The workers
+evidently react to these conditions, and standing at the back of the
+kitchen I was quite unaware of the diner&#8217;s entry. &#8216;When do the people come
+in?&#8217; I asked from my shelter behind a huge steamer where puddings were
+rising to the occasion. &#8216;A hundred men are already seated and served&#8217;, was
+the amazing reply. They had entered through a side door leading out of the
+garden, had there purchased a &#8216;check&#8217; for the value of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span> dinner
+required, and presenting the &#8216;check&#8217; at the serving-counter, had received
+their portion, piping hot from the hot shelves fitted beneath.</p>
+
+<p>Picking up the necessary cutlery from an adjoining table, the customers
+had seated themselves at any special small marble-topped table of their
+fancy. Waitresses, some voluntary workers garbed in rose-coloured overalls
+and mob-caps, and some staff employees in white or blue uniforms, moved
+about amongst the tables, supplying small wants. Through the open windows
+floated the scent of hay and flowers; it seemed almost ludicrous to
+connect the scene with war and the manufacture of its engines of
+destruction. The quality of the food was excellent and the variety great.
+A dinner hour spent in such a canteen is a refreshment to both body and
+soul of the employees.</p>
+
+<p>In another instance, the firm have handed over the canteen and its
+management to a workers&#8217; committee upon which the managing director also
+sits. I noticed in this canteen various devices worthy of imitation, where
+catering is undertaken for large numbers. The method adopted, for example,
+of dividing the serving-counter into hatchments for the various items on
+the menu, and separating by rails the floor-space in front of each
+compartment, seems to economize both the time and patience of the
+customers. The note of economy with efficiency is emphasized in this, as
+in many canteens, and I was shown with pride some &#8216;little brothers&#8217; on an
+adjoining piece of land&mdash;pigs that were fattening on the canteen &#8216;waste&#8217;.</p>
+
+<p>These developments, started in munitions areas during the urgency of
+warfare, will, without doubt, have permanent importance in the days of
+peace, and it is probable that the munition workers&#8217; canteen, doubtingly
+adopted by employers some two years ago, is symptomatic of a revolution in
+the home life of the industrial worker, as well as of new methods of
+economy in the national supply of fuel and food.</p>
+
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr style="width: 50%;" />
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span></p>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VIII" id="CHAPTER_VIII"></a>CHAPTER VIII: HOUSING</h2>
+<p class="title">BILLETING&mdash;TEMPORARY ACCOMMODATION&mdash;PERMANENT ACCOMMODATION</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p class="dropcap"><span class="caps">Of</span> the indirect problems arising from a prolific output of munitions the
+most acute has undoubtedly been the affair of the housing of the workers.
+The opening of a new factory, or the conversion of existing works to the
+needs of the State, often involve the transference of thousands of
+workers, and in some cases the districts to which the stream of
+immigration is directed are already congested, and already suffering from
+inadequate housing accommodation.</p>
+
+<p>In one town in the North, for example, the population has since 1914
+increased by immigration from 16,000 to 35,000; in another town, where the
+1911 census showed a population of 107,821, an unexaggerated estimate
+gives the figure for the end of 1917 as 120,000; in other munition areas a
+similar inflation of population has taken place. The housing problem has
+been further complicated by the almost total prohibition of building
+during the war period, save for Government purposes.</p>
+
+<p>The effect of these conditions in the early days of the war was, as may be
+imagined, highly unsatisfactory to the residents in certain munition
+areas, as well as to the immigrant work-people. Overcrowding became rife;
+lodgers were at the mercy of unscrupulous landladies, and all the evils
+associated with bad housing conditions began to make their appearance.
+Then the Ministry of Munitions came to grips with the question, and
+although it remains a thorny subject, the activities of the Department may
+be fairly said to have accomplished a miracle in some areas in the housing
+of the munition workers.</p>
+
+<p>The infinite variety of local conditions, as well as the humanness of the
+workers, obviously complicate the matter, and while it has been found
+possible to synthesize the factory system of a given area, no stereotyped
+regulations can conceivably be produced to cover the accommodation of its
+employees. The problem is therefore attacked piece-meal, each local
+proposition being decided on its own merits. A broad guiding principle
+has, however, been educed wherever the housing situation occasioned by the
+output of munitions demands State intervention. In the first place, it is
+decided whether the needed accommodation can be met in part, or<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span>
+altogether, by existing houses&mdash;a system now sanctioned by the Billeting
+Act of May 1917. Secondly, when it is found necessary to provide further
+housing room, consideration is given as to whether new buildings shall be
+of a temporary or of a permanent type.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p class="center"><i>Billeting</i></p>
+
+<p>Chronologically, an authorized system of billeting munition workers has
+been the latest development in the State housing schemes, but even in the
+early days of the war this arrangement existed in embryo. Local committees
+were then appointed which, with the aid of the Employment Bureaux,
+compiled lists of suitable lodgings for immigrant women workers. From the
+earliest war period, too, provision was made to meet young women
+new-comers at railway stations and to place them, if necessary, in
+temporary unimpeachable lodgings, until permanent accommodation was
+available. This scheme has now developed into the regularized activities
+of a Billeting Board (established August 1917), working under powers given
+by the Billeting Act. Under this enactment, compulsory billeting is
+provided for, but in practice is not adopted, sufficient facilities having
+so far been forthcoming from voluntary sources.</p>
+
+<p>The Billeting Board works in hearty co-operation with local authorities
+and individuals, and has met with extraordinary success. In the first
+instance, two executive members of the Board proceed to a congested
+munitions area and, with local aid, institute an inquiry as to whether
+billeting can be successfully carried out. In such areas as the Clyde, or
+Woolwich, billeting would, for example, be out of the question, but in
+other localities, such as Barrow and Hereford, where public opinion ran
+that there was no further accommodation even for a stray cat, the Board
+has yet found suitable billets for 900 persons in Barrow and 1,200 in
+Hereford.</p>
+
+<p>The question of transit, it is true, is intimately connected with the
+housing problem, and through the action of the Billeting Board it has in
+many cases been possible to remove difficulties of locomotion, and hence
+to bring further accommodation within reach of the factories. The Board
+has also been enabled to form local committees on which sit
+representatives of each housing interest (e. g. landlady, locality,
+lodger), and it has authority to recover rent from defaulting tenants.</p>
+
+<p>These, and other powers, have resulted in throwing many additional
+apartments on to the market. Yet difficulties remain in the administration
+of the Act in that the industrial workers are under no discipline such as
+that applied to soldiers, and there is no local authority to compel a
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span>munitions worker either to go into a given billet, or to remain there
+when placed. The goodwill of the locality and of the employees has,
+however, been so great that the system works smoothly, and from August
+1917 to December 31, 1917, 3,000 to 5,000 munition workers have been
+placed in existing houses. In a congested district where lodging
+accommodation is exhausted, the Billeting Board reports on the need for
+further houses, and at such centres as Barrow and Lincoln new houses are
+now being erected on their recommendation.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p class="center"><i>Temporary Accommodation</i></p>
+
+<p>Excluding the utilization of local lodgings and the adaptation of existing
+buildings such as Poor-Law structures, Elementary Schools, charitable
+institutions, three distinct types of provisional accommodation for
+munition workers have made their appearance: temporary cottages, hostels,
+and colonies. The temporary cottage corresponds fairly closely to the
+ordinary type of permanent industrial cottage, save that the former is
+built of wood or concrete and is usually one story instead of two; it
+contains three to five rooms, and is rented on the basis of about 5<i>s.</i>
+6<i>d.</i> to 7<i>s.</i> 6<i>d.</i> per week for a three-roomed abode.</p>
+
+<p>Generally speaking, these rooms are allocated to married rather than to
+single women; sometimes the wife, as well as the husband, works in the
+neighbouring factory, but more usually the wife, housed in the temporary
+cottage, remains at home, housekeeping for the man worker. The unmarried
+girls and women workers in crowded districts are generally accommodated in
+hostels, or in colonies, the term used for a group of hostels. The hostel,
+which is designed to accommodate from 30 to 100 persons, is provided with
+its own kitchen, dining-room, and common-room, and to a certain extent
+life therein approximates to that of a large family.</p>
+
+<p>The Colony, or group of hostels, has been found convenient where a large
+number of women must be housed. Each hostel, or hutment, in the group is
+arranged for the sleeping accommodation of 100-130 persons, the
+dormitories being divided into cubicles (some single, some double),
+accommodation for bath-rooms being always made in these dormitory blocks.
+Under the Colony system, meals are usually partaken of in a separate
+building or buildings. The residents from all the hutments also meet in
+the recreation-room and in the laundry, common to all.</p>
+
+<p>Experience, however, teaches that each hostel should have its own common
+room and that a Colony should not shelter very large numbers. About 500
+girls, in five hostels, seems to be the ideal number for effective
+home-making, yet we have large housing schemes for the accommodation<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span> of
+many thousands which are at present answering their purpose as a war-time
+measure. For the management of the Colony an exceptionally capable lady
+superintendent is needed, into whose hands usually falls the selection of
+the hutment matrons and their staffs, as well as the canteen managers and
+their subordinates. In the most developed Colonies a recreation officer is
+often appointed.</p>
+
+<p>I recall a visit to one of the largest Colonies for munition workers in
+the Midlands. The scheme embraces the housing and feeding of some 6,000
+women, drawn from every part of the United Kingdom, indeed, possibly from
+every corner of the Empire. The staff, in all, comprises some 300 persons.
+Perfect harmony reigned, and the girls seemed thoroughly at home in their
+novel surroundings. Each girl can claim a separate cubicle, which is
+divided from the adjoining compartment by a wall and door. Here and there,
+indeed, the arrangement was varied and two friends&mdash;terrified at sleeping
+alone&mdash;had secured permission to pool their bedrooms and to arrange a
+double sleeping-room and dressing-room.</p>
+
+<p>The cubicle system is, notwithstanding, much appreciated by the woman,
+who, working in company of hundreds of her fellows, and sharing perhaps a
+common life for the first time, rejoices in the possession of some spot in
+which to express her inner self. In some cubicles in that Colony a desire
+for beauty asserted itself and the walls were gay with prints from
+illustrated papers; in others, dainty coloured curtains had been
+introduced and the locker was covered with a cloth to match. In another
+room, the owner had evidently a taste for embroidery, and all the toilet
+accessories bore this feminine touch. But, generally speaking, the chief
+feature I noticed in that, as well as in other Colonies where the cubicle
+system prevails, was the cleanliness and order of the apartments. A taste
+for purity is infectious, and it is unlikely that girls, having once come
+under an influence that induces them to leave their sleeping apartment
+immaculate before going to work before dawn, will ever again tolerate slum
+conditions.</p>
+
+<p>The many problems involved in the housing of these girls of various types
+are indeed almost lost sight of by the visitor, but, as a lady
+superintendent once reminded me, there are difficulties inherent in the
+job. Some girls will arrive with uncleanly habits, even when the medical
+officer has sorted out those unclean in person; others will, at first,
+show signs of violent antipathies and strange fears, and there is always
+the need for upholding an atmosphere of religious and racial toleration.
+In the Midlands Colony a system has been adopted of placing the bedrooms
+of girls from one part of the United Kingdom in the same corridor, the
+Irish in one wing, the Scotch in another, and so on, but in the other
+parts of the country I have found perfect harmony where such
+classification is not observed.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/img21.jpg" alt="" /></div>
+<p class="caption">PAINTING A SHIP&#8217;S SIDE IN DRY DOCK</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/img22.jpg" alt="" /></div>
+<p class="caption">GENERAL VIEW OF WOMEN AT WORK ON AIRCRAFT FABRIC</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/img23.jpg" alt="" /></div>
+<p class="caption">THE CANTEEN</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span>The feeding of the hostel residents presents its own difficulties,
+especially in these days of war. In some hostels and colonies, such as the
+one in the Midlands, the residents take their meals in their own canteen;
+it being possible to supply the needs of a shift in the interval from
+work. In other hostels, arrangements are made by which meals can be had
+either at the hostel or the factory canteen.</p>
+
+<p>In these days of fluctuating food prices, it is difficult to indicate the
+cost of up-keep of a munition-workers&#8217; hostel, but, in general, it has not
+been found practicable to put the hostel on an entirely self-supporting
+basis. This is especially the case in the Government establishments, where
+the return on expended capital is at present only sought in increased
+munitions output.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p class="center"><i>Permanent Accommodation</i></p>
+
+<p>At first sight, the provision of temporary accommodation alone may appear
+the obvious method for the housing of munition workers. Cheaper and more
+rapid construction is obtainable by this method, and existing buildings
+may be adapted. But if, in an area of pre-war housing shortage, there is
+good prospect of permanent manufacturing activity, it is more often
+decided that permanent, rather than temporary, structures are provided.</p>
+
+<p>It may be of interest to note the methods that have been adopted by the
+State in the provision of permanent accommodation. These may be detailed
+under four heads:</p>
+
+<p>1. In a certain number of cases loans have been made to Public Utility
+Societies for the construction of dwellings for munition workers. Such
+loans are conditioned after the manner already made familiar to the public
+by Garden Suburb and other Associations.</p>
+
+<p>2. Loans have been made directly to certain individual firms to enable
+them to house their immigrant employees. These loans have been issued at
+the current rate of interest&mdash;usually 5 per cent.&mdash;and run, generally
+speaking, for a period of forty years.</p>
+
+<p>3. In a few exceptional cases, certain private firms&mdash;now Controlled
+Establishments&mdash;are permitted to charge a part of the increase on the cost
+of building (due to war conditions) to that portion of the firm&#8217;s profits
+which would otherwise have gone to the Exchequer.</p>
+
+<p>4. A contribution is, in some instances, made by the State to certain
+local authorities of a part of the capital cost of building. In all cases
+this contribution is less than the estimated increase due to war
+conditions.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span>The type of permanent building erected by such means is that which
+characterizes many of our newer industrial districts, namely a two-story
+brick cottage, containing two or three bedrooms, a living-room and a
+kitchen, a bath, in some cases a bath-room. Sometimes a complete village
+or township has arisen, as it were from the earth, to shelter the working
+population who have so willingly left their homes to further the common
+cause by land and sea. In another instance, a large National factory has
+been erected on an isolated waste in the North country. The workers come
+from long distances, and not only need accommodation, but some reasonable
+provision for recreation and the amenities of life.</p>
+
+<p>Beyond the great high road sweeping on to Scotland, some one- or
+two-roomed cottages, a village shop or two, and a few more imposing
+residences there was, in June 1915, nothing but bogland in the immediate
+neighbourhood of the site of this new factory. The landscape presented a
+view of coarse grass and brackish water; beyond that, beach and sea, and a
+horizon bounded by rugged mountains, capped in winter by snow. It needed
+courage, as well as genius, to undertake the transformation of such a
+desolate waste into surroundings which should offer a lure to industrial
+workers. But the work has been done in silence, quickly as well as
+efficiently, with imagination, as well as thoroughness, and with an eye to
+the future destiny of the place.</p>
+
+<p>By July 1915, the first huts were occupied, and by December 1917, when I
+was a privileged visitor, there had arisen a thriving busy township and a
+village some five miles beyond. Excellent railway communication between
+township, village, and factory has been established, many good roads have
+been built, there are permanent cottages, churches, a school, shops, a
+staff club, an institute, a large entertainment hall, a cinema house, and
+a central kitchen, providing cooked meals for all the workers in the
+factories, and raw food-stuff for hostels and huts. Little gardens
+surround the houses big and small, temporary or permanent, and allotments
+are in great request, and there is also provision for outdoor recreation,
+such as bowls, tennis, cricket, &amp;c. The permanent brick cottages are built
+in blocks of twelve, which are now thrown together to form a hostel. The
+construction is so planned that ultimately these cottages can be
+re-separated for family use.</p>
+
+<p>There is housing accommodation for over 6,000 women operators, which was
+practically all in use. The task of supervising the home conditions of
+this army of women falls into the hands of a lady Welfare Superintendent,
+who keeps all the complicated machinery of hostels, huts, and lodgings in
+running order. The possibilities in the housing of industrial women away
+from their own homes have, I believe, never been so<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span> clearly demonstrated
+as in this town on the marshes. The lady superintendent who has pioneered
+this movement is of the opinion that its success is bound up with the fact
+that the hostels are limited to the accommodation of from 70 to 100 girls
+in each. Other key-notes to the prevailing happiness of the women
+residents are, I gathered, that a minimum number of rules are enforced and
+that the women are treated as responsible human beings. The elder women
+are often housed in bungalows under the care of a housekeeper-cook, and
+they greatly enjoy the greater independence and the appeal to their
+individuality possible in such surroundings.</p>
+
+<p>The hostels, at the time of my visit, were in most hospitable mood. It was
+the eve of Christmas, and festivities, tempered to war-time needs, were
+the order of the day. The sound of a piano and singing outside a certain
+hostel suggested a frolic within. We entered, the lady superintendent and
+myself. The lower floor had been converted into reception-rooms and supper
+was laid out on tables decorated with spoils from the hedge. Gleaming red
+berries and glistening holly-leaves were on walls and brackets and here
+and there a sprig of mistletoe placed in suitable places for &#8216;auld lang
+syne&#8217;. There were present young men, as well as girls, and a lively game,
+&#8216;the Duke of York&#8217;, was in progress.</p>
+
+<p>Suddenly the singing and accompaniment came to a sudden halt and the whole
+of the company trouped in from adjoining rooms. A young girl came forward.
+&#8216;We wish to take this opportunity&#8217;, she said, &#8216;of thanking our matron and
+our secretary for the most happy time we have had under this roof. We do
+it now because we hope not to be here next year, but instead to be
+welcoming our boys home from the Front&#8217;. It was a simple, spontaneous
+expression of the general emotion of the hostel residents in that area.</p>
+
+<p>Everywhere I found a similar joy of life among the workers: in the
+Institute clubs, where both girls and men were reading, studying, singing,
+and dancing; in the cinema hall, where the ever-popular &#8216;movies&#8217; were
+taking place; and in the big recreation hall, where a weekly &#8216;social&#8217; was
+being held. There, two girls provided the band, to which other girls
+danced with girls, or with men in khaki, or with factory workers in
+civilian dress. There was a healthy comradeship between girls and men and,
+when the hour of parting came there were leave-takings of which no one
+could be ashamed. Laughter and jollity in plenty, and snatches of song up
+and down the darkened streets, as group after group found its way home,
+but self-respect and dignity noticeably present.</p>
+
+<p>In a new town, emerging during the hurry and bustle of the war, amongst
+new occupations, at which women needs must wear a masculine costume, we
+have at least accomplished this: that the spirit of home-life,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span> of joy,
+and of love has not been discouraged: rather has it been fostered, or
+rekindled, in these unaccustomed homes provided by the State. Indeed, many
+of the girls passing through this strange war-time adventure have
+assuredly gained by their pilgrimage precisely in those qualities most
+needed by the wives and mothers of the rising generation.</p>
+
+<p>It was an inspiring glimpse into a new industrial world, a portent, maybe,
+of the time to come. The words of a golden sonnet welled up:</p>
+
+<p class="poem">Then felt I like some watcher of the skies<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">When a new planet swims into his ken;</span><br />
+Or like stout Cortez when, with eagle eyes,<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">He stared at the Pacific&mdash;and all his men</span><br />
+Looked at each other with a wild surmise&mdash;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Silent, upon a peak in Darien.</span></p>
+
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr style="width: 50%;" />
+<p><strong>Footnotes:</strong></p>
+
+<p><a name="f1" id="f1" href="#f1.1">[1]</a> Welfare work has since been officially extended to factories other
+than those engaged in munitions production by Clause 7 of the Police,
+Factories, &amp;c. (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act (1916).</p>
+
+<p><a name="f2" id="f2" href="#f2.1">[2]</a> <i>Health of Munition Workers Committee</i>, Memorandum No. 3, Report on
+Industrial Canteens (Cd. 8133); Memorandum No. 6, Appendix to Memorandum
+No. 3, Canteen Construction and Equipment (Cd. 8199); Memorandum No. 19,
+Investigation of Workers&#8217; Food and Suggestions as to Dietary: Report by
+Leonard E. Hill, M.B., F.R.S. (Cd. 8798).</p>
+
+<p><a name="f3" id="f3" href="#f3.1">[3]</a> A Food Section of the Ministry of Munitions has since been established
+to carry on the work of the Central Control Board (Liquor Traffic).</p>
+
+<p><a name="f4" id="f4" href="#f4.1">[4]</a> <i>Punch</i>, September 6, 1916.</p>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr class="full" />
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@@ -0,0 +1,3074 @@
+The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Woman's Part, by L. K. Yates
+
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+
+
+
+Title: The Woman's Part
+       A Record of Munitions Work
+
+
+Author: L. K. Yates
+
+
+
+Release Date: December 29, 2011  [eBook #38437]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII)
+
+
+***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WOMAN'S PART***
+
+
+E-text prepared by David Edwards and the Online Distributed Proofreading
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+
+
+
+[Illustration: THE MANUFACTURE OF 4.5-INCH CARTRIDGE CASES: OPERATING THE
+DRAWING PRESS]
+
+
+THE WOMAN'S PART
+
+A Record of Munitions Work
+
+by
+
+L. K. YATES
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+New York
+George H. Doran Company
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+
+  CHAPTER                                             PAGE
+
+     I. THE ADVENT OF WOMEN IN ENGINEERING TRADES        7
+        SHARING A COMMON TASK                            9
+        DILUTION                                        11
+        HEROISM IN THE WORKSHOP                         12
+
+    II. TRAINING THE MUNITION WORKER                    14
+        THE QUINTESSENCE OF THE WORK                    15
+        THE INSTRUCTIONAL FACTORY                       17
+        FIRST STEPS IN INDUSTRIAL LIFE                  18
+
+   III. AT WORK--I.                                     20
+        SHELLS AND SHELL CASES                          21
+        IN THE FUSE-SHOP                                23
+        CARTRIDGES AND BULLETS                          25
+
+    IV. AT WORK--II.                                    28
+        THE MAKING OF AIRCRAFT                          28
+        OPTICAL INSTRUMENTS                             30
+        IN THE SHIPYARDS                                33
+
+     V. COMFORT AND SAFETY                              37
+        WELFARE SUPERVISION                             37
+        PROTECTIVE CLOTHING                             41
+        REST-ROOMS AND FIRST AID                        42
+        WOMEN POLICE                                    43
+
+    VI. OUTSIDE WELFARE                                 45
+        RECREATION                                      45
+        MOTHERHOOD                                      47
+        THE FACTORY NURSERY                             48
+
+   VII. GROWTH OF THE INDUSTRIAL CANTEEN                52
+        GENERAL PRINCIPLES                              54
+        THE WORKER'S OASIS                              55
+
+  VIII. HOUSING                                         57
+        BILLETING                                       58
+        TEMPORARY ACCOMMODATION                         59
+        PERMANENT ACCOMMODATION                         61
+
+
+
+
+ILLUSTRATIONS
+
+
+  THE MANUFACTURE OF 4.5-INCH CARTRIDGE CASES:
+  OPERATING THE DRAWING PRESS                         _Frontispiece_
+
+                                                                PAGE
+
+  TURNING THE COPPER BAND OF A 9.2-INCH HIGH-EXPLOSIVE SHELL      16
+
+  DRILLING SAFETY-PIN HOLE IN FUSE                                16
+
+  INSPECTING AND GAUGING FUSES                                    17
+
+  TURNING THE OUTSIDE AND FORMING THE NOSE-END OF A 9.2-INCH
+  HIGH-EXPLOSIVE SHELL                                            17
+
+  ASSEMBLING FUSES                                                20
+
+  COOLING SHELL FORGINGS                                          20
+
+  OPERATING A LUMSDEN PLAIN GRINDER: RE-FORMING 8-INCH
+  HIGH-EXPLOSIVE CUTTERS                                          21
+
+  ENGRAVING METAL PARTS FOR COMPASSES                             28
+
+  COLOURING AEROPLANE PLANES                                      28
+
+  CHIPPING AND GRINDING BLADES OF CAST IRON PROPELLER WITH
+  PORTABLE TOOLS                                                  29
+
+  WOMAN ACTING AS MATE TO JOINER MAKING SEA-PLANE FLOATS          29
+
+  CUTTING FRAYED-EDGE TAPE                                        36
+
+  BRAZING TURBINE ROTOR SEGMENT                                   36
+
+  MOUNTING CARDS FOR DRY COMPASSES                                37
+
+  TREADLE POLISHING-MACHINES, FOR SMOOTHING LENSES                37
+
+  SLITTING AND ROUGHING OPTICAL GLASS                             44
+
+  VIEW OF CANTEEN KITCHEN                                         44
+
+  WEIGHING FERRO CHROME FOR ANALYSIS                              45
+
+  BALSAMING LENSES                                                52
+
+  MAKING INSTRUMENT SCALES                                        53
+
+  PAINTING A SHIP'S SIDE IN DRY DOCK                              60
+
+  GENERAL VIEW OF WOMEN AT WORK ON AIRCRAFT FABRIC                61
+
+  THE CANTEEN                                                     61
+
+
+
+
+THE WOMAN'S PART
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I: THE ADVENT OF WOMEN IN ENGINEERING TRADES
+
+SHARING A COMMON TASK--DILUTION--HEROISM IN THE WORKSHOP
+
+
+In a period of titanic events it is difficult to characterize a single
+group of happenings as of special significance, yet at the end of the war
+it is likely that Great Britain will look back to the transformation of
+her home industries for war purposes as one of the greatest feats she has
+ever accomplished. The arousing of a nation to fight to the death for the
+principle of Liberty is doubtless one of the most stirring of spectacles
+in the human drama; it has repeated itself throughout history; but it has
+been left to this century to witness in the midst of such an upheaval the
+complete reorganization of a nation's industry, built up slowly and
+painfully by a modern civilization for its material support and utility.
+
+Before the outbreak of hostilities Great Britain was supplying the world
+with the products of her workshops, but these products were mainly those
+needed by nations at peace. The coal mines of Northumberland, the
+foundries of the Midlands, the cotton mills of Lancashire were aiding vast
+populations in their daily human struggle, but the demand of 1914 for vast
+requirements for war purposes found Great Britain unprepared. The
+instantaneous rearrangement of industries for war purposes, possible to
+Germany by reason of forty years of stealthy war preparations, was out of
+the question for a nation that neither contemplated nor prepared for a
+European conflagration. Eight or nine months had to elapse before the
+people of Great Britain were aroused to the realities of modern warfare.
+
+It was then only that a large public became aware that the Herculean
+struggle was not merely a conflict between armies and navies, but between
+British science and German science, between British chemists and German
+chemists, between British workshops and the workshops of Germany. The
+realization of these facts led to the creation of the Ministry of
+Munitions in May 1915 and the rapid rearrangement of industries and
+industrial conditions. Before the war, three National factories in Great
+Britain were sufficient to fulfil the demand for output for possible war
+purposes; to-day, there are more than 150 National factories and over
+5,000 Controlled Establishments, scattered up and down the country, all
+producing munitions of war. The whole of the North Country and the whole
+of the Midlands have, in fact, become a vast arsenal.
+
+Standing on an eminence in the North, one may by day watch ascending the
+smoke of from 400 to 500 munition factories, and by night at many a point
+in the Midland counties one may survey an encircling zone of flames as
+they belch forth from the chimneys of the engineering works of war. The
+vast majority of these workshops had previously to the war never produced
+a gun, a shell, or a cartridge. To-day, makers of agricultural and textile
+machinery are engaged on munitions, producers of lead pencils are turning
+out shrapnel; a manufacturer of gramophones is producing fuses; a court
+jeweller is engaged in the manufacture of optical instruments; a maker of
+cream separators has now an output of primers. Nor is this all. New
+industries have been started and languishing trades have been revived.
+
+The work of reorganization has been prodigious, and when the history of
+Britain's share in the war comes to be written in the leisured days of
+peace, it is unlikely that the record will transmit to a future generation
+how much effort it has taken to produce the preponderance in munitions now
+achieved. With the huge task of securing an adequate supply of raw
+material has gone hand in hand the production of a sufficiency of suitable
+machinery and machine tools, the equipment of laboratories for chemical
+research, the erection, or adaptation, of accommodation in which to house
+the new 'plant', and the supply of a continuous stream of suitable labour.
+In face of the growing needs of the Navy and Army this labour question has
+been a crucial test; it is a testimony to the 'will to win' of the whole
+people that the problem from the outset has found its solution. As soon as
+the importance of the demand for munitions workers was widely understood,
+a supply of labour has continuously streamed into the factory gates. There
+are now 2,000,000 persons employed in munitions industries--exclusive of
+Admiralty work--of which one-third are women.
+
+The advent of the women in the engineering shops and their success in a
+group of fresh trades may be accounted as an omen of deep significance.
+Women in this country have, it is true, taken their place in factory life
+from the moment that machinery swept away the spinning-wheel from the
+domestic hearth, and it is more often the woman mill-hand, or factory
+'lass', who is the wealthier partner in many a Lancashire home. Women
+before the war, to be sure, took part in factory life where such
+commodities as textiles, clothing, food, household goods, &c., were
+produced, but by consensus of opinion--feminine as well as masculine--her
+presence in Engineering Works, save on mere routine work, or on a few
+delicate processes, was considered in the pre-war period as unsuitable and
+undesirable.
+
+
+_Sharing a Common Task_
+
+At the outbreak of hostilities, a few of the most far-sighted employers,
+contemplating a shortage of labour through the recruitment of men for
+military service, hazarded the opinion that women might be employed on all
+kinds of simple repetition work in the Engineering Shops. Further than
+that even the optimist did not go. There was also no indication that women
+would be willing to adventure into a world where long hours and night-work
+prevailed, from which evils they were protected in the days of peace by
+stringent Factory Acts. Events have proved that the women of Great Britain
+are as ready as their menfolk to sacrifice comfort and personal
+convenience to the demands of a great cause, and as soon as it was made
+known that their services were required, they came forward in their
+hundreds of thousands.
+
+They have come from the office and the shop, from domestic service and the
+dressmaker's room, from the High Schools and the Colleges, and from the
+quietude of the stately homes of the leisured rich. They have travelled
+from far-off corners in the United Kingdom as well as from homesteads in
+Australia and New Zealand, and from lonely farms in South Africa and
+Canada. Every stratum of society has provided its share of willing women
+workers eager from one cause or another to 'do their bit'.
+
+Even in the early days of the advent of women in the munitions shops, I
+have seen working together, side by side, the daughter of an earl, a
+shopkeeper's widow, a graduate from Girton, a domestic servant and a young
+woman from a lonely farm in Rhodesia, whose husband had joined the
+colours. Social status, so stiff a barrier in this country in pre-war
+days, was forgotten in the factory, as in the trenches, and they were all
+working together as happily as the members of a united family.
+
+Employers and former employees likewise often share a common task in the
+workshops of the war. At Woolwich, for example, a lady of delicate
+upbringing could, at one period, have been seen arriving at the Arsenal in
+the early hours of each morning, accompanied by her former maid, both
+being the while 'hands' in the employ of the State. It is well known in
+certain circles how Lady Scott, the widow of the famous Antarctic
+explorer, put aside all private interests to take up work in a munitions
+factory, how Lady Gertrude Crawford became an official, supervising
+women's work in shipyards, and how Lady Mary Hamilton (now Mrs. Kenyon
+Slaney), the eldest daughter of the Duke of Abercorn, and Miss Stella
+Drummond, daughter of General Drummond, have won distinction as workers in
+'advanced' processes of munitions production.
+
+These are but a few distinguished names amongst a crowd of women of all
+degrees of society who have achieved unexpected success in work to which
+they were entirely unaccustomed. Amongst this nameless multitude,
+attention has been called from time to time to the remarkable feats in the
+engineering and chemical trades, in electrical works, and in the
+shipyards, of kitchen-maids and of dressmakers, of governesses and
+children's nurses.
+
+The underlying motives, all actuated by war conditions, which have turned
+the tide of women's work into new and unfamiliar occupations, are,
+however, more diverse than is generally supposed. Unquestionably, the two
+main driving forces have been patriotism and economic pressure, and of
+these patriotism, the love of country, the pride of Empire, accounts for a
+large proportion of women recruits. Yet there are other motives at work:
+the old human forces of family love and self-sacrifice, pride, anger,
+hatred, and even humour. I have questioned workers at the lathes and in
+doping rooms, in Filling Factories, and in wood-workers' shops, and find
+the mass of new labour in the munitions works is there from distinctive
+individual reasons. It is only by the recognition of all these forces that
+successful management of a new factor in the labour problem is possible.
+An indication of the life-history of one or two individual munitions
+workers may exemplify the point.
+
+There is the case of a girl tool-setter in a factory near London. She is
+the only child of an old Army family. When war broke out, she realized
+that for the first time in many generations her family could send no
+representative to fight the country's battles. Her father was an old man,
+long past military age. The girl, although in much request at home, took
+up work in a base hospital in France, but at the end of a year, when
+broken down from over-strain, was ordered six months' rest in England.
+Recovery followed in two months, and again, spurred by the thought of
+inaction in a time of national peril, she entered a munitions factory as
+an ordinary employee. After nine months' work she had only lost five
+minutes' time.
+
+Another factory worker is a mother of seven sons, proud-spirited,
+efficient, and accustomed to rule her family. The seven sons enlisted and
+she felt her claim to headship was endangered. She entered a munitions
+factory and, to soothe her pride, sent weekly to each son a detailed
+account of her industrial work. At length, the eldest son wrote that he
+thought his mother was probably killing more Germans than any of the
+family. Since then, she says, she has had peace of mind.
+
+In another factory, in the West of England, there is an arduous munitions
+maker who works tirelessly through the longest shifts. Before her entry
+into the industrial world she was a stewardess on a passenger-ship. The
+vessel was torpedoed by a German submarine, and she was one of the few
+survivors. Daily she works off her hatred on a capstan lathe, hoping, as
+she tells the visitors, some day to get equal with the unspeakable Huns.
+
+Then there is a typical case of a wife who has learned some of life's
+little ironies through her work on munitions production. Her husband, an
+old sailor, worked for the same firm before the war. He used to come home
+daily and complain of the hardness of his lot. It was 'a dog's life', he
+constantly reiterated, and his wife was careful to make reparation at
+home.
+
+War broke out and the naval reserve man was recalled to sea. The firm were
+put to it, in the labour shortage, for a substitute, and invited the
+wife's aid. Having heard so much of the hardships of the work, she
+refused, but after some persuasion agreed to give the job a trial. At the
+end of a week, she surmised the task was not so hard as she contemplated;
+after a month had passed she realized the position. The job had been a
+capital excuse to ensure forgiveness for domestic short-comings. The wife
+awaits her husband's return with a certain grim humour.
+
+Having arrived in the engineering trades, actuated by whatever motives,
+the woman munitions maker has more than justified the hopes of the pioneer
+employers who sponsored her cause. As soon as organized labour agreed that
+trade union rules and pre-war shop practice should be suspended for the
+duration of the war, women were rapidly initiated in the simple repetition
+processes of shell-making and shell-filling. Machinery was adapted to the
+new-comers, and the skilled men workers were distributed amongst the
+factories to undertake the jobs possible only to experienced hands.
+
+
+_Dilution_
+
+Thus, the principle of dilution, as old as Plato's _Republic_, which as a
+theory was reintroduced to British students by Adam Smith, has widely come
+into practice through the urgency of the war. Women have been successfully
+introduced into a new group of occupations, men have been 'upgraded', so
+that many semi-skilled men have become skilled; and the skilled men have
+been allocated entirely to employment on skilled jobs.
+
+Once introduced to the munitions shops, women soon mastered the repetition
+processes, such as 'turning', 'milling' and 'grinding', as well as the
+simpler operations connected with shell-filling. The keenest amongst them
+were then found fit for more 'advanced' work where accuracy, a nice
+judgment, and deftness of manipulation are essential. Such are the
+processes connected with tool and gauge-making, where the work must be
+finished to within the finest limits--a fraction of the width of a human
+hair; such are the requirements for the work of overlooking, or inspection
+of output; and such are the many processes of aeroplane manufacture and
+optical glass production, upon which women are being increasingly
+employed.
+
+They are also undertaking operations dependent on physical strength, which
+in pre-war days would have been regarded as wholly unsuitable to female
+capacity. War necessity has, however, killed old-time prejudice and has
+proved how readily women adapt themselves to any task within their
+physical powers. One may, for example, to-day watch women in the shipyards
+of the North hard at work, chipping and cleaning the ships' decks,
+repairing hulls, or laying electric wire on board H.M. battleships. High
+up in the gantry cranes which move majestically across the vaulted factory
+roof, one may see women sitting aloft guiding the movement of the huge
+molten ingots; in the foundries, one may run across a woman smith; in the
+aeroplane factories, women welders work be-goggled at the anvils.
+
+An engineering shop is now sometimes staffed almost entirely by women
+'hands', and it is no uncommon sight to find in the centre of the shop
+women operators at work on the machines; at one end a group of women
+tool-setters, and at another women gaugers who test the products of this
+combined women's labour. In the packing-rooms the lustier types of women
+may be seen dispatching finished shells, and on the factory platforms
+gartered women in tunic suits push the loaded trollies to waiting
+railway-trucks for conveyance to the front. One of the most surprising
+revelations of the war in this country has, indeed, been the capacity of
+women for engineering work, and to none has the discovery been more
+surprising and more exhilarating than to the women themselves.
+
+
+_Heroism in the Workshop_
+
+The work has, in fact, called for personal qualities usually thought to be
+abnormal in women. The women in the engineering shops have disproved any
+such surmise. Where occasion has demanded physical courage from the
+workers, the virtue has leaped forth from the average woman, as from the
+average man. Where circumstances call for grit and endurance, there has
+been no shirking in the factories by the majority of the operators of
+either sex. The heroism of the battlefields has frequently been equalled
+by the ordinary civilian in the factory, whether man or woman. Sometimes
+incidents of women's courage in the works have been reported in the press
+as matters for surprise. They are merely typical instances of the spirit
+that animates the general mass of the workers in Great Britain.
+
+A few examples may be added in illustration. On a recent occasion, a woman
+lost the first finger and thumb of her left hand through the jamming of a
+piece of metal in a press. After an absence of six weeks, she returned to
+work and was soon getting an even greater output than before.
+
+Another instance relates to a serious accident in an explosives factory,
+when several women were killed and many were injured. Within a few days a
+considerable number of the remaining female operators applied and were
+accepted for positions in the Danger Zone at another factory. Another
+incident is reported from some chemical works in the North. The key
+controlling a valve fell off and dropped into a pit below, rendering the
+woman in charge unable to control the steam. An accident seemed imminent
+and the woman, in spite of the likelihood of dangerous results to herself,
+got down to the pit, regained the key and averted disaster.
+
+In a shipyard on the North-East coast, a woman of 23 years had been
+engaged for some time in electric-wiring a large battleship. One day, when
+working overhead, a drill came through from the deck, piercing her cotton
+cap and entering her head. She was attended to in the firm's First Aid
+room and sent home. To the surprise of every one concerned, she returned
+to work at 6 a.m. on the following day, and laughingly remarked that she
+was quite satisfied that it was better to lose a little hair than her
+head.
+
+In the trivial accidents which are, of course, of more frequent
+occurrence, the women display similar calmness and will stand
+unflinchingly while particles of grit, or metal, are removed from the
+eyes, or while small wounds--often due to their own carelessness--are
+dressed and bound. The endurance displayed during the early period of
+munitions production, when holidays were voluntarily abandoned and work
+continued through Sundays, and in many hours of overtime, was no less
+remarkable in the women than in the men. Action is continuously taken by
+the Ministry of Munitions to reduce the hours of overtime, to abolish
+Sunday labour, and to promote the well-being of the workers, but without
+the zeal and courage of the women munitions makers the valour of the
+soldiers at the Front would often be in vain.
+
+As the Premier remarked in a recent speech: 'I do not know what would have
+happened to this land when the men had to go away fighting if the women
+had not come forward and done their share of the work. It would have been
+utterly impossible for us to have waged a successful war, had it not been
+for the skill and ardour, enthusiasm and industry, which the women of the
+country have thrown into the work of the war'.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II: TRAINING THE MUNITION WORKER
+
+THE QUINTESSENCE OF THE WORK--THE INSTRUCTIONAL FACTORY--FIRST STEPS IN
+INDUSTRIAL LIFE
+
+
+When, in answer to the demand for shells and more shells, factories were
+built, or adapted to the requirements of war, it was soon found that a
+supply of suitable labour must be ensured, if the maximum output was to be
+maintained. The existing practice of the engineering shops, by which a boy
+arrived by gradual steps, counted in years, from apprenticeship to the
+work of a skilled operator, was obviously impossible where an immediate
+demand for thousands of employees of varying efficiency had to be
+fulfilled. The needs of the Navy and Army further complicated the problem
+by the withdrawal of men of all degrees of skill from factory to
+battlefield.
+
+The discovery of an untapped reservoir of labour in women's work, and the
+adaptation of a larger proportion of machines to a 'fool-proof' standard,
+certainly eased the situation, yet the problem remained of the immediate
+provision of workers able to undertake 'advanced', as well as simple work,
+in the engineering shops. Factory employers were from the outset alive to
+the situation, and at once adopted measures for the training of new-comers
+within their shops, but harassed as the managers were by the supreme need
+for output, it was hardly possible to develop extensive schemes for
+training within the factory gates. Hence, arose a movement throughout the
+United Kingdom among the governing bodies of many institutions of
+University rank, among Local Education Authorities, and among various
+feminist groups, to make use of existing Technical Schools and
+Institutions for the training of recruits in engineering work.
+
+The effort was at first mainly confined to the instruction of men in
+elementary machine work, and the London County Council may fairly claim to
+have acted as pioneer in this connexion. Yet, as early as August 1915, a
+group of women connected with the National Union of Women's Suffrage
+Societies (of which Mrs. Fawcett, widow of a former Postmaster-General, is
+the president) decided to finance a scheme for the training of women
+oxy-acetylene welders, converting for this purpose a small workshop run by
+a woman silversmith.
+
+It was soon observed by the Ministry of Munitions that these sporadic
+efforts--sometimes successful beyond expectation, and sometimes failing
+for want of funds, or for lack of intimacy between training-ground and
+factory employer--must be co-ordinated, if they were to tackle
+successfully the growing task imposed by war conditions. The conception of
+a Training Section for factory workers within the Ministry of Munitions
+arose, took root. The section was established in the early autumn of 1915.
+
+In the October of that year, authority to finance approved training
+schemes throughout the country was given to the new department. Some fifty
+colleges and schools, undertaking independent schemes, were then brought
+into touch with the Ministry, and steps were taken to develop the existing
+systems. Equipment was thereby improved, recruiting of students
+stimulated, and a scheme for the payment of maintenance during
+training--such as the Manhattan Schools in New York had previously
+introduced to social investigators in this country--was established. The
+extension of the courses of training from instruction in simple processes
+to such advanced engineering work as lead-burning, tool-setting, and
+gauge-making soon followed, and was accompanied by necessary theoretical
+instruction in the methods of calculation of fine measurements.
+
+
+_The Quintessence of the Work_
+
+For these advanced classes, men alone were at first eligible as students,
+women being only instructed at the outset in elementary parts of the work.
+In the early days, the women were invited 'to do their bit', by learning
+how to bore, how to drill, how to plane, how to shape, and above all, how
+to work to size. The chief battle of the Training Centre with regard to
+the instruction of women was then, and still remains, the implanting of a
+feeling for exactitude in persons accustomed to measure ribbons or lace
+within a margin of a quarter of a yard or so, or to prepare food by a
+guess-work mixture of ingredients. I remember, at the beginning of a
+course of training for women, how an instructor at a large metropolitan
+Centre remarked that 'ninety-nine per cent. of the new students do not
+know what accuracy means', and he detailed how difficult it was to instil
+into their mind 'that quintessence of their work'.
+
+Scientific methods of tuition, helped no doubt by women's proverbial
+patience, have, however, enabled the lesson to be learned after a few
+weeks' intensive training. The courses last but six to eight weeks and, at
+the conclusion of the carefully graduated tasks, it is not too much to
+say that the success of the women has been, in an overwhelming number of
+cases, surprising both to teachers and pupils.
+
+I have before me a batch of letters from factory employers, written in the
+early period of the training schemes. They all bear testimony to the value
+of the outside instruction. One manager notes how the trained women from
+the Schools were able 'to become producers almost at once'; another states
+that the drafting of the women students from School to factory has enabled
+the work of munitions to be carried on 'with greater expedition than would
+otherwise have been the case', and yet another, with a scarcely concealed
+note of astonishment, relates that his students were able to be engaged at
+once on 'all kinds of machinery, capstan lathes, turning lathes, milling
+and wheel cutting machinery'.
+
+This discovery of the employer, of the potentialities of women's work in
+the engineering trades, soon led to a development of the instruction of
+female students in the Training Centres; more advanced machine work was
+added to the curriculum, as well as tuition in aeroplane woodwork and
+construction, in core-making and moulding, in draughtsmanship and
+electrical work, in optical-instrument making, including the delicate and
+highly-skilled work of lens and prism making.
+
+New Training Centres are constantly being opened in provincial areas, the
+instruction being adapted to the needs of local factories. There are now
+(December, 1917) over forty training schools for engineering work in Great
+Britain, as well as nine instructional factories and workshops, and the
+proportion of women to men trained in all the processes may be reckoned
+roughly as two to one.
+
+The system of instruction is based, in some of the Centres, on the general
+principle that the School undertakes the preliminary work of tuition in
+the simpler engineering processes; the Instructional Factory, or workshop,
+specializing in the more skilled processes, acts as a clearing-house for
+promising students from the schools. The urgency of warfare does not,
+however, permit the application of any hard-and-fast rules. I have seen
+specimens of some of the most 'advanced' work produced in a School;
+indeed, the delicate work of lens polishing and centring, the intricacies
+of engineering draughtsmanship, the precise art of tool-setting and
+gauge-making have become specialisms of the Schools in certain localities.
+
+[Illustration: TURNING THE COPPER BAND OF A 9.2-INCH HIGH-EXPLOSIVE SHELL]
+
+[Illustration: DRILLING SAFETY-PIN HOLE IN FUSE]
+
+[Illustration: INSPECTING AND GAUGING FUSES]
+
+[Illustration: TURNING THE OUTSIDE AND FORMING THE NOSE-END OF A 9.2-INCH
+HIGH-EXPLOSIVE SHELL]
+
+As I write, the face of an eager girl of 21 years recurs to memory. She
+was showing me, the other day, a master gauge produced at a School in the
+Eastern counties. 'I made it all myself,' she said joyfully, 'dead exact,
+and all the other gauges of this size in the School are made from it. I
+have just been appointed assistant instructor in gauge-making.' When it is
+recalled that the deviation in the measurements of a gauge is only
+tolerated within such limits as a 3/10000 part of an inch, the production
+in a School of a master gauge, 'dead exact' in all its dimensions, is a
+proof that the student has already gone some way in the mastery of the
+craft of the engineer.
+
+
+_The Instructional Factory_
+
+On the other hand, the Instructional Factory is often forced by war
+conditions to enrol raw recruits who seem likely material for the urgent
+needs of surrounding factories. In such cases, the candidate is placed on
+trial for a week or two in the Instructional Workshop, as in the School.
+If, at the close of the period of probation, she is deemed unsuitable, she
+is advised at that preliminary stage to return to her former occupation.
+
+Speaking generally, the rejects are extraordinarily few, and although it
+would be premature to draw definite conclusions, the experience of the
+Training Section suggests that there is considerable latent capacity for
+engineering work in a large number of women. A tour of the Instructional
+Workshops emphasizes the point; everywhere, women may be seen mastering in
+the short intensive course the one advanced job for which each is being
+trained. In the Instructional Workshop, the atmosphere of a School is
+exchanged for that of a factory, the conditions of a modern engineering
+shop being reflected within its precincts. Thus the students 'clock on and
+off' on arrival and on departure, observe factory shifts, work on actual
+commercial jobs, obtain their tools from an attached store, and so on. The
+work varies in these Instructional Factories as in the engineering shop of
+the commercial world.
+
+In one section of such a hall of tuition you may see the women intent on
+the production of screws, or bolts, or nuts; in another part, such objects
+as fuse needles may be in the course of manufacture. You stop to see the
+magic which is answerable for the birth of the tiny factor which shall
+detonate the explosive, and you are amazed to find that a fuse needle
+requires six tools for its production and eight to nine gauges for testing
+the accuracy of its measurements. Or, you may perhaps pause before a
+machine which is turning out tiny grub screws. To see a rod of steel offer
+itself, as it were, to the rightful instruments on a complicated machine
+to impress the thread and slit, to watch it proceeding on its way until a
+tiny section is divided and a complete screw is handed over to a tray
+outside the machine, is, to the uninitiated, a miracle in itself.
+
+To see the whole of these complicated processes guided and operated by a
+smiling girl makes one hopeful for the national industries of the future.
+Setters-up of tools are at work in another section of the same
+Instructional Factory and at other machines are students grinding,
+milling, or profiling.
+
+You may then visit another Instructional Factory to find that aircraft is
+the specialty. I recall one such training-ground in a bay of an aeroplane
+factory. There the girls learn almost every part of aircraft production,
+from the handling of the tiny hammers used on the woodwork for the body
+and wings, to the assembling, or putting together the tested parts. In
+this training factory, a system prevails of lectures by the practical
+instructors on the use of necessary tools; questions from the students are
+encouraged at the close of the lecture, and, I was informed, when on one
+occasion I was one of the audience, that the saving of the instructor's
+time by the adoption of this method was beyond expected results.
+
+Again, you may visit an Instructional Factory where foundry work is
+included in the curriculum, or where advanced machine work is a feature. I
+have stood in one Instructional Workshop where some 600 machines were
+whirring simultaneously, and where the spirit of energy and goodwill of
+both students and instructors seemed as tangible as the metal objects
+produced. In this institution all the accomplished work is for production;
+night as well as day shifts are worked, and the needs of our armies, or
+those of our Allies, are frankly discussed with the operators. There is no
+occasion for other incentive: raw recruits, students from the Schools,
+discharged soldiers from the Front, men unfit for active service, all
+these denizens of the training-shop vie with each other to produce a
+maximum output.
+
+It speaks volumes for this workshop that in spite of the continual changes
+of operators--each set of students remaining only for a course of six to
+eight weeks--it is entirely maintained on a commercial basis. To reach
+such a standard in these circumstances is to imply that the heroism of the
+workshop has become an ingrained habit in operators and staff.
+
+
+_First Steps in Industrial Life_
+
+I remember watching in this training-ground the manufacture of small
+aero-engine parts, exact in dimensions to within the smallest limits of
+tolerance. I put a query as to the wastage of material in such an
+operation, when handled by comparative new-comers. 'Scrapping from this
+process', replied the production manager with pride, 'does not exceed a
+total average of one per cent.' The women at work at the time had come
+from the most varied occupations. A large proportion had never worked
+outside their own home, others were domestic servants, cooks, housemaids,
+and so on, others were dressmakers from small towns, and one, I recall,
+was an assistant from a spa, where she had been engaged handing out
+'waters' to invalids. 'It is not the rank of society from which the
+student is drawn that matters,' remarked an instructor; 'it is the
+personality of the individual that counts.'
+
+Every care has been taken by the Ministry of Munitions to make it easy for
+women of all classes to participate in their schemes of instruction. The
+middle class girl who has never undertaken independent work, the woman who
+has always lived and worked within the shelter of her own home,
+undoubtedly felt in many cases debarred from entering industrial life. The
+necessity of living away from her family, in order to enter a
+Training-School, the absence of home conditions in school or factory, the
+dread of an entirely masculine superintendence, all helped to strengthen
+artificial barriers between potential students and the needed engineering
+work. The Training Section, watching the development of its schemes,
+became aware of the necessity of making arrangements for students from the
+Welfare point of view, and an organization has thus developed by which the
+first steps in industrial life are made easy for the most apprehensive of
+new-comers.
+
+Girl students by rail are met by a responsible woman official and are
+accompanied to suitable lodgings, or to hostels. In the event of pressure
+in accommodation, the new student is introduced to temporary apartments,
+or to a 'Clearing Hostel', where she awaits in comfort a vacancy. In the
+large Training Centres, a woman supervisor is in charge. She makes all
+arrangements as to the provision of meals, rest-rooms, cloak-rooms,
+First-Aid centres, and so on, and is ready to advise the women students on
+all points relating to their personal interests.
+
+Women students are also enabled to wear a khaki uniform, as members of the
+Mechanical Unit of the Women's Legion, a privilege found to be of distinct
+value to girls unaccustomed to steering an independent course in the more
+boisterous streams of life. The appreciation of the students of the
+safe-guarding of their individual desires crops out in unexpected places.
+In a handful of correspondence from students, one gleans such remarks as
+the following:
+
+    'Mrs. H. never spares herself any trouble as long as she can make
+    things pleasant for me, she considers it her "war work" to make
+    munition workers happy, and it is very nice to meet people that
+    appreciate what we are doing for our country.'...
+
+    'We were met at the station by the works motor. All at once we turned
+    up an avenue of lime-trees and drew up at the door of our country
+    estate. It is a real lovely house and we revel in the glories of fresh
+    air, lawns and gardens, good beds and well-spread tables. We cross a
+    field to the works. Dinner and tea await us when we get here, and
+    there is a well-stocked vegetable garden to give us fresh vegetables,
+    so we all feel indeed that our lines are fallen in pleasant places,
+    and we are very grateful.'
+
+In these ways a bridge has been built by the Ministry of Munitions between
+the normal life of the women in this country and the work in the munitions
+factory.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III: AT WORK--I
+
+SHELLS AND SHELL CASES--IN THE FUSE SHOP--CARTRIDGES AND BULLETS
+
+
+Arrived in the munitions factory, the new-comer, whether from a Government
+Training Centre, or from another occupation, is given two or three weeks'
+trial on the task she has come to undertake. Only a very small proportion
+of the women offering their services--one experienced manager puts it at 5
+per cent.--are found unsuitable, and these are discharged during the
+probationary period.
+
+Except in the case of those who have received a preliminary training, or
+of those who have merely transferred their energies from other factory
+work, the average woman has, at the initial stage in the munitions shops,
+to overcome an instinctive fear of the machine. Occasionally, the fear is
+intensified into an unreasoning phase of terror. 'One has to coax the
+women to stay with such as these,' said one understanding foreman,
+pointing to a monster machine with huge-toothed wheels. 'We don't ask a
+woman to sit alone with these at first, for she wouldn't do it, so we put
+a man with her, and let her sit and watch a bit, and after a while she
+loses her fear and won't work anything else, if she can help it.'
+
+The women, in fact, soon get attached to the machines they are working, in
+a manner probably unknown to the men. 'I've been here a year on this
+machine, and I can't do near so well on any other,' is a remark many a
+girl has made to me as I have watched her on a difficult job. From time to
+time, a girl will even confess that she 'can't bear to think of some one
+on the night-shift working _her_ machine'. An understanding has arisen
+between the machine and the operator which amounts almost to affection. I
+have often noticed the expression of this emotion in the workshops; the
+caressing touch of a woman's fingers, for instance, as a bore is being
+urged on to the job on the machine. This touch, which cannot be taught, or
+imparted, enables the operation to be started in the most effective method
+possible, and goes to the making of an excellent and accurate worker.
+
+The femininity of the worker has, however, its drawbacks, and for the sake
+of successful handling of women in the munitions factory, it is as well
+that these psychological points should be noted. If, for example, a
+machine is out of gear, or if the operation is held up for any other
+cause, the women munition makers will sometimes behave in an unreasonable
+manner, quite bewildering to a foreman accustomed only to dealing with
+men. The temporary cessation of work may make only a slight money
+difference to the woman operator by the end of the week: 'not enough to
+fuss about,' as the foreman judges. But the woman nevertheless often
+_does_ fuss, because in her eyes the wages do not loom so large as the
+interruption to her work. She 'hates standing-by', she will say, for she
+cannot express the emotion of which she is but dimly conscious, that a
+woman's deep instinct is to give freely of her fullness, and it frets her
+very soul to be balked in the middle of a job.
+
+[Illustration: ASSEMBLING FUSES]
+
+[Illustration: COOLING SHELL FORGINGS]
+
+[Illustration: OPERATING A LUMSDEN PLAIN GRINDER: RE-FORMING 8-INCH
+HIGH-EXPLOSIVE CUTTERS]
+
+Other initial obstacles in the employment of 'new' female labour in the
+factories result from the exchange of the manifold duties of the woman in
+her own home for repetition work performed in the company of hundreds of
+other human beings. These difficulties are, however, soon overcome, and
+the new-comer, generally speaking, rapidly becomes one of a large and
+merry company. The whirr of the wheels and the persistent throb of the
+machinery may at first distract her, but after a short time the factory
+noises are unnoticed, save as an accompaniment to her thoughts, her
+laughter, or her song. I have indeed met in the England of to-day nothing
+more inspiriting, outside the soldiers' camps, than the women munition
+workers at work or at play.
+
+In August 1916, there were some 500 different munitions processes upon
+which women were engaged. To-day, they are employed upon practically every
+operation in factory, in foundry, in laboratory, and chemical works, of
+which they are physically capable. Within the limits of this publication
+it is not possible to follow them into every field of their endeavours,
+yet a glance at their work in a few typical products may give some slight
+indication of women's contribution to Britain's effort in the World War.
+
+
+_Shells and Shell Cases_
+
+Of the numbers of operations that go to the making of a shell, women now
+undertake every process, in some works, including even the forging of the
+billets in the foundry. It was the urgent need of a greatly increased
+output of shells in 1915 which led to the widespread introduction into the
+engineering shops of female labour, and the women have repaid this unique
+opportunity by their unqualified success. So rapid, and so marked, has
+been their progress in shell production that by the spring of 1917 the
+official announcement was justified, that, by March 31 of that year,
+Government contracts for shells of certain dimensions would only be given
+where 80 per cent. of the employees were women.
+
+At first, the women were mainly engaged in simple machine operations, such
+as boring, drilling, and turning, or in filling the shells. They are, at
+present, working hydraulic presses, guiding huge overhead cranes,
+'tonging', or lifting the molten billets, 'setting', or fitting the tools
+in the machines, inspecting and gauging, painting the finished shell
+cases, making the boxes for dispatch of the finished product, and trucking
+these when finally screwed up and ready for exit from the factory to the
+Front. It is not possible to describe here in detail women's entire
+contribution to the production of a shell, but, from foundry to railway
+truck, she has become an alert and promising worker.
+
+In the foundry, her appearance is as yet exceptional, yet in the North
+country it is no unusual sight to find a woman in the cage suspended from
+the overhead travelling crane, operating its protruding arm. Now, she will
+pick up with the clumsy iron fingers a pig of iron and thrust it into the
+glowing depths of a furnace, or she will lift the red-hot billet and bring
+it to the hydraulic press, where it is roughly hollowed into its
+predestined shape.
+
+In the shell shop proper you may watch the woman operator on some scores
+of processes; at one machine, she may be attacking the centre of the
+billet with a revolving nose, at another she may be 'turning' the outside
+of a shell. The shavings curl off in this process like hot bacon rind and
+fall in iridescent rings around her: blue, purple, peacock, or gleaming
+silver. Or, you may watch the woman worker 'threading' the shell, a
+process by which the screw threads are provided, into which the nose of
+the shell is afterwards fitted; or, you may stand and marvel at the skill
+of the worker who so deftly rivets the base-plate into the shell's lower
+end. But, perhaps, the most attractive operation to the visitor to the
+shell shop is the fitting and grooving of the shell's copper band, a
+process which leaves the machine and worker half-hidden in the glory of
+sunset tints, as the copper scrap falls thickly from the machine.
+
+At every stage, the shell is gauged and tested, examined and re-examined,
+since accuracy is the watch-word of its production. Sometimes, the
+machine-operator will gauge her own product; at other stages, the shell
+passes into the hands of women overlookers of the factory, the final tests
+being made by Government 'viewers'. The inside, as well as the outside of
+the shell is submitted to such inspection, and you may see women peering
+into the interior of the shells, aided by the light from a tiny electric
+bulb, mounted on a stick. This contrivance is thrust successively into
+rows and rows of shells.
+
+Women are now exclusively used for the painting of the shells, a process
+accomplished, not by means of a brush and paint-pot, but by the operator
+playing a fine electrically-worked syringe on to the surface of the shell.
+This process is undertaken in what is often called 'the butcher's shop',
+the shells, in pairs, being swung up on a rope into a compartment where
+the operator works from behind a protective iron screen.
+
+In the Filling shops, women's devotion to their work has been proved once
+and again. Whether the process undertaken be in company of a few comrades,
+or in isolated huts where lonely vigils are kept over stores of
+explosives, the munition-girls are hardly known to flinch in their duty.
+
+Sometimes, they have volunteered to work throughout the night when
+air-raids are in progress, at other times, women-workers have returned to
+the Danger Zone immediately after some bad experience there; and, in every
+case, the woman worker in the Filling Factory cheerfully sacrifices much
+which she holds dear in life. It may signify but little to a man to give
+up his small personal possessions whilst at work in the danger areas, but
+to many a woman worker it means much, that she may not wear a brooch, or a
+flower, while on duty, and that her wedding-ring, the only allowable
+trinket, must be bound with thread while she works. Her tresses, which she
+normally loves to braid, or twist into varying fashions, must also be left
+hairpinless beneath her cap. She must relinquish her personal belongings
+before going to her allotted task; no crochet-hook or knitting-pin may
+accompany her into the zone where friction of steel, or hard metal, might
+spell death to a multitude of employees. Yet this sacrifice of
+individuality is given freely by the woman in the Filling shop, and she is
+still merry-hearted and blithe as she fills the small bags with deadly
+powder, or binds the charge which shall fire the shell.
+
+When the shell is finally filled and passed 'O.K.', or perfect, it is a
+woman who packs it into its box and who wheels it on a truck, sometimes
+for a mile or more over narrow platforms, to hand it to another woman who
+stacks it into the waiting railway-wagon. Any one who has watched
+throughout the production of a shell in a factory of to-day can only echo
+a well-known author's recent salute: 'Hats off to the Women'.
+
+
+_In the Fuse Shop_
+
+The fuse, that small and complicated object which explodes the shell, is a
+war-product now largely produced by women's labour. A few inches in
+length, it requires some hundreds of operations for its manufacture, even
+if the initial processes on the metal are excluded from the count. In
+section, it looks like a complicated metal jig-saw puzzle of exquisite
+finish and cohesion: viewing it externally, a child might mistake it for a
+conjurer's 'property', a bright metal egg, or roll often surrounded by a
+metal ring marked with time measurements.
+
+The care and accuracy necessary for the production of this small object
+can hardly be imagined by the uninitiated: it is measured and re-measured
+in every diameter, since on its perfection depends the life of the gunner
+and his team. The fuse shop is usually characterized by its cleanliness
+and quietude. I recall one such shop stretching far away into distance
+both in length and breadth. Under its roof some 1,500 women were at work.
+Conversation could be held in any part of the shop, undisturbed by the
+usual factory noises. The fuse parts are, indeed, so small that the
+machinery is necessarily light, and in such a shop it is dexterity and
+accuracy that tell, rather than physical strength.
+
+Rows of graceful women and girls were standing at their machines, and I
+recall how their overalls and caps of varied hues made a rainbow effect,
+as one watched from a distant corner. Some were in cream colour and some
+in russet-brown, or apple green, the caps sometimes matching the overall
+and sometimes offering a strong contrast. A splash of purple, or a deep
+magenta, mingled with the head-dresses of softer hue, for in this shop,
+away from the Danger Zone, no insistence was made on uniformity of factory
+costume. Other women, wearing a distinctive armlet, were passing in and
+out between the rows of workers, now stopping and bending over a machine,
+now making some bright remark to the operator, as a ripple of laughter
+indicated, or again, pointing out in sterner wise some danger, or some
+error in the job. These itinerary women are the overlookers, who since the
+war have perfected themselves in their special job and can now supervise
+the operators.
+
+At long tables, other women were sitting; some quite elderly and
+grey-haired, some mere girls. They were measuring with small gauges parts
+of the fuse, some the size of a good-sized bead. There are 150 different
+gauges authorized for the measurement of one type of fuse, and in practice
+even more are used, to ensure perfection of accuracy. I stood spell-bound
+at one of these gauging tables and watched the examination of small screws
+and flash plugs. There were six little squares of felt on the table, on
+which the examiner placed rejects, classified according to the detected
+flaw. The work proceeded with the utmost dispatch, the 'accepted' or
+'perfect' heap growing as if by magic.
+
+At another table, a girl was testing springs of about an inch long. If any
+of these showed the smallest fraction too much length after being
+submitted to a given pressure, they were put aside as 'scrap'. At yet
+another table, tiny fuse needles were being examined for length,
+thickness of phlange, and accuracy of point, and on a high flat desk,
+near a machine, I noticed seventeen different gauges were ranged for the
+examination of the percussion end of the fuse-body, one ten-thousandth
+part of an inch being the limitation or variation allowed in such parts.
+
+When all the parts have been examined they are passed to other tables for
+assembling, or putting together. In this operation almost superhuman care
+is required, and the work is reserved for the best operators and
+time-keepers as a reward for long service. 'Assembling' is regarded as the
+plum of the fuse-room. The operators are well aware of the importance of
+the task, as they stow away in the time fuses the pea-ball, pellet,
+spring, stirrup, ferrule, and other components of the fuse. The needle is
+fixed by blows from a small hammer, and at length the fuse is completed
+and passes out of the room of its creation to receive its 'filling' from
+other hands.
+
+
+_Cartridges and Bullets_
+
+The production of cartridges and bullets is another branch of munitions
+production in which women are mainly employed. These objects, which, when
+completed, are together no longer than a ball-room pencil, make in their
+manufacture no great demand on physical strength.
+
+On entering a cartridge and bullet shop, one is at once struck with its
+individuality. There is more stir and movement than in a fuse-room, but
+less of the imperiousness of the machinery than in the shell or gun shop.
+There is in the cartridge and bullet room still the whirr of wheels and,
+above that, the deep constant throb of the driving-force, that makes
+conversation almost inaudible to the new-comer. But beneath this bass
+accompaniment, one can hear the lesser sounds belonging to the cartridge
+and bullet-room alone. There may be the buzz of the circulating gas
+machines--which resemble miniature merry-go-rounds--the tap, tap, of the
+cartridges as they are thrown out of the machine into a box below, and the
+tinkle of bullets as they are poured into weighing machines, or on to
+tables, or into huge barrels, such as are used on the wharves for the
+transport of herrings.
+
+A cartridge and bullet-shop sometimes is as animated and as picturesque as
+an open-air market under a southern sky. I remember such a shop where the
+girls were in various factory costumes, some at the machines in khaki and
+some in cream-coloured overalls and caps; some, who were 'trucking', or
+removing the product in boxes, were in cream trouser-suits, with smart
+head-dresses fashioned from brightly-coloured oriental handkerchiefs. In
+between the rows of girls men in dark suits were passing to and fro, now
+stopping to examine, or alter a machine and now taking up a box of
+bullets and pouring out its glittering contents like a silver stream, so
+that the output from each worker might be weighed and assessed.
+
+Through an open door, at one side of the shop, one could see other men,
+like stern magicians, dropping cartridges into vats of acid, and just to
+the side of the vats I caught sight of two girls vigorously shaking a sack
+of cartridges, hot from the furnace. As they shook, they sang an army
+refrain: 'Take me back to dear old Blighty,' with a chorus of laughter. At
+the extreme end of the shop, near the door whence the product made its
+exit, were long narrow tables, piled with bullets, reminding one of a haul
+of silver sprats on the quay-side. These were the inspecting tables where
+the bullets receive minute attention from women viewers.
+
+The women's work in the bullet-shop is of extraordinary interest to the
+onlooker, although many of the processes must be infinitely more
+monotonous, from the worker's standpoint, than operations in other
+munitions productions. The elongation of the little metal vessel,
+resembling an acorn-cup, into a full-length cartridge, or bullet,
+necessitates many operations in which the dexterity of human fingers and
+the ingenuity of the machine both come into play. In the shop I recall, in
+one machine employed for semi-annealing, the cartridge was being 'fed'
+into a metal revolving plate. This passed behind an asbestos screen into a
+double row of gas jets, where the semi-annealing or hardening process was
+being accomplished. The dexterity of the operators was so great that one
+woman was often feeding two machines, apparently without effort, and never
+missed placing the cartridge into the correct aperture in the revolving
+plate.
+
+In another process, I watched young girls sitting round a table and
+placing bullets into circular apertures in small trays, resembling
+solitaire-boards. Many of the girls were working with such speed that it
+was impossible to follow the movements of their fingers, but they,
+unconscious of their prowess, worked with averted heads, smiling in
+amusement at the visitor's astonishment.
+
+In yet another operation, it was the machine that held one's attention.
+The operator was feeding cartridges into a metal band which slipped out of
+view while the process of 'tapering' was performed. When finished, a metal
+thumb and index finger appeared, which delicately picked up the
+cartridges, one by one, and threw them aside. The displaced cartridge then
+hopped out of the machine into a box at the side of the machine.
+
+Entranced by the many mysteries in the production of cartridges and
+bullets in the shop I am recalling, I had not noticed that the
+tea-interval had arrived, and suddenly found that the work-room was almost
+empty of human beings. Only two girls remained. They were sitting sewing,
+whilst they devoured thick slices of bread and butter out of a newspaper
+packet. The woman inspector, who was my guide, turned sharply. 'What are
+you doing here?' she said, 'Eating your tea in the workshop, instead of
+outside, or in the canteen. Be off at once into the fresh air.' Then, with
+the indignation fading out of a good-humoured face: 'What next?' she said.
+
+Looking out of the open door at the streams of bright and happy girls
+laughing, singing, dancing, and running, as only healthy youth can do in
+the midst of these dark days of war, I seemed to see other and brighter
+days ahead stretching out into the years of the future, when the workfolk
+would all taste a fuller joy in life. With renewed hope, I gave her back
+her challenge: 'Well! and what next?'
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV: AT WORK--II
+
+THE MAKING OF AIRCRAFT--OPTICAL INSTRUMENTS--IN THE SHIPYARDS
+
+
+_The Making of Aircraft_
+
+The production of aircraft, undertaken in this country on a large scale
+only since the outbreak of the war, has fallen more naturally into the
+hands of women. The work is for the most part light, and the new
+factories, often erected in open country, are bright, airy, and largely
+free from the noise of machinery. Added to these special attractions to
+the woman worker, there is apparently a distinct appeal to the youth of
+both sexes and to women of all ages in anything connected with the art of
+flying.
+
+It is no secret that our output of aircraft is steadily increasing, and
+that during 1917 it has been doubled. In one factory in London, the output
+has been trebled within three months; in Lancashire, there are instances
+in which it has been doubled, and other areas show an improved production
+varying from 25 to 50 per cent. Yet the increased demand for labour for
+this work has always been immediately answered, and there is a steady flow
+into the factories of the best type of women workers from every class of
+society. Here and there, one already meets a woman who, during the short
+period of the war, has risen to be manager or partner in an aircraft
+factory. Unconsciously, such a one emphasizes the fact that the mastery of
+the element of the future is likely to be an affair of both the sexes.
+
+A visit to any aeroplane factory repeats the hint, and reveals the
+extraordinary versatility of skill latent in women, which can well be
+applied to this form of industry. 'Women _must_ have been cabin'd,
+cribbed, and confined before the war', said a foreman in taking me over
+his shop in an aircraft works. 'Look what they can do at this kind of job,
+and yet many of them are ladies, from homes where they sat about and were
+waited upon.' The wonder of it cannot fail to impress a visitor, since
+only four years ago women were allowed to undertake in aircraft
+construction merely those parts which convention deemed suitable for
+feminine fingers: such processes, for instance, as the sewing of the wings
+by hand, or by machine, or the painting of the woodwork.
+
+[Illustration: ENGRAVING METAL PARTS FOR COMPASSES]
+
+[Illustration: COLOURING AEROPLANE PLANES]
+
+[Illustration: CHIPPING AND GRINDING BLADES OF CAST IRON PROPELLER WITH
+PORTABLE TOOLS]
+
+[Illustration: WOMAN ACTING AS MATE TO JOINER. MAKING SEA-PLANE FLOATS]
+
+To-day, they undertake almost every other process both at the carpenter's
+bench and in the engineering shop, and the chief impression you carry away
+from a stroll through such a factory is that the women are thoroughly at
+home in the work. The operations are often so clean that the workers'
+overalls and caps of the daintiest shades of pink, blue, white, and
+heliotrope, remain fresh; the material for aeroplane parts is usually so
+light that the handling of it presents no difficulty to a slip of a girl.
+When within the works, the visitor is constantly stimulated to the thought
+that the hand which rocks the cradle should obviously be the one to make
+the air-machine.
+
+One expects, of course, women's familiarity with the occupation in the
+room where the fine Irish linen is cut out and fashioned into wings. One
+is not surprised at the facility with which the measuring and cutting out
+are accomplished, and, maybe, an emotion of admiration arises, similar to
+that evoked by the contemplation of old tapestries, when one watches the
+hand-sewing of a seam in a wing of some 10 feet in length. Not a stitch of
+the button-holing of such a seam deviates by a hairbreadth from its
+fellows. Such work has, however, been women's province through the ages.
+
+But a new sensation is awakened in the carpenter's shop where women are
+working with dexterity at the bench, handling woodwork like the men, now
+dealing with delicate wooden ribs, or again, fashioning propellers out of
+mahogany or walnut with such nicety that there is not the slightest
+deviation between the dimensions of a pair. In the room where the linen is
+stretched over the wooden ribs, I have seen women working with tiny
+hammers, giving fairy blows that never miss their mark on tiny nails.
+
+It is with fascination that a visitor stands by be-goggled women as they
+undertake the welding of metal joints by the oxy-acetylene process. Here,
+conscientiousness is a vital quality in the operator, since an undetected
+flaw in the weld, as a works foreman recently remarked, 'might easily send
+an airman to Kingdom Come'. For this process, women of education are more
+often selected.
+
+It is with awe that you watch the women at work on the metal parts of the
+aeroplane, drilling, grinding, boring, milling on the machine, or
+soldering tiny aluminum parts for the fuselage, and in each process
+gauging and re-gauging, measuring and re-measuring. Women also work on
+aero-engines, and help in the manufacture of the magneto, the very heart
+of the machine. They even undertake special processes, which before the
+war were only entrusted to a select body of men. I stood one day, for
+example, watching a woman splicing steel rope, a process undertaken in
+pre-war days by sailors. She was working with extraordinary speed and
+unconcern, and had learned the job in three or four days. Before then, she
+told me, she had been her employer's cook.
+
+But the most alluring scene of all is the assembling of aircraft. The
+infinite number of separate parts are now ready; they have been tested by
+factory overlookers and retested by Government inspectors. The greatest
+care is taken in these examinations: it is the only possible insurance of
+the lives of the brave youths on their journey above the clouds. All the
+workers know this, and the seriousness of the job is reflected on their
+faces. But now all the parts are ready and to hand in the Erecting
+shop. Then wings and propeller are added to body, the engine and
+leather-upholstered seats introduced, the electric apparatus fitted up,
+the compass, ammunition box and other instruments and weapons placed in
+position.
+
+The aeroplane is at length complete, and stands in the hangar like some
+great bird, with outstretched pinions, awaiting its first flight into the
+Unknown. Women undertake every process of this assembling, and have
+acquired familiarity with all the parts. This was put to the test recently
+in a certain works when a woman operator was directed to dismantle a
+machine. Without hesitation, she stripped the complex network of the
+structural stay-wires and the control wires, and then re-assembled them,
+correct in every particular, at the first attempt.
+
+
+_Optical Instruments_
+
+Of the many industries developed by the war, the production of optical
+instruments offers a striking example of rapid progress. Before 1914, the
+optical glass industry of Europe was largely in the hands of Germany and
+Austria, and the outbreak of hostilities meant the total closing of that
+market to the Allies. The lack of optical instruments thus occasioned was
+at first a source of grave national peril, since optical glass provides,
+as it were, eyes for both Navy and Army. The eyes of the guns are the
+range-finder, the director, the sighting telescope, periscope, prism
+binoculars, and other instruments for observing fire and correcting the
+aim; the tank would be blind without its periscope, and observations are
+made from aircraft by means of photographic cameras and lenses.
+
+At sea, the tale is repeated; the submarine requires at least one eye, and
+the submarine chaser needs many, while, by means of optical instruments,
+the naval gunner can fire at a target which is about 15 to 20 miles away.
+The very health of the army depends, in great measure, on optical glass,
+since the Royal Army Medical Corps fights malaria and other diseases due
+to parasites, which must be magnified by a microscope a thousand times
+before they can be identified. Hence, the solution of the problem of
+optical munitions was a vital matter in the early days of the war.
+
+With characteristic energy, Great Britain set to work and soon restored a
+languishing trade. The task was enormous; the industry had to be revived
+from its very foundations. The production of the peculiar types of glass
+required for optical instruments in itself presented a formidable
+obstacle, even its principal ingredient, a special quality of sand, being
+formerly derived mainly from Fontainebleau and Belgium. But by widespread
+investigation efficient substitutes were soon discovered, the problem of
+mixing the ingredients was at length solved, formulae for special glasses
+devised, and we are now producing large quantities of optical glass of
+perfect quality. The production of the raw material was, however, only a
+first step in obtaining an adequate supply of optical instruments.
+
+Numbers of delicate processes stand between the rough glass and the
+finished implement. The glass must be cut, ground, and curved exactly to
+the requisite design, which in itself takes many days of high mathematical
+computation; it must be smoothed and polished, cleaned with meticulous
+care, and adjusted to a nicety in the particular instrument for which it
+is fashioned. The difficulties and pitfalls are incalculable; from start
+to finish the glass obeys no fixed laws, but answers only to the skilled
+handling of the scientist and craftsman. 'Optical glass is the mule of
+materials', comments a recent writer with sincerity.
+
+The absence of requisite labour for what was practically a new industry
+was a serious menace, and it is to the credit of Englishwomen that, as
+soon as the need for their services in this direction was made known, they
+stepped without hesitation into this unfamiliar and highly skilled
+industry. Their success therein is remarkable, and many, from such
+callings as high-class domestic service, kindergarten instruction, music
+teaching, blouse and dressmaking, have achieved a wonderful record in the
+delicate and highly technical processes of lens-smoothing and polishing
+and in the production of prisms of faultless polish and cut.
+
+There is, I take it, no more interesting munitions development than in
+factories where these lenses and prisms are produced. The work is so fine
+and so delicate that one feels it might be more suitably transferred for
+manipulation to elves, or fairy folk, who might undertake the various
+processes standing at a large-sized toad-stool. But with the stern reality
+of war upon us, willing feminine fingers have had to be trained to handle
+these lenses, the smallest of which, when ranged in trays, resemble a
+collection of dewdrops, and the largest of which would easily fill the
+port-hole of an ocean-liner.
+
+Optical glass when it comes into the workshop has the appearance of small
+blocks of rough ice of a greyish hue. These blocks are roughly sliced and
+cut into shape by a rotating metal disk charged with diamond dust. The
+prisms and lenses in their initial stage are then handed on to women, who
+complete the work on their surfaces. Each process has its particular lure
+for the interested visitor. You may watch the slices of glass being shaped
+into prisms by handwork against the tool; you may follow these embryo
+prisms through the various processes of smoothing and polishing until a
+small magnifying prism is obtained for use in a magnetic compass, or until
+a large prism is completed suitable for a submarine periscope. You may
+follow the creation of a lens from the roughing and grinding of the glass
+slices with emery, or carborundum, until the approximate shape is given,
+or you may follow a later process of sticking the smaller lenses on to
+pitch, so that they may form a single surface for smoothing and polishing.
+
+Again, you may watch the superlatively difficult operation of centring a
+lens. This task is necessary to ensure the polished surfaces of the lens
+running perfectly true and it requires a skilled touch and a trained eye
+to undertake it satisfactorily.
+
+In a shop in a certain optical munitions factory I met the first woman who
+worked a centring machine in that area. She was formerly a housemaid, and
+told me that, at first, all the men had discouraged her from the job and
+had said it was 'impossible for a woman to do such work'. But she 'stuck
+it'--so she said--and in a few weeks, to her own surprise and the men's
+dismay, this peculiarly skilled job became familiar to her. 'Now I feel I
+am doing something,' she said in triumph. This sentiment was echoed by
+another worker in that factory who was accomplishing the surprising task
+of 'chamfering', or putting a tiny bevel onto the edge of a lens.
+
+The large lenses measure only 2 inches in diameter; the smaller ones are
+about the size of a threepenny bit, and every operation, whether grinding,
+trueing, smoothing, polishing, or centring, must be accomplished with the
+utmost care. Even the final process in the manufacture of the lens or
+prism, 'wiping off', is fraught with responsibility to the operator.
+'Wiping off,' or cleaning the lens, can only be done with a silken duster,
+for the finished glass, like a dainty lady, will tolerate the touch of
+nothing coarse.
+
+In cases where the glass is graticulated, or marked with fine lines for
+measurement purposes, the task of 'wiping off' is of extraordinary
+difficulty; in the opinion of at least one foreman with whom I have
+discussed this question, the operation is only perfectly successful when
+performed by a girl's fingers. It is of supreme importance that no speck
+of dirt or hint of grease from a finger-mark be left on the glass when
+finally adjusted, or the instrument would become a source of danger to the
+user. No wonder that the feeling of the optical instrument workshop
+expresses itself in the words: 'Cleanliness is more than godliness at this
+job.'
+
+The completed glass at length reaches the stage where it is set in its
+instrument, be it periscope, dial-sight, telescope, and so on. Although
+the most exact measurements have been observed both in the metal part and
+on the glass, small adjustments are necessary; for the fit must be so
+perfect that even if the metal case suffers shell-shock, the glass must
+still not rattle. But it is the metal alone which is submitted to
+alteration, and it is wonderful how women have been able to obtain
+sufficient dexterity to make these infinitesimal changes in the metal
+parts. One can see a mere girl undertaking such a task by giving the metal
+three or four delicate strokes from a file so fine that it would not hurt
+a baby's skin. Meantime, the lens or prism is finally examined (also by
+women) for size, scratches, and other imperfections, and is then
+re-cleaned. Girls and women take a full share in the production of the
+metal parts for the optical instruments and also assemble, or collect the
+parts, for the adjustment of the glass, but so far they do not generally
+adjust or test the completed instrument.
+
+The operations used in the production of optical instruments for war
+purposes are, of course, similar to those required in the manufacture of
+implements used in peace-time, such as opera-glasses, telescopes,
+microscopes, surveying instruments, photographic and cinematograph
+apparatus, &c., and it is expected that women who have entered the new
+war-time industry will happily find themselves, when peace dawns, in
+possession of a permanent means of livelihood in a skilled occupation.
+
+
+_In the Shipyards_
+
+'Ships, ships, and still ships': such is the main need of the Allies in
+this, the fourth year of the war. To answer this demand, every dockyard in
+the country is working at the highest pressure. Into this work, strange as
+it may seem to those familiar with the rough-and-tumble life of a
+shipyard, women have penetrated and have so far surmounted all obstacles
+in the tasks to which they have been allocated.
+
+At first, dilution in shipyards was looked upon as a hazardous experiment.
+The work is mostly heavy and clumsy, and the type of men undertaking it,
+splendid fellows enough in their physique and general outlook, are mainly
+accustomed to dealings with the boisterous elements and with men comrades
+of their own pattern. Their attitude towards women, it was feared, would
+make for trouble immediately that the other sex was introduced as
+fellow-workers. Even the most optimistic amongst shipbuilders were aghast
+at the idea of women working shoulder to shoulder with men on board ship.
+Yet here and there a pioneer employer has arisen, and the experiment has
+been tried. It is succeeding unquestionably.
+
+I have been into the shipyards and seen the amazing sight and am convinced
+of its expediency, at all events as a war-time measure. Special care must,
+of course, be taken in the planning and the supervision of women's work on
+board ship, but given the right type of inspectress, charge hand, and
+workers, there is no reason why women should not, in increasing numbers,
+fill the gaps in the shipyards, as in the factories. The women chosen to
+undertake such tasks are well aware of the service they are rendering to
+the nation at this juncture, and to the women workers the first day on
+board ship is one of supreme happiness. 'They are so excited when they
+actually get on board,' said a dockyard inspectress to me recently 'that
+they forget all about the difficulties and objections to the work.' It is
+well that this is so, for it is not too easy for the novice to move about
+below, even on a big battleship.
+
+I was taken over one where the women were working. It was in a big yard
+crammed with shipping of every kind--so full that one could echo the words
+of the old Elizabethan, who said of a crowd: 'There was not room for a
+snail to put out its horns.' A stiff breeze was blowing, and the sea
+beyond ran full and blue. The great battleship along the dock lay serene
+and stately, bearing, as it were, with grim humour the meddlesome tappings
+and chippings of impertinent human beings, who presumed to furbish her up.
+There were men on the conning-tower, busy with paint-pots, and there was a
+tangle of ropes and pots on the upper decks where the guns were biding
+their time. Men were calling lustily to each other, and were darting here
+and there as brisk and wholesome as the breeze.
+
+'We go down here,' said the inspectress, pointing to a ladder as steep as
+the side of a house. She bounded down with the ease of an antelope.
+Another ladder, and yet another. The inspectress seemed to have forgotten
+their steep incline and I was left, a helpless landlubber, cautiously
+descending step by step. When I joined her in the engine-room she was
+already deep in conversation with one of her staff. And then I noticed the
+secret aid to her agility. All the women aboard ship were dressed in
+trouser suits. The suits, of blue drill for the supervisors, and of a
+similar material in brown for the labourers, were made with a short tunic,
+and the trousers were buckled securely at the ankle. A tight-fitting cap
+to match completed the smart workmanlike costume which permits of perfect
+freedom of movement in confined places. Without such a costume it would be
+hardly possible for women to work on board.
+
+The women workers on this particular battleship were engaged in renewing
+electric wires and fittings, a job which requires a good deal of care and
+accuracy. On the lower deck, they were fitting up new cables and were
+perched in high places, here 'sweating in' a distribution box, there
+marking off the position for the wires. Others were drilling holes, others
+again were 'tapping', or making a thread in the holes. In the engine-room
+the women were busy stripping worn-out electric wiring and were working by
+the light of tall candles, as merry as a party preparing a Christmas tree.
+
+Everywhere the women were working in pairs, an arrangement found
+especially advisable on board. Behind a small iron door we found one
+couple working on a fire-control in a nook where the entrance of a single
+visitor caused bad overcrowding. 'These are my mice', said the
+inspectress; 'they always get away into the cupboard-jobs, and very well
+they work there too. But we have to maintain a strict discipline on board,
+far stricter than anything known in the factories.'
+
+No talking, I was informed, is allowed in that dockyard, during the
+working hours on board, between the sailors or men labourers and the women
+and there is constant supervision of the women employed. These work on
+board in parties of 20-22, each party being under the care of a charge
+hand. When the staff included three charge hands for supervision on board,
+an inspectress was appointed for this special branch of the work. The
+system seems to work well, and I noticed how the men and women had
+evidently accepted each other as comrades. Coming into a secluded gangway
+a man-labourer, who had finished his job, was unconcernedly shaving before
+a square of mirror, while two or three women just beyond went on, just as
+unconcernedly, tap, tapping at the electric fittings. There was no
+chaffing, no 'larking', between the men and women, but a sense of
+comradeship, such as one notices in a Co-education School.
+
+The women on electric-wiring receive, in that dockyard, one month's
+instruction on dummy bulk-heads before going on board; their
+instructors--expert men--accompany them to the number of two to every
+party of twenty or so, and remain with them for ten to twelve months.
+After that, the women are able to work without an instructor, and I was an
+eyewitness to this arrangement on a cargo vessel, where electric wiring
+was also being undertaken.
+
+Besides the work on board, women in dockyards are employed in the various
+engineering shops where almost every description of construction and
+repair work for vessels is undertaken. I have seen numbers of women at
+work in such an electrical department, winding armatures, making parts for
+firing-gear, polishing, or buffing and repairing electrical apparatus, &c.
+The work in such a repair section is full of interest and variety. From
+day to day the operators receive consignments of electrical apparatus
+damaged on board by the elements, or worse. Great dispatch is needed, and
+the women work with the utmost zeal and efficiency. I noticed them
+undertaking such varying operations as lackering guards for lamps and
+radiator fronts, repairing junction and section boxes, fire-control
+instruments, automatic searchlights, &c., and they were turning out their
+work, the foreman said, just like men. In the constructional department,
+women are now employed in making bulkhead pieces, or metal-work of various
+kinds, in oxy-acetylene welding, and occasionally in the foundry.
+
+When it is recollected that before the war only elderly women--the
+grandmothers--were, generally speaking, employed in the dockyards, and
+those only on such ornamental tasks as flag-making or upholstery for
+yachts, it is hardly credible that the granddaughters are now working
+successfully on intricate processes and even at jobs where physical
+strength is a qualification. 'We can hardly believe our eyes,' said a
+foreman recently, 'when we see the heavy stuff brought to and from the
+shops in motor lorries driven by girls. Before the war it was all carted
+by horses and men. The girls do the job all right though, and the only
+thing they ever complain about is that their toes get cold.' 'They don't
+now', said a strapping young woman-driver, overhearing the conversation.
+'We've got hot-water tins.' Then, in a low voice, for my ears alone, 'I
+love my work, it's ever so interesting.'
+
+It is this note that one finds above all, amongst the women in the
+dockyards. The spirit of the sea, the almost forgotten heritage of an
+island population, has been stirred once more, and the sight of the good
+ships in harbour thrills the woman-worker, as the man, with a sense of
+independence, freedom, and love for 'this England, ... this precious stone
+set in the silver sea'.
+
+No wonder that Englishwomen find their work in the dockyards 'ever so
+interesting'.
+
+[Illustration: CUTTING FRAYED-EDGED TAPE]
+
+[Illustration: BRAZING TURBINE ROTOR SEGMENT]
+
+[Illustration: MOUNTING CARDS FOR DRY COMPASSES]
+
+[Illustration: TREADLE POLISHING-MACHINES, FOR SMOOTHING LENSES]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V: COMFORT AND SAFETY
+
+WELFARE SUPERVISION--PROTECTIVE CLOTHING--REST-ROOMS AND FIRST AID--WOMEN
+POLICE
+
+
+The problems arising from the sudden employment of thousands of women in
+the factories have obviously been connected not only with the technical
+training of the workers and with the adaptation of machinery to their
+physical strength. Something had to be done, and that without delay, to
+ensure the comfort and safety in the workshops of these new-comers to
+industrial life.
+
+In the first great rush for an increased munitions supply, war emergency
+dictated the temporary suppression of the Factory Acts. There was no demur
+within the factory gates. Women worked without hesitation from twelve to
+fourteen hours a day, or a night, for seven days a week, and with the
+voluntary sacrifice of public holidays. Their home conditions in a vast
+number of cases offered no drop of consolation. Many of these women were
+immigrants from remote corners of the Empire, or from faraway towns and
+villages of the United Kingdom. Housing accommodation in crowded
+industrial areas, or in a thinly populated countryside, was strained to
+breaking-point. Undaunted, these workers--many of whom had previously led
+an entirely sheltered life--rose before dawn to travel long distances to
+the factory, and returned to take alternative possession with a
+night-shift worker of a part share of a bedroom. The shameful conditions
+to which the factory children were subjected at the period of the
+Industrial Revolution seemed about to return.
+
+
+_Welfare Supervision_
+
+Such a state of things could not be tolerated, and Mr. Lloyd George, then
+Minister of Munitions, grasped the situation. 'The workers of to-day', he
+said, 'are the mothers of to-morrow. In a war of workshops the women of
+Britain were needed to save Britain; it was for Britain to protect them.'
+Measures were immediately adopted to improve the conditions of the workers
+in the factory. A Departmental Committee was appointed to consider all
+questions relating to the health of munition workers, and at the Ministry
+of Munitions, on their recommendation, a Welfare and Health Department was
+established, charged with 'securing a high standard of conditions for all
+workers in munitions factories and more especially for the women and
+juvenile employees'. Since then, step by step the machinery is being set
+in motion for improving the conditions of life of munition workers.
+
+Yet Welfare work in the factory is no new thing in England. In pre-war
+days it had not, it is true, reached as widespread a development as in the
+United States, but as long ago as 1792 it was in practice in this country
+under another name. It is recorded of that period of one David Dale, whose
+factory was a model to his contemporaries, that he 'gave his money by
+shovelfuls to his employees' to find that 'God shovelled it back again.'
+From the early part of the nineteenth century, sporadic attempts were
+successfully made to improve the conditions of the factory workers over
+and above the requirements of legislation, and before 1914 a number of
+enlightened factory owners had won renown by the practice of Welfare work
+within their precincts. The seal of official sanction has, however, only
+been gained since the war, through the influx of women into munitions
+trades.[1]
+
+The Health of Munitions Workers Committee has, since its inception,
+investigated at factory after factory such questions as the employment of
+women, hours of labour, Sunday labour, juvenile employment, industrial
+fatigue, canteen equipment, the dietary of workers. It has published its
+conclusions in memoranda, stripped bare of officialism, so as to reveal
+with frankness facts acquired by scientists in touch with reality.
+
+Working in connexion with this Committee is the Welfare and Health
+Department of the Ministry of Munitions. It follows closely the
+suggestions of the experts, its Welfare officers moving up and down the
+country, now offering a suggestion to the management of a factory, and
+again, assimilating some practical experiment in Welfare work, originated
+by a progressive factory-directorate. Thus, a pooling of ideas is being
+effected, and isolated experiments of value are now being propagated
+throughout the country.
+
+But possibly one of the most valuable tasks of the Welfare and Health
+Department is the selection and training of candidates for the work of
+Welfare Supervision in the factories. A panel of approved candidates is
+kept in readiness, so that a busy factory-manager may have at hand a
+choice of Welfare workers who will, if necessary, undertake the entire
+supervision of the personal interests of his female, or juvenile staff.
+These officers, after engagement by the factory management, are
+responsible solely to the firms that employ them and not to the Ministry
+of Munitions. In establishments where T.N.T. (Tri-nitro-toluene) is
+handled, the presence of a lady Welfare Supervisor is compulsory; in all
+National factories such an officer is recognized as a necessary part of
+the staff; and in Controlled Establishments, where a number of female
+operators are employed, the management is officially encouraged to make
+such an appointment.
+
+In many cases, engineering shops are for the first time employing female
+operators, and the management depute with relief all questions as to the
+personal requirements of the 'new labour' to the lady superintendent; in
+other instances, such matters as the engagement of the employees, canteen
+arrangements, and so on, are placed in the hands of other officials.
+Hence, the duties of the lady Welfare Supervisor differ from factory to
+factory. Generally speaking, the supervisor, or lady superintendent within
+the factory is made responsible for some, or all, of the following
+matters:
+
+1. She aids, or is entirely responsible for, the selection of women,
+girls, and boys for employment.
+
+2. The general behaviour of the women and girls inside the factory falls
+under her purview.
+
+3. The transfer of a woman employee from one process to another is
+suggested by the Welfare Supervisor where health considerations make such
+an alteration advisable.
+
+4. She is consulted on general grounds with regard to the dismissal of
+women and girls.
+
+5. Factory conditions come under her observation, and reports are made,
+when necessary, to the management, on the cleanliness, ventilation, or
+warmth of the establishment.
+
+6. The necessity of the provision of seats is suggested, where this is
+possible.
+
+7. In large factories, where the canteen is under separate management, the
+Welfare Supervisor reports as to whether the necessary facilities are
+available for the women employees. In smaller factories, the Welfare
+Supervisor may be called upon to manage the canteen.
+
+8. While not responsible, except in small factories, for actual attention
+to accidents, the Welfare Supervisor works in close touch with the factory
+doctors and nurses. She also helps in the selection of the nurses, and
+should see that their work is carried out promptly. She supervises the
+keeping of all records of accidents and illness in the ambulance room, and
+of all maternity cases noted in the factory. She keeps in touch with all
+cases of serious accident or illness and with the Compensation Department
+inside the works.
+
+9. She supervises cloak-rooms and selects the staff of attendants
+necessary for these.
+
+10. The protective clothing supplied to the women at work comes under her
+supervision.
+
+In large establishments where the female and juvenile staff is counted by
+the thousand, these multifarious duties are necessarily divided among many
+individuals, and the Welfare work within the factory (Intra-mural Welfare,
+as it is now termed) develops into a Department. A typical example of such
+an evolution may be seen at the Royal Arsenal, Woolwich. In pre-war days,
+the female staff numbered 125; to-day some 25,000 women are there at work.
+
+The Welfare supervision is happily in charge of a super-woman. In addition
+to her manifold duties she has trained a staff of assistants who, like
+herself, spare no effort to promote the health and happiness of those
+under their care. I have stood many an hour in this super-woman's office
+and watched her, surrounded by a throng of workers, fitting new-comers
+into vacancies, listening to reasons from others for a desired
+transference, or advising as to work, or meals, health, or recreation. No
+girl was refused a hearing, however trivial the difficulty, and a
+grievance as to the colour of a factory cap was discussed with as much
+attention with one employee as the causes of a 'shop' disagreement was
+with another complainant. I have accompanied her on visits through the
+works (the entire tour would take almost a week to accomplish), and have
+noted the diplomacy with which a suggested improvement in ventilation, or
+a needed cloak-room alteration, was discussed with the official in charge,
+and carried through. I have seen the faces of rows of workers light up as
+this modern Florence Nightingale passed through their shop, and have
+walked through the Danger Zone amazed at the arrangements for the
+protection of the worker.
+
+What is true of the life in such large concerns as Woolwich Arsenal, or
+His Majesty's Factory, Gretna, is typical on a large scale of the
+development of Welfare work in many a munitions factory throughout the
+kingdom. Protective clothing has been universally adopted, ambulance-rooms
+and rest-rooms have been opened, cloak-room accommodation improved,
+canteens established, sane recreation encouraged, and the protection of a
+women-police service introduced. In short, an atmosphere is being
+introduced by which the old-time barrier between employer and employed is
+being helped to disappear.
+
+
+_Protective Clothing_
+
+So much has been accomplished since the advent of women in the munitions
+factories with regard to protective clothing for the worker that the
+subject might well fill a chapter to itself. A separate Department in the
+Ministry of Munitions now concerns itself solely with its supply, and is
+continually experimenting with improvements in aprons, gloves, boots,
+caps, and tunics. Cotton overalls are now generally worn by the women
+employees and much thought has been given to the production of these
+garments in suitable materials and design. They are made with firmly
+stitched belts and with inset pockets, so as to avert accidents by contact
+of loose ends in the machinery, and are more often in the popular shades
+of khaki, or brown, with scarlet facings, or dark blue faced with crimson.
+But there is no set rule either as to colour, or design, so long as the
+principle of protection is followed.
+
+Caps, which at first were much disliked by the workers, have at length
+found general favour, not, it is true, by reason of the immunity they
+offer against accident, but because they have been fashioned so as to add
+'chic' to the wearer. They are usually of the 'Mob,' or 'Dutch' variety,
+and match the overall in colour and texture; they are all designed so that
+there is no pressure round the head. Sometimes, the cap of safety has been
+skilfully used as a mark of distinction, and one may see, in a shop
+staffed by women, the operators at the machines in khaki headgear, the
+setters-up of machines in scarlet caps, and the overlookers or inspectors
+of the product in bright blue head-dress.
+
+For wet and dusty work there are trouser suits in cotton, woollen, or
+mackintosh, or tunic suits with knee breeches and leggings, or gaiters.
+Mackintosh coats are also provided for outdoor work in shipyards, or for
+trucking and lorrying, or for overhead crane-work within the factory.
+
+Acid-proof and oil-proof aprons are now furnished for certain operations,
+and for other processes specially prepared gloves are supplied. The
+varieties in workshop gloves are now very great; they are made in such
+materials as india-rubber, canvas, or leather, or a union of these three,
+or in teon-faced canvas or teon-faced leather. Some are cuffless; others,
+for work in acids, have turned-up cuffs, and others again are gauntlets
+reaching the elbow. In every case, the process for which they are provided
+is minutely studied, and the fashion adopted is dictated by utility.
+
+Footgear has also received a considerable amount of attention, and there
+are now available Wellington boots, or half-Wellingtons, for outdoor work,
+or wooden clogs for processes in the shops where the flooring is apt to
+become persistently wet.
+
+But, possibly, factory fashions receive most care when designed for
+wearers in Filling shops. For these, suits in wool lasting-cloth are found
+satisfactory, the most popular and smartest being in cream-colour, faced
+with scarlet. Fire-proofed blue serge overalls and asbestos coats with
+caps of the same material are also employed in certain of these factories.
+For work in the Danger Zone no metal fasteners are permissible, and the
+coat, or overall, is cut so as to protect the neck and throat from contact
+with the powder used in the process.
+
+Boots and shoes for this type of work are also specially designed. No iron
+must enter into their composition, the soles being either machine-sewn, or
+riveted with brass. Sometimes, cloth and india-rubber over-shoes are the
+chosen footwear of the Danger Zone, and in this case the fasteners must
+also be free from iron. These precautions are no mere fad, but essential
+safeguards where friction between a fragment of iron and a combustible
+powder might lead to an explosion. Respirators, and in some cases veils,
+are also needful accessories of the Filling factory, and these too are
+provided for the workers.
+
+A complete factory uniform has thus evolved since the war: it is a model
+of suitable clothing for industrial work. Arising from within the
+workshops to meet essential needs, these fashions are not only free from
+vulgarity, or eccentricity, but have a distinct beauty of their own. It is
+unlikely that women, once accustomed to the comfort and cleanliness of
+such garments, will desire to return to the discredited habit of tarnished
+finery worn at work.
+
+
+_Rest-Rooms and First Aid_
+
+Ambulance and First-Aid work within the factory was not unusual even in
+pre-war days. Since the development of munitions production it has become
+almost a commonplace, and from December 1, 1917, its provision has been
+obligatory in blast furnaces, foundries, copper-mills, iron-mills, and
+metal works. Where T.N.T. is handled, the employment of at least one
+whole-time medical officer is compulsory, if the employees number 2,000,
+and, if in excess of that figure, at least one additional medical officer
+must be employed. The professional work of these doctors is supervised by
+the medical officers of the Welfare and Health Department, who also in a
+similar way supervise the safety of workers employed upon the manufacture
+of lethal gases.
+
+The extra expense involved in the provision of such safeguards is by no
+means unproductive. In one factory, for example, it has been estimated
+that 2,500 hours were saved in a single week by prompt attention to minor
+ailments; in another factory, where the firm meets all smaller claims for
+Workmen's Compensation, it was found that in a period of eighteen months
+following the establishment of a First-Aid organization, a credit balance
+of nearly L500 accrued to the management after all expenses connected with
+the factory doctor and the nurses had been defrayed.
+
+Tribute should be paid to the medical staff for their share in the triumph
+of First-Aid work within the munitions factory, for without their
+extraordinary devotion the record of misadventure would undoubtedly be
+higher. One hears from time to time how, in a temporary breakdown of such
+a staff, a single worker will hold the fort. A typical case is recorded in
+the press as I write. It tells of a young nurse who worked shifts of
+twenty-four hours at a stretch, for a fortnight, during the absence of her
+colleagues.
+
+The development of the factory rest-room and cloak-room has also been a
+marked feature in the munitions factories where women are employed.
+Formerly, it was usual to see the women workers' outdoor garments hung
+round the workshop walls; to-day, in numbers of munitions works, the
+women's cloak-rooms are provided with cupboards where hot pipes dry wet
+boots and clothing, where each girl has her own locker with lock and key,
+and where the maximum of wash-hand basins supplied with hot and cold water
+are set up. In T.N.T. workshops compulsory washing facilities are even
+more elaborate. Bath-rooms are available, as well as a generous supply of
+towels, and face ointment, or powder, are supplied as preventatives to any
+ill effects from handling explosives.
+
+Inside the workshops the spirit of reform is equally apparent; seats are
+provided where possible, and lifting-tackle, or sliding boards, are
+introduced to minimize strain when dealing with heavy weights. Sometimes,
+one hears how such improvements, suggested for the women employees, are
+extended to the men. At a certain engineering works, for example, where in
+pre-war days women had never been employed, it was suggested by a
+Government official that seats should be supplied for the women. The
+management looked askance. It would be 'such a bad example to the
+apprentices', it was said. The point was, however, pressed, and after a
+short time the suggestion materialized. The manager then stated, with
+surprised satisfaction, that the seats 'seemed to renew people', and he
+had accordingly extended the improvement to the men.
+
+
+_Women Police_
+
+One of the most recent developments in the protection of women in the
+factories is the employment of women police. In the summer of 1916, when
+it was found necessary to obtain further control and supervision of the
+women employees in munitions works, Sir Edward Henry, the Chief
+Commissioner of Police, recommended that the Ministry of Munitions should
+apply to the Women Police Service for a supply of trained women police.
+This request has now created an extensive development of such work, and
+to-day women police are undertaking numerous duties in munitions works.
+They check the entry of women into the factory; examine passports; search
+for such contraband as matches, cigarettes, and alcohol; deal with
+complaints of petty offences; assist the magistrates at the police court,
+and patrol the neighbourhood of the factory with a view to the protection
+of the women employed.
+
+As many of the works have been erected in lonely places, and as the shifts
+are worked by night as well as by day, it can easily be imagined what a
+safeguard to the young employee is the presence of these female guardians
+of the peace. Even within the precincts of the factory, the security
+assured by the patrolling police-women is of great importance, since many
+of the factories are built on isolated plots extending perhaps six miles
+from barrier to barrier, and within these boundaries women are often
+employed in isolated huts, should they be engaged on the production of
+explosives. The preventive work of the women police is, in these areas,
+incalculable.
+
+In such ways, Welfare work has taken root in the factories of Britain, and
+in the words of Mr. Lloyd George, 'it is a strange irony, but no small
+compensation, that the making of weapons of destruction should afford the
+occasion to humanize industry. Yet such is the case.'
+
+[Illustration: SLITTING AND ROUGHING OPTICAL GLASS]
+
+[Illustration: VIEW OF CANTEEN KITCHEN]
+
+[Illustration: WEIGHING FERRO CHROME FOR ANALYSIS]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI: OUTSIDE WELFARE
+
+RECREATION--MOTHERHOOD--THE FACTORY NURSERY
+
+
+_Recreation_
+
+The gift in the early days of munitions development of several thousands
+of pounds from an Indian prince, the Maharajah of Gwalior, for the benefit
+of munitions employees, helped to focus attention from the outset on their
+needful recreation. The necessity for a maximum output, bringing in its
+train long shifts, overtime, and a minimum of holidays, at first left
+scant leisure at the munition girl's disposal, yet it was at once apparent
+that some effort must be made to render that leisure healthful and
+invigorating. As soon as the Welfare Supervisors took up their positions
+in the factories and came into living touch with the needs of the women
+employed, requests found their way to the Ministry of Munitions for grants
+for recreation purposes from the Maharajah's fund.
+
+At first, 'a piano for the recreation-room or canteen' was the more
+general appeal; for, strangely enough, after the long hours in the
+engineering shops the normal munitions girl craves most, not for passive
+amusement, such as 'the pictures', but for free movements of her own body.
+Above all, she desires to dance, or to enjoy the rhythm of physical drill,
+or, in the summer, to swim or dive, or to chase a ball in one or other of
+the popular team games. Within doors, the piano provides, as it were, a
+spring-board from which she can jump into a leisure-time atmosphere of
+merriment; it is the send-off to her dance, the guide to her song, and the
+backbone to the joy found in the united action of physical drill.
+
+The piano once provided in canteen, or recreation-room, you will find the
+munition girl footing it in the dinner-hour, or tea-interval, or in any
+other period when she is off duty. So long as the tune be bright, the
+merry-hearted munition-maker will dance the old dances, or the more
+complicated modern steps, as her mood suggests.
+
+From self-taught dancing, the desire for a more perfect expression in
+movement is a natural evolution, and in certain cases grants from the
+Maharajah's fund have defrayed the fees of dancing mistress, or sports
+instructor. Sums from the same source have been paid to assist the
+organization of a club, for the provision of a recreation-room, for the
+erection of swings and see-saws, for the installation of a swimming-bath,
+for tools and seeds for factory girls' gardens, for dramatic
+entertainments, for lectures for the instruction of apprentices, and in
+Ireland, for the enlargement of schools for children of women munition
+workers.
+
+Side by side with these endeavours, other efforts to promote sane
+amusement for munition makers have been fructifying. Many an enlightened
+factory employer, studying the problem of woman-labour within his own
+works, has come to the conclusion that 'if women are called upon to work
+continuously, especially at repetition jobs, their pleasure in life must
+be kept alive'. Being business men, they have soon turned the theory into
+practice, and have encouraged, started, and financed recreation schemes
+for their own employees.
+
+In Sheffield, for example, successful dramatic entertainments have been
+given, the actors and actresses emerging from the engineering shops; near
+Birmingham, a firm has provided a cinema, an orchestra, and a dancing-room
+for their workpeople, and on Saturday evenings, free conveyance in an
+omnibus is arranged for those workers resident in outlying hostels and
+married quarters.
+
+At Norwich, another firm has appointed a woman recreation officer to teach
+the girls physical drill, dancing, tennis, and other games. Dances and a
+fancy-dress ball have been organized there, and in the summer, tennis,
+bowls, and cricket are played in a large recreation ground. These are but
+a few instances, typical of the growing understanding amongst employers in
+this country of the value of playtime to a women's staff.
+
+Outside the factory other agencies have been at work, voluntarily
+attempting to provide rest and refreshment for the women whose sacrifices
+for the war are so great and so patiently endured. Such bodies as the
+Young Women's Christian Association or local Civic Associations have
+opened recreation clubs--sometimes for girls only and sometimes
+'mixed'--where concerts, dramatic entertainments, and lectures are given,
+and classes in useful arts or games are held. Women from the aristocracy
+and working women, civic authorities and the clergy, have joined hands
+throughout the country to help forward this effort for the physical,
+spiritual and intellectual recreation of the munitions worker.
+
+The very spontaneity and eagerness of the movement have naturally led here
+and there to overlapping, and in the spring of 1917 it was found advisable
+to co-ordinate local streams of goodwill and energy. A branch of the
+Welfare and Health Department of the Ministry of Munitions was thus
+established to keep in touch with all agencies outside the factory which
+deal with schemes regarding recreation, sickness, maternity-cases,
+creches, housing, and transit facilities. Extra-mural Welfare officers
+have since been appointed to undertake such duties in various localities.
+These act as _liaison_ officers between existing associations of every
+denomination in a given district, and centralize all outside efforts for
+the protection and relaxation of the munition women of that area.
+
+The Welfare officer at first surveys carefully the needs of the district,
+and institutes an inquiry as to provisions for their satisfaction. If
+necessary, a conference is then called of individuals and representatives
+of local bodies dealing with these matters, and sub-committees are
+appointed for each part of the work. When the numbers of women workers are
+comparatively small in a given area and no adequate provision has been
+made for their recreation, a central club is often opened. In other
+localities, existing clubs, or institutions, are adapted to new
+requirements, or new ones are added, according to local needs. Where night
+shifts are worked in the local factories, it is usual to arrange the open
+hours of the club to suit the workshop leisure hours. Thus, a club may be
+open from 6 to 8 a.m.; at midday, for two hours, and again from 4.30 to
+9.30 p.m. In such cases, it is often necessary to employ paid club
+managers, as well as local voluntary help.
+
+The clubs, however, vary, both in scope and management, the general
+principle followed by the Welfare officer being to ensure provision for
+recreation, and then to leave the administration to local effort.
+Encouragement is given by the Ministry of Munitions to employers of
+Controlled Establishments and to the management of National factories to
+help forward the movement for recreation for their staffs by allowing
+Treasury grants out of excess profits to be made towards approved schemes.
+In many districts the grants are 'pooled' for recreation purposes for the
+whole area. Recreation for the munition worker thus rests on a secure
+basis. In the winter months, dancing, physical drill, theatricals, games,
+and classes are in full swing in the principal munitions areas, and in the
+summer, outdoor sports are encouraged, as well as the tending of vegetable
+plots and flower gardens.
+
+
+_Motherhood_
+
+A more difficult task falling to the 'Outside Welfare' officer is the
+supervision of maternity cases arising among munition workers. The
+all-important question of motherhood necessarily crops up in the factories
+where hundreds of thousands of women are in daily employment. Numbers of
+them are wives of men hard at work in war industries at home; others are
+war-widows, and while the illegitimate birth-rate has not gone up
+disproportionately in munitions areas, the unmarried mother, from time to
+time, presents a special problem.
+
+The care of the expectant mother necessarily begins within the factory
+gates. We have so far no published conclusions from an authoritative
+survey of this question, such as Dr. Bonnaire (Chief Professor of
+Midwifery at the Maternity Hospital, Paris) has provided for France, yet
+scientific investigations and experiments undertaken by the Health of
+Munition Workers' Committee are in progress. As far as possible, the women
+Welfare Supervisors within the works keep their management informed of
+maternity cases as they are noted, and, where possible, the expectant
+mother is placed on lighter work.
+
+No woman known to be in that condition is, after a certain period, kept on
+at night work, nor is she allowed to work in an explosives factory, nor
+yet to handle T.N.T. 'We send the girl to the doctor and we act on his
+advice. If we can keep her, we always take her off night work and heavy
+machines and where there is a good deal of exertion,' is a report typical
+of the procedure in such cases in many factories. 'It is too risky for an
+expectant mother to stay on at all,' is a characteristic opinion from a
+Filling Factory; and from a high-explosives factory comes the verdict that
+an expectant mother should, after a certain period, be discharged from the
+works in view of the occasional occurrence there of small explosions. Such
+maternity cases are, when possible, transferred, through local agencies,
+to lighter national work outside the factory.
+
+
+_The Factory Nursery_
+
+Closely connected with the safeguarding of motherhood is the case of the
+munition workers' children of pre-school age. After two months' interval
+from the baby's birth, many of the maternity cases from the factory return
+to their previous work, and the infant must, in the mother's absence, be
+nursed by others. A similar condition applies to the work of other mothers
+whose labour is required for munitions production.
+
+It sometimes happens that in a given area the call to the munitions
+factories has been answered by practically all the available women in the
+neighbourhood whose home ties are light, and the local labour reserve is
+found amongst the women with one or two young children. If these women are
+to offer their services, it is essential that their young family should
+not be neglected. Sometimes, the mothers are able to make their own
+arrangements and a 'minder', either a relative, or a neighbour, is
+forthcoming, but, generally speaking, such a plan is not satisfactory in a
+locality where every active individual is undertaking urgent war work.
+
+Thus has arisen in many districts the claim that a nursery for munition
+workers' children should be established. A local association, or an
+individual, often finds it possible to finance such a scheme; in other
+cases, monetary aid is required and obtained from the Ministry of
+Munitions. In the latter circumstances, the Ministry of Munitions,
+co-operating with the Board of Education, grants 75 per cent. of the
+approved expenditure on the initial provision and equipment of the
+nursery, as well as 7_d._ a day for each attendance of a child, the
+balance of the expenses being met partly by fees (varying from 7_d._ to
+1_s._ a day, or from 7_s._ 6_d._ to 9_s._ 6_d._ a week) charged to the
+mothers, and partly by contributions from the local originators of the
+scheme.
+
+Where night shifts are worked, the munition workers may claim night
+accommodation for their children; arrangements are also made to board the
+infants by the week. In the schemes approved by the Ministry it has
+generally been found possible to adapt existing buildings, but where no
+suitable accommodation is available within reasonable distance of the
+mothers' homes a new building is erected.
+
+Such a nursery has been erected near Woolwich and provides a useful model
+for this country. It is a long low building of bungalow type, surrounded
+by a small garden. The main room, the babies' parlour, is a long apartment
+enclosed on two sides by a verandah, and on the third, by a wide passage
+well ventilated at each end. The room itself is full of light and air,
+there is plenty of play room, and no awkward corners to inflict bruises
+unawares. A lengthy crawl brings a baby-boarder into the sunshine of the
+verandah and the safe seclusion of its play-pens, and a longer crawl and a
+hop is rewarded by entrance into the surrounding garden, where a
+delectable sand-pit is a permanent feature.
+
+Brightly-coloured flowers enliven the garden in spring and in summer and
+attract bird and insect visitors, companions often more interesting to a
+two-year-old than the most sprightly of humans. Mattresses occupy part of
+the floor space of the nursery, and at night-time are developed into
+full-fledged beds. At one end of the room are cupboards let into the
+walls, at the other, furniture fashioned for the needs of each 'two feet
+nothing'. There, instead of being perched on a high chair to feed with
+giants from an elevated table-land, the infant visitor sits on a miniature
+arm-chair at a table brought to the level of childhood. The low tables
+are, in fact, kidney-shaped and hollowed on the inside, so that a nurse,
+or attendant, seated in the centre, may feed half a dozen children in
+turn. The toddler's dinner in this retreat recalls the feeding time in a
+nest. A smiling nurse in the centre feeds, turn by turn, her open-mouthed
+charges whose satisfaction is expressed in human 'coos'.
+
+Another room in this delightful babies' house is devoted to infants: a
+brigade in cots, of which the advance-guard, during fine weather, invade
+the verandah. The daintiness of the room with its blue curtains and
+cot-hangings and the chubby satisfaction of the cot-dwellers must be a
+constant inspiration to the visiting working mothers. Spotless kitchens
+for the preparation of the children's meals are situated in the rear of
+the nurseries; there is also an isolation room where suspect infectious
+cases are detained, and a laundry with an indefatigable laundress. The
+bathing room, fitted with modern appliances, is in many respects
+excellent. The whole establishment is warmed by a central-heating
+installation, the radiators being well protected with guards.
+
+It may not always be possible, through lack of funds, to reproduce these
+ideal conditions, but where the accommodation is less and the ground space
+more limited, every care is taken that the factory nursery shall have an
+ample provision of fresh air. Efforts are also made to obtain as much
+local support as possible.
+
+In some districts, the whole of the clothing provided at the nursery is
+made by the little girls from a neighbouring Elementary School. At Acton,
+Middlesex, for example, I was shown piles of the daintiest little
+underwear, diminutive shoes and charming cotton frocks, all made in the
+sewing classes at their school, by pupils of eleven to thirteen years of
+age. The boys of the local manual schools--not to be outdone--contributed
+to this nursery all the carpentry for the cots for the elder babies. These
+small beds, fashioned out of hessian cloth, swung on long broom poles,
+with a wooden board at head and foot, seemed of a particularly economical
+and practical pattern.
+
+The factory nursery is certainly gaining popularity as a war-time measure;
+as a permanency in peace times it is recognized that there are some
+objections to its establishment. An alternative scheme, even in the war
+period, is being mooted. The suggestion is made that babies should be
+'billeted', or boarded out in the munitions area amongst women who are not
+employed outside their home. Supervision of the baby boarders, it is
+thought, might be undertaken by inspectors under the Local Authority. This
+scheme might, it is true, largely prevent the congregation of many
+children in one nursery and the resultant danger of the spread of
+contagious infantile disease. On the other hand, the proposal, if
+accepted, might open the doors to overcrowding in thickly populated areas
+and to the neglect of the baby boarder, undetected by a local
+inspectorate, already overstrained by war-time conditions. The scheme is,
+however, only at the discussion stage, as I write.
+
+In any case, the care of the munition workers' children is attracting
+considerable public attention, since in spite of the war, or because of
+it, the importance of the health and well-being of the ordinary
+individual, and more especially of the young, is becoming part of the
+creed of the average citizen.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII: GROWTH OF THE INDUSTRIAL CANTEEN
+
+GENERAL PRINCIPLES--THE WORKER'S OASIS
+
+
+'Money hardly counts; it is labour we have to consider nowadays', recently
+remarked the managing director of a large munitions works. It is this new
+conception that has given impetus to the development of the industrial
+canteen, now a feature of the munitions factory. In the opinion of Mr.
+John Hodge, M.P., Minister of Pensions, who since the war has acted for a
+long period as Minister of Labour, canteens in the engineering shops were
+'necessary from the start', and one of the earliest investigations of the
+Health of Munition Workers' Committee was on the subject of the provision
+of employees' meals. The results of the inquiry are embodied in three
+valuable White Papers.[2]
+
+I have since been into many canteens connected with munitions works, and
+so far I have not met a factory manager who has regretted their
+introduction. Yet, only three or four years ago, the average employer
+would have told you that a dinner brought by a worker in a newspaper, or
+tied up in a red handkerchief, stored in the works, heated anywhere, and
+eaten near the machines, was 'quite all right': and, as for the boys in
+the factory, it was considered shameful to 'coddle them'; if necessary, a
+factory lad should 'eat his dinner on a clothes line'.
+
+To-day, when the utmost ounce of energy is needed from man and woman, and
+boy and girl, wherever munitions production is concerned, it is recognized
+that the quality and quantity of the workers' food matters, and that even
+the surroundings where the meal is partaken of counts in the conservation
+of the essential reserve of human energy and power of will. Thus, the best
+type of industrial canteen is designed not only 'to feed the brute', but
+to rest his mind. This is especially the case in certain Filling
+Factories, where immunity from ill-effects from the handling of T.N.T. has
+been found to depend largely on the physical fitness of the workers. In
+such factories, as well as in establishments where women are employed on
+night shifts, the provision of canteens is obligatory on employers and,
+indeed, recent legislation (the Police, Factories, &c. (Miscellaneous
+Provisions) Act, 1916) has empowered the Home Secretary to require the
+occupiers of workshops and factories to make arrangements, where
+necessary, for the supply of meals for their employees. In the stress of
+warfare, when the demand for a maximum output is necessarily the
+pre-occupation of the factory manager, it was, however, recognized that
+the canteen must be State-aided. A Canteen Committee was therefore
+appointed under the Central Control Board (Liquor Traffic). The work of
+this committee is twofold: it aids the factory management to open its own
+canteen or canteens, and it supervises and helps approved dining-rooms
+managed by voluntary bodies. In the first case, the expense for any
+necessary canteen is entirely borne by the Government, if the factory is a
+'National' one. In Controlled Establishments, the employer is allowed to
+charge the cost of the canteen as 'a trade expense', a concession by which
+the State practically bears the expense out of funds which would otherwise
+reach the Exchequer. In the case of canteens provided by voluntary bodies,
+such as the Young Men's Christian Association, the Young Women's Christian
+Association, the Church Army, the Salvation Army, the National People's
+Palace Association, Ltd., &c., the Board pays half the capital
+expenditure, where approved.[3]
+
+[Illustration: BALSMING LENSES]
+
+[Illustration: MAKING INSTRUMENT SCALES]
+
+The efforts of these voluntary bodies have been of the utmost service,
+especially at the outset of munitions production on a vast scale, when the
+factory proprietors, or directors, were unable to devote even a fraction
+of their time to matters not obviously connected with output. The devotion
+of the unpaid workers in the voluntary canteen has through the turmoil of
+war hardly received due recognition, but it is no less than that of the
+nurses in the military hospitals, or of the munitions workers themselves.
+Women of aristocratic families, accustomed to personal service from a
+large staff of domestic servants, and entirely unused to physical labour,
+as well as women hard-worked in their own homes or in livelihood
+occupations, have, since the need of the canteen was declared, come, by
+day and by night, to undertake the arduous duties of cooking and scrubbing
+for vast numbers of working-people. _Mr. Punch's_ delightful illustration,
+'War, the Leveller', where the rough scullery-maid from the slums is
+depicted issuing the emphatic order to the well-bred marchioness, 'Nah
+then, Lady Montgummery Wilberforce, 'urry up with them plates',[4] is by
+no means a fancy picture of the hither side of canteen-life.
+
+In one factory, substantial meals have been provided daily by 17
+voluntary assistants for some 1,200 workers; in another locality, the food
+of 2,000 to 3,000 munitions employees has been arranged by 23 volunteers;
+and in another establishment, 6,000 workers have been provided with
+standing-up refreshments by 17 voluntary helpers. The rapid growth of the
+canteen system during the past fifteen months, accompanied by the
+increasing difficulties of catering for vast numbers under war-time
+conditions, has, however, led to the transference of numbers of voluntary
+canteens to the care of the factory management.
+
+
+_General Principles_
+
+Industrial canteens differ from one another in many respects, partly
+because there was at first no fund of common experience in this country
+from which to draw, and partly because hours of work, tastes and customs
+in industrial areas vary considerably. Hence, methods of administration
+and catering, found possible or popular in one canteen, are sometimes a
+complete failure when tried in other districts. In one canteen, with a
+seating capacity for 2,000 women, I found that three gallons of pickles
+were sold in pennyworths daily; in another district, the popular taste ran
+in the direction of jam tarts. Yet, even with the small store of
+experience so far accumulated, certain general principles at least as
+regards site, construction, equipment, and administration of the canteen
+have been evolved. For instance, as regards site, a gloomy dining-room is
+never popular. If possible, a garden outlook should be arranged, and at
+the least, the canteen walls should be of a restful colour. It seems
+obvious that if pictures are introduced, they should be varied and bright,
+yet I have seen one canteen of which the walls were covered at intervals
+with reproductions of the same uninteresting print.
+
+Another obvious point, too often neglected, is the insurance of good
+ventilation in canteen and kitchen. The dining-room should, if possible,
+provide separate accommodation for men and women, and should have a
+buffet-bar and serving-counter with separate hatchments for different
+items of the menu. Again, it is a matter of common consent that the
+'ticket system' of payment for the food handed over the counter is the
+best. Ticket-offices, where the 'checks' are obtainable for cash, should
+be carefully placed with regard to entrance doors, serving-counters and
+dining-tables, so that the minimum time is expended in preliminaries by a
+_clientele_ who has but a strict dinner-hour at its disposal. In a
+well-organized canteen I have seen over a thousand workers seated and
+served within ten minutes of the announcement of the dinner-hour within
+the factory shops.
+
+In the larger canteens, developments, as may be expected, run chiefly
+along the lines of labour-saving appliances. Electric washing-up machines,
+electric bacon-cutters, as well as electric bread-cutters, tea-measuring
+machines, counter hot-closets for warming food brought by employees may
+now be seen in many kitchens where the needs of thousands of diners must
+be considered.
+
+But it is perhaps in the smaller concerns that the development of the
+industrial canteen is most assured. Experiments can there be more easily
+tried, and if necessary, discarded, where the customers are counted by
+hundreds, rather than by thousands. From a tour of canteens, I select a
+couple of such instances. The other day I happened, during the
+dinner-hour, to be in a new munitions factory concerned with the
+production of magnetos, aero-engines, electric switches, and so on, work
+undertaken by men and women, boys and girls. The manager of this works has
+studied the labour question up and down the country, and has set down his
+conclusions, not on minute sheets, but in the bricks and mortar of new
+buildings, in green lawns and flower beds bright with colour, and in
+allotments round his shops.
+
+
+_The Worker's Oasis_
+
+The canteen is a feature of the place. It stands apart from the factory, a
+long low building, one side looking on to a tennis court and the other on
+to homely but delightful vegetable plots. The workers' dining-room is
+divided down the centre: one side for the men, the other for the women. A
+serving-table, but no partition-wall, separates it from the kitchen,
+which, in its turn, is divided by further serving-tables from mess-rooms
+for the engineers and staff employees. The kitchen, in reality a series of
+ovens, stoves, and steamers, is a revelation of labour-saving appliances,
+heated by electricity. On the day of my visit there was not the slightest
+odour of cooking from these various utensils, although hot meals for some
+250 persons were in preparation.
+
+The factory hooter 'buzzed'. The dinner hour, the workers' oasis, had
+arrived, yet there was no clatter of dishes, or bustle of serving-maids,
+in the canteens. An atmosphere of repose was as manifest as in a
+well-appointed reception-room of some stately English home. The workers
+evidently react to these conditions, and standing at the back of the
+kitchen I was quite unaware of the diner's entry. 'When do the people come
+in?' I asked from my shelter behind a huge steamer where puddings were
+rising to the occasion. 'A hundred men are already seated and served', was
+the amazing reply. They had entered through a side door leading out of the
+garden, had there purchased a 'check' for the value of the dinner
+required, and presenting the 'check' at the serving-counter, had received
+their portion, piping hot from the hot shelves fitted beneath.
+
+Picking up the necessary cutlery from an adjoining table, the customers
+had seated themselves at any special small marble-topped table of their
+fancy. Waitresses, some voluntary workers garbed in rose-coloured overalls
+and mob-caps, and some staff employees in white or blue uniforms, moved
+about amongst the tables, supplying small wants. Through the open windows
+floated the scent of hay and flowers; it seemed almost ludicrous to
+connect the scene with war and the manufacture of its engines of
+destruction. The quality of the food was excellent and the variety great.
+A dinner hour spent in such a canteen is a refreshment to both body and
+soul of the employees.
+
+In another instance, the firm have handed over the canteen and its
+management to a workers' committee upon which the managing director also
+sits. I noticed in this canteen various devices worthy of imitation, where
+catering is undertaken for large numbers. The method adopted, for example,
+of dividing the serving-counter into hatchments for the various items on
+the menu, and separating by rails the floor-space in front of each
+compartment, seems to economize both the time and patience of the
+customers. The note of economy with efficiency is emphasized in this, as
+in many canteens, and I was shown with pride some 'little brothers' on an
+adjoining piece of land--pigs that were fattening on the canteen 'waste'.
+
+These developments, started in munitions areas during the urgency of
+warfare, will, without doubt, have permanent importance in the days of
+peace, and it is probable that the munition workers' canteen, doubtingly
+adopted by employers some two years ago, is symptomatic of a revolution in
+the home life of the industrial worker, as well as of new methods of
+economy in the national supply of fuel and food.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII: HOUSING
+
+BILLETING--TEMPORARY ACCOMMODATION--PERMANENT ACCOMMODATION
+
+
+Of the indirect problems arising from a prolific output of munitions the
+most acute has undoubtedly been the affair of the housing of the workers.
+The opening of a new factory, or the conversion of existing works to the
+needs of the State, often involve the transference of thousands of
+workers, and in some cases the districts to which the stream of
+immigration is directed are already congested, and already suffering from
+inadequate housing accommodation.
+
+In one town in the North, for example, the population has since 1914
+increased by immigration from 16,000 to 35,000; in another town, where the
+1911 census showed a population of 107,821, an unexaggerated estimate
+gives the figure for the end of 1917 as 120,000; in other munition areas a
+similar inflation of population has taken place. The housing problem has
+been further complicated by the almost total prohibition of building
+during the war period, save for Government purposes.
+
+The effect of these conditions in the early days of the war was, as may be
+imagined, highly unsatisfactory to the residents in certain munition
+areas, as well as to the immigrant work-people. Overcrowding became rife;
+lodgers were at the mercy of unscrupulous landladies, and all the evils
+associated with bad housing conditions began to make their appearance.
+Then the Ministry of Munitions came to grips with the question, and
+although it remains a thorny subject, the activities of the Department may
+be fairly said to have accomplished a miracle in some areas in the housing
+of the munition workers.
+
+The infinite variety of local conditions, as well as the humanness of the
+workers, obviously complicate the matter, and while it has been found
+possible to synthesize the factory system of a given area, no stereotyped
+regulations can conceivably be produced to cover the accommodation of its
+employees. The problem is therefore attacked piece-meal, each local
+proposition being decided on its own merits. A broad guiding principle
+has, however, been educed wherever the housing situation occasioned by the
+output of munitions demands State intervention. In the first place, it is
+decided whether the needed accommodation can be met in part, or
+altogether, by existing houses--a system now sanctioned by the Billeting
+Act of May 1917. Secondly, when it is found necessary to provide further
+housing room, consideration is given as to whether new buildings shall be
+of a temporary or of a permanent type.
+
+
+_Billeting_
+
+Chronologically, an authorized system of billeting munition workers has
+been the latest development in the State housing schemes, but even in the
+early days of the war this arrangement existed in embryo. Local committees
+were then appointed which, with the aid of the Employment Bureaux,
+compiled lists of suitable lodgings for immigrant women workers. From the
+earliest war period, too, provision was made to meet young women
+new-comers at railway stations and to place them, if necessary, in
+temporary unimpeachable lodgings, until permanent accommodation was
+available. This scheme has now developed into the regularized activities
+of a Billeting Board (established August 1917), working under powers given
+by the Billeting Act. Under this enactment, compulsory billeting is
+provided for, but in practice is not adopted, sufficient facilities having
+so far been forthcoming from voluntary sources.
+
+The Billeting Board works in hearty co-operation with local authorities
+and individuals, and has met with extraordinary success. In the first
+instance, two executive members of the Board proceed to a congested
+munitions area and, with local aid, institute an inquiry as to whether
+billeting can be successfully carried out. In such areas as the Clyde, or
+Woolwich, billeting would, for example, be out of the question, but in
+other localities, such as Barrow and Hereford, where public opinion ran
+that there was no further accommodation even for a stray cat, the Board
+has yet found suitable billets for 900 persons in Barrow and 1,200 in
+Hereford.
+
+The question of transit, it is true, is intimately connected with the
+housing problem, and through the action of the Billeting Board it has in
+many cases been possible to remove difficulties of locomotion, and hence
+to bring further accommodation within reach of the factories. The Board
+has also been enabled to form local committees on which sit
+representatives of each housing interest (e. g. landlady, locality,
+lodger), and it has authority to recover rent from defaulting tenants.
+
+These, and other powers, have resulted in throwing many additional
+apartments on to the market. Yet difficulties remain in the administration
+of the Act in that the industrial workers are under no discipline such as
+that applied to soldiers, and there is no local authority to compel a
+munitions worker either to go into a given billet, or to remain there
+when placed. The goodwill of the locality and of the employees has,
+however, been so great that the system works smoothly, and from August
+1917 to December 31, 1917, 3,000 to 5,000 munition workers have been
+placed in existing houses. In a congested district where lodging
+accommodation is exhausted, the Billeting Board reports on the need for
+further houses, and at such centres as Barrow and Lincoln new houses are
+now being erected on their recommendation.
+
+
+_Temporary Accommodation_
+
+Excluding the utilization of local lodgings and the adaptation of existing
+buildings such as Poor-Law structures, Elementary Schools, charitable
+institutions, three distinct types of provisional accommodation for
+munition workers have made their appearance: temporary cottages, hostels,
+and colonies. The temporary cottage corresponds fairly closely to the
+ordinary type of permanent industrial cottage, save that the former is
+built of wood or concrete and is usually one story instead of two; it
+contains three to five rooms, and is rented on the basis of about 5_s._
+6_d._ to 7_s._ 6_d._ per week for a three-roomed abode.
+
+Generally speaking, these rooms are allocated to married rather than to
+single women; sometimes the wife, as well as the husband, works in the
+neighbouring factory, but more usually the wife, housed in the temporary
+cottage, remains at home, housekeeping for the man worker. The unmarried
+girls and women workers in crowded districts are generally accommodated in
+hostels, or in colonies, the term used for a group of hostels. The hostel,
+which is designed to accommodate from 30 to 100 persons, is provided with
+its own kitchen, dining-room, and common-room, and to a certain extent
+life therein approximates to that of a large family.
+
+The Colony, or group of hostels, has been found convenient where a large
+number of women must be housed. Each hostel, or hutment, in the group is
+arranged for the sleeping accommodation of 100-130 persons, the
+dormitories being divided into cubicles (some single, some double),
+accommodation for bath-rooms being always made in these dormitory blocks.
+Under the Colony system, meals are usually partaken of in a separate
+building or buildings. The residents from all the hutments also meet in
+the recreation-room and in the laundry, common to all.
+
+Experience, however, teaches that each hostel should have its own common
+room and that a Colony should not shelter very large numbers. About 500
+girls, in five hostels, seems to be the ideal number for effective
+home-making, yet we have large housing schemes for the accommodation of
+many thousands which are at present answering their purpose as a war-time
+measure. For the management of the Colony an exceptionally capable lady
+superintendent is needed, into whose hands usually falls the selection of
+the hutment matrons and their staffs, as well as the canteen managers and
+their subordinates. In the most developed Colonies a recreation officer is
+often appointed.
+
+I recall a visit to one of the largest Colonies for munition workers in
+the Midlands. The scheme embraces the housing and feeding of some 6,000
+women, drawn from every part of the United Kingdom, indeed, possibly from
+every corner of the Empire. The staff, in all, comprises some 300 persons.
+Perfect harmony reigned, and the girls seemed thoroughly at home in their
+novel surroundings. Each girl can claim a separate cubicle, which is
+divided from the adjoining compartment by a wall and door. Here and there,
+indeed, the arrangement was varied and two friends--terrified at sleeping
+alone--had secured permission to pool their bedrooms and to arrange a
+double sleeping-room and dressing-room.
+
+The cubicle system is, notwithstanding, much appreciated by the woman,
+who, working in company of hundreds of her fellows, and sharing perhaps a
+common life for the first time, rejoices in the possession of some spot in
+which to express her inner self. In some cubicles in that Colony a desire
+for beauty asserted itself and the walls were gay with prints from
+illustrated papers; in others, dainty coloured curtains had been
+introduced and the locker was covered with a cloth to match. In another
+room, the owner had evidently a taste for embroidery, and all the toilet
+accessories bore this feminine touch. But, generally speaking, the chief
+feature I noticed in that, as well as in other Colonies where the cubicle
+system prevails, was the cleanliness and order of the apartments. A taste
+for purity is infectious, and it is unlikely that girls, having once come
+under an influence that induces them to leave their sleeping apartment
+immaculate before going to work before dawn, will ever again tolerate slum
+conditions.
+
+The many problems involved in the housing of these girls of various types
+are indeed almost lost sight of by the visitor, but, as a lady
+superintendent once reminded me, there are difficulties inherent in the
+job. Some girls will arrive with uncleanly habits, even when the medical
+officer has sorted out those unclean in person; others will, at first,
+show signs of violent antipathies and strange fears, and there is always
+the need for upholding an atmosphere of religious and racial toleration.
+In the Midlands Colony a system has been adopted of placing the bedrooms
+of girls from one part of the United Kingdom in the same corridor, the
+Irish in one wing, the Scotch in another, and so on, but in the other
+parts of the country I have found perfect harmony where such
+classification is not observed.
+
+[Illustration: PAINTING A SHIP'S SIDE IN DRY DOCK]
+
+[Illustration: GENERAL VIEW OF WOMEN AT WORK ON AIRCRAFT FABRIC]
+
+[Illustration: THE CANTEEN]
+
+The feeding of the hostel residents presents its own difficulties,
+especially in these days of war. In some hostels and colonies, such as the
+one in the Midlands, the residents take their meals in their own canteen;
+it being possible to supply the needs of a shift in the interval from
+work. In other hostels, arrangements are made by which meals can be had
+either at the hostel or the factory canteen.
+
+In these days of fluctuating food prices, it is difficult to indicate the
+cost of up-keep of a munition-workers' hostel, but, in general, it has not
+been found practicable to put the hostel on an entirely self-supporting
+basis. This is especially the case in the Government establishments, where
+the return on expended capital is at present only sought in increased
+munitions output.
+
+
+_Permanent Accommodation_
+
+At first sight, the provision of temporary accommodation alone may appear
+the obvious method for the housing of munition workers. Cheaper and more
+rapid construction is obtainable by this method, and existing buildings
+may be adapted. But if, in an area of pre-war housing shortage, there is
+good prospect of permanent manufacturing activity, it is more often
+decided that permanent, rather than temporary, structures are provided.
+
+It may be of interest to note the methods that have been adopted by the
+State in the provision of permanent accommodation. These may be detailed
+under four heads:
+
+1. In a certain number of cases loans have been made to Public Utility
+Societies for the construction of dwellings for munition workers. Such
+loans are conditioned after the manner already made familiar to the public
+by Garden Suburb and other Associations.
+
+2. Loans have been made directly to certain individual firms to enable
+them to house their immigrant employees. These loans have been issued at
+the current rate of interest--usually 5 per cent.--and run, generally
+speaking, for a period of forty years.
+
+3. In a few exceptional cases, certain private firms--now Controlled
+Establishments--are permitted to charge a part of the increase on the cost
+of building (due to war conditions) to that portion of the firm's profits
+which would otherwise have gone to the Exchequer.
+
+4. A contribution is, in some instances, made by the State to certain
+local authorities of a part of the capital cost of building. In all cases
+this contribution is less than the estimated increase due to war
+conditions.
+
+The type of permanent building erected by such means is that which
+characterizes many of our newer industrial districts, namely a two-story
+brick cottage, containing two or three bedrooms, a living-room and a
+kitchen, a bath, in some cases a bath-room. Sometimes a complete village
+or township has arisen, as it were from the earth, to shelter the working
+population who have so willingly left their homes to further the common
+cause by land and sea. In another instance, a large National factory has
+been erected on an isolated waste in the North country. The workers come
+from long distances, and not only need accommodation, but some reasonable
+provision for recreation and the amenities of life.
+
+Beyond the great high road sweeping on to Scotland, some one- or
+two-roomed cottages, a village shop or two, and a few more imposing
+residences there was, in June 1915, nothing but bogland in the immediate
+neighbourhood of the site of this new factory. The landscape presented a
+view of coarse grass and brackish water; beyond that, beach and sea, and a
+horizon bounded by rugged mountains, capped in winter by snow. It needed
+courage, as well as genius, to undertake the transformation of such a
+desolate waste into surroundings which should offer a lure to industrial
+workers. But the work has been done in silence, quickly as well as
+efficiently, with imagination, as well as thoroughness, and with an eye to
+the future destiny of the place.
+
+By July 1915, the first huts were occupied, and by December 1917, when I
+was a privileged visitor, there had arisen a thriving busy township and a
+village some five miles beyond. Excellent railway communication between
+township, village, and factory has been established, many good roads have
+been built, there are permanent cottages, churches, a school, shops, a
+staff club, an institute, a large entertainment hall, a cinema house, and
+a central kitchen, providing cooked meals for all the workers in the
+factories, and raw food-stuff for hostels and huts. Little gardens
+surround the houses big and small, temporary or permanent, and allotments
+are in great request, and there is also provision for outdoor recreation,
+such as bowls, tennis, cricket, &c. The permanent brick cottages are built
+in blocks of twelve, which are now thrown together to form a hostel. The
+construction is so planned that ultimately these cottages can be
+re-separated for family use.
+
+There is housing accommodation for over 6,000 women operators, which was
+practically all in use. The task of supervising the home conditions of
+this army of women falls into the hands of a lady Welfare Superintendent,
+who keeps all the complicated machinery of hostels, huts, and lodgings in
+running order. The possibilities in the housing of industrial women away
+from their own homes have, I believe, never been so clearly demonstrated
+as in this town on the marshes. The lady superintendent who has pioneered
+this movement is of the opinion that its success is bound up with the fact
+that the hostels are limited to the accommodation of from 70 to 100 girls
+in each. Other key-notes to the prevailing happiness of the women
+residents are, I gathered, that a minimum number of rules are enforced and
+that the women are treated as responsible human beings. The elder women
+are often housed in bungalows under the care of a housekeeper-cook, and
+they greatly enjoy the greater independence and the appeal to their
+individuality possible in such surroundings.
+
+The hostels, at the time of my visit, were in most hospitable mood. It was
+the eve of Christmas, and festivities, tempered to war-time needs, were
+the order of the day. The sound of a piano and singing outside a certain
+hostel suggested a frolic within. We entered, the lady superintendent and
+myself. The lower floor had been converted into reception-rooms and supper
+was laid out on tables decorated with spoils from the hedge. Gleaming red
+berries and glistening holly-leaves were on walls and brackets and here
+and there a sprig of mistletoe placed in suitable places for 'auld lang
+syne'. There were present young men, as well as girls, and a lively game,
+'the Duke of York', was in progress.
+
+Suddenly the singing and accompaniment came to a sudden halt and the whole
+of the company trouped in from adjoining rooms. A young girl came forward.
+'We wish to take this opportunity', she said, 'of thanking our matron and
+our secretary for the most happy time we have had under this roof. We do
+it now because we hope not to be here next year, but instead to be
+welcoming our boys home from the Front'. It was a simple, spontaneous
+expression of the general emotion of the hostel residents in that area.
+
+Everywhere I found a similar joy of life among the workers: in the
+Institute clubs, where both girls and men were reading, studying, singing,
+and dancing; in the cinema hall, where the ever-popular 'movies' were
+taking place; and in the big recreation hall, where a weekly 'social' was
+being held. There, two girls provided the band, to which other girls
+danced with girls, or with men in khaki, or with factory workers in
+civilian dress. There was a healthy comradeship between girls and men and,
+when the hour of parting came there were leave-takings of which no one
+could be ashamed. Laughter and jollity in plenty, and snatches of song up
+and down the darkened streets, as group after group found its way home,
+but self-respect and dignity noticeably present.
+
+In a new town, emerging during the hurry and bustle of the war, amongst
+new occupations, at which women needs must wear a masculine costume, we
+have at least accomplished this: that the spirit of home-life, of joy,
+and of love has not been discouraged: rather has it been fostered, or
+rekindled, in these unaccustomed homes provided by the State. Indeed, many
+of the girls passing through this strange war-time adventure have
+assuredly gained by their pilgrimage precisely in those qualities most
+needed by the wives and mothers of the rising generation.
+
+It was an inspiring glimpse into a new industrial world, a portent, maybe,
+of the time to come. The words of a golden sonnet welled up:
+
+  Then felt I like some watcher of the skies
+    When a new planet swims into his ken;
+  Or like stout Cortez when, with eagle eyes,
+    He stared at the Pacific--and all his men
+  Looked at each other with a wild surmise--
+    Silent, upon a peak in Darien.
+
+
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[1] Welfare work has since been officially extended to factories other
+than those engaged in munitions production by Clause 7 of the Police,
+Factories, &c. (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act (1916).
+
+[2] _Health of Munition Workers Committee_, Memorandum No. 3, Report on
+Industrial Canteens (Cd. 8133); Memorandum No. 6, Appendix to Memorandum
+No. 3, Canteen Construction and Equipment (Cd. 8199); Memorandum No. 19,
+Investigation of Workers' Food and Suggestions as to Dietary: Report by
+Leonard E. Hill, M.B., F.R.S. (Cd. 8798).
+
+[3] A Food Section of the Ministry of Munitions has since been established
+to carry on the work of the Central Control Board (Liquor Traffic).
+
+[4] _Punch_, September 6, 1916.
+
+
+
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