This book is sent forth with the hope that it will stimulate the women of America to still greater endeavors to make American cities better places in which to live. Women by natural instinct as well as by long training have become the housekeepers of the world, so it is only natural that they should in time become effective municipal housekeepers as well. This book demonstrates how successfully they may fulfill this rôle. May the volume prove an inspiration and a guide to those whose interests it may have stimulated. Mrs. Beard has done her work well. May the response be a fitting one.
Clinton Rogers Woodruff
CONTENTS
| CHAPTER | PAGE | |
|---|---|---|
| I. | Education | [1] |
| II. | Public Health | [45] |
| III. | The Social Evil | [97] |
| IV. | Recreation | [131] |
| V. | The Assimilation of Races | [170] |
| VI. | Housing | [199] |
| VII. | Social Service | [220] |
| VIII. | Corrections | [259] |
| IX. | Public Safety | [287] |
| X. | Civic Improvement | [293] |
| XI. | Government and Administration | [319] |
| Index | [339] |
WOMAN’S WORK IN
MUNICIPALITIES
CHAPTER I
EDUCATION
Women’s connection with the schools and the educational system lies both in professional, or official, and volunteer service. We shall consider their professional relation to the schools in the first place, because it is the older.
The history of the education of women from the early days, when to educate “shes” was viewed with horror as an immoral proposition, to the present time when more “shes” graduate from the high schools than “hes,” is an interesting record in itself. Even more significant, however, is the fact that both hes and shes are educated largely by women in the secondary schools which are the schools of the “people.”
The dominance of women in the secondary schools does not meet with universal approval. The more vigorous of the opponents of the educational monopoly by women argue that women teachers do not comprehend the realities of modern business and political and social life, and are therefore not fitted to give a wide social training to the young, especially to boys.