A group of nonworking Lithuanian women heard that neglected children
were reported to the settlement in the neighborhood. One of the women
investigated, and found many children locked in houses for the day,
with coffee and bread for lunch. One child, too small to shift for
himself, was found with his day's supply of food tied around his neck.
The women decided to open a nursery in charge of a Lithuanian woman
who would be able to speak to the children in their own language, as
few children below school age spoke English. The original plans were
to accommodate ten or twelve children, but as soon as the nursery
opened there were so many women wanting to leave their children there
that it took as many as thirty children. The nursery was maintained
for about eighteen months, and was then closed because of the
difficulty of raising the necessary funds.
Some such plan must be developed that takes care of the foreign-born
mother's work if she is forced to supplement the family's income
outside of the home. The organization of family life that has grown up
parallel with the industrial system assumes her presence in the home.
When misfortune makes this impossible some provision for caring for
the children must be found.
CHANGED DUTIES OF A MOTHER
Another changed condition in the life in this country is that the
family group is usually what the sociologist calls the "marriage"
group, as distinguished from the "familial" group, which is generally
found in the old country. The grandmothers and maiden aunts, who were
part of the group in the old country, and who shared with the mother
all the work of the household, are not with them in this country. The
older women are seldom brought on the long journey, and the maiden
aunt is either employed in the factory system, or she sets up a house
of her own, so that in any event her assistance in the work of the
household can no longer be relied on. It is perhaps the grandmother
that is missed the more, because it was to her that the mother of a
family was wont to turn for advice as well as assistance.
This decrease in the number of people in the household is not
compensated for by the diminution in the amount of work, which is
another fact of changed conditions. For in this country the housewife
no longer spins and weaves, or even, as a rule, makes the cloth into
clothing. She does not work in the fields, or care for the garden or
the farm animals, all of which she was expected to do in the old
country. The loss of the older women in the group, however, means that
what tasks are left must all be done by her.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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