Civic improvement; Urban women; Women in public life
The Housewives’ League, organized and directed by Mrs. Julian Heath of
New York, has the twofold aim of securing pure food uncontaminated by
dust and flies and of securing it at a lower cost. In the general pure
food war, Mrs. Heath and her assistant, Miss M. E. McOuat, have, among
other things, sought to interest girls in their teens in the purity and
cleanliness of the candy and soda water they buy. Open-air meetings in
the poorer districts of New York City, where cheap and dangerous wares
are on every hand, have been held to warn young children against poisons
of various kinds. At the same time this organization has assisted those
officials who have sought to induce storekeepers to carry better
varieties. They have also reported violations of the law as they have
been discovered.
The Women’s Health Protective Association of Philadelphia had a Bakeshop
Committee which visited bakeries and consulted with the bakers
themselves over conditions. The state of affairs that was revealed to
the women led to a public agitation and legislation controlling the most
unsanitary features of these places.
A new bakeshop code secured by the women of Cleveland requires absolute
cleanliness and a ten-hour day for employees. A “White List” is
published showing those bakers who best observe the code.
Mrs. E. E. McKibber, chairman of the Food Sanitation Committee of the
General Federation of Clubs, has sent a letter to the clubs of each
state to this effect:
“Do you as club women keep yourselves informed and discriminate against
poor food as you do against poor clothing?
“Have you helped pass an ordinance looking to a better food supply, to
the better handling of food?
“Have you any organization in your town that looks after the food
supply?”
This pressure by the chairman of the Food Sanitation Committee of the
clubs indicates that hundreds of committees representing thousands of
women are instituting a constructive campaign for better and cleaner
food.
The Women’s Municipal League of Boston has been very active. “The
cleanliness and hygienic condition of markets seems to me to belong
peculiarly to woman’s province,” writes the chairman of its market
committee, “and I confess it gives me a certain feeling of shame that a
comparatively small and new city like Portland should be more civilized
in this respect than Boston. It is, however, encouraging to think that
Portland has been brought to this standard from a lower condition than
Boston’s by the efforts of a few women.”
The Boston League in connection with its market work made a study of
oysters last year in their relation to the transmission of infectious
diseases, and cold storage.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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