— Women On The Job --- and at B.C. Packers’ plant in Steveston they can be sure their children are happy an ad safe in the company’s nursery. By KAY GREGORY AST summer, a common sight outside B.C. Packers’ plant at Steveston was a group of small children playing around alessly, no one apparently in charge, while their mothers rked inside the cannery cleaning and packing the fish that such an important part of the food supplies we are sending the British people and our men overseas: Faced with the problem of what to do with their children ile at work, many women employed by the cannery just ; them outside to play with others around the fish dock. his was enough to worry any ther. Trucks and jitneys hurry- back and forth, loading crates canned fish,. with no time to constantly on the look out for all children playing under their y wheels, the edge of the dock onstant danger to smaller tots >) might go too near, overbal- te and fall in, with no one to ow but playmates who would too small to explain coherent- what had happened or even run for help fast enough. fonsequently something had to done. With the prospect loom- that the more women they ployed, the more acute the hblem would become, B.C. Pack- wisely decided to solve the jblem before anybody got hurt, Wow, between 16 and 25 chil- dren play safely, warmly and hap- Ppily in a small cottage right near the plant, with a supervisor to watch over them, to help them learn the alphabet, how to count, and above all how to live com- Munally with their playmates. These children playing together in early life are learning to share their playthings and candy, to re- alize that more pleasure can be obtained by sharing it with a playmate than being selfish and grabbing everything for their own personal enjoyment. e@ TARTING last July with three children, the nursery was an experiment which has proven so successful that the company plans ‘sociation here. a War measure, Republican Senator Coudert warned that some com- prehensive plan of providing nursery schools is needed if mothers are to go into war production plants to any great extent. ‘We can’t economize at the expense of the youngest generation, no matter what else we forego,” he said. Plans were also announced at the meeting for a nurs- ery school aid bureau to enroll volunteers who wish to gain clearer knowledge of nursery school work. Special training for these volunteers would be provided through the United Kindergarten Mothers group. “The organization considers nursery schools a war- time need for the releasing of womanpower for work on the home front and for proper physical, mental and emo- tional development of the pre-school age child under war- time conditions,’ declared Mrs. Ruth M. Baylor, presi- dent of the association. That nursery schools will become a wartime necessity in the United States very shortly was shown by Secre- tary of Labor Perkins in a recent report on manpower. Predicting that 4,500,000 more workers would be needed in war industries and elsewhere by Dec. 1, 1943, Miss Perkins said that probably 3,000,000 would have to be women. Tt had been estimated, she said, that about 13,000,000 women were now employed in non-agricultural pursuits, and that there were many millions more who could be gainfully employed, but who were not so engaged now. Nursery Schools Wartime Necessity | See of nursery schools_as an integral part of the public school system was advocated at a recent meeting of the United Kindergarten Mothers As- Attended by 700 parents and educators in the Hotel Pennsylvania, the meeting heard recommendations from several speakers that nursery schools were important as NEW YORK. e now to paint and paper the house, equip it with better furniture and build a playground out of a mud- dy, weed-ridden plot right in front, so that the children can play outdoors under supervision instead of having to go several blocks to a park where they are not under the watchful eye of their nurse. Between 800 and 900 women are now working in the plant, some on day shift, 8 a.m. to 6 p.m., and the rest on night shift, 8 p.m. to 6 a.m. Women with children are given preference for day shift, as it has not yet been found necessary or practical to keep the nursery open later than 8 p.m. Children put to sleep in the evening should be able to sleep right through, and as yet the demand has not reached the point where very many women with children have been called out. if, of course, women on the day shift have to work late, as is sometimes the case, to catch up with urgent orders, the nursery is kept open. for their children until they leave, usually about 10 p:m. or a little later. Wursery hours are usually from 8 in the morning to 8 at night. HILDREN from 2 to 6 years old are accepted in the nursery if their mothers work in B.C. Packers Imperial cannery. They are left there when the plant opens in the morning, given a morning snack of fruit or a sandwich pro- vided by the mothers and collect- ed at noon for lunch, which is either packed at home or obtained at the company cafeteria, where a good hot meal of meat and vege- tables can be obtained for about 10 cents. After lunch they go back to the nursery for more games and a short nap. Mid-afternoon snacks provided by the company, hot chocolate, cocoa or milk, and then home with mother at quitting time, unless she happens to be working late, when another meal can be obtained at the cafeteria. Expert medical supervision is supplied to all children in the nur- Sery every day by Mrs. Elizabeth Jeffries, public health nurse at the cannery. Every child is exam- ined carefully each morning by Mrs. Jeffries, who checks up to see if they have any indication of cold, sore throat, or spots, so that adequate precautions can be taken to protect the other children from infection. Many more women could enter industry, releasing men now employed for the armed forces and essential war industries, af nurseries were established ander government direction. Wo special training is required for supervisor of a nursery such as this, Mrs. Jeffries felt, so long as it is someone intelligent and able to keep a cool head in any emergencies that might arise. Se HE value of such an enterprise in improved morale and peace of mind of a woman working in the plant is inestimable. She no longer has to worry if her toddler, left outside with slightly older children, has fallen off the dock, or has been run over by a truck or interurban — the BCHlectric Marpole-Steyveston line ends by the plant and children would play all over the car rails, in complete disregard of their danger. More women have also been released for work. Many for the first time in years have been able to earn a decent wage, at the same time knowing that while they are able to do something to help in their country’s war effort in- directly. Their children are be- ing adequately looked after, in fact, probably receiving better medical supervision than is usu- ally the case in the average home, where a doctor is often not con- sulted unless the child shows marked symptoms of something “serious.” Take, for example, the case of one woman now working at the plant who is separated from her husband. She has two children, and the only allowance she had been able to obtain was $20 a month, insufficient to keep them. As soon as she heard the nurs- ery was open, she brought the children down and went right to work, earning a decent wage. She is now able to build a much bet- ter home and life for herself and the children. e HERE are undoubtedly many instances like this. There are thousands of women who would be only too glad to enter industry if day nurseries were made avail- able throughout Vancouver and district, not only in big industries, but in district centers where all kinds of women could take ad- vantage of them to do their share in helping to win the war, and not only in full-time paid jobs, but in voluntary Red Cross work, first aid, auxiliary nursing, ARP, fire watching, often impossible because of family ties. These jobs now have to be done by women and men who could otherwise be released for full-time work else- where. The weakness of day nurseries which cater only to one particular industry or plant, is vividly illu- strated by the Steveston nursery, open only to workers in the Im- perial Cannery. Down the road are two More canneries, run by other firms, also employing women, which have no nursery facilities. Children of women working in these canneries still have to run the streets if they are not lucky enough to have relatives to look after them, They are not allowed in the nursery already set up, al- though this could be extended and equipped to cope with a much larger number of children, @ UPERVISION and financing of such nurseries, to be fully ef- ficient and suitable, should be under federal government control, open to all women regardless of What industry they work in. The mere fact that women are needed in ‘non-essential’ civilian services proves that they are re leasing someone else for ‘essen- tial’ work, and so their children should have just as much atten- tion and care as the children of women who work directly in war industries: But until such government- sponsored nurseries are estab- lished throughout she country, small day nurseries such as the one at Steveston are helping to solve the problem, and are show- ing the way for much better things to come in the future.