Analyzing Character Part 9

MISFITS IN THE PROFESSIONS

In the traditional educational system the common school is not particularly adapted to prepare its pupils for life, but rather to prepare them for either a high school or a preparatory school. Pa.s.sing on to the high school, the same condition prevails. The whole question in every high school and every preparatory school is whether the training will accredit one to certain colleges and universities. So the traditional high school graduate is not prepared for life; he is prepared for college or the university. He goes on to the university. There he finds that he is being prepared chiefly for four or five learned professions--the law, the ministry, medicine, engineering, and teaching. In the beginning, the university was supposed to train a man, not for work, but for leisure. The very word scholar means a man of leisure. People were trained, therefore, not for usefulness, but for show; not to earn their living in the world, but rather, their living having been provided for them by a thoughtful government or a kind-hearted parent, to present evidences of the fact. One of the chief of such evidences was the ability to go to a college or university and to take the time to learn a great deal of useless knowledge about dead languages, philosophies, and dry-as-dust sciences. While this is not true to so great an extent to-day, there is still much of the old tradition clinging about colleges and universities, and we are training men and women, not for commercial or industrial or agricultural lines, but rather, for the learned professions.

THE "WHITE COLLAR MAN"

In England and other European countries no man is held to be a gentleman who has ever earned his living by the work of his hands. No one is accredited with standing as an amateur athlete who has ever "lost caste"

in this way. While this caste feeling is not so strong in America as it is abroad, it still has a considerable influence upon parents and their children in the selection of a vocation. While one does not lose caste by doing manual labor, temporarily or as a makes.h.i.+ft, he suffers socially, in certain circles, who chooses deliberately a vocation which requires him to wear soiled clothing, to carry a plebeian dinner-pail, and to work hard with his hands. Because of this, many bricklayers, carpenters, blacksmiths, shoemakers, plasterers, plumbers, and other workers, ambitious socially for their sons, instead of teaching them trades in which they might excel and in which there might be an unrestricted future for them, train them for clerical and office work. Having felt the social handicap themselves, these men and their wives determine that their children shall belong to the cla.s.s which wears good clothes, has soft, white hands, and eats luncheon at a cafeteria--or from a paper parcel which can be respectably hidden in an inside coat pocket. And so there are armies of "white collar men" who would be healthier, wealthier, more useful, and happier if they wore overalls and jumpers.

The "typical" bank clerk is a good ill.u.s.tration. Pallid from long hours indoors, stooped from his concentration upon interminable columns of figures, dissatisfied, discontented, moving along painfully in a narrow groove, out of which there seems to be no way, underpaid, he is one of the tragedies of our commercial and financial age. While the section-hand may become a section boss, a roadmaster, a division superintendent, a general superintendent, a general manager, and, finally, the president of a railroad; while the stock boy becomes, eventually, a salesman, then a sales manager, and, finally, the head of the corporation; while apprentices to carpenters, bricklayers, and plumbers may become journeymen, and then contractors, and, finally, owners of big buildings; while the farmhand may become a farm owner, then a landlord, and, finally, perhaps, the president of a bank; while a workman in a factory handling a wheelbarrow may afterward become the president of the greatest corporation in the world, the clerk, toiling over his papers and his books, is almost inevitably sentenced to a lifetime of similar toil, with small opportunities for advancement before him.

There are men fitted by inheritance and training for clerical work and what lies beyond and above it. They are so const.i.tuted that they have the ability to take advantage of opportunities, to forge to the front from such a beginning, and to rise to commanding positions. But this is not true of the men who have apt.i.tudes which would make them successful in active work with their hands, and afterward with hand and brain. These men of inherent activity and skill of hand, men whose bones and muscles were made for work, whose whole nature calls for the out-of-doors, are doomed to stagnate, grow discontented, and finally lose hope, if compelled by pride or bad judgment to undertake the "white collar man's" job.

SOCIAL VALUE OF THE "WHITE COLLAR MAN"

Regarding the social deficiency of this cla.s.s of worker Martha Brensley Bruere and Robert W. Bruere, in their excellent book, "Increasing Home Efficiency," have the following to say:

"The output of their domestic factory so far is two sons able to earn living salaries, who are useful to the community undoubtedly, but as easy to replace if damaged as any other standard products that come a dozen to the box. They themselves didn't like the upper reaches of the artisan cla.s.s where they had spent their lives, so they boosted their sons till they could make a living by the sweat of their brains instead of the sweat of their brows. Society can use the Shaw boys, but is it profitable to produce them at the price? The money that made these boys into a clerk and a stenographer cost twenty years of their parents' brain and muscle. Mrs.

Shaw has bred the habit of saving into her own bones till now, when she might s.h.i.+ft the flatiron, the cook stove and the sewing machine from her shoulders, she can't let go the $10 a month her 'help' eats and wastes long enough to straighten up her spine. These two boys and a daughter still in the making have cost their father and mother twenty years, which Mr. Shaw sums up by saying:

"'So, you see, the final result of making up your mind to do a thing, including the great trouble of bringing up a family, is just getting down to the ground and grinding.'

"Isn't it just possible that society has lost as much in the parents as it has gained in the children? Couldn't we have got the same product some cheaper way? Or a better product by more efficient home management?"

WOMEN'S WORK

Perhaps the saddest of all the misfits are to be found amongst women, or it may be that their cases seem to us to be saddest because there are so many of them. Under the old-time regime there was but one vocation open to women--that of wife and mother. Regardless of apt.i.tudes, physical strength or weakness, personal likes or dislikes, all women were expected to marry and bear children, and to qualify successfully for a vocation which combined the duties of nursemaid, waitress, laundress, seamstress, baker, cook, governess, purchasing agent, diet.i.tian, accountant, and confectioner. In the early days of this country, in addition to these duties, women were also called upon to be butchers, sausage-makers, tailors, spinners, weavers, shoemakers, candle-makers, cheese-makers, soap-makers, dyers, gardeners, florists, shepherds, bee-keepers, poultry-keepers, brewers, picklers, bottlers, b.u.t.ter-makers, mil-liners, dressmakers, hatters, and first-aid physicians, surgeons and nurses. In more modern times, women have entered nearly all vocations. But even yet there is much prejudice against the woman who "descends" out of her traditional "sphere." The woman who is not a wife, mother, and house-keeper--or a domestic parasite, housekeeping by proxy--loses caste among the patricians. Many men and, on their behalf, their mothers and sisters, shudder at the sordid thought of marrying a girl who has been so base as to "work for her living." And so stenographers, clerks, accountants, saleswomen, factory workers, telephone operators, and all other women in the business world are about 99 per cent temporary workers.

Even in executive positions and in the professions, most women look upon wages and salaries as favoring breezes, necessary until they drop anchor in the haven of matrimony. And even those who most sincerely proclaim themselves wedded to their careers, in many instances, exercise their ancient privilege, change their minds, and give up all else for husband and home.

Every normal woman was intended by nature to marry. It is right that she should marry. She does not truly and fully live unless she does marry. She misses deep and true joy who is not happily married--and usually feels cheated. But the same may be said of every normal man. The difference is that, according to tradition, marriage is woman's career, while man may choose a life work according to his apt.i.tudes. Because of prejudice, however, it is rarely that the happily married woman makes a business or professional career. Husbands, except those who do so through necessity or those who are unafraid of convention, do not permit their wives to work outside of the home. Because of false pride, many men say: "I am the bread-winner. If I cannot support my wife as she should be supported, then I do not wish to marry." And so thousands of women sigh away their lives at work they hate while a hungry, sad world suffers for what they would love to do.

The waste of these misfits is threefold: First, the women lose the opportunity for service, profit, and enjoyment which should be theirs.

Second, the world loses the excellent services which they might render.

Third, oftentimes these women are very poor housekeepers. They simply have not the apt.i.tudes. Their husbands and their families suffer.

WOMEN WITHOUT HOMES

Another very large cla.s.s of misfits, and, perhaps, even more to be pitied than any other, is composed of the women who are compelled to earn a living in the business world, in the professional world, or elsewhere, whose true place is in the home. Many of these are unmarried, either because the right man has not presented himself, or because there are not enough really desirable men in the community to go around. Others are widows. Still others are women who have been deserted by their mates. Some of them are compelled to support their parents, brothers, and sisters, or even their husbands.

If traditional methods and courses of education miss the needs of many of our young men, what shall we say of conventional education for girls?

Well, to tell the truth, we do not know what to say. Educational experts, reformers, philosophers, investigators, and editors have spoken and written volumes on the subject. Women upon whom the different kinds of educational formulae have been tried have also written about it. Some of them have told tragic stories. There has been, and is, much controversy.

Some say one thing--some another--but what shall common sense say? After all, education is rather a simple problem--in its essentials. It means development--development of inborn talents. And education ought especially to develop the natural apt.i.tude of most of our girls for efficiency in home-making and child-rearing. Most young women enter upon the vocation of wifehood and motherhood practically without any training for these duties.

It is as unscientific to expect all women to be successful wives and mothers as it would be to expect all men to be successful farmers. It is as tragic to expect an untrained girl to be a successful wife and mother as it would be to expect an untrained boy to be a successful physician and surgeon.

EXECUTIVES AND DETAIL WORKERS

A very broad division of misfits is into those who are fitted to do detail work, trying to do executive work, and those who are natural-born executives compelled to do detail work. This is a very common cause of unfitness.

Some men love detail and can do it well. They naturally see the little things. Their minds are readily occupied with accuracy in what seem to others to be trifles, but which, taken together, make perfection. They are careful; they are dependable; they can be relied upon. Such people, however, do not have a ready grasp for large affairs. They cannot see things in their broader aspect. They are not qualified by nature to outline plans in general for other people to work out in detail. They are the men upon whom the world must depend for the careful working out of the little things so essential if the larger plans are to go through successfully.

On the other hand, there are some people who have no patience with details. They do not like them. They cannot attend to them. If depended upon for exact.i.tude and accuracy, they are broken reeds. They forget detail.

There are many executives holding important positions and making a sad failure of them because they are, by natural apt.i.tudes, excellent detail men but poor planners and executives. The following story ill.u.s.trates, perhaps, as well as anything we could present, the qualities of these overworked, busy, busy executives who have no right to be executives, but ought to be carrying out the plans of someone else:

HOW SOCRATIC HELPED BRAINERD BUILD BUSINESS

People sometimes bring their business troubles to a friend whom we shall call Socratic. And Socratic helps them out for a consideration. His time is valuable and he bought his wisdom at a high price.

Some months ago a pompous fellow dropped in. We recognized him as Brainerd, one of the leading business men of a small city. His story was this: He had built up a big enterprise during the pioneer boom days of easy money and negligible compet.i.tion. Now, when margins were closer, the pace hotter, and a half dozen keen fellows were scrambling for their shares of a trade he had formerly controlled jointly with one other conservative house, he found sales falling off and his profits dwindling to a minus quant.i.ty.

Socratic heard him through; then said: "I'll look your business over, tell you the troubles, and show you how to remedy them for one hundred dollars."

"Oh, I couldn't afford to pay that much, the way business is now,"

Brainerd objected.

"How much, then, do you figure it would be worth to you to have your sales and profits climb back to high-water mark?"

"Oh, that would be worth thousands of dollars, of course. But can you guarantee me any such results?"

KEEPING THE APPOINTMENT

"Well, if you carefully study over what I tell you, and faithfully follow my advice, and the results are not satisfactory, you need pay me nothing.

Is that agreeable?"

"Sure! If you can show me how to bring my profits back to normal, I'll gladly pay you two hundred."

"It's a go!" said Socratic. "Have the contract drawn up ready to sign when I call to begin my examination. When shall that be?"

"Well, let's see. I'm so all-fired busy it's hard to find time for anything. Say early next week sometime."

"All right. What day?"

"Oh, Tuesday or Wednesday."

"Tuesday will be satisfactory. What hour?"

"Well, some time in the forenoon, I guess."

"Ten o'clock be all right?"

"Yes, ten o'clock will do."

"Very well, I'll be there at ten sharp."

Tuesday morning, at ten sharp, Socratic stood by Brainerd's desk. Brainerd was working away like a busy little high-pressure hoisting-engine. He looked up with a bright smile.

"Oh, it's you, is it? Sorry, but I can't do anything for you to-day. I'm awfully up against it for time. Can't you drop in a little later in the week?"