{"id":97,"date":"2010-04-12T11:52:06","date_gmt":"2010-04-12T16:52:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.historicjoplin.org\/?p=97"},"modified":"2010-04-12T11:52:06","modified_gmt":"2010-04-12T16:52:06","slug":"life-as-a-hello-girl","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.historicjoplin.org\/?p=97","title":{"rendered":"Life as a Hello Girl"},"content":{"rendered":"

In 1910, the Joplin News-Herald<\/em> ran a story about the advantages of working as a \u201cHello Girl.\u201d The News-Herald<\/em> remarked that while it might not be fun to \u201csit up to a switchboard and come in contact with the varying dispositions of several hundred people each day\u201d there were \u201csome things about the work of the central girl at the Home Telephone company’s office in this city that probably come to no other working girls in town.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Hello<\/a>

Hello Girls operating the telephone board<\/p><\/div>\n

Despite hearing about \u201cheartless corporations\u201d the News-Herald<\/em> assured readers that this was not the case with the Home Telephone Company located in a building on Joplin Street.\u00a0 Since 1906, girls were treated to an on-site \u201cculinary department and lunch rooms.\u201d The News-Herald<\/em> reporter, unable to curb their enthusiasm, gushed, \u201cA lunch room and a kitchen in the telephone plant!\u201d On \u201cpleasant days\u201d a light lunch was served, but when the weather turned bad, regular dinners were served that were, \u201cequal to those of the best restaurants in town.\u201d Girls were guaranteed a free lunch twice a day.<\/p>\n

When the operators were at work on Thanksgiving, Christmas, and other holidays, the company served large dinners in the company dining room so that the girls could at least have a hot dinner during the holiday.\u00a0 Empty stomachs and \u201cimproper food\u201d, the company believed, could affect an employee’s disposition.\u00a0 Lunches and holiday meals meant, \u201ccongenial employment, pleasant surroundings, and the saving of considerable money in the course of a year.\u201d<\/p>\n

Even more astonishing, at least at this time in history, was the fact that the company also had \u201cbaths, individual lockers, and a rest room, or sitting room\u201d that was overseen by a \u201cregularly employed matron.\u201d Should a girl seem exhausted or ill, she would be sent to the rest room or home.\u00a0 Mrs. R.L.Whitsel, the company’s matron, was hailed as, \u201cexperienced and efficient.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"A<\/a>

This unnamed telephone operator from 1911 is representative of telephone operators of the time.<\/p><\/div>\n

If the weather was nasty, the company paid for closed carriages to pick up girls at their homes to bring them to the office.\u00a0 Once their shift was over, a carriage would transport the girl safely back to her home.\u00a0 The company’s management realized that \u201chealthy, happy, and well cared for girls are more likely to be cheerful and pleasant to their patrons and more prompt in service than girls who are overworked and neglected.\u201d Wet clothes were considered \u201chard on the disposition and health of the girls and the telephone company prefers to have its employees happy and cheerful, even if that means occasional bills for carriages.\u201d<\/p>\n

Given the number and types of jobs available in Joplin at the time, it appeared that if a young woman could secure a job as a Hello Girl, she found herself with a relatively comfortable means of income.\u00a0 It also represented a time period when society felt that young women deserved an extra amount of protection from the theoretical evils of the business world, where vicious characters lurked to take advantage of young, innocent women.\u00a0 Never the less, this legacy of care from the Victorian world seemed to offer some of the women of Joplin a safe and inviting place to work.<\/p>\n

Source: Joplin News Herald, 1910<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In 1910, the Joplin News-Herald ran a story about the advantages of working as a \u201cHello Girl.\u201d The News-Herald remarked that while it might not be fun to \u201csit up to a switchboard and come in contact with the varying dispositions of several hundred people each day\u201d there were \u201csome things about the work of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[167,168,328,378,52,169,31,8,11,141,166,379],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.historicjoplin.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.historicjoplin.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.historicjoplin.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.historicjoplin.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.historicjoplin.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=97"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.historicjoplin.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.historicjoplin.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=97"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.historicjoplin.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=97"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.historicjoplin.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=97"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}