Page:The Girl Who Earns Her Own Living (1909).djvu/145



girl with commercial ambition who has no knowledge of stenography, typewriting or bookkeeping, nor the time and funds to acquire it, should consider telephone operating. If she has adaptability, keen powers of observation, persistency, and the wisdom of secrecy concerning her employer's affairs, she will advance to a position of trust as rapidly by way of the telephone switchboard as by the stenographer's desk. Scores of women who have no knowledge of stenography or typewriting now hold positions of responsibility and draw good salaries. Other girls may do the same. The first important means toward this end is to secure a hearing and prove one's worth. The switchboard provides a business door easy to open, and one which may lead eventually to the innermost shrine.

In every city hundreds of girls preside over branch exchanges for the beggarly salary of five dollars a week. They are the same girls