Evening Republican, Volume 17, Number 202, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 25 August 1913 — DOWRY FOR BRIDE [ARTICLE]

DOWRY FOR BRIDE

British Postoffice Provides for Girls Who Wed. Upward of 14,000 Are Entitled to Participate in the Government’s Generosity—The Year’s Gratuities , Will Reach £28,500. London.—When Mr. Herbert Samuel, the postmaster general, presented his estimates to the house of commons recently he told how the postoffice had shared during the last year in the general prosperity of the country,- and how he hoped to make a profit In the coming /ear of £5,860,000. He also told about oversea cables, imperial wireless communication, the telephone amalgamation and underground telegraphs; but he did not make any* mention of the part that Cupid plays in the vast organization of which he is the head, and what the god of love costs the state every year. Every girl in the postoffice receives a dowry from the government when she gets married, the amouht varying, of course, according to her length of service. Last year the sum spent on such gratuities was no less than £25,000. On the establishment of the postoffice there are upward of 14,000 women; but a year or so ago there were at least 30,000 more filling what Is called “unestablished” situations (some of them employed only for a portion of the day). Since the National Telephone company’s system was transferred to the state, however, a great many more females have become - government servants, and as that evidently means more marriages the sum estimated for dowries for 1913-14 has been increased to £21,500. Hundreds of G. P. O. girls get married every year. And why shouldn’t they? In 1907, for instance, the postmaster general’s report says that the number of women who “retired on marriage’’ was 329, with an average service of nine years. In 1909 the marriage market was brisker, for no fewer than 413 women, with an average age of twen-ty-eight years, quitted ttye service of the postoffice to become wives and mothers. v ' The distribution of the marriage dowries is welcomed by nobody so much as by the postal staff themselves; for, although the women get the money, the members of the male staff so often marry postoffice women that the interest in the government “nest egg" becomes mutual. By a strange coincidence this is borne out by what has just happened in Dundee. There the postal authorities have discovered a novel method of coping with the seasonal pressure at various offices in the country districts. Most of the married women in the city who had served as telegraphists in their spinsterhood have been invited by the postmaster to rejoin the staff during the summer months, and asking what remuneration they would' expect for their services. Many of these ex-of-ficials are the wives of the present telegraphists at Dundee, and, although the master has been treated with more levity than seriousness, it has been asked in postal circles whether this unique proposal is to *be regarded as an “admission that the remuneration of the male telegraphists is not sufficient to meet the expenses entailed in supporting a household.” The postmaster general may have to answer the question to the house of commons.