AMERICAN FREE TRAINING SCHOOLS.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume IX, Issue 309, 15 September 1874, Page 2

AMERICAN FREE TRAINING SCHOOLS.

The Auckland Herald' says:— -We do not know whether our American cousins carry to an issue all the practical social problems they start. Recently we published an article from a New York journal in which was detailed the working of an institution started in that city wherein it was proposed to teach boys various trades in addition to the acquirement of the three " Rs." An equally unique institution lately founded in that city is described in recently received New York journals. It was founded in April, 1873, by a number of ladies who bad associated themselves together, with the laudable object of helping women to help themselves. To this end they established what they termed a Free Training School. In the first instance it was held in the private residence of Mrs Hodges, the chief promoter and the present manager of the undertaking; but the applications for admission became so numerou?, and it was found advisable to add so many fresh branches of instruction to those originally contemplated, that a large four storey building was rented in East Tenth" street, and here the operations of the society are being carried on with signal success. On the basement floor practical instruction is given in cookery; while in an adjacent reetaurnnt, which is open to the public, and constitutes a source of incomp, waitresses undergo a special training for their work. The first floor is occupied by a library, reading room, and class rooms. In the latter, phonography, writing, book keeping, and proof reading are taught twice a week by the ladies of the society, while those who are preparing to become governesses have opportuni ties afforded them for musical practice. On the second floor there are about 60 sewing machines, the use of which has been gratuitously furnished by the manufacturers' city agents, and here instruction is imparted in a'lthe var a ies of this kind of work. The third floor is set apart for laundry work; and in the fourth are dormitories for such girls as are homeless and friendless. Every respectable woman who is , desirous of being taught any branch cr , branches of labor, is taught free of charge, and as soon as she is qualified to earn her own living, work is procured for her, or she is placed in a situation. The New York Tribune, from which these particulars are derived, states that " duriug the past year over 3000 women have been trained and placed in situations. During that time the average daily attendance has been about fifty, and throughout there has always been a great demand for the women as they became competent in any branch, especially with regard to those who have prepared for household servants." Once a week evening receptions are held for the purpose of bringing together former and present pupils, when cheerful conversation, music, and short lectures on household management, the preservation of health, and the treatment of disease, and on kindred subjects, combine to render the meeting agreeable and attractive. One of the principal pianoforte manufacturers in New.York has lent the institution a fine piano, and the reading room is well supplied with books and papers. The ladies make it an inflexible rule to give no money except in return for honest labor, while a feeling of self-reliance and habits of industry are sedulously cultivated among "the pupils. The Melbourne Argus suggests that something of the kind, on a smaller scale, should be established in that city. There are plenty of people whoae tine and energies are now running to waste, and who fritter away more money on frivolous objects than would suffice to found such an institution and to keep it going; while all around ns is growing up a shiftless and thriftless female population, too proud to enter into domestic service, and too ignorant, of the simplest household duties to qualify them to become otherwise than a burden to the unfortunate working man who should be rash enough to marry any one of them. The same remarks will apply to other cities in the Australasian Group besides Melbourne.