SIX WOMEN

New Zealand Listener, Volume 7, Issue 170, 25 September 1942, Page 14

SIX WOMEN

ANNE SCOTT-JAMES, in "London Calling," lists these six women as playing a great, creative part in Britain’s war effort. 1. Mrs. Winston Churchill Being a Prime Minister’s wife is one of the most exacting jobs in England. Mrs. Winston Churchill does it with indefatigable energy, unfailing taste and unforced goodwill. Mrs. Churchill does nowhere near as much independent work as, say, Mrs.

Roosevelt. She concentrates on helping her husband with his job-accompanying him everywhere, visiting bombed towns with him, listening to his speeches from the Gallery of the House of Commons. Last year, however, she undertook an important enterprise of her own by becoming Chairman of the "Aid to Russia" Fund, for which over £1,000,000 has already been raised. She is not the sort of chairman who gives tea-parties to discuss how a committee could be formed to consider how the fund should be started. 2. Dr. Edith Summerskill . A Member of Parliament, a practising physician, a wife and mother, an author, a public speaker and an ardent feminist. Dr. Summerskill has every feminist virtue. She is a witty competent speaker and a sure-fire organiser. At the end of 1941, after many rebuffs in her efforts to get women admitted to the Home Guard, she decided to form on her own a Women’s Home Defence Corps, a body of women volunteers who would learn to handle rifles, to read Army maps, and do liaison work. Her passion is women’s rights. The present relationship between men and women is, she says, unsatisfactory to the point of tragedy. Universities should be made to admit women on equal terms with men. Workers must be paid for the’ job, irrespective of sex. Women airraid victims must receive equal com-

pensation with men. Housewives must be paid a proportion of their husbands’ salaries as a legal right. She wants: A better deal for women. Family allowances. Improved health and maternity services for all. A fuller public knowledge of child welfare and planned families. And towards these her vigour and hard work have already accomplished much, 3. Blossom Miles She meant to be an actress. Instead, she learnt to fly and married her instructor, F. G. Miles, one of the most famous aero-designers in the country. Then she made a serious study of aircraft designing. In a remarkably short time she became a qualified engineer, and is now the only woman in England -probably in the world — who can design an aeroplane down to the last detail, Always a pioneer, she started recently the first training school for draughtswomen. The school takes in twenty girls at a time and trains them in aircraft designing. 4. Deborah Kerr Deborah Kerr is only twenty, but she has already starred in three serious films. After a small part beautifully executed in Major Barbara, she played the lead in Love on the Dole, Hatter’s Castle, and the new film about occupied Norway, The Day Will Dawn, She has a chance of being a top-rank actress. She has a modesty and seriousness that are rare on the screen — the same delicate touch characteristic of Joan Fontaine-but not of many others. 5. Dame Myra Hess It isn’t easy in a war to keep alive our sense of culture. Dame Myra Hess is one of the people working hardest for the arts-she is the organiser and inspiration of the now famous Lunch-time Concerts at the National Gallery. City workers, soldiers on leave, men and women from Whitehall offices pour in during the lunch-hour to listen. A special canteen is open on the spot so that they don’t have to go lunchless. The concerts kept going right through the blitz period, and it is recorded that when a time bomb exploded in the building the Stratton Quartet played on without a single false note. 6. Vera Lynn The final bouquet goes to Vera Lynn, who is entertaining the country in a very different way as the " Forces’ Sweetheart." It is by her voice and her sincerity that she moves a million stalwart hearts. ’ Troops are notoriously the most sentimental creatures in the world, and Vera Lynn is a warm, human ball of sentimentality. In a low, true voice that brings a sob to the throat and a catch to the heart she sings nostalgic, caressing — such as "Good-bye Heartaches," "That Lovely Week-end." And by so Vera Lynn provides entertainment for lonely homesick men.