As a worker in the factories for years and as an organizer of working women for five or six years, as one who has come in contact with the working wo… - Pauline Newman

A working woman is a human being, with a heart, with desires, with aspirations, with ideas and ideals, and when we think of food and shelter we merely think of the actual necessities to cover her body and to feed her. But what about the other things? Have we thought of providing her with books, with money for amusements, and when I speak of amusements I do not speak of the five cent picture shows, I speak of amusements that a girl should go to — a good drama or refined vaudeville — few think about that. Have you thought about a girl providing herself with a good room that had plenty of air, proper ventilation, in a somewhat decent neighborhood. Do you think of all these things when we speak of a minimum wage? Do you want a girl to have a nice comfortable room?

I also recall that on Sunday morning when we didn't have to go to the shop, we went to lectures. A man called Hugh Pentacost lectured at a place on Sixth Avenue and Forty-Second Street, named Merit Hall. It's no longer there. We would come at eleven o'clock, and Mr. Pentacost would lecture on current events. He was an excellent speaker. He was, as I remember, a philosophical anarchist, and we really didn't discuss his philosophy at all. We would take up current events. We were very much interested in that, and we would go there just as religious people would go to synagogue. We would go there every Sunday except on Sundays that we had to work in the shops.

Some of us got to know about the Socialist Literary Society on the East Side of New York, East Broadway. It was chiefly a young men's club, but some of the young ladies wanted to join...I remember the hot debates that went on at the Socialist Literary Society whether to admit women, and finally the women won out. They voted to admit women, so...We joined the Socialist Literary Society, and there, really, we obtained what we could in the way of education, especially with English literature. The club was very fortunate in obtaining the services of Dr. Henry Newman, no relation of mine, but who was a professor of literature at City College of New York. I think he still is with the Brooklyn Ethical Cultural Society. He was a magnificent teacher. I don't think there are many who can surpass his interest in the students and in the people who came to his classes. And I, personally, shall never forget his kindness and attention. I remember he was teaching us English literature, giving us an idea of what George Eliot and Thackeray and Dickens were about. And he would ask questions to find out whether we really got his point... He was terribly interested in my reading, and I still remember his kindness and attention, because he was a great help to me. Lord knows what I might have read if it weren't for him.