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SUBWAY NEWSGIRLS MAY STRIKE.

Threatened with Increased Hours and Have “Kids” as Rivals.

Subway newsgirls threaten to “walk out” of the tunnel in a body if the decree for a twelve-hour day, instead of one of nine or ten, goes into effect, as reported, on March 1. Thus far, however, the report has received little or no confirmation.

Newsgirls on the downtown side have been in the habit of reporting for duty at 7 o’clock in the morning, but have had three hours off from 9 to 12.  This by courtesy was called the “luncheon hour.”

Now, however, they are asked, it is said, to report at 7:30 o’clock in the morning and remain on duty until 7:30 at night, taking their luncheon with them and eating it at their posts.

While no formal or organized effort has been made among the girls to strike, the individual feeling is that they have a distinct grievance.

Moreover, newsboys have invaded their ranks, usurping the positions of their co-workers.  More than that, these “kids,” as the girls contemptuously term them, get more money than they.  While the girls received $6 a week, the boys, it is declared, get as much as $8, in instances.

“One of the managers told me to-day, as one of those who have been here longest,” a girl who runs a stand at an uptown station told a Tribune reporter, “that he had heard we had a newsgirls’ union.  I told him I knew nothing about such a union as he described.  Will I stand for a twelve hour day?  Well, I guess not.  What do you think I’m made of?  On the uptown side the girls’ hours generally are from 9 to 7, with half an hour for luncheon.  On the downtown side they work from 7:30 a. m. until 7:30 p. m., but are free between 9 and 12.  Now, I hear we are all to work for twelve hours.  If it’s true, we won’t stand for it!  No, sir!”

“Some of the ‘kids,’” said her girl partner, “get only $4.50 a week but others, at Fulton-st., I have heard, make as much as $8.”

Other girls voiced substantially the same grievance, and there seems little doubt that only a spark is needed to explode the magazine.

Artemas Ward, of Ward & Gow, the advertising agents for the news company, said to a Tribune reporter last night: “I have not heard of this matter except through the press. That is all I have to say.”