The Women’s Employment Society was founded in Morristown, New Jersey in 1872. The Society incorporated in 1886 and was founded with the intention of supplementing the income of women in the Morristown area who could not leave their homes to work. As such, the Women’s Employment Society, through their home sewing program, worked with women living in poverty, with low or no income, and with disabilities and illnesses.
The most noted of the Society’s work in these records is with Morristown Memorial Hospital, as the Society sewed custom items such as towels, operation sheets, bed sheets, gauze pads, and slings for hospital use. The Society entered into a contract for these services with Morristown Memorial Hospital on January 6, 1955, and the contract lasted until December 17, 1979.
The Women’s Employment Society advertised itself both in print and on the radio. Its motto was “Help Others to Help Themselves,” and during its partnership with Morristown Memorial Hospital, the Society provided upwards of ten thousand articles of sewing annually. After the partnership with the Hospital ended, the Women’s Employment Society gradually dissolved.
The records of the Women’s Employment Society date from 1877 to 1980. They include minutes from both general member and board member meetings of the Society, correspondence between Society members and each other, as well as business partners and attorneys, brief financial records, press materials about the Society, and business information such as price lists.
The collection is arranged into six series: Meeting Records, Administrative Papers, Legal Papers, Publications, Press Materials, and Photographs. The records are arranged alphabetically by year.
Series I: Meeting records, 1877-1977. The records of and pertaining to the organization’s meetings are in this series through written minutes of regular and annual meetings from 1877-1974; written minutes of Board of Manager meetings from 1959-1977; and special resolutions passed by the organization from 1966-1970.
Series II: Administrative Papers, 1879-1979. This series includes records pertinent to the administrative duties and actions of the organization. Documents in this series include member lists from 1952-1954 and 1966; lists of board members from 1957-1966; the organization president’s annual reports from 1879-1967; the organization’s bylaws as of 1956; sewing instructions for members as of 1955 and 1961; price lists for the organization’s goods and services from 1972; banking records between 1954-1969; correspondence between some of the organization’s members between 1959-1979; correspondence between the organization and Morristown Memorial Hospital from 1955-1974; and correspondence between the organization and the State of New Jersey in 1954. These documents all attest to the functions fulfilled by the organization.
Series III: Legal Papers, 1959-1976. This series contains correspondence with attorneys regarding legal proceedings to secure a grant for the Women’s Employment Society from the Women’s Work and Art Exchange from 1961-1976, and the will of Elizabeth N. Little first written in 1959 with addendums through 1969.
Series IV: Publications, 1925. This series includes a book written by the Great Grandson of Dr. Lewis Condict, the original owner of the Women's club house.
Series V: Press Materials, 1949-1980. This series consists of press releases by the Society between 1949-ca. 1960 and articles published about the Society in The Hellbox, a newsletter for the Morris Community Chest, and MemoScope, a newsmagazine issued by Morristown Memorial Hospital from 1950, then 1977-1980.
Series VI: Photographs. Two photographs of women sewing, ca.1950.
This collection is open for research under the conditions set forth in the North Jersey History and Genealogy Center archives access policy. All archival material should be handled with care and kept in its original order; notes may only be taken in pencil or with a computer, and food and drink are prohibited in the Reading Room. Records may be copied for scholarly or personal research using the edge scanner or a digital camera without flash; however, researchers must obtain copyright permission prior to publishing material from the collection.
Women’s Employment Society Records, 1877 – 1980. North Jersey History and Genealogy Center, Morristown and Morris Township Library.
Processed and described by Maeve Forde, Intern, February 2017. Encoded by Jeffrey V. Moy, April 2017.