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Sheltered Workshop ECAUSE so many Women's Institutes B are interested in their County Homes and in the problems of age and aging, it seems in order to pass along these observa- tions of a sheltered workshop and what it can mean to an older person to have some work to do, to earn a little and to have comâ€" panionship for at least part of every day in- stead of sitting idle and alone, perhaps steadily breaking down both physically and mentally. This workshop was started by the Women‘s Patriotic League in 1914 to provide a centre where older or handicapped women could work at sewing for the Red Cross or making such toys as rag dolls which had formerly been imported from Germany. The shop is now operated under Provincial Charter by a Board of thirty women. The building is a large house in Toronto made from two rooming houses to give several large sunny workrooms. a kitchenâ€"for the women who come here to work are given a good. hot dinner at noon. :1 dining~room with a piano in one corner so that there can be music and singing in the recreation period after the noon meal and an office for the director, Mrs. Henrietta Kirkness. The third floor is an apartment rented continuously as a residence. The work program is carried on under pro- fessional supervisors and includes making drapes and slip covers, quilting. re-covering ciderdowns. dressmaking alterations and all kinds of mending. Most of the orders come from individual customers; the dressmaking alterations are done for both individuals and women‘s dress shops. There is a steady supply of contracts in less skilled workâ€"folding cir- culars. filling envelopes. stringing price tags. Payment to the women for this work ranges from two to five dollars a day according to the skill required and includes the noon dinner and a coffee break. They work from nine to four. five days a week, a staff of about eighty women. With a few donations from publicrspirited citizens the enterprise is self-supporting. A second shop on a smaller scale is quarâ€" tered in a church basement under the direcâ€" tion of Mrs. Mary Agnew. Both men and women work here. They do only such work as folding and mailing circulars‘ stapling the pages of booklets. No sewing is undertaken; One 01 lhe greal sulisfoclions of age is havino lhing interesting to do. but they are experimenting in making 1' articles for sale. And they help to pa: pcnscs by taking care of the church. While these “sheltered” workshops are i care of themselves financially their real pOse is not economic: they exist for the li ness and well-being of the people they They were set up to provide daytime for needy women fifty years old or helping them to maintain their indepem and their self respect. These women coull measure up to employment outside a tcred shop. Some are in their eighties. are disabled in one way or another. have been referred to the shop as alcoh or psychiatric cases. In the friendly at: phere of the place. with work to absorb interest. with a sympathetic director to tail they take on a “new lease of life.” The) (My. how they sing!); they play cards or - or "visit" in their rest period. Best ol they make friends. It all adds up to a torn therapy that wards off senilin and gin purpose to the days. For many reasons a sheltered workshoi“ the scale of this one is practical only I fairly large centre. But is it possible that 5' phase of the work might be workable 1. small town, perhaps under the sponsorshil‘ ‘ the Senior Citizens’ Club with its fair Plot tion of sixty to scventy-year-old retired I‘ 1‘ and women as capable as they have L " been to handle such a projectâ€"if it is neet ‘ And the Women‘s Institute might give 3: assistanceâ€"Ethel Chapman.