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American economist From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Amy Hewes (September 8, 1877 – March 25, 1970) was an American economist, "a pioneer in introducing the minimum wage to the United States",[1] who taught at Mount Holyoke College from 1905 to 1943.
Amy Hewes | |
|---|---|
Amy Hewes, from the 1910 Mount Holyoke College yearbook | |
| Born | September 8, 1877 Baltimore, Maryland |
| Died | March 25, 1970 Ossining, New York |
| Occupation(s) | Economist, college professor |
| Known for | taught at Mount Holyoke College from 1905 to 1943 |
Amy Hewes was born in Baltimore, Maryland, the daughter of Edwin Hewes and Martha G. Hewes.[2] Her birth was registered with the Baltimore Monthly Meeting of Friends. She earned a bachelor's degree at Goucher College in 1897. She earned a master's degree at the University of Berlin in 1900, and completed doctoral studies in sociology at the University of Chicago in 1903,[3][4] with a dissertation titled "The Part of Invention in the Social Process."[5] Along with the Wisconsin school, the Chicago School of sociology is very influential in the academic history of disciplinary sociology and between 1892-1920 Hewes was the only woman student awarded a fellowship in the sociology department[6] However, Albion W. Small, department chair in sociology at Chicago, would recommend her not for a position in sociology or cognate disciplines but as a language instructor of German: "political science--civics, constitutional and diplomatic history, elementary economics and sociology--or something within hailing distance of these I should not hesitate--but German is a sight too wide of the mark", she wrote to Small, clarifying her choice to decline this job in a letter.[7]
Hewes taught at Mount Holyoke College from 1905 to 1943; she was promoted to the rank of professor in 1909. Among her students at Mount Holyoke were Ella Grasso, governor of Connecticut, who considered Hewes a mentor.[8] She also taught at the Bryn Mawr Summer School for Women Workers.[9][10] From 1943 to 1947, she was visiting professor at Sarah Lawrence College, University of Massachusetts, and Rockford College.[11] She also gave lectures on labor topics for community audiences.[12]
Hewes served as executive secretary of the Massachusetts Minimum Wage Commission from 1913 to 1915.[3] She also worked on national and international committees concerning minimum wage and wartime labor shortages.[13][14][15] She testified at a Senate hearing on labor education extension programs in 1948.[11] She received an award from the United States Department of Labor in 1962, "for furthering the lot of laborers throughout the U.S."[16]
Books by Hewes include Industrial Home Work (1915),[17] Women as Munition Makers: A Study of Conditions in Bridgeport, Connecticut (1917),[18][19] and The Contribution of Economics to Social Work (1930).[20] For the United States Women's Bureau, she authored the study, Women Workers in the Third Year of the Depression (1933).[21] She also directed a published student study, Women Workers and Family Support (1925).[22] In addition to five books, she wrote over forty publications[6] in major academic journals[23] including American Economic Review,[24] Journal of Political Economy,[25] Monthly Labor Review,[26] Social Service Review,[27] American Journal of Sociology,[28] and Current History.[29]
Hewes lived with other Mount Holyoke faculty in South Hadley, Massachusetts, including fellow economist Alzada Comstock.[30] She died in 1970, aged 92 years, at a nursing home in Ossining, New York.[31][7]
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