Kathleen Butler, Godmother of the bridge

KATHLEEN BUTLER
———
GODMOTHER OF THE
BRIDGE
———
Clever Girl in Designer's Office
Helps in Gigantic Undertaking
———
If the worn-out term, "the weaker
sex," meant that women are intellectually
inferior to man in brain possibilities,
Miss Kathleen Butler, secretary and clerk
to Mr. J. J. C. Bradfield, the bridge de-
signer, would put the argument all askew.
Mr. Bradfield is the father of the
bridge, but Miss Butler is the godmother.

MISS KATHLEEN BUTLER. Help
MISS KATHLEEN BUTLER.
and in a special paper he has issued on
the subject, Mr. Bradfield states that he
has not the slightest hesitation in saying
that it would be impossible for a better
arranged specification to have been pre-
pared in any office. Mr. Bradfield
drafted the specifications, but Miss But-
ler did the rest.
Whilst her chief was abroad she dealt
with all matters in relation to the ten-
ders, she replied to the shoals of
laborious correspondence, and prepared
the very complete information supplied
She has helped to build it, and Mr. Brad-
field most gracefully acknowledged her
aid in an address he delivered during the
week.
Miss Butler arranged all the specifi-
cations on which tenders for the bridge
have been, and still are being, called,
to the Legislative Council and Assembly,
which was largely responsible for the
Act reaching finality.
Miss Butler dealt with all phases of
the big undertaking — wages, manufacture,
prices and general expenses. An idea
of her task can be gained by the realisa-
tion of the fact that the building of the
bridge is the gigantic matter of a
£5,000,000 contract.
This is what Mr. A. E. Ellis, the
manager of the Pittsburgh (U.S.A.)
Testing Laboratory declares in a letter,
recently received by Mr. Bradfield. Mr.
Ellis is unknown personally to the de-
signer of the bridge :
We have made a complete study of the plans
and specifications covering the construction of the
cantilever bridge across Sydney Harbor, and we
wish to take this opportunity of complimenting
you on being the author of what seems to us
to be a more complete and comprehensive speci-
fication than any we have thus far encountered
in our experience of inspecting large bridges.
A structure manufactured and erected in com-
pliance with these specifications would result, in
our opinion, in a very high type of bridge.
Miss Butler joined the Public Service
when a mere child in 1910. She was edu-
cated at the Mount Victoria Public
School, and later at Mount St. Mary's
Convent, Katoomba. As a typiste and
stenographer she is a marvel. In the
light of an arithmetician and all-round
business girl, her name is Miss Efficiency.