'The Woman Who Toils' is a fascinating investigative journalism account conducted by two sisters, Bessie and Marie Van Vorst. In writing the book, they began an undercover investigation into women and child factory laborers by finding jobs in factories under aliases. Bessie worked in a plant in Perry, New York, a knitting mill near Buffalo, and a Pittsburgh pickle factory, among other places, using the name “Esther Kelly”. Marie Van Vorst found employment in a shoe factory in Lynn, Massachusetts, and a cotton mill in Columbia, South Carolina, under the alias “Bell Ballard”. In their book the Van Vorsts portrayed the troublesome working and living conditions they had observed, and their consequences for women and girls. Bessie appealed for a more compassionate attitude towards these employees. Van Vorst also noted that factory women enjoyed the independence afforded them by paid labor and therefore delayed marrying. “I never saw a baby nor heard of a baby while I was in town”, Van Vorst wrote after nearly three weeks spent in Perry. She also discussed sociability and the discipline of factory work as a dangerous alternative to family unity.
