Men hate us until they don’t have us. In 1902, after the Second Boer War, the soldiers left in South Africa settled down only to realize that there wasn’t enough woman folk to go around.
On November 14, 1902, the following report was published along with an image showing how many women were needed in each area.
WOMEN NEEDED IN AFRICA
When the British and Boers were fighting across the rolling veldt of South Africa that country needed men, fighting men. Now that peace has been publicly proclaimed South Africa needs women. For women are scarce in the Transvaal. They are so manifestly in demand that employers find great difficulty in supplying themselves with feminine help. They have tried the experiment of importing young women, but the experiment has not proved entirely satisfactory because there is a general tendency in the Boer country towards matrimony. There are in South Africa today thousands of available young men who are ready and anxious to sacrifice themselves for their country.
Employers who have secured lady clerks, typists, shop girls, and general servants from England and other countries have become weary of seeing them leave their services for matrimony. Source
