In this transparency we see a young girl working in a textile
factory. This was a common form of work for children since their
nimble fingers made it easier for them to thread the spinning machines.
- • Immigrants took jobs that most native-born
Americans refused to do, such as working in textile factories,
stockyards, coal mines, and steel mills. Unskilled workers,
the bulk of whom were the "new immigrants," were
normally paid 10 cents an hour, or $5.50 a week. Children,
of course, made barely half of that. In 1910, the average
work week for a factory employee was about 55 hours, though
12-, 14-, and even 16-hour workdays were not uncommon,
even for children.
- • Many of the occupations in which immigrants
worked were highly dangerous. Between 1880 and 1900, over
35,000 workers were killed on the job—an average of
one every two days. Occupational diseases, such as "black
lung" in coal miners and "white lung" in
textile mill workers, were not seen as the responsibility
of the employer. When workers became ill, compensation
was rarely provided.
- • In 1905, 10- and 11-year-old boys worked
in the coal mines of eastern Pennsylvania. Most of these
boys were "breakers," which meant that they sat
on boards over a chute from which tons of coal poured;
their job was to pick out the stone and slate from the
coal. Ten hours of this work a day exhausted most of the
boys—they became round-shouldered and their growth
was stunted. But what the boys feared most was losing their
balance as they stood on the narrow board, and falling
into the chute where they would easily be crushed by new
loads of coal crashing down the chute.
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