The Generation Before: Child Labor at the Beginning of the 20th Century By William Joseph Lapham
There were several generations of Americans that came before the generation Tom Brokaw called “The Greatest Generation.� The generation that immediately proceeded the so called greatest generation endured incredible hardships to build and defend their young nation. This pamphlet highlights a few of the jobs children were forced to do before child labor laws protected them.
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Newsies
We were just kids tryin’ to make some money. Our folks came from the old country: England, Ireland and Italy. We didn’t know nothing about the hazards of cigarette smoke. Hell, everybody smoked cigarettes. Dint need no filters neither. Ma and Pa worked in the clothes factory downtown, we hardly ever seen ‘em. We ate, some. But mostly what we did was sell papers. Man would drop our packs of papers and we’d start peddlin’ before sunrise. Kep’ at it all day long. When somethin’ happened somewhere, we was out there tellin’ folks ‘bout it. I remember one time we were hollerin: “Extra, Extra! Read All About It! United States Declares War on Germany! Get Your Paper Here!"
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Powder Monkeys
In the days of sail, I was a powder monkey. We were young but strong as hell and fast, real fast. We carried powder bags up from the ship’s magazine to the gun crews on the firing line and we hustled our asses, too, we had races. We worked our tails off for next to no pay, but we ate, we ate a lot, I couldn’t hardly get enough to eat. The experience couldn’t’a been better, listening to sea stories and telling a few, stories of battles at sea, men and boys struggling ‘gainst tide and time, and those pissers on the other ships; I wouldn’t trade that for nothing. And when the battles were over we cleaned them cannon like the president hisself was comin’ to visit. You could shave in that shine, but don’t let me catch ya doin’ it. I’ll bust yer fuggin teeth and an’ you won’t have ta worry ‘bout ‘em anymore. 3
Greasers
Friction’s the enemy, y’see, simple physics, ther-mo-die-namics, heat. Friction causes heat and heat causes expansion and expansion causes all sorts of problems. So bearings need grease, lots of grease because without grease the heat generated from the friction of metal rubbing ‘gainst metal will cause bearings ta seize, lock solid, freeze. Rotation and torque and profits will drop to zero, any gauge will show it, you can see for yourself, and without that machine doing work, well, that’s money lost, plain as you have it. We hire kids to do the greasin’ because they don't cost much and they’re fast, even in the ‘Bama heat, and speed is money and the supply of kids is endless. Endless supply of kids. You make 'em and we'll break 'em.
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Breaker Boys
They call us Breaker Boys ‘cuz we break rocks from coal. We don’t go ta school or nothin an' we git paid 60 cent a day which ain’t bad for a lad a ten. Older boys caint do it on account dey too stiff an' we can jus’ lean over an’ pick the rocks off a conveyor belt dat runs under us an’ leave da coal. We got busted up hands, tored up fingers, an’ once in a while, a lad’ll git pult in an’ scream fer a bit til he gits keelt. We work, oh, ‘bout half a day but we git Sunday off and we cough in turch, an’ dat preacher he gits mad, but we cough dat black shit out an’ we spit on the floor. Black.
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Spinners
My name is Emily and I been a spinnah since I was eight. These machines is loud n' make my ears ring all night and I cough ‘cause the little threads get stuck in my throat. I go ta work in the dahk and I don’t come home til the sun goes down. When it’s nice outside I like to look out the windar. I’d like to go outside an’ play wi’ that little girl by those train tracks. I’d like to go to school n' learn ta read an’ write too, but momma needs the money I make here.
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Doffers
My mother died giving birth to me in her bedroom in 1898 – I was the youngest of eight kids. When I was eight years old, I started working as a doffer in a cotton mill; we made thread from raw cotton and the cotton fibers that blew off those machines made me cough everyday til I went to France in the Great War. The Germans used mustard gas and I inhaled some in a trench and like to cough up a fuckin' lung. I had a hell of a time finding a job in the ‘20’s on account of my coughing all the time. Government didn’t help us none, so I ran moonshine around road blocks until the stock market crashed in ‘29. I figured I’d be better off working on a farm on the Great Plains in the Depression, but that big dust storm hit us square on the blind side and the farm failed. I went to Detroit to build tanks figurin’ they’d need ‘em for the second war that was brewin' in Europe; that one, you pro’ly heard, was way worse than the first one. Anyway I was plumb tuckered out by the time I turned fifty and that’s when I died. I couldn’t breathe no more.
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