Child Labor in Greater Boston: 1880-1920
5/5
()
About this ebook
Related to Child Labor in Greater Boston
Related ebooks
Roxbury Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsWest Central Georgia in Vintage Postcards Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5England's Other Cathedrals Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFour Great Americans Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSomerville Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5Tenting On The Plains OR General Custer In Kansas And Texas Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBoston's Orange Line Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMakers and Romance of Alabama History Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsI See Lincoln's Underpants: The Surprising Times Underwear (And the People Wearing Them) made History Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsClay: The History and Evolution of Humankind’s Relationship with Earth’s Most Primal Element Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Weaverville Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLest We Forget: The Sisters of Providence of St.Mary-of-the-Woods in Civil War Service Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsIndependence Hall in American Memory Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Tecumseh:: The First Century Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBirmingham Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Jamaica Plain Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsOld Joliet Prison: When Convicts Wore Stripes Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLiving the Dream: The Contested History of Martin Luther King Jr. Day Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBoston in Motion Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe American-British Artist Benjamin West: A Short Biography Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsNovanglus Essays Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsUp From Slavery Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Architect John D. Parkinson: Eternally Elevating the Los Angeles Skyline Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsCaptain John Smith: A Select Edition of His Writings Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5When Lincoln Met Wisconsin’S Nightingale: Cordelia Harvey’S Campaign for Civil War Soldier Care Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsA Hundred Acres of America: The Geography of Jewish American Literary History Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsHistory of the Byzantine Empire Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Joy of Life Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsRoad Through Midnight: A Civil Rights Memorial Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Amarillo's Historic Wolflin District Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5
Travel For You
Fodor's Bucket List USA: From the Epic to the Eccentric, 500+ Ultimate Experiences Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsNortheast Treasure Hunter's Gem & Mineral Guide (5th Edition): Where and How to Dig, Pan and Mine Your Own Gems and Minerals Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsPacific Coast Highway: Traveler's Guide Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFodor's The Complete Guide to the National Parks of the West: with the Best Scenic Road Trips Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFodor's Best Road Trips in the USA: 50 Epic Trips Across All 50 States Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Lonely Planet The Travel Book: A Journey Through Every Country in the World Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Fodor’s Alaska Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Lonely Planet Mexico Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Fodor's New Orleans Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Lonely Planet Maine & Acadia National Park Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5South: Shackleton's Endurance Expedition Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Lost Towns of North Georgia Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsCool Japan Guide: Fun in the Land of Manga, Lucky Cats and Ramen Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5RV Hacks: 400+ Ways to Make Life on the Road Easier, Safer, and More Fun! Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSpotting Danger Before It Spots You: Build Situational Awareness To Stay Safe Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Spanish Verbs - Conjugations Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFodor's Bucket List Europe: From the Epic to the Eccentric, 500+ Ultimate Experiences Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDisney Declassified Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/550 Great American Places: Essential Historic Sites Across the U.S. Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge: Traveler's Guide to Batuu Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Time Traveler's Guide to Medieval England: A Handbook for Visitors to the Fourteenth Century Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Fodor's Nova Scotia & Atlantic Canada: With New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island & Newfoundland Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Longest Way Home: One Man's Quest for the Courage to Settle Down Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Nashville Eats: Hot Chicken, Buttermilk Biscuits, and 100 More Southern Recipes from Music City Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Let's Build A Camper Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Reviews for Child Labor in Greater Boston
2 ratings1 review
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Short but sobering book that makes me feel very sympathetic for the bootblacks, factory workers, cranberry pickers, scavengers and the other much-too-young laborers in these vintage pictures. One minor flaw is that some of the captions duplicate text either from the chapter introductions or previous photos. It's more than offset, however, by the insights into the children's working conditions and the general picture of the industries that used to be so important in the Boston area.
Book preview
Child Labor in Greater Boston - Chaim M. Rosenberg
library.
INTRODUCTION
In 1630, John Winthrop led a fleet of 14 ships of sail with 840 passengers of various crafts and professions, some of whom were from the west of England; but the greatest part from the vicinity of London,
to settle the Massachusetts colony. A number of the settlers made their way up the Charles River to Charlestown, where they found several wigwams, a few English people, and one house with an old planter, who could speak the Indian language . . . they landed their goods at a well watered place . . . and here began to build a town,
Winthrop’s city upon a hill. From the earliest days of European settlement, children were expected to help their parents with the chores in the home and on the farm. Boston, as the capital of the Massachusetts colony, reached a population of 4,000 people in 1675 and 15,520 people by the year 1765.
The American industrial revolution began early in the 19th century, with cotton textiles made in factories powered by the flow of the Charles and Merrimack Rivers. Boston grew rapidly as the financial center and port of imports and exports. In his speech before the US House of Representatives on April 26, 1820, Sen. Henry Clay of Kentucky recounted his visit to the Boston Manufacturing Company in Waltham. Clay stated that it was better for children to be working than see them idle. Outside the House of Representatives were crowds of little mendicant boys and girls [who] assail us every day . . . as we come and go out, begging for a cent. [If they] were employed in some manufacturing establishment, it would be better for them.
In 1825, the senate of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts recorded that children in factories worked 12 or 13 hours each day, excepting the Sabbath, which leaves them little opportunity for daily instruction, [keeping them in] ignorance to all other concerns.
It was necessary to set up schools for the education of the laboring classes in the practical Arts & Sciences.
Seth Luther was one of the early American labor reformers and a champion of the downtrodden child. In 1833, he published the passionate Address to the Working Men of New England. If Henry Clay returned to the region, wrote Seth Luther, We could show him some of the prisons of New England, called cotton mills. Instead of rosy cheeks, the pale, sickly, haggard countenance of the ragged child, haggard from worse than their slavish confinement in the cotton mills . . . The child is taken from his bed at four in the morning and plunged into cold water to drive away his slumbers and prepare him for the labors of the mill.
To Seth Luther, American industry was following the pattern long established in Britain, where children of very tender ages are compelled to work in mills for 12 to 14 hours, with only 30 minutes for all meals.
In 1833, claimed Luther, of 57,000 persons employed in the cotton and wool mills of America, 31,044 are under 16 years of age, and 6,060 are under the age of 12 years.
The mill owners made great profits while the poor must work or starve . . . 13 hours actual labor is required each day, it is impossible to attend to education among children.
Luther demanded that children work only
10 hours a day and that they attend school.
By 1845, Boston’s population of 114,366 was largely of old Massachusetts stock. Lemuel Shattuck prepared the Census of Boston for the Year 1845. He divided the population of Boston into three classes. The Dependent Class was under 15 years of age—one third of the population—because they are dependent on others for support.
The Productive Class (aged 15 to 60) contained 60 percent of the total population, which did the work, while the small Aged Class (over 60 years) no longer worked. With epidemics and poverty rampant, early deaths were common. Four out of 10 children died before reaching five years of age. After finishing school, girls from well-off families did not work but stayed at home until they married. Less fortunate girls found employment in the textile mills or as domestic servants. Boston’s census for 1845 recorded 5,706 domestics (4,984 females and 722 males) serving in Boston homes.
The Irish came before the Civil War, the girls and women to work as domestic servants and the men as unskilled laborers. Until 1880, Boston was still a walking city, with most of its residents living within two miles of the state house. During the 40 years after 1880, many thousands of Eastern and Southern European immigrants arrived, and the population of the city more than doubled to 748,060. Railroads and streetcars linked Boston with its suburbs and with the surrounding towns. The wealthy and the middle classes took advantage of rapid transportation to move away from the crowded city center. Residential communities sprang up around the railroad stations. People built their homes in the suburbs and nearby towns along the new streets that carried the electric streetcars. By 1920, the Boston metropolitan region had a population of nearly two million.
At the height of immigration, 4 out of 10 Boston residents were foreign born. As unskilled workers, manual laborers, or tailors, they occupied the lowest levels of the social and economic ladder. Driven from their native lands by poverty and political turmoil, the immigrants gravitated to the old Boston neighborhoods such as the South, North, and West Ends, making Boston an increasingly poor