Hellraisers Journal – Friday February 19, 1909
New York, New York – Lewis Hine Speaks to Social Problems Club
From The Brooklyn Daily Eagle of February 15, 1909:
CHILDREN IN COTTON MILLS
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Lewis Hine Tells Social Problems Club
About Conditions in the South.
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Noon hour at Newberry Mills of South Carolina. All these children are working here. Witness, Sara R. Hine. —–
Before the Social Problems Club of the Young Women’s Christian Association, yesterday afternoon. Lewis Hine gave a lecture on the “Children in the Southern Cotton Mills.” The lecture was illustrated with lantern slides. Mr. Hine has worked in the Ohio valley and in the South investigating child-labor conditions. His camera has played an important part in his investigations, and the pictures shown yesterday were taken in mills of North and South Carolina and in Georgia. The speaker said that no little trouble is experienced with the superintendents and overseers of the factories in gaining admission and permission in take pictures. They are suspicious of all Northerners and are afraid that conditions existing in the mills will be exaggerated.
Grace and Lettie Harper work in Lydia Mills, Clinton, South Carolina. Witness Sara R. Hine. —–
Often when the very small children are found working in the mills the overseer will say that they just “happened in” and are not regulars, but the lecturer found that a great part of the work is done by those who just “happen in” The very young children are often not on the books of the mill, but they do their share of the work. The money they earn is put into the pay envelope of an older member of the family. In speaking of the living conditions of the majority of the people, Mr. Hine said that they were very bad. Some of the tiniest children, both boys and girls chew tobacco. The census of 1900 showed that 36 per cent. of the people above 10 years were illiterate. There is no compulsory education there. Mr. Hine said that the child-labor conditions may be changed by the parents doing more work and refusing to allow the children to work in the mills, but the only way in which the problem can be solved is by adequate legislation, backed up by adequate inspection.
Little spinner at Whitnel Cotton Mfg. Co. North Carolina. Working there one year, some at night. Out of 50 employees, ten children about her size. —–
The Social Problems Club extends a hearty invitation to all interested in the child-labor movement to attend the lecture to be given next Sunday on “Children in the Mines,” especially in the anthracite regions, by Owen Lovejoy, national secretary of the child-labor movement. The lecture on February 28 will be by Dr. John Haynes Holmes of New York, who will talk of the “Children in the Churches,” and what we do, do not do and could not do for the laboring classes.
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[Photographs, emphasis and paragraph break added.]
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