INSIDE FACTS ABOUT THE "GOOD OLD TIMES."
Stephen A. Knight, an Aged Cotton Manufacturer,
Tells of Work and Wages
Seventy Years Ago.
The more deeply one looks into the conditions of life in the "good old times" the more likely is he to find reason for exclaiming, "Thank Heaven, I live in the Now!" Life held out comparatively little for the American working man three-quarters of a century ago. Wages were very small, education was exceedingly hard to obtain, and the comforts of life were few in comparison with the present time.
At the recent meeting of the National Association of Cotton Manufacturers, in Boston, Stephen A. Knight, of Providence, a former president of the association, gave his reminiscences of old-time mill work. Mr. Knight began as a bobbin boy in a mill at Coventry, Rhode Island, in 1835. After the lapse of seventy years he says:
My work was to put in the roving on a pair of mules containing two hundred and fifty-six spindles. It required three hands—a spinner, a fore side piecer, and a back boy—to keep that pair of mules in operation. The spinner who worked alongside of me died about two years ago at the age of one hundred and three, an evidence that all do not die young who spend their early life in a cotton-mill. I am hoping to go one better.
The running time for that mill, on an average, was about fourteen hours per day. In the summer months we went in as early as we could see, worked about an hour and a half, and then had a half-hour for breakfast. At twelve o'clock we had another half-hour for dinner, and then we worked until the stars were out.
From September 20 until March 20 we went to work at five o'clock in the morning and came out at eight o'clock at night, having the same hours for meals as in the summer-time.
For my services I was allowed forty-two cents per week, which, being analyzed, was seven cents per day, or one-half cent per hour.