Today in Labor History July 29, 1903: The first delegation from Mother Jones’ March of the Mill Children arrived at Teddy Roosevelt's summer home in Oyster Bay, Long Island. They went there to publicize the harsh conditions of child labor. Roosevelt wouldn’t allow them through the gates. In 1901, the millworkers in Pennsylvania went on strike. Many were young women and girls, demanding to be paid adult wages. At the time, fully one in every six American children was employed, generally at extremely low pay and often under dangerous conditions. Many of the kids had lost fingers or limbs. Mother Jones would go on to cofound the IWW, in 1905.
The march started in Philadelphia, on July 7. During the march, Mother Jones gave her famous “Wail of the Children” speech, which included the following lines:
“After a long and weary march… we are on our way to see President Roosevelt at Oyster Bay. We will ask him to recommend the passage of a bill by congress to protect children against the greed of the manufacturer. We want him to hear the wail of the children, who never have a chance to go to school, but work from ten to eleven hours a day in the textile mills of Philadelphia, weaving the carpets that he and you walk on, and the curtains and clothes of the people. In Georgia where children work day and night in the cotton mills, they have just passed a bill to protect song birds. What about the little children from whom all song is gone? The trouble is that the fellers in Washington don’t care. I saw them last winter pass three railroad bills in one hour, but when labor cries for aid for the little ones they turn their backs and will not listen to her. I asked a man in prison once how he happened to get there. He had stolen a pair of shoes. I told him that if he had stolen a railroad, he could be a United States Senator.”
In her autobiography, Mother Jones wrote the following about the march: “Every day little children came into Union Headquarters, some with their hands off, some with the thumb missing, some with their fingers off at the knuckle. They were stooped things, round shouldered and skinny. Many of them were not over ten years of age, the state law prohibited their working before they were twelve years of age.
It wasn’t just in mills, either. Children worked on farms, in factories, as servants in rich people’s homes, pretty much anywhere where they could do the work. They were often chosen over adults because they could be paid much less, and were less likely to demand rights, or to organize a strike. They could also do things with their small hands that adults were often less able to do well, particularly dangerous things, like unclogging gears and conveyor belts. I portray this in my novel, ANYWHERE BUT SCHUYLKILL. My protagonist, Mike Doyle, starts work in the coal breaker at age 12. However, many boys worked in breakers as young as 6. And many of them were missing fingers or hands. Many died young, too, from accidents.
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