[Newspaper]
Publication: The Muncie Morning Star
Muncie, IN, United States
vol. 27, no. 58, p. 8, col. 4
MILLS TOO BUSY
FOR ANY IDLENESS
Muncie Industries to Give Brief
Vacations Owing to the
Rush of Work.
BALL BROS. CLOSE FRIDAY
Some Plants Will Rest Only One Week
and Many Will Operate Every
Day Without Stop.
Probably for a shorter period than for many years past the hum of industry in Muncie factories will cease this summer. A review of the score of Muncie Industries, aside from the regular two months’ respite of the glass workers, shows that the summer vacations for repairs are to be shorter, while in some not a day can be lost and there will be no idleness. In general the manufacturers report a year of prosperity. In many mills the output at products has been greater than ever before.
June 30, next Friday, is the day toward which hundreds of Muncie glass workers are looking. Scores of employes in the three Muncie factories operating will within a week or two be found in camps along the northern lakes or Hoosier streams. Others are looking forward to quiet rest at home.
At Ball Bros. Glass Manufacturing company’s factories about 1,300 men will forget their daily toil next Friday evening. About 500 will work during the entire summer, as the stamping works will operate continuously and a large force will continue to ship until late in the summer.
AT THE HEMINGRAY PLANT.
R. G. Hemingray states that two tanks in the Hemingray factories will be off when the fire goes out next Friday night. About 175 men will be free, while almost an equal number on a third tank and in the shipping department will work until later in the season.
The Boldt factory will also close Friday in the flint glass department, the white liner department having closed over two weeks ago owing to damage by wind storms, which is now being repaired.
Orders which have been received fix the date for the closing of the Midland steel plant on next Saturday. Officials state they can make no definite statement as to the duration of the shutdown. General repairs, however, have been ordered and it is expected that the big steel industry will not be idle for many weeks, especially in case of an early settlement of the wage scale. Four hundred men will be effected by the close.
NO TIME FOR IDLENESS.
Pushing ahead at its greatest capacity, the Indiana bridge plant is one of the Industries which cannot find time to allow a summer respite, even for removal to the new site southeast of the city, which is contemplated before 1906. C. M. Kimbrough states that four months' hard work ahead at present precludes any possibility of idleness during the summer unless in case of inability to secure steel, shipments of which are slow. Even this, however, is improbable.
At the Hickson bedstead factory in West side the foundry fires will burn low next Saturday and for a week over 200 employes will be idle, with the exception of a small force which will be employed in making repairs in a general way.
The same number of men and women employes at the Ontario silverware works will he idle during the first week in July. Leo S. Ganter, secretary of the company, states that the date for the semi-annual shut-down is the week of July 2. General repairs will be made.
WORK FOR EVERY DAY.
Elmer Whiteley, of the Whiteley Malleable Castings company, states that their plant will be operated during the entire summer with no shut-down. The rush of work will keep the force of 400 men at work continuously and the thorough repairs made last summer will preclude the need of additional work of the kind this year.
The American rolling mill corporation's plant will also probably continue in operation full blast during the entire summer. Local officials state that in their opinion no shut-down, with the possible exception of temporary periods of partial idleness of a day or two necessitated by breakage of machinery, will occur.
Officials of the Pioneer Pole and Shaft company's local plant, the Muncie bending works, state that as yet no shut-down is contemplated and will not be ordered unless necessitated later in the summer by the need of repairs.
Kitselman Bros., wire fence manufacturers, state that in all probability neither of their two factories will be idle during the summer except on July 4 and Labor day. "If business rushes as it is at present," said Mr. Roe Kitselman last evening, "well run right along. Our Boyceton shops have just been started after a shut-down for repairs and the Council street factory positively will run continuously through the summer."