Muncie men argue for boy labor

MUNCIE MEN ARGUE

FOR LABOR OF BOYS

Give Law Makers Evidence as

to Their Necessity in Glass

Factories.

COULD ALWAYS USE MORE

Messrs. Ball and Hemengray

Appear Before Joint Commit­tee

of Indiana Legislators.

Indianapolis, Ind., Jan. 31. — Indiana glass manufacturers representing a weekly pay roll of $80,000, were given a hearing at a joint meeting of the house and senate committee on labor today to register their objections to Senator Hugg's child labor bill.

The "glass men" have found several objectionable features in this bill. Their principal contention, however, is that the bill will prevent boys under 16 years of age from working in the glass factories at night.

The big glass concerns in the gas belt employ what they call two "shifts," each set of men and boys working eight hours and a half.

The manufacturers declare they will not be able to run their factories with­out the aid of boys. "And we cannot get on without running at night." said Ralph Hemengray [sic] Hemingray, a Muncie manufacturer.

"We have tried men." he added, "and singularly enough, men cannot do this work as well as lads. At no time this year have we had all the help we could use. There seems to be a shortage of boys."

Is it due to race suicide?" asked Senator Hugg.

Mr. Hemengray [sic] Hemingray said that notwith­standing statements to the contrary he knew of no more healthful occupation for man or boy then to be employed in a glass factory. Boys in his establishment, he said, earned from 80 cents cents to $1.25 a day.

Edward Ball, another Muncie glass manufacturer, said: "It is very difficult to get labor at this time and we are compelled to employ children. But we have to work them at night part of the time. We were compelled to dis­mantle a glass plant we had in Illinois because of labor conditions. In Illinois night, work for children is prohibited and it is tending to drive factories out of the sttate [sic] state."

OTHER EVIDENCE

George A. H. Shideler, a glass man­ufacturer of Marion, talked along simil­ar lines. He said that a boy coming to one of the Indiana glass factories will earn $3 a day after his first year and when he has worked four years he is paid a journeyman's wages, being able to earn from $6 to $9 a day as a glass blower.

John L. Thompson, the head of the Thompson bottle works of Gas City, urged the committee to do nothing that would have a tendency to injure the glass industry. "We are now on a per­manent basis," he said. "The gas is gone, but the glass men are here to stay."

Larz Whitcomb, representing the Manufacturers' association of Indiana, objected to the feature of the bill that prevents boys and girls from working more than nine hours a day.

C. P. Smith, a representative of the Indiana Federation of Labor, defended the bill. "I know that you men repre­sent dollars," he said, addressing himself to the glass manufacturers at the start. "Special stress has been laid on the dollar side of the question here to­day. The organization I am here to represent in inspired by a higher pur­pose, I hope."

Mr. Smith maintained that the glass manufacturers can find men to take the places of the children they employ. The place for the child is not in the factory," he declared, "this place is in the home or at school or out where he can enjoy God’s beautiful sunlight.

Daniel H. McAbee, head of the state department of inspection, who is seek­ing to have the child labor bill enacted into a law, closed the discussion. He made an appeal for the little cash girl who is compelled to work Satur­day nights.