National Republican., 1883-02-26

Of scientific journals, and all the leading
magazines. Here an evening drawing
school Is conducted by Prof LOOMS, grad
uatc of the New Haven Art school, and on
certain evenings weekly there is q sing
ing school in charc of Mr.. Parent, ono of
the clerks of the company. Tho evening
schools are taught by Mrs. Peck. When the
evening schools are not in session men who
wish to smoke use that room to smoke, play
chess, backgammon, &C., and the library
is full of readers every night. All the facili.
ties of the reading room, library, art and
singing classes, &c, are absolutely free to
employees of the company, who are also en-
couraged to avail themselves of them by sys-
tenn of annual rewards for progress in draw
ing, music, and general education. Every
YEAR the company hires the Willmantic
Opera house and provides an orchestra for
the singing classes TO give an entertainment
for the qualification of the employees. One
evidence of the purpose to make its people
| Intelligent is in company's notice, conspicu-
ously posted all through tho mills, TO the eff
feet that after July A. 1883, no person will be
employed there who cannot read and write.
| Another evidence that Is constantly before
the employees is in tho regular advancement
| to positions of responsibility, and at increased
wages of those who distinguish themselves
by mental activity and progress. Outsiders
arc not brought in to take good places that
become vacant, but the most capable men
Apmong the employees are advanced 10 them.
Particular attention has been given TO tho
| domiciliary arrangements for the families of
the employees. In the town proper, on the
north side of the Willimantic river, the com.
pany owns about sixty houses, which are
rented to employees exclusively. They are
plain, comfortable, but not handsome build
ings, aud do not admit Of much in the way of
improvement or decoration. The company
have fixed idea that by giving people pleas.
ant and beautiful surroundings they instinc-
lively become moro careful, cleanly, tasteful,
intelligent, and consequently more valuable
to their employers. So about two years since
they set to work erecting cottages for their
people over on pleasant half wooded tract on
the south side of the river, known AS "the
oaks" President Barrows's own house. an
odd and very pretty edifice of stone and brick,
in the Elizabethan cottage style, and that of
Mr.. Reid, chief of the dyeng department--a
charming residence of old English type-and
that of Senator Boss, the resident agent OF the
| company, an equally fine structure, are all
over there. The cottages of the working
people arc of three styles and sizes, but differ
in their colors. All are very pretty COM
modious, and surrounded in summer time by
charming gardens and lawns.
The company keeps gardener TO care for
tho many plants in mill No. and about tho
| grounds, and he Is instructed to supply the
people with all the cuttings he can make, and
they care for, from his plants also TO teach
them how to cultivate these. Then reward
Is offered every year by the company for tho
door yard that is handsomcst on the first of
September. All the cottages are supplied
| with gas and an ample service of pure water
from q reservoir on tho hill above them.
Among the oaks is pleasant picnic ground
and dancing pavilion, where every Satur-
afternoon and evening in summer time the
company supplies band for a concert by day
and dance at night. The rent of none Of
these cottages is higher than $40, and tho low
est is $3.50 month.
In the spring of 1870 tho company deter
| mined 10 erect new and larger mill than any
of tho three already used by the company.
On the first of April the ground where IL was
to stand was a rough pasture; in November
building, $50 feet long by Ia feet wide and
two stories high, of brick, iron, and glass,
covered the ground and the machinery in il
was Mt work, In the erection of the new mill
tho company's cherished purposes of educat-
ing the people, cultivating their artistic taste,
and making tho conditions of their labor as
pleasant rs possible, were kept constantly in
view. The walls were built so that the base
of every one of the huge windows should be
flower bed, and these were filed with thou
sands of plants bearing the most beautiful
foliage and bloom. Then the porches or great
Enclosures at tho several entrances in addi-
tion to being provided with numbered closet
spaces for the employees to hang their hats
and wraps, and being decorated with hand
some steel engravngs and Autographs nicely
framed under glass, were still further adorned
with large central beds ofearth, in which many
hne tropical plants are grown each with its
name clearly marked upon piece of wood
planted beside 1t. These attractive porches
have their practical uses, besides their orna-
mental and educational service.
Iu one of them, at 9:15 every work day, all
the younger employees of fourteen years or
| less have recess of half or three-quartcrs of
an hour from work. during which time they
are supplied with mugs of honest milk and
handfuls of crackers. IL is not the desire of
the company to employ girls and boys under
the age of fourteen, and they have only
forty.nine such employees among their 900;
| but the children's parents insist upon having
them employed all the time that the law does
not require that they shall attend school, and
as far as possible the company endeavors, by
inducing them 20 attend the evening schools,
to insure that their education shall not be
wholly neglected for their work. They all
stoutly declare that they are fourteen"
when questioned about their age, and earn
from $2 to $3.50 week each
1t was not simply to surround their people
with beauty that the flowers were provided
! by the company in the construction of the
walls of the new mill. To spin fine thread
successfully it is requisite that the atmos-
| phere shall be humid and of equally warm
| temperature. The warmth is easily secured,
but to secure the humidity has been more
difficult, and it used TO be said that only in
Scotland could suitable atmosphere be
found. The Willimantic company proves
| that by introducing water as n spray into the
air of the old mills tho desired end was
| attained. In the new one the flowers make
necessary just the desired atmospheric cOndi-
tions Ii takes 700 buckets of water q week
| to keep them ilOurishing, and the evapora-
| tiOn of that water gives just the right degree
of humidity constantly. The purity of the
atmosphere in this vast r0om whore $4,000
| spindes are now running-with space for
1900 more-is surprising TO any one who
has ever visited a cotton mill There is no
| iilaments Of cotton in the atmosphere. And
the girls tending the spindle3 seem to have
| instinctively brought themselves into har-
mony with the pure air, the flowers and
the beautiful cOlors from the stained glass
windows with which the sunlight 1ccks the
floor and walls. They are trim, neatly
dressed, clean, bright, and happy looking.
| One Of the noteworthy evidences of the
company's care for their people and the skill
with which they know how 10 apply it Is in
the power supply Of this mill. Instead of a
ponderous machine, with great belts and
drums and q wilderness of pulleys over
head, shutting Of light and air, and, worse
than all else, keeping the floor constantly
| jarring and shaking, are fast running engines
| in the basement making $50 revolutions a
minuto-equivalent to driving locomotive
with five and half feet driving wheels,
seventy miles an hour. All the shafting Is
under tho spinning room floor In q cement
bed. There Is not the slightest tremor In the