The Warner weekly sun. (Warner, Brown Co., Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1885, 1885-04-17
overworked Children.

New Jersey has a child labor law
which forhids the employment in man
~ufactories of boys under II years Of
age and girls under IA, and also pro-
vides that no child under IA shall be
employed more than sixty hours a
week. Last July an amendment to
the law wens into effect. This says
that no child between IL and Is shall
be employed in any mandatory un-
less such child shall have attended
school for twelve weeks within one
year Immediately preceding the M
ployment. The annual report of Law
renee L. Fell, the inspector of facto-
ries and workshops, has just been
made.
There are eight thousand factories
in the state, employing about fifteen
thousands youths and children. When
the educational section of the law went
into operation hundreds of children
who could not show that they had at
tended school were turned out of the
shops. They or their guardians made
application for permits for them to
work, and during the rest of the year
the inspectors were largely engaged
In considering those cases. Through
these examinations the inspectors dis
covered startling facts concerning the
ignorance of the children.
The average age at which they went
to work was 8 years, after one or
two years of schooling. All of them
had been accustomed to work ten
hours a day, and many of them even
fnnrfonn hn,,~a Thoco 49, -
ed the shops the earliest in life were
the punest and the most ignorant.
Some of them were set at work al so
tender an age that they could not tell
when they began. The weekly wages
OF the children do not average So.
Many of the children often complain
that they DO not have a full dinner
hour, and when doing overtime they
got only fifteen or thirty minutes for
supper. A girl under 15 years was
found by Inspector Fell working at 10
o'clock at night in a factory where the
temperature was over 100 degrees.
After her thirteen hours and a half
OF toll she had to walk two miles be-
fore reaching home.
The vast majority of the children
Schhob spun NOIuO III mOTG budu OU6
syllable, and many cannot spell at
all. They cannot answer the simplest
questions in geography. A girl of 10
years told "a inspector that Europe
was In the NOON. A few were found
who never heard of the sun, or moon,
or earth, and a large number who
could not tell where or when they were
born. A boy born in New York and
living in Paterson said that New York
was in Jersey and Jersey was in Pater-
son. This boy had been at WORK from
his 9Th year. IL was the opinion of
some that Europe was an ocean.
Ninety-fiVe per cent could answer no
questions about ether states or cities
of the United States. Children who
had been brought to this country be-
fore their 9th year, in some cases,
never heard the name of their native
country. Some children born in Hol-
land never heard of that country,
and some children born in Ireland
said that Ireland was in America.
Boys and girls who had been brought
to this country from Great Britain,
Ireland, and Germany, between the
ages of ~ and Is years, were better
educated and knew more about the
geography and history of America
than children born and reared in the
state.
Mr.. Fell says the work of the inspec.
tors has crowded day and night
schools, and he suggests that the state
provide more adequate school accom-
modations in every county. He also
recommends that a law be passed for
the protection of children employed
where the sale Of goods is carried on.
The present law applies to factories
UnlY.=Ne1O York Ga1n.