The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1890-02-24
THE CLOTHES PIN BUSINESS.
Interesting Facts and Figures O,
the Industry.
NEW York SUM-


hndt, hy chinineddy, oudtm During
desultory walk about the city the other
day the writer was more than ever struck
with this triple shod truth.
For instance, there's the common,
everyday clothes pin-the reliable old
bisected clothes pin Of our mothers,
which no man has ever been able to inn
prove on any more than he has improved
upon the wheelbarrow or the old fash
Toned wooden rolling pin. Who would
imagine that there was anything about
the clothes pin that was worth finding
out? Nobody! But there is.
In his walk the writer was passing a
little grocery, where a box of clothes
pins was among the things displayed
outside.
How L..:::2h for clothes pins todayY'
he asked of the grocer.
'Four cents" was the reply.
"Four cents apiece?'
apiece! Great Hickory! no. Four
cents dozen."
"Ah-h-h! Are you a good judge of
clothes pins?"
'Shouh say so! I've made more than
a million of emp replied the storekeeper.
"Pve followed the clothes pin, sir, in all
| the processes of its evolution, from the
growing tree to the polishing box. Sayl"
exclaimed the dealer, in a sudden burst
of confidence and picking up a clothes
pin. ''To look at that pin you'd scarce
ly believe that the manufacturer could
make and sell twelve of them for cent,
and have profit of more than so per cent.
on them at that; now, would you?"
mot to look at it, 1 wouldn't"
But he can do it, SIR" exclaimed the
grocer He can do it. He can white
out clothes pins at the rate of eighty a
minute. How? Easy enough. All he's
got to do is to take his maple or birch
log and go to work. Say his log is ten
feet long and foot through. He won't
have to pay more than So for it. If he
pays any more than that he don't know
his business. That log will white I'D
into $4,000 clothes pins as certain as the
tree the log came from grew. 1t will
take the man two hours and half to
chew that log up into clothes pins, which
is at the rate of 1900 an hour. But when
they are all cut out they are worth S96. 40
to the maker. He will work ten hours
day, II he is smart, and will get away
with four of those logs. It's easy figur.
ing to find out that he will then have on
hand $4,000 clothes pins, worth 1886, go
if they're worth cent.
"The lumber for those pins has cost
only So, providing the man wasn't stuck
in buying it. Now, if that was all the
expense, man with clothes pin fac
tory would be a blamed sight better off
than if he owned coal mine But those
logs have to run the gauntlet of a good
deal of machinery before they are full
tedged clothes pins. A saw separates
the log into lengths of sixteen inches;
another one saws these blocks into
boards three-quarters of an inch thick;
third saw reduces the boards to strips
three-quarters of an inch square. These
little strips are pushed to a big wheel,
which hurries them to a gang of other
saws, where they are chopped into
clothes pin lengths quicker than sau-
sage machine can chop up pound of
beef.
"These lengths are carried by swift
moving belt to a machine that grabs
them and sets them in a lathe. The
lathe gives them their shape in the
twlnkling OF an eye and throws them to
the man, who feeds them to still another
saw, which moves backward and for
ward as if it were madden than snake.
This saw chews out the slot that the
washerwoman is to shove down over the
clothes ON the line one of these DAYS, and
the clothes pin is ready, all but kiln dry
ing and polishing. Kiln drying knocks
the sap out of the wood, and the polish
ing is done by letting the clothes pins
rub against themselves in revolving
iron cylinder.
All these processes cost money, and
when the manufacturer comes to put up
his goods for sale he finds that his profit
on the $4,000 pins, or days hard work,
is only about 1913. pay the manufac-
turer cent dozen, or about "a cents a
thousand, and, really, SIR am COM
PEELED in these tight times to sell them
for cents dozen, or 1886 thousand,
which wouldn't be SO bad if I sold
thousand every hour or so. But, with
care, thousand clothes pins will stay by
me for month or two, and L have even
had them with me whole year. Chi
nese cheap labor is pelting the life out Of
the clothes pin trade, for Ling Sing and
Wun Lung don't use clothes pins in their
laundries, and they're washing about all
the clothes that are washed, it seems to
me, nowadays. How manyedozen shall
/ do you up, sir?'
"Half dozen'll do said'the reporter,
and the man looked disappointed as he
counted them out.