Clinch Valley news. [volume] (Jeffersonville, Va.) 18??-2019, 1894-04-27
KID GLOVE MAKING,
ONE TOWN IN FRANCE ALMOST
SUPPLIES THE WORLD.
Nearly Ton Million Kids Slain An
nuaiiy for the Grenoblo NIanu-
iactories-No Machinery Used;
It's All Hand Labor.

ohN MuCItNSI YOU 90
you are sure to find that the best
gloves are of French manufacture.
rms success is not due to u question
OF taste only, but to excellence of
Workmanship also. There is NOTHING
mechanical about glovemaking it is
all hand labor therefore, experienced
and skillful operatives are necessary
to produce good merchandise. But MS
Frenchmen do not like to leave their
homes 1T is the Belgians, the Germans
and the Italians who go abroad and
devote themselves to the production
OF ON inferior kind of goods for toilet
purposes in other countries.
AT Grenoble alone 1900, 600 dozen
pairs of gloves are manufactured an
nunlly. This represents value of
81, 600, 600 to $1,000, 900, and gives
employment to $4,000 workpeople of
both sexes. There arc 1000 men and
u, 700 women residing in rayon of
thirty-eight miles around Grenoblo
who live by this work. Glovemaking,
then, Is interesting from q social point
OF view, rs it is one of the few callings
open to female labor in which they
can earn respectable wages without
abandoning husbands, homes and lit
tie ones.
Only kids and lambs furnish glove
skins, tho first about ninety-fvo per
cent of the whole quantity. As re-
CARDS other animals, they have never
covered any persons hands, and when
you see the sign "dogskin gloves" to
designate certain kind for riding and
driving, accept my word for it that
tho merchant is taking advantage of
your blissful ignorance.
Kids must be killed when still at
milk, otherwise their skins are only fit
for making boots and shoes. Only
very small goats can, therefore, be
used, and from each skin not more
than three gloves can be obtained. To
produce the 1900, 600 dozen pairs that
Grenoble alone manufactures no fewer
than 5000, 900 bleating little victims
have to be killed yearly. The reason
why Grenoble takes the lead over nnv
other town in the glove industry is
less on account of the number of goats
reared whereabouts than it is to the
special Quality of the waters of that
city for dyeing the skins. Dauphiny
dyers have reached perfection in
coloring which cannot, perhaps, be
realized elsewhere. The current card
of glovemaker comprises 800 differ
ent tints, and everyday consumers de-
mand novelties which must be turned
out after any sort of sample.
Let us now go into the manufactor-
les and see tho different operations
necessary to make gloves, from tue
moment that the tanned skins arrive
all white from the leather dressers up
to their being sent out in soft tissue
paper to the wholesale houses. On
their arrival in factory the skins are
submitted to IN examination that is
very important. Employees look at
them one after the other, and decide
by the grain, the tineness and quality
of resistance what kind of color each
ought to receive, and it is ticketed ac-
cordingly.
Before this, though, it had been de-
cided whether the glove is to be
glazed or suede glove; for, though
these two sorts appear SO different to
the touch, they are, in fact, identical,
except that the first are worn lust as
the animal wore the skin-that is to
say, the exterior is the hairy side
while with the suede the skin is turned
and the hair, or Glover side," to use
term of the trade, is in contact with
the hand. The skins which were sent
IN tho 6vora ora raturna1 fo,. o,,4l:
Now they undergo a much more deli
cate sorting, this time by the foreman,
who decides how many gloves of this
or that side can be got out of each,
and they go to the workmen, who must
cut according to the measurements in
Dictated. Now the skin is in the hands
of the glover and is ready for the
"dolage." This is to shave the skin
with Il very sharp blade, SO as to give
it the minimum of thickness with the
maximum of fexibility. This is such
n delicate operation that, before pro-
ficiency can be obtained, at least two
years apprenticeship is required. The
most expert workmen cannot dole
more than six skins an hour.
The process adopted for glazed
gloves is exactly the reverse of that
for suedes; it is Us if in one case YOU
took piece of orange peel and com
menced to cut on the smooth or shiny
side, and in the other you started on
the tibruous side of the peeling. The
comparison is more exact by saving
that the solidity of the skin lessons by
diminishing it from the exterior to
sha interior. This is why productions
from South America are used for suede
gloves. Out on the prairies of Brazil
young goats run wild, and from the
day of their birth wander amcng
bushes, where their skins get scratched
so much as to render them useless for
glazed gloves; but they are more
solid, and what just now called the
"fbrous side" offers an envelope
which, sufficiently resisting, is quite
unlike that of the goat of this country.
You would perhaps think that some
men would be employed to do the
"dolage" only, and all others to do
IL