The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1896-12-11
TRADES THAT KILL.
PATTON COMPAR ED WITH
OTHERS.
Miseries of Lead Workers-SOme Die
In Four Months From the Effects
of the Poisonous Fumes-Natch-
makers Contract Terrible MaIa-
dies.

Considerable attention is being given
the various trades and occupations
which are said to jeopardiZe the health
and lives of the workers. And some
appalling facts have been discovered.
| but it is doubtful if these will lead to
remedial legislation, for the victims
| are the poor and the ignorant, who are
quite as much opposed to the invesu-
gators as are the oppresSors them
selves Living always upon the verge
/ of starvation as their forefathers did
for generations before them, these I'M
fortunates regard the investigators as
meddling monsters who would de-
stroy their only means of earning
bread for themselves and their chill
dren They are content to work and
die, as their fathers and mothers did,
and as their children will do.
But while England certainly heads
the list as a nation with killing occu-
pations, the same conditions exist here,
but in a much less aggravated form
And there is no remedy unless the
demands of commerce be arrested, and
to make that possible the whole ma
chinery of the world must be re-
adjusted.
In round figures. there are 100000
wage-earners in England employed in
killing or health destroying occupa-
tons, and quite as many in this coun-
try, owing to the similarity of the in
duStries.
It would seem that the making of
dynamite should be a more hazardous
calling than the making of hats, but
carefully gathered statistics show that
for one death of a dynamite worker
there are ten of hatmakers. In fact,
the dynamite trade is not classed
among deadly occupations. In the max
ing of hats a, fine lint is thrown off
which works its way day by day into
the lungs of the workman, producing
in time a variety of maladies, and
each one of them a life shortener.
NINE YEARS OF LIFE.
Hat making is trivial. however. TO
the trade of manufacturing chlorine
Gas. 1t has been shown that if a per-
fectly healthy man follows this occu-
patton for nine years he will be a.
corpse. Nine years is the maximum, !
the minimum three months. This gas
is extensively used for bleaching and /
dyeing, and in the making emits /
heavy greenish vapOr. This poison,
entering the lungs of the workman, !
soon brings on a racking cough, in /
flaming the lung cells and eating away !
the tissues and generally ending IN /
death.
Ice factories are common enough /
throughout the country, but 1t is not |
generally known that ten years is the
limit set by physicians for man VINO
works in one of these places. In the
hot summer days. when the tempera-
ture is among the COS, the men in an
ice factory are working in place as
cold as the polar regions, muffied up
in overcoats and ear muffS, and wear !
ing heavily padded gloves. Even then
they suffer from cold; yet when the
days work is over they swelter like
the rest of humanity. These extreme
changes soon weaken the system, and
or consumption is the ulti-
mate end.
Much publicity was recently given
to the fact that the Gould brothers
had insisted upon the girls employed
in their matchmaking factories hav-
ing their teeth filed. The girls OBJ
they had appreciated the full danger
Of their calling they would have done
otherwise. After three years of con-
labor, the average match
maker, from the poison given off, con-
tracts a loathsome disease which takes
hold of the bones of the body. The
bones most quickly affected are those
of the jaw and face, and in time these
crumble away, leaving the worker
hideouS spectacle.
REAL WHITE SLAVES.
The lead workers of Newcastle. En-
gland, are the most to be pitied. They
are genuine white slaves, and the fact
that so per cent of them are women
makes their lives the harder. Death is
a common occurrence among these
women. and the death Is due directly
to the effects of working over the lead.
A recent case was one which hap
pened on the day member of the in
vestigation committee reached New
castle The victim was a 19-vear-old
girl named Elizabeth Ryan. She had
worked as a white Lead woman only
four months. Her duty was to carry
from the tanks in which the white
lead - mixed into a haste with water
to the stoves, or hot chambers, in
" hich it is dried. three dishes of the
lead, each weighing "a pounds, or Y
pounds in all. These are carried on
the head. and the work is continuous
Il hours p day.
When she had been at this work four
months the girl fell down on the floor
IF the factory one morning foaming at
the mouth and tearing her hair. She
was carried to the workhouse, and the ]
only entry made in the register was
.Elizab beth Ryaa-lead poisoning" ON
The second day there is another entry: :