The record-union., 1896-12-15
BROOKLYN SWBATSHOPS.
Work Given Only to Ladies'" at StarVa-
ton prices.
How First-Class Manufacturer Se-
cures Embroidered Shawls
and Sacks.

it's most respectable neighborhoods.
Though conducted with great respecta-
bility it pays wages which will hardly
compare with the sweatshops in the
poorer districts of New York, against
which so much has been said and writ
ten.
This shop does not appeal to the
sympathies, as do those in which half
starved women and children work and
suffer for their daily bread, for there
is an unwritten law that only ladies"
need apply for work They do apply
in large numbers. It Is to some ex-
tent because Of the poor pay ladies will
accept, for a bare pittance Of pin mon
ey, students of sociology say, that the
misery and vice and wreatchedness of
the lower class of sweatshops remains
what 1t Is.
In the case In point in Brooklyn, a
woman, living in Quincy street, has
been giving out embroidery for years
to women in comfortable homes who
will do it for inconceivably low prices.
On Tuesday Of each week they call for
it, and return 1t completed the follow
ing Tuesday. The work consists chiefly
Of infants flannel shawls and sacks
For the shawls from 81 % to So a dozen
is given, and for the sacks from 81 %
to 50 a dozen. The materials are fur
nished. The simplest Of these shawls
are made OF flannel an inch short Of
seven -eighths Of a yard square. The
work done on them is solid embroid-
cry. On these simplest shawls there
IS an indented line Of scallops to be
worked around the four sides. In one
corner is a large design, which runs
half way UP the shawl, when it is fold
ed cornerwise. In this design Is large
flower, leaves, buds, and dots. In the
opposite corner is a smaller cornerpiece,
the flower being omitted, the leaves,
buds and dots to be embroidered.
This Is all solid work, and for one
shawl the worker is paid less than 101a
cents There is a proportionate in
crease of work on the shawls for which
higher prices are paid. The work must
be we'll done or it will MOI be accepted.
One woman, over 90 years old, who re-
Gently took home two shawls to en-
broider, Of variety for which Is cents
apiece is paid, worked three days to
finish one. When both were completed
and returned, she was told that for
only two shawls but % cents would
be paid. The little sacks must be
sewed together in the body, the seams
opened and feather-stitc on the
right side, and a pattern-not a simple
scallop-worked entirely around the
body of the garment, the sleeve at the
wrist, apd the collar.
There are enough women engaged in
embroidering sacks to keep three women
constantly at work finishing them. Fiji
teen dozen and more Of the sacks and Of
the shawls are sent weekly to the
wholesale manufacturer for whom the
work is done. 1t is necessary to cut out
| the scalloped edge of all the work sent
in-in itself no small task
The woman who has charge of this
work does not pretend that a living is
go be made from It. If people want
pocket money, they can get it, she says,
and she has people who have worked
| for her for years. She has paid some
of them she says, as much as S4 a week
| She acknowledges that they are Won
derful workers. One is a Cuban woman
and the mother of a family. She has
worked for eleven and half years.
| But she is a marvel with her needle.
| She must be to embroider three shawls
in day. Other women have worked
for nine years, and there are among the
workers women 60, 20, even one sc
years old. They are said to love the
| work
| 1t is hard for any one who under
stands embroidery to believe that the
most expert workwoman could en-
broider more than one Of even the cheap
er shawls, with the least elaborate
patterns, in less than a day of from ten
to twelve hours. Expert workers say
that it cannot be done. For one shawl,
the product OF one days hard work,
from 1012 to 10 cents is paid.
The Brooklyn woman sweater works
for frst-class wholesale manufac-
! turer. She intends to give the work
only to people in comfortable homes.
She knows it is not possible to live on
the money she pays. Some of her work
ers really need the money for clothes, If
they are not obliged to work for their
daily bread. There are plenty of
women, she says, to take all the work
she can give out.-New York Times.