The Hocking sentinel. [volume] (Logan, Ohio) 1871-1906, 1897-05-20
A PROFIT ON BIG FAMILIES.
MiII Operatives Find an Advantage
in Many Children.

in Many Children.
The cable dispatches telling OF the
proposal of the French government to
offer premiums for large families, hop
ing by this inducement to restore the
native population to its size of quar-
ter of century ago, merely broach, as
something novel, a system which has
for reasons not of statecraft, but mere
ly personal, long been in operation IN
Eastern Connecticut.
In the mills, which are to be found
wherever in this hilly portion Of the
State there is water power, the work
ers are French Canadians. Big mills,
with their hundreds and even thou
sands of operatives, are numerous, and
little mills, each employing from twen-
ty to thirty to 100 to 200 workers Of
both sexes are tucked down between
the hills in all sorts of possible and
seemingly impossible spots.
In the large mills is to be found
sprinkling of women of other nationali-
ties. but fully 80 per cent. are French.
In the smaller mills there are practi-
cally none but French wOrkmen.
What surprises the visitor who has
come out of a New England city like
Hartford or New Haven to see how
cotton and woolen goods are made is
the number of children in the factories.
Should this visitor ask the superin-
tendent of small mill to point out the
children of one family he will name
half a dozen in the room in which he
happens to be; indicate another on the
stairs and four or five in the various
wOrkrOOms.
The father and mother may or may
not be workers in the factory. If the
family is large enough the mother Is
the housekeeper, and the Onerous duty
of the father is to escort his offspring
to and from work. He goes to the
mill with them in the morning and
knows that they are all inside the gate
chinery. At noon he conveys them
home to dinner and back to the fac
tory. At night he may come to take
them home, but this is not an impera-
tive duty. On pay day he comes to
the factory and draws the wages Of all
OF them.
A mile from Dayville. and about five
miles from this city, is factory from
which man, who can neither read nor
write, draws over 800 month for the
labor Of his children. The size of the
family is indicated by an extract from
the factory books showing that the
children earn from 81 to S4.50 week.
This Frenchman is merely one of
many who have found profit in large
family. He is now making hay while
the sun shines. and in a few years he
will retire TO a farm in Canada, with
from 81 600 to $4,000 in his canvas bag.
There he will live, a nabOb among his
people, the remainder of his life.
This child farming is but one act Of
the drama of French factory life. The
years during which all the children
work and the father draws the wages
are necessarily few. The fund for a
fife of ease must be made quickly. The
female child. which at IA is the source
of greatest profit, is ready to marry
one of her own class at 16, and she does
so promptly. The new husband and
wife will work Oh in the mill for the
next five years, with occasional inter-
ruptions when there are additions to
the family. and then they vanish. They
have gathered their savings and gone
to Canada to raise family. They
make no fuss about the matter. 1t is
the regular thing. Ten years later, or
even sooner, they will be back with n
big string of boys and girls to earn
money for them; they will gather the
profits and retire tor life to the Cana
dian farm, as their fathers and moth
ers did.
1t is noticeable of late years that the
operatives are more in haste to be rich
than formerly. They rush back to the
factories with smaller families than
were common twenty years ago. In
deed. it is rarely now that families OF
more than thirteen are found, and few
in the factory tenements exceed ten in
number-New York Times.