The weekly examiner., 1901-04-27
CONSIDER THE WORKERS.
Do You Who Buy Things Ever Think of Those Who Make Themf

Do You Who Buy Things Ever Think
 of Those Who Make Themf
 The absolute ignorance of the people who buy things about the conditions that prevail in the homes and shops of the people who make things will be the
 wonder of the less stupid generations of future years. Those of us who live in fine houses and touch electric bells
 for a living know more about the Greeks and Romans than we do about the living men and women who per form the useful work of the world.
 Many a wealthy man lives in a fools paradise. He is not willfully indifferent to the sufferings of others. He is only ignorant. AS he dictates to his stenog- rapher he does not, know that her mother is dying of consumption for lack of the railway fare to Colorado.
 She Is to him as much part of the of flee furniture as the telephone.
 He does not know that the paper up- on which his letters are written was made in Holyoke factory by half na- ked slaves who get 10 cents an hour.
 He does not know that his clothes
 were made in New York sweatshop and that little 5-year-old tots pulled out the bastings.
 He does not know that the chair he sits in was made by the women carpen- ters of Michigan, who toll among
 boards and shavings and whirling belts
 for $S week.
 He does not know that the glass out
 of which he sips his ice water was
 made by dying glass blower. killed
 by the unhealthy conditions of his trade.
 He does not know as he watches the curling smoke wreaths that his cigar was made by young Jewess who suf- fered from nicotine poisoning nor that the match with which he lit it was dip- ped by pretty Swede girl who died shortly afterward of "phossy jaw.'' When we look at a skyscraper, how many of us think of. the men who built it? How many of us have ever given ten minutes thought to the dangers which these structural iron workers have to face every day? No insurance company will take these men as risks on any terms. Their union is their only protection. When one of them is dis
 ab1ed, he receives $5 a week from his
 union, and in the event of his death
 his widow receives $75.
 There are so many accidents that the
 union cannot afford to pay more. As one of them said to me not long since
 '"The motto of our craft is, We do not die; we are killed.'"
 How few of us know the hardships endured by the men who dug the foun- dations for these skyscrapers! In Man haitian the piers or caissons on which
 our high buildings rest. are sunk from 60 to 130 feet beneath the surface. The
 "sand dogs" who do the digging work
 at the bottom of an iron shaft filled with compressed air. Every one of them suffers severely sooner or later from the terrific air pressure.
 They do not feel any evil effects while at work, but after they have reached the surface they frequently get what thew call the "bends. :" a sort of. tightening of the muscles, which is apt to leave them crippled. It gives them the most severe pain, and no doc tor has been found who can cope with it. Rheumatism is nothing in com parison with it. None but the most robust laborers can escape the 'sbends" and endure the compressed air work for as long as four or five years. When the shaft is 125 feet deep, the pressure is so great that the men cannot stand 1t longer than 45 minutes at a time. Two shifts, or 90 minutes, are counted as days work, for which they re- ceive $2.5O each, enough to pay for back seat at the opera. If all the members of the Albany legislature were compelled to do the work of the structural iron workers or the sand dogs'' for just one week, there would be the greatest boom in good labor legislation that this state has ever seen-Herbert N. Casson in New York Journal. .