The Montgomery advertiser., 1908-12-01


 all. were constructed at a cost Of | sl00.o00. and are 1t adornment for | mihfonaire's home. There are tub, | spray and needle baths. with soap and 1 towels but each is required to take at least two baths a week on the com pany's time. Cleanliness is preached as much for the sanitary welfare of the employe as 1t is for the perfec- ton of the manufactured product that they must handle The girls are furnished caps. aprons and sleeves that they may be neatly clad for the work without extra ex- pense to themselves. and chairs with backs and footstools are provided for all. There are classes in domestic science for the girls who wish them. and circulating library is main tained, the company sending to the city library for the books and being answerable for their care and for their return. There are $50 operatives and | office employees in all- in the plant. and these have established relief fund. This fund is maintained by small contribution rom each man | member and a smaller one from each girl every week. the sum being avail able for the use of any one who is | III. Needless to say. with industrial | conditions such as these in continual existence, the company has little trou- | ble in securing employees. There is no need here for the company to con itnue> its work in the homes of its employees as Is necessary in many oth- | CT factories as there are no congested districts for them to live in, and their | home life is above the average, be- | cause they represent group some I what above the average factory hand. Here is the first place in which electricity has been employed as a l cooking agency by large pmanufac- tory, the crackers, baked from the | shredded wheat, being passed on an endless belt through an electric cook, ing process, whereby as each bar is indented in the cracker current of l heat at 400 degrees Fahrenheit, Is imparted, and when the journey is nn- 1 ished, the triscuit is baked Electric ity plays an important part in the factory's existence, 800 horse power being required for various duties. The i electric sign over the building is said to be the largest in the world. Each letter in the sign is six feet high and to illuminate all the letters requires | 1,400 incandescent lights. It took B. 900 feet of wire for the electrical l wiring.
 The biscuit that are the company's largest product are not baked by electricity. They are placed on a | half an hour through an oven of even 1 temperature and are then finished in closed ovens, anthracite being the heat producing agent. One and a fourth million biscuits are made every day. the rule being to make no more if possible than the market demands, so the supply will remain fresh. It takes over 5000 bushels of wheat to make these. The wheat is brought into the building through an under ground tunnel and taken by elevators | to the top of the building. Then story by story, it is brought down, | through process after process, with machinery doing the lifting and carrying. endless chains going from story to story. so that the product is | rarely touched by human hands, and individual labor is minimized.
 After the wheat has been cleansed from dust and the debris that comes in even the best product of the mills, 1t is steamed in cylindrical wire cages for thirty minutes, cured" for twen- | ty-four hours, then crushed between corrugated rollers that spin the pulp out into long threads. years spin ming, if the shreds were put end to end, would amount to over 5300O, 900 miles. Thirty-six shredders feed these into a machine that cuts them in bis- cult shape, another places them on the baking pans, and then human hands come for the first time to place these on the conveyers that carry them to the ovens. Belts convey the biscuit to the packing rooms where white clad, white capped girls put them in boxes. other belts carry them to another department where the boxes are sealed and packed. and where a mailing machine puts the lid in place and fastens 1t.
 Everywhere there is the appearance of letsurely haste that guarantees the long service of the employees and proves the thoughtfuIness of the em- ployes. Everywhere there is a~thor- oughness and dispatch that comes from the adoption of good business methods, and the careful training of the factory hands. Everywhere there is evident the use of labor saving, time saving devices and the effort to make each employees working hours comfortable. Such plans for the employe are not made for the purpose of advertising. or through misplaced altruistic motives. The management will tell you that it is not sentimentalism, or a fad for well fare work overdone. They know it is good business proposition to keen their employees healthy, happy and content. and they say so. They know 1t is absolutely necessary for a food manufacturing concern to make clean liness apparent at every turn and a permanent feature of the work, and they are doing 1t in the best manner. While some of the arrangements are possibly better than the average fac tory or mercantile house could afford or would deem necessary for It's em ployes, the general ideas are we'll worth emulation. This is a model factory above the general average of today but 1t will be the average fac tory tomorrow, for the ideas 1t dem- onstrates are becoming more general and work like this more potent in the great uplift movement.
 | Copyright, 1908, by Frederic J. Has
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 TOmOrrOW-The Great UpIIft. K 1 The RlRYnrnmnda Mnvemanf