The Birmingham age-herald., 1918-06-09

away night and day making small arms
 for our soldiers in Europe.
 | I wish I could show you one of the
 big factory rooms where the pistols are
 made You will have to have a photo l graphic pass to gain admission and you ] will be stopped again and again as you walk about from one machine to an other. I visited one room, which was as | long as good-sized city block, as wide or wider than Commonwealth avenue, Boston. I figure that it covers some thing like two acres, and it's walls or
 brick and glass and its saw-toothed glass
 roof throw bright light on the maze of special machinery buzzing below. Standing at one end of the room I looked through a thicket of the flying wheels and moving belts, which, run by electricity, keep the machinery in
 action. There are wheels overhead and wheels near the machines At first you | can hardly distinguish the machines and | it takes moment or so for you to see that every belt runs a machine, and that nearly every machine has a man or woman standing before it. There are more than thousand hands at work in
 the room, and there are more than that
 number of these special machines, many
 of which are operated by women As you
 go on you see that the women are doing
 all kinds of work Some of them are
 pounding with hammers, others are using
 files and others are gauging the parts
 to see that each is accurate to the
 splitting of hair Many of the women
 are operating machines and girls of IS
 are managing four different machines at
 one time, putting in and taking out new
 parts so quickly that not the stroke of
 lever nor the bite of a lathe goes to
 waste.
 The company is speeding it's work to the utmost, and it does all it can to in- crease the output of the individual work | CT. Everything is paid for by the piece, and the laborer who turns out the more work gets the more wages This is true of both women and men, and the women are paid exactly the same as the men | and according to the amount they pro | duce For a time there was a fear on | the part of the girls against speeding | up lest the price per piece should be cut, I and in the end they should be doing 1 more work for the same money. gans of about 10 women were employed on | certain part of the pistol. Each was turning out about 300 parts per day when the superintendent urged them to ln- crease their output to 1000, saying he would guarantee them the same pr1ce per piece. That offer was made two weeks ago, and the girls are now aver aging 300 per day and soon each Will be making 1000.
 There has been a decided speeding up of the work since we entered the war; l and that on the part of the men and women themselves. The most or the em- oloyes are enthusiastic patriots, and the women especially feel that they are oo- ng their bit in the war. There are Tags n every room, which were bought py he employees, and both men and women Ia to ha Cross | md the Liberty Loan.
 I have been especially interested in the work of the women. They labor away side by side with the men, and still there is but little conversation or gossfping going on The output fixes { the pay and so both time and work are money. Some of the girls are i from $25 to S35 week, and ! some of them making more than men Ii 1t the same job. They like the work, Ii md the households of Hartford are ( having a famine in women's labor on I account of the domestic servants leav- z ng and going into the munitions fac ( ories One of the highest officials S If this pistol-making plant recently 1 t lad a warning from one of his house Iy maids that she was going to leave. 1 f ie asked her what was the matter f She replied she was going to work in 1 il SoltS factory, where they would give r Ter more wage. Hhe said They won't | f rive you a job; and if they do I'll fire s 'ou." But he thereupon raised her wages so that they were equal to hose of the girls in the pistol plant md I am told she is still on the job
 The officials say that the women re steadier than the men and that 2 hey lose less time. They are in such emand that in certain of the firearms f p actories of this region any woman s nay come in and work for a certain r umber of fixed hours per day at II iece-work. All that is required is n hat she must tell just when she will II ome and that she be there regularly m pr the time fixed Some women work al rom 10 to F in the morning, end t' lany school teachers add to their in- kl ome by putting in two or three hours SC
 day after school is over I am told to hat the people of New Haven are bt 'orried for fear that after hours' dc -ork of the teachers in the factory fo lay decrease their efficiency in the ,hools.
 The Colt plant making automatic in lstols is a nine-hour shop, but the pc nployes are urged to work longer til nd are paid for the amout they turn | in Ut. Some of the men stop at 5 of