Evening star., 1920-02-08
BY RAY STANNARD BAKER.
ARTICE XIII.

II nA NNAnD bANTsfNs
ARTICE XIII.
I CAN best set forth the new meth
of cooperation between employ
ers and workers in America
generally called the shop com
mittee" system-by telling the eX'
traordinarily interesting story ol
what has happened in one small IN
dustry where it has been applied lr
a following article 1 shall present
general survey of the present state
and pr0mise of the entire movement
Wappingers Falls is a very OLD
town. as towns go in America. 1t lies
back from the Hudson river a few
miles below Poughkeepsie. where a
fine stream comes down out of the
hills to supply power for its mill. In
earlier days before the railroads came
its only communication with New
York was by way of Hudson river
sloops. which in summer worked IN
through the narrow inlet, or in winter
by stage coach along the river road
Here long ago bleachery and cot
ton print works was established
now called the Dutchess bleachery. !
asked a bent. old man 1 saw working
over one of the watts how long he had
been there.
What's that?"
.'How long have you worked here?
"Fifty-nine years." he said. "in this
one place"
So it was long ago. 1t was like
nIQnta
America 1t has its royal family that
owned everything-mill. houses. land
and lived little there, but had lei
sure for education and European
travel-opportunity written large.
And the people worked long hours
as long, they say, as fourteen-then
twelve. then ten, and wages were
low. There was never any incentive
upon their part to work hard or I'M
prove methods, or increase produc-
ton, because no surplus of their COM
mon toll ever by any chance reacheo
their pockets. for their income was
inexorably set by the iron law OF
supply and demand in the wage mar
ket. On the other hand, tney oio nInp the
bear whatever losses the state OF the
trade or the inefficiency of the man
asement might entail upon the IN
dustry-for whenever business was
.dulr' the mill could be slackeneo
down or closed and nth they .bnr snrowa Was o as
much a commodity as the chlorate OF
lime they used in bleaching the new
gray cloth or the starch in stiffening
Men Of ImaEination.
few years ago the mill was pur.
chased by a new company, the cn.ei
owners of which were men with SO
cial Imagination. They are among
the many employers in America VINO
are beginning to be troubled apout
their relationships to their business
and to their workers
When the war came to Wapplnses
Falls there was that sudden lift OF COM
mon effort, common enthusiasm. Wnlch
for a moment fired the soul OF America.
For a moment We forgot ourselves we
were greater than ourselves. Inere are
those who mourn over the reaction ana
the present wave of unrest, but nothing
can ever rob US of that great moment
nor wipe out the effect OF It. we snail
never go back to the ante-bellum ways
or times Whether we like 1t or not we
are entering a new world.
The war logged Wappingers Falls, as
1t logged so many other towns. into
q sudden self-consciousness 1t had. LOT
once, a good look at itself. Here II
was, a rather outwardly attractive
town of some $500 people-with COM
Portable shady streets and picturesque
hills all about. Most of the people
lived in pleasant but more or less diiapi-
dated company houses. few OF which
were miserably built Of sheetiron. roofs
and all, as cold in winter as they were
hot in summer. There was one big
Roman Catholic Church-for majority
of the people are of Irish and Italian
origin-and four struggling. competing
Protestant churches, most OF them with
out vision or leadership. Its schools
were no better nor worse. perhaps. than
those in other mill towns like this-more
a habit, a routine, than a source Of pow
er. Its politics was without issues or
ideas: had degenerated into local fac-
ticnal strife for trivial authority and
small rewards Its saloons were the
saloons of any small manufacturing
town and the less said Of them the bet
ter AS for the mill in which all the
people worked. for which the town ex-
listed. it was owned almost exclusively
Iits capital is $1.35o. .OOO) by people who
did not live in Wappingers Falls and
never had.
Not an especially pleasant portrait,
you say; and yet this town was prob
ably better than the average Of mill
towns in America. 1t might be called
"a Portrait of an American Town at
the Beginning of the Twentieth Gem
tury." There was not enough emotion
below the surface to make it's aspect
tragic there was only blankness.
dullness, uncreativeness-boredom!
New Relationship Sought.
In the summer of 1918 a young min
lister named James Myers went to
Wappingers Falls. He was sent by
the owners of the company to see
what he could do to change the con-
ditions. When the new company had
taken the property 1t had been much
run down physically: they had built
it up. got it on profitable basis, and
they wanted now to attack the prob
lem of new relationship with the
personnel.
"lndustrial Democracy" Appeals.
Mr. Hatch, the treasurer Of the
company had been for some time in
1erested in experiments in industrial
democracy" and had begun the intro
duction of the new system in a mill in
which he was interested in Abbeville,
S. c. He wanted to try out something
of the same sort in Wappingers Falls
He had only two general ideas regard
ing the method of going about it
both fundamental; one was to go slow,
not make changes too abruptly; the
other was to be honest with the work
ers at every step, that is, not to give
them something that looked like a
''new deaF' merely as screen for a
closer riveting upon them of the old
syStem-Or to prevent unionism or to
forestall strikes
meeting of the 500 operatives was
called and the new representative
plan was explained to them, and they
elected, by secret ballot. six repre-
seutatives (afterward eleven) from
the various departments. These were
organized into board of opera
Iap oh