The Washington herald., 1922-01-08
NAVAL LIMITATION CLOSES SIlPBUHDNG NEWPORT
ping and shipbuiidins centers in


ping and shipbuiiding centers in
the world. {
There in the midst OF rural
district, with the Virginia coal
mines in the background and a
direct rail tunnel to the Ohio River
and the Great Lakes and the steel
producing centers of the Middle
West, was a reservoir of negro la
Dor yet untapped which might be
divorced from the soil and taught
the art of shipbuilding. His
dream became reality. The piers
were built, and the shipyards were
opened. Mechanics came from
other cities, and both negroes and
whites came from the farms. Me-
gro labor was practically unre-
stricted and the percentage IN
creased until 1t became approx
mately Is per cent of the whole.
1T explains the absence OF the
foreigner" in the Newport News
yard. ~
. Then came the war. The gov
transportation of troops and war
supplies, and discouraged shipping
to foreign ports. Under the stim-
ulus of the government naval pro-
gram the shipyard investment ran
up to s35.000.000. The population
of the town doubled. The number
of workers in the shipyards in
creased from 1000 In 1914 to 13.5o0
in 1920. From the shipyards alone
a payroll OF 100000 was made out
weekly. The banks showed depos-
its of s1A,000.000 and savings of
approximately $10.000,000. New
merchants came to town, but even
then people could not get waited
on in the stores.
Following the war the shipbuild-
ing program continued. and activ-
ity at the coal piers. due to the
English coal strike, kept up
through the early months of this
year. Then came the slump. There
was no foreign commerce. There
was no building of, commercial
ships. There was no repair work
for them. There was no call for
ships supplies. Laborers about the
docks were laid off. Their num-
hers were swelled by seamen from
the ships that were laid up-for-
eigncrs mostly, away from their
home ports.
M,n Were Let 60.
At the sh pyards the men living
in barracks. who had constituted
tn" floating population during Ias
war. had peCn let go as the work
gradually let down. Until July,
however. there were 10000 still
employed at the yards on govern
nent building contracts. for there
were four ships on the ways. Then
the Senate cut the naval appro-
priation and. in August and Sep
tember. 5000 more men were laid
off. This brought the number of
employees down to the 1914 figure,
many of them on part-time work.
Winter is here. Nobody knows
how many families there are in
Newport News on the verge or
Iever the line OF poverty. The i'm
preston that half the workers
have returned to their homes" or
that they have savings to live on
has been general. But no one has
verified this. Guesses made by the
Central Labor Union, the city man.
ager. the secretary of the colored
Y. NJ. c. A., and the secretary of
the Red Cross vary from 1000 to
5000 out of work.
Down in the Sailors Rest. which
has been taken over by the Y. NJ. c.
A, 5.311 meals and 2.o64 free beds
were given in September. The num-
Der has decreased slightly each
month as the seamen have found
opportunity to Nturn to their
home ports. A candy firm adver-
tised a soup line: fifty men came.
The Salvation Army, the girls club
of the Y. W. c. A, the Y. NJ. c. A.
and the, ,American.-Lesion all have
had calls for relief in the last few
weeks.
Since November the shipyards
have given 500 a month to the
Red Cross. which has been doing
general relief work. Now the city
manager has taken the lead in Or
ganizing an associated charities.
which will take over the work of
the Red Cross: "dime-a-week"
campaign has been launched in
which every employed person has
been asked to give 10 cents a week
for twenty weeks to help the unem-
ployed: and a man who has spent
his life as a ships carpenter-an
employe of the shipyards just put
on the pension list-has been en-
ployed to act as secretary of the
association. The city has itself
taken no steps to employ men on
public works.
A One-Industry Town.
Meantime the chamber of COM
merce has Weakened up to the fact
that Newport News is a one-in-
dustry town; that it has done moth
ing at all to develop diversified in
dustries; and that land held high Is
not attractive to the manufacturer.
1t has discovered that. although il
has at its backdoor agricultural
products-peanuts. potatoes and
'Smithfield' hams-an untouched
lumber country and in its waters
fish and oysters in abundance. il
has not encouraged markets for
these products. II discovered that
shippers from Newport News had
been Disseminated against and
were having to pay 30 per cent
higher tariffs from Newport News
than from Norfolk just across the
harbor. and this 1t already has
had rectified.
Tha -