The Bismarck tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, N.D.) 1916-current, 1924-07-12
NEW LEASE ON LIFE!
Eight-HOur Day Makes Steel
Workers Happy and Con.
tented
BY GEORGE BRITT
NEA Service Writer

Gary, Ind, July 12.-These thou
sands of blackened, overalled men,
| swinging dinner buckets, who troop
up Broadway from the 'works
! every day are changed crowd.
The 12-hour day, Old Man of the
Sea upon the back Of the steel in
| dustry, has been eliminated with
the apparent result of better work
! ers, better town and better bust
ness.
There's snap in their step, ami
nation in their talk, and smiles on
their faces as they come from work.
Those who ride the street cars, ac-
cording tc the conductors, are more
trouble than they used to be--more
boisterous, more argumentatlve,
not such limp automatons.
They are better men to have
about the house, say their wives
and mothers. They pay more at
tention to the children and have
reduced the truancy rate at school.
Bank Clearings Gain
They are buying better merchan-
disc, say the merchants. Working
IL hours a day, they would send
their wives to the stores, even for
! their own shirts and suits. Now
they go shopping even for their
own shirts and suits. Now they
go shopping with their wives and
demand better goods.
Gary bank clearings fer the first
four months this year were $751;
949 900. They were only $56i-
114,O0O for the same period last
year when the longer hours were in
effect at the mills.
The steel mills basketball league
had 25 teams this past winter as
compared with 10 the year before,
when hours were longer. The pub
lie schools vocational classes were
crowded this winter with voluntary
applicants, without any effort to
get pupils.
With the sudden acquisition of
hours of free time, the men re-
manned sober and orderly. Arrests
show no advance, says Chief of Po-
lice w. A. Forbis.
Corporation Profits, Too
This increase in happiness and
human wellbeing, forced on the
industry by American public opin-
ion, is costing 10 per cent in steel
production, according to Judge E.
H. Gary, chairman of the United
States Steel Corporation. Yet the
corporation would appear to be
bearing up under it.
The directors voted an extra so
cents per share to the quarterly
dividends on common stock in jan
uary and April, making it, as
Judge Gary said, virtually "a Z per
cent stock" Net earnings for the
first quarter Of 1924 for the entire
steel corporation, were reported as
$5O,O75,445.
That is the largest in the history
of the corporation except during
the war, and more than $15,O00,000
greater than during the first quar-
ter Ct last year.
Twice since the 12-hour day was
eliminated, in October and March,
the Gary works have set worlds
| records for volume of pig iron pro-
duction.
Some workers bitterly dislike the
shorter work day of eight or ten
hours. They are mostly husky
young foreigners who can stand the
gait, who prefer to toll longer
hours, draw more money, and get
back sooner to affluent peasant
hood overseas. Sometimes now
they work two shifts in succession.
Low wages is the chief COM
plant. The scale went up some
as the working day was shortened.
Common labor, the majority CLASH
fication, gets SO cents an hour in
stead CT 40 cents. That means 81
for an S-hour day instead of $3.50
for a 12-hour day.