The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1926-02-18
LIBBY CANNERY
LEADS IN RANKS
OF EXPLORERS
Whole Families Slave in
Order to Live
BY A Worker Correspondent.

KENT, Wash, Feb. 16-The earn
ings of whole family working from
eight to twenty hours daily in the
Libby Mcneil and Libby cannery in
Kent, Wash, are necessary to main
tain family in tolerable decency. In
true old-fashioned cotton mill style
fathers, mothers and children, most
of them protestant-nordic whites,
seize gratefully and humbly the op-
portunity of combining their efforts in
order to hive according to american
standards"
Ruled by Iron Heel.
Men are paid from thirty to thirty
five cents an hour; boys twenty-five
cents an hour; and women twenty
seven and one-half cents an hour
when they are not doing piece work.
The manager who it is rumored, re-
ceives but $50 dollars a month and
the forelady who receives forty cents
an hour, are inexorable in their de-
mands for speeding up, altho they also
are ruled by the iron hand. This
'iron hand" is the competition be-
tween the various branches of the
company for efficiency" The manag-
er of the Kent cannery in 1924 re-
ceived cash prize for adding to the
profits of Libby Mcneil and Libby by
exploiting the workers, thereby
achieving the distinction of being the
second in rank of efficiency" Who
knows but that the balancing of 1925
accounts may show that the ambitions
of the local manger have been real
lied, and that Kent cannery leads all
the rest in service to stockholders?
The Washington eight-hour law is
not as much a thorn in the side of an
ambitious manager, as it is an occa-
sional annoying tickle. Women can
merry employees are excluded from the
limitations of the law since they are
workers on perishable fruits and vege-
tables. This provision. of the statute
is interpreted by the state department
of labor and industries to include pre-
paration and canning of sauerkraut
and dill pickles which are kept in
watts for indefinite periods, and beets
which obviously are not perishable
within a reasonable time. Women
frequently label and box cans for
more than eight hours, which even
the department of labor and indus
tries admits is not legal
Work Day and Night.
Altho / never worked more than
eleven and one-half hours in one day,
frequently the men and boys worked
all day and all night, and again the
next day if they were able. Time and
one-half for overtime was not even to
be considered.
Libby Mcneil and Libby is one of
the largest packing companies in the
world. It preserves and cans fruits,
vegetables, Hawaiian pineapple, sal
mon, pickles, condiments, milk and
meats. These products are prepared
principally in Illinois, Wisconsin, In
diana, Michigan, Oregon, Washington,
Colorado, New York, Alaska, and
Hawaii The company has large real
estate holdings, owns refrigerator and
other cars for transportation, and a
number of ocean going vessels and
floating equipment for the Alaska sal
mon canneries.
Swift & Company controlled Libby
Mcneil and Libby until 1918, when the
packing trust was dissolved by SUI
preme court decision. Five members
of the Swift family, however, are
members of the board of directors.
OF the authorized capital stock about
eighty per cent is seven per cent GU
mulative preferred, while about
twenty per cent is common.