The Factory Girl's Song
date: label: date made
content: 1840s
label: date made
content: 1835 - 1855
notes: label: Description
content: This broadside contains the lyrics to “The Factory Girl’s Song,” a folk song whose origins date back at least to the 1830s. The song’s nineteen 4-line stanzas describe the daily work of the mill girls in different jobs: spinning, weaving, and dressing the finished cloth. At the end the singer tells of returning home to marry, giving up the rigors of tending the machinery and working for harsh overseers. The song may have originated in Lowell, Massachusetts, but some scholars suggest that the reference to wages earned in “shillings” instead of dollars may mean it had connections to Canadian immigrants to the Lowell textile mills. Several iterations of the song are known, including “The Lowell Factory Girl”, “The Factory Girl’s Come-All-Ye” from Lewiston, Maine, and generalized versions titled “Factory Girl.”
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
place: label: place made
content: United States: New England
topic: label: Subject
content: Girls
label: Subject
content: labor issues
label: Subject
content: Music
label: Subject
content: Textile Processing and Production
setName: label: See more items in
content: Home and Community Life: Textiles
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content: Cultures & Communities
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content: Work
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content: American Enterprise
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content: Industry & Manufacturing
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: 2013.0125.01
label: accession number
content: 2013.0125
label: catalog number
content: 2013.0125.01
objectType: label: Object Name
content: broadside
physicalDescription: label: Physical Description
content: paper (overall material)
label: Physical Description
content: printer's ink (overall material)
label: Measurements
content: overall: 9 1/2 in x 5 3/4 in; 24.13 cm x 14.605 cm