Horny History: Mother Jones and Child Labor

It’s real history, as told by some horny dude in my inbox and me.

Mother Jones (1830-1930) [public domain]

One child in a warm home with plenty of food, an education and a bright future paid for by the profit from their daddy’s business. The profit made by another child unable to go to school because they need to work to survive, sleeping on the dirty floor of a mill, overcome with exhaustion, a future of illness, injury or death. If they do grow old they have the opportunity to create more children who can work to their deaths in the factory.

Then came Mother Jones.

(If you want to read this story without the horny man, click below.)

Just The Story: Mother Jones and Child Labor

Technically that isn’t the badass quote from Mother Jones, but I think she would want you to subscribe so I can keep telling more stories like hers. Speaking of which…

Stopping child labor doesn’t answer the question, why were the children working. The families didn’t send their children to work because they wanted to. They had no choice. The wages the adults earned weren’t enough to sustain them. Additionally, younger children needed to be brought with to work so that the mothers could earn money.

Often housing was on site and rent paid to the mill. Stores were also owned by the company. The mill owners easily could have created a system in which adults made enough to live by, but they didn’t. Their profits grew off of the tiny hands of the children.

What happened to these families that depended on the income of their children to survive, when the children could no longer legally work? Some suffered. However, with the enormous decrease of available laborers, demand increased and so did wages for adults and children over 14.

When people say times have changed they mean people, like Mother Jones have fought for that change. There are still rich people who will gladly make their profits off of children, only public perception holds them back.

So, they do it where they can get away with it. Moving their factories to countries that haven’t rose up yet to stop them. There's approximately 160 million child laborers worldwide, of which 80 million are children in hazardous conditions.

One child in a warm home with plenty of food, an education and a bright future paid for by the profit from their daddy’s business. The profit made by another child unable to go to school because they need to work to survive, sleeping on the dirty floor of a mill, overcome with exhaustion, a future of illness, injury or death.

Sources:

Crusade For Child Laborers C.K. McFarland

The Autobiography of Mother Jones Mother Jones

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You should also read:

Not So Horny History: Harriet Robinson and the Lowell Mills

Horny History: Jane Street and the Domestic Workers’ Union

Make America Learn History Again: The Hershey Strike of 1937