THE TRAINING OF MILLINERY WORKERS

THE TRAINING OF MILLINERY WORKERS

ALICE P. BARROWS

Committee on Women’s Work, New York City

“We have no time for learners.”—“Learning is nothing but running errands.”—“It’s always experience, experience they want, and I didn’t have it, so what was the use?”—“Trade schools are no good. It is altogether different outside.” These were some of the remarks heard at the beginning of an investigation of workers in the millinery trade[32]which led to an intensive study of the training of girls for that occupation. “Industrial education” is a large, general term. What it meant to the workers in one trade throws much light upon it, and suggests a method for dealing with a subject which is at present rather topheavy with theories.

Probably no trade in which girls are employed could illustrate better than millinery the present status of industrial education for girls in New York City. There are more women in this trade than in any other except the clothing trades. There are more classes in millinery than in any other women’s trade except dress making. It is one of the first industrial subjects introduced into the school curriculum. Yet an investigation of workers in millinery showed that these classes were being formed when there was little information upon the most important factors in the problem of trade training—that is, thegirls, the schools where they had received their previous instruction, and the trade in which they worked.

It is not easy to describe the millinery trade clearly because the essence of the description is to show that it cannot be made clear. If the next few paragraphs leave the reader with an impression of chaos then the description has been successful. “The millinery trade is about twenty-five different trades,” said one employer. This statement does not give a true impression because it does not show that each branch overlaps and penetrates into every other in a most confusing manner. Millinery shops are of all types, in all parts of the city, with all kinds of work. Broadly speaking, the establishments can be divided into wholesale and retail, and in general it may be said that in wholesale shops “it’s speed we want,” and in retail, “careful, neat hand workers.” Actually, such definitions of the trade are not true to fact. Every variety of hat is made in all kinds of ways whether manufactured at wholesale or retail. There are “trimmed hats” and “untrimmed hats,” “ready-to-wear hats,” “artistic millinery,” “home-made hats,” and “tailor hats.” At first glance, it would seem that the trade is an excellent example of the subdivision of labor. The important point to the worker, however, is that sometimes it illustrates this subdivision of labor and sometimes it does not. Trimmed hats are found in the same establishments with untrimmed and ready-to-wear hats, or with only one or with neither. Artistic millinery is found in exclusive private shops and in sweatshops. Tailor hats are made in the same establishments with trimmed and untrimmed hats or in shops by themselves. Home-made hats are found to be contract work for great factories, or “neighborhood work for a few friends.”

Naturally, this lack of system and standard is reflected in the demands made upon workers. In general, it may be said that there are four stages in making a hat,—designing it, making the frame, covering the frame, and trimming it. And in general it may be stated that there are seven kinds of positions open to a girl looking for work in millinery. She may be a learner, an improver, a preparer, a milliner, a copyist, a trimmer, or a designer. But when a girl starts to look for work as preparer,for example, she may turn toward a Fifth avenue shop where she must be a “neat worker” who can make frames accurately by hand, and “have an eye for color and form”; here she may advance from preparer to designer; or she may find her way into a shop a few doors away where she does not need to make frames because they have two girls who make all the frames; or she may apply at a department store where in one department she will have an opportunity to do all the kinds of work found in the Fifth avenue shop, “only not so particular”; or she may go into the ready-to-wear department where “you never make a frame but cover with straw and stick on a rosette”; or she may join the throng of girls pouring into a Broadway wholesale house, and as she walks up the stairs she may stop at any one of the five floors and enter a “millinery establishment.” But in one she will be asked to do straw operating all day; in another to make dozens of wire frames a day; in another to trim hats by the dozen and never make frames; in another to work at nothing but millinery ornaments. In the autumn of 1908 she finds it difficult to get a position as preparer because “the machines are driving them out”; and in the spring of 1909 preparers are in great demand because “the styles have changed this season, and hand work has come back this month.” In any case, she thinks herself fortunate if she works more than six months a year at $5 a week in not more than three or four positions. No prophecy can be made about the kind of skill which will be demanded in any shop.

But if no two establishments are alike in methods of work, they all have one characteristic in common. The slack season descends upon employers and workers alike. Taking the employers’ statements, the millinery year is at best only seven or eight months long, divided into fall and spring seasons. The fall season, starting on Division street and lower Broadway in July, gains headway in August, rushes up Fifth avenue in September, and then gradually spreads out north and south, east and west, lingering for the longest time where the current is least swift. Third avenue and Fifth avenue, Grand street and Harlem cannot buy early and all at once. In any case, the season disappears before Christmas. The spring season beginsin January, and gains speed until the Easter rush, after which workers are laid off in great numbers.

“It is terrifically hard work while it lasts,” said one employer. If it is terrifically hard work for the employer with some capital, credit and business shrewdness, it is obvious that to the girl with no capital, no credit and no knowledge of trade conditions except as represented by her place, “laid off—slack” means an even more serious loss. According to census figures, 64% of the women employed in retail establishments are out of work in January. In August 65% are unemployed. In September, the busy wholesale month in the autumn, there is no room for 11% of the number needed in the spring. In June 45% are out of work. Of 639 positions in millinery held by the group of workers investigated, 447, or more than two-thirds, lasted less than six months. Although they sometimes found work in other trades when laid off from millinery, 60% of those who could estimate the time lost were unemployed more than three months in the year. “Millinery gets on my nerves,” said one girl, “because there is always the worry about the seasons.”

The following is a calendar of a girl who had worked in millinery for a year. She was particularly fortunate in getting subsidiary work.

August—Worked 3 weeks at millinery on Third avenue. Worked 1 week on Broadway. Laid off—slack.September—Looked for work.October—Worked at millinery on Sixth avenue 4 weeks.November—Worked at millinery on Sixth avenue 3 weeks. Laid off—slack. Sold candy one week. Left to return to millinery.December—Worked 3 weeks at millinery on Sixth avenue until the day before Christmas. Laid off—slack. Sold candy one week.January—Sold candy one month.February—Returned to millinery.March—Worked at millinery.April—Worked at millinery.May—Worked at millinery. Laid off—slack.June—Looked for work.July—Looked for work.

August—Worked 3 weeks at millinery on Third avenue. Worked 1 week on Broadway. Laid off—slack.

September—Looked for work.

October—Worked at millinery on Sixth avenue 4 weeks.

November—Worked at millinery on Sixth avenue 3 weeks. Laid off—slack. Sold candy one week. Left to return to millinery.

December—Worked 3 weeks at millinery on Sixth avenue until the day before Christmas. Laid off—slack. Sold candy one week.

January—Sold candy one month.

February—Returned to millinery.

March—Worked at millinery.

April—Worked at millinery.

May—Worked at millinery. Laid off—slack.

June—Looked for work.

July—Looked for work.

The season also has its effect upon workroom conditions. “It’s rush, rush all the time and then nothing to do.” In 62% of the shops investigated the girls worked nine to nine and a half hours daily. A large majority had a working week of fifty to fifty-five hours. In only eight was the week less than fifty hours. In 86% of the shops the day’s work lasted regularly until six o’clock or later—an important fact when the question of evening school work is to be considered. 71% of the girls worked overtime in the busy season. During the overtime season the total hours varied from less than ten up to fifteen a day.

The wages which workers in millinery receive are not such as to compensate them for short seasons and long hours. The average wage is between seven and eight dollars. Considered from the point of view of yearly income, the weekly average of seven or eight dollars is reduced 25 or even 50% by the slack season. A liberal estimate of the average wage, allowing for loss of time, would be five dollars. But the keynote of the wage question in millinery is lack of standard. The workers have no trade union large enough to sign contracts with employers. The only bargain is the individual bargain. If the method of payment is by the piece, “you never know what you are going to get.” As one girl expressed it: “Piece work is bad because you are always fussing about the price. At that French place, they said they’d pay you seventeen cents a hat but at the end of the week you would find they had made it fourteen cents. It was awful. You had the same fight every season over the prices. Instead of giving you what you ought to get they’d say to themselves, ‘We’ll make it $2.50 a dozen, and if they will work for that, all right; if not we can make it $3.’”

A tabulation of wages received in 738 positions held by 201 workers shows what a variation in wages there is in positions called by the same name. The variations are as follows:

Learners: 0 to $5.Improvers: less than $2 to $8.Preparers: $2 to $15.Milliners: $4 to $12 or $15.Makers: $4 to $9.Copyists: $4 to $15 or more.Trimmers: $6 to $25 or more.

Facts such as these have been used in other countries as an argument for the establishment of minimum wage boards in millinery. Public opinion in this country does not yet demand such action.

If these facts about conditions in the millinery trade prove anything they prove that “learning to make hats” is a very different thing from “learning the millinery trade.” The experiences of millinery workers would seem to suggest that in modern times, perhaps even more than in the days when industrial conditions were less complex, apprenticeship must include learning the trade as well as one process in it, if the workers are to be efficient. A milliner who does not know that millinery means machine work and hand work, speed work and careful work, that the seasons are irregular, that the wages are unstandardized, and that conditions are constantly changing, is in no position to become efficient. Such knowledge is part of her job, and it is as necessary that she should understand her various relations to the trade in which she is working as that she should master the technique of the machine that she is operating. Power to adapt to different types of establishments, to varied kinds of work, and to fluctuating seasons, rather than specialization in a particular process, is a practical necessity for the girl who would earn her own living. According to the testimony of both workers and employers she does not get this power in the trade itself; employers have no time for learners, and the girl finds that “learning is nothing but running errands.” According to the same testimony, the schools do not know the trade and do not prepare their pupils to do any one thing well. In order to test the truth of these criticisms, millinery classes were investigated in the course of this study, and their graduates were interviewed.

The visits to these classes were profitable in three ways.They brought out the prevalent ideals in regard to women’s work, the tendencies in the past with respect to methods of teaching trade courses, and the possible questions which need to be considered in plans for the industrial education of girls. Half the group of workers investigated had attended classes where millinery was taught. There were sixty-two of these classes in the city, of which only three aimed specifically to prepare girls for trade. The others gave courses “for home and trade use”; that is, they aimed primarily to teach women to make their own hats, but girls could also enter the class if they wished to prepare for trade.

The three schools which aimed at trade preparation dealt with three different types of girls. One was founded in order to prepare the fourteen-year-old girl who is forced to leave school at the earliest time allowed by law; one would take no girls under sixteen years of age; the third gave training to immigrant girls of any age. They were all alike in that they knew little about their pupils’ previous schooling or their experiences after they went to work. Only one attempted to make any investigation of trade conditions. In regard to methods of instruction, only one sifted its applicants by requiring them to state whether they intended to work at the trade. Only one tried to eliminate the unfit by taking girls on trial. Only one attempted any instruction in trade conditions, and that one found it difficult to give such instruction to the type of girls with whom it was dealing. The aim of this “academic” work was to supply the lack in the general education of the fourteen-year-old girl. To do this, courses in English, arithmetic and civics were given. Civics included “industrial history, cultivation, manufacture, and transportation of materials, citizenship, commerce, philanthropics, history of Manhattan and social ethics.” The time allotted to English, arithmetic and civics was one hour a week for each. The course was six months long. All preparation on these subjects had to be done by the pupils during this one hour in the classroom. The graduates from only one of these schools had anything favorable to say about the work. After visiting the schools and following up the experience of the pupils who had taken courses there, itwas easy to understand why the girls thought that it was “altogether different outside.” On the other hand, daily indications of the complexities of the conditions “outside” gave us a sympathetic realization of the size of the task which the schools had undertaken.

As classes in industrial training will ultimately find their way into the public school system, not only is it important to understand the aims and methods of the trade schools, but it is also desirable to know what has already been done in the way of industrial training in the public schools. At the time of this investigation millinery was taught in forty-five evening schools in New York City. Thirty-nine of these were elementary schools. The investigation of these schools was profitable because it threw light upon the function of evening schools, their connection with day schools, their conception of the aim of industrial courses for girls, and finally the effect of these ideals upon the actual formation of a trade class in one evening school.

The school buildings are very imposing. One finds no difficulty in locating them at night even at a distance of two or three blocks. A great dark building occupying about one-third of the noisy, crowded block, gives notice to the visitor that she is headed in the right direction. The school always looks impressively quiet and remote. Few windows are lighted and only one door is open. After picking her way through crowded streets, stepping around small children, narrowly avoiding collisions with innumerable boys and girls darting in and out among the crowds, the visitor finds the inside of the building quite deserted, and her footsteps echo in the great, gray, empty basement. She can find no one to direct her to the principal, but presently seeing a few girls straggling up the fireproof stairs she follows them to the assembly room, a waste of empty desks. At one end is a long desk where the principal is seated. Often she has been teaching all day in a day school. Soon a girl enters slowly and hesitatingly, and slips into a chair near the door, where she stays until the principal turns to her with, “What can I do for you?” Bashfully the girl comes up to the desk and whispers down into it that she wants “to take up millinery.”—“Your name?”—“Sadie Schwartz.”—“Address?”—“—East ——.”—“Age?”—“Fourteen.”—“Have you left school?”—“Yes.” Sometimes the question is asked, “Are you working? At what occupation?” Sometimes it is omitted. Then the principal concludes, “Here are two cards. Keep one and give one to the teacher. The millinery class is down the hall on the right-hand side.” This is the extent of the consultation before entering a class.

After the girl has been in the class a short time, she learns that most of the girls are taking the course so that they can learn to make their own hats. More and more girls come as Easter approaches. They can stay as long as they like, and go when they like. They can even keep on making their own hats for two years or more.

“It is rather unfortunate that the board of education supplies the materials,” said one teacher; “because I have known of cases where the girls come simply to get a hat and then leave. For example, I know of one case where a girl at the end of a few weeks asked to be transferred from the millinery class and when asked her reason, said that she wanted to go into dressmaking because ‘I’ve got a hat and now I would like a dress to match.’”

“You don’t learn anything in evening school,” said a girl who was in trade; “every night it is a little on a hat, and one hat a year.”

During the year 1908-9, a well-known educator asked the following question in a course upon social life and the school curriculum: “Upon what questions in the community would you desire to be informed so as to adapt a course of study to the social conditions in that community?” That question sums up the problem of industrial education. The schools which have just been described exemplify some of the chief methods advocated at present for making this adaptation. A study of them also shows what happens when there is little or no information, or desire for information, about the social conditions of the community in which such courses are being given. One of the best known city superintendents of schools writes in a recent report:[33]

“The establishment of trade schools by the public school authorities is now a matter of discussion in every manufacturing city in the land. Manufacturers and philanthropists alike are clamoring for the introduction of industrial training into the public schools.... The true reason for industrial education lies ... in the fundamental conception of modern education—to fit the child for his life environment.... In the public discussion of this subject there has been much exhortation, much denunciation, much eloquence, but little practical wisdom or suggestion.”

Such a quotation is itself full of practical wisdom, for it goes to the root of the difficulty in stating that the object of education is to fit the child for his environment. Yet if this is the purpose of schools, it is obvious that accurate knowledge of the environment is a first essential in educational plans. This raises a fundamental question in regard to trade-school training. Should we not start a department of investigation even before we form the trade school, and should we not continue such a department as long as the school continues? If the trade schools which everyone is advocating are not based upon accurate knowledge of the conditions they have to meet, it seems safe to say that they will result only in the disappointment of the girls, the increased exasperation of the employers, and the humiliation of the schools. Familiarity with some establishments, and “being in touch” with trade is not knowledge of trade conditions. Trade is complex. Preparing for trade is like preparing for the weather. You never can tell what is going to happen next. Weather prophets are not infallible, yet experience has proved that it is desirable at least to attempt to work out a scientific method of studying weather conditions. There seems to be no good reason why we should not apply scientific methods to the study of social as well as physical conditions.

For instance, investigation of the millinery trade proved it to be an industry in process of transition from home to factory, with all the confusion in processes that is involved in such transition. Yet only one of all the schools studied made any attempt to discover the demands of this trade. Investigation showed that an understanding of industrial conditions is as necessary forefficiency as ability to make a hat. Yet only one school tried to give an understanding of those conditions, and the time given to such study was totally inadequate. Investigation proved that one cause contributing to short seasons and low wages was the oversupply of workers. Yet there were more classes in millinery than in any other trade in the city, except one. Investigation revealed the fact that instead of specialization, the ability to adapt is of primary importance to the worker. Yet psychology and practical experience alike make it clear that such ability cannot be given in a six months’ course.

This brings us to the second factor in the problem about which there is little information—the workers themselves. When the whole subject of industrial training is in such an experimental stage it is unfortunate that only one school has attempted to keep systematic records of pupils. To fail to keep such records is like trying to erect a building with no knowledge of the materials. If such records had been kept it is probable that the attempt to train immature fourteen-year-old girls in six months for a trade like millinery would have been abandoned long ago. It is even possible that the advocates of trade education would have been driven to realize that efficiency in industry, as in everything else, depends not upon a desk knowledge of the three R’s, but upon a sound, vital, general education which gives power of adaptation. Even a slight acquaintance with women workers in industry brings out the fact that they lack this power, which comes from training of the mind. Why have girls been permitted to leave school without receiving this training? If the first essential for fitness to survive in modern life is the adaptability which comes from a well-trained mind, and if the function of the schools is to develop such fitness, are they giving the required training? If not, can the curriculum be changed so that the general schooling shall be more real, more connected with life? It is a matter of concern to school authorities that so many children leave the grammar school before graduation. Out of 201 millinery workers, 104 began work when they were between fourteen and sixteen years of age; eight started before they were fourteen; twenty left school before they were fourteen. Of these 201 girls, 152attended school in New York City. Of these 152, eight attended parochial schools, 144 public schools. Of the 144 who attended public schools, only thirty-three were graduated. Such facts are used as arguments for starting trade schools which shall prepare girls and boys for their life work. To some of us they seem to be cogent reasons for trying to discover how these grammar schools can be revitalized so that the graduates will be prepared for life. It is said that the pupils leave because they do not see that school is preparing them to earn their own living. The one hundred millinery workers who had studied in trade classes said that the instruction there did not help them to earn their living.

Where does the fault lie? A study of one trade in which girls are working suggests that reorganization of general education is the most vital factor in industrial training. This suggestion may be mistaken; for it is based upon knowledge of conditions in only three trades for women—millinery, and two others investigated at the same time. It is evident that the question can be conclusively answered only after exhaustive study of girls, of schools and of trades. From the point of view of manufacturers, workers and educators, such investigation is of primary importance. To those who are eager for plans by which individual girls may get training immediately, the comparatively slow gathering of information does not appeal. Nevertheless, such information will have to be obtained sometime. Such investigation should be systematically made. It is not easy, but it is practicable, if we reduce the problem to its simplest terms. We should divide up each city into comparatively small units for investigation, the village communities, as it were, that make up the city. By taking the schools as the center of these communities and by studying the pupils—their personal and family history, their education, and their experiences in trade,—it would be possible to collect information which would give a sound basis either for reconstruction of the general school education or for the formation of a system of trade schools.

FOOTNOTES:[32]This article is based upon a report not yet published onwomen at work in millinery shops in New York City. It is the result of an investigation carried on for the Alliance Employment Bureau of New York from the autumn of 1907 until the spring of 1909. Two hundred millinery girls were interviewed at home or in the office of the bureau and questioned about their wages, hours, trade history, regularity of employment and training for work. Their names were secured from girls’ clubs, trade classes, employment bureaus, and fellow-workers. More than two hundred shops, including all in which the two hundred workers had been employed since July, 1907, were visited and questions asked about training of learners, wages, hours, seasons, demand and opportunities for experts, and the employer’s opinion of trade-school training.[33]Tenth Annual Report of the City Superintendent of Schools, New York City, July, 1908.

[32]This article is based upon a report not yet published onwomen at work in millinery shops in New York City. It is the result of an investigation carried on for the Alliance Employment Bureau of New York from the autumn of 1907 until the spring of 1909. Two hundred millinery girls were interviewed at home or in the office of the bureau and questioned about their wages, hours, trade history, regularity of employment and training for work. Their names were secured from girls’ clubs, trade classes, employment bureaus, and fellow-workers. More than two hundred shops, including all in which the two hundred workers had been employed since July, 1907, were visited and questions asked about training of learners, wages, hours, seasons, demand and opportunities for experts, and the employer’s opinion of trade-school training.

[32]This article is based upon a report not yet published onwomen at work in millinery shops in New York City. It is the result of an investigation carried on for the Alliance Employment Bureau of New York from the autumn of 1907 until the spring of 1909. Two hundred millinery girls were interviewed at home or in the office of the bureau and questioned about their wages, hours, trade history, regularity of employment and training for work. Their names were secured from girls’ clubs, trade classes, employment bureaus, and fellow-workers. More than two hundred shops, including all in which the two hundred workers had been employed since July, 1907, were visited and questions asked about training of learners, wages, hours, seasons, demand and opportunities for experts, and the employer’s opinion of trade-school training.

[33]Tenth Annual Report of the City Superintendent of Schools, New York City, July, 1908.

[33]Tenth Annual Report of the City Superintendent of Schools, New York City, July, 1908.

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