Jane Elizabeth Robbins

“ The girls marry with the expectation of continuing their hard life in the factory.
The poverty of the home is often increased by the intemperance of the father. "It is better to go to a picnic with a woman, a woman does not get drunk," said a wise little maiden six years of age.
To those theorists who look for great progress when women shall obtain a position of economic independence, the Bohemian women cigarmakers ought to be an interesting study. The wife with her quicker fingers often makes better wages than her husband. ”

“ Many of the cigar-making girls brought up in this country learn their trade from regular teachers. They pay for their tuition, and are several weeks in learning to become bunchmakers or cigarmakers. The bunchmakers get the tobacco into the shape of a cigar, and the cigarmakers spread the leaves out on the suction-table and put the final coverings on. They are both paid by the thousand cigars, and their wages vary greatly. Some earn only four or five dollars a week, while others earn twelve dollars, and sometimes even higher wages. ”

“ I asked a thoughtful Bohemian of the educated class why the women did not demand more power, since they contribute so largely to the family finances, and he answered, "Because they would not consider such a demand fitting." Husband and wife seem to go on much as they have always done since "male and female created he them." ”

“ They are almost always able to read their own tongue—they have several newspapers—and they care a great deal for the education of the children. The children speak Bohemian more than any other New York children speak the tongue of their fathers and the ancestral tongue seems to have a tendency to bind the family together and to preserve its traditions in this new land. ”

“ The most noticeable effect of having the mothers go to factory is that the ordinary masculine aversion to doing woman's work, is greatly moderated. The boys run home from their play after school hours to start the kitchen fire, so that the water may be boiling when their mothers come home. ”

“ A girl of thirteen often has the care of several younger children, besides doing much of the housework for the family. A grandfather or a grandmother, even if very feeble, is a great addition to the family life in furnishing the adult point of view in the absence of both parents. ”

“ They work under a considerable nervous strain, as speed is a first consideration, if they are to make fair wages. In their hurry many of them bite off the small ends of the cigars (a pleasant thought for the smoker) and they sit all day holding bits of tobacco in their mouths.
The light must be good for their work and the heat of the nearby gas jet adds greatly to the discomfort from the bad air. The floor and walls of the factory are often dirty and the dressing rooms where clothing is hung, are simply large closets partly partitioned off from the main rooms. ”

“ The Bohemians are perhaps the cleanest of the poor people in the city and they struggle manfully against the bad conditions of the New York tenement houses. They are fortunate in being intensely musical, and they find great joy in the occasional dance or picnic. ”

“ The men and women employed in the higher grades of work, the men employed as packers and a small percentage of the women and girls who work at suction-tables belong to the different branches of the cigarmakers' union. ”

“ Several times I have come into a home and found the strong young husband washing, and not at all embarrassed to be caught at the wash-tub.
The older children, both boys and girls, take care of the younger ones. They are trained to responsibility from their earliest youth, and make great gains in both strength and charm of character. ”

“ The windows are generally kept closed because the tobacco must not be allowed to become dry.
The strippers, who know little English and are therefore called "greeners," are paid by the day, and seldom earn more than five or six dollars a week. They are down at the bottom of the economic scale and are not admitted to the cigarmaker's union. ”

“ This union, besides giving insurance against sickness and death, does much to protect its own memebers, and also in time of special struggle it offers some defense to even the most helpless of the cigarmakers. ”

“ They make beds and sweep and clean house. I have known a boy of eleven to acquire sufficient knowledge of housework so that, at his mother's death, he was able to do all the work for a family of four. ”