The Lowell Work Force, And The Social Origins Of Women Workers

As the Industrial Revolution spread across the western world, America found itself amidst the innovations the revolution brought. One of these social changes was the increase of women in the workforce. This led to the positive experience of The Lowell Mills system that enabled more opportunities for women to become more independent by giving them more control in their lives, more chances to use their intellect, and an overall different change of the life path a woman can take.

Women that worked in factories had terrible working conditions with low wages. Middle-class and working-class women fought for better working conditions and to get higher wages. The Women’s Trade Union League was a partnership with middle class and working class women to fight for their rights in a working environment. During the 20th century it unionized women workers and supported women’s strikes. The trade union helped the women with anything they needed. Middle class and upper class donated money for legal representation, speaking to the press, and participated in picket lines.

Woman along with the children were affected while working during the industrial revolution. During 1834 and 1836 Harriet Martineau, a British feminist and abolitionist, visited America and enthusiastically embraced the social implications of the Industrial Revolution, (DTA, 223). Martineau compared the lifestyle of women to slaves and said the United States contradicted the principles of the Declaration of Independence. She did believe though with some progress that it could become New England’s new industrial order. One of the Mill factories Martineau visited, Waltham Mill, was a prime example of the scheduled lifestyle of women mill workers. Women Mill workers of all ages worked at Waltham Mill, which I compared to a boarding school because of their strict schedules. The ladies had a time to wake up, to be at work, to eat, and to go to school. A lot of women did not mind the harsh conditions they lived and worked in because they fought for their equality of rights for a long time now.

1. The first essay clearly shows the impact that an ideology of domesticity on women in New England in the 1830’s. The writer at first calls this time period a “paradox in the “progress” of women’s history in the United States”. During this time apparently two contradictory views on women’s relations to society clashed, unusually, those two being domesticity, which essentially limited women, giving them a “sex-specific” role that they must abide to, this mostly being present at the home with their husbands and whatever kids they may or may not have had at that time, and feminism, which essentially tried to remove this domesticity, trying to remove sex-specific limits on women’s opportunities and

With the dawn of America’s Industrial Revolution in the 1820s, the first urban factories emerged, providing the first non-domestic job opportunities for women. Some factories embraced

Firstly, the Industrial Revolution affected women in the working and poor classes by allowing them to work in factories and mills. Before this time, women in the working class were primarily working unpaid jobs such as cooking and cleaning around the house for the family, but the industrial revolution gave women the chance to be paid and work outside of their homes (Frader, “Effects of the Industrial Revolution”, BCP). Most women obtained jobs in the textile industry. According to Dr. Christopher Wells, a professor of U.S cultural history at Macalester University, explained that ,“The town of Lowell, MA, for example, was incorporated in 1826 and soon hosted over 30 different mills.” (Wells, “Industrializing Women”, Teaching History). In the Lowell Mills, women expected to work at least thirteen hour days of constant and tiring labor in which women accounted for three-fourths of the workers in the mill. (Wells, “Industrializing Women”, Teaching History). Women factory workers typically made around $3.00 to $3.50 per week which was much greater than most women could earn in their hometowns (Dublin, “Women and

With all these, they also had the responsibility to be a housewife and take care of the household. Women in US. History also talks about the Lowell Mill Girls. Francis Cabot Lowell perfectly learned the power of looming in the early 19th century. He then opened a factory and higher around ten thousand girls to work for him.

of the employees. This workforce allowed these owners to pay a low wage since they were young girls who otherwise where not generally employed in society previously. Many of these workers were young women who had little or no hope of getting married or finding a job. Men were heading out west, so young women needed to find work. Many of them came to work to help pay off the family debts, or to save money for education, or save money for a younger siblings education. This brought on a new era for women. Through the Industrial Revolution, girls in Lowell, and furthermore the country, had a changing role in society by speaking on working regulations, women’s rights, and having a paying job.

Women who worked in mills in Massachusetts during the Industrial Revolution (1830s) lived in an era of exploitation. These women were being used by factory owners. Factory owners had control over what women in the mills did and also had control over what they did in the boarding houses which was a way of exploitation. Women had strict rules in the boarding houses (Eynon 8). If they did not follow these rules then one would get kicked out of the house and would lose their job.

1.Historian Nancy Scott focuses on the New England women’s gender roles. A two-fold role, Domesticity and Feminism. A paradox in “progress” of women’s history in the United States of 1830’s. “New England women in 1835 endured subordination to men in marriage and society, profound disadvantage in education and in the economy, denial of access to official power in the churches that they populated, and virtual impotence in politics. A married woman had no legal existence apart from her husband’s”. Women had no voting and inheritance rights. Widows and single women with property had to submit to taxation without being represented. In economy they had second-class position. Those who worked earned one-fourth to one-half to men for

In the 19th century, women would work in the Lowell mills and were called Lowell Girls. For the time period, it was very beneficial for young women to work at these mills. They were able to do things that they couldn’t do at home. There were advantages and disadvantages for the girls to be working in the factory.

Women were always faced specifically in history by men until they became equal to them. In the story “The yellow wallpaper” the author Charlotte Perkins Gilman says some things about the way women were treated by men back then in the 19th century. Women’s roles and place in the 19th century American society are very humiliating, rational for this society and weird. Women back then were treated as “something” not as “someone” that is to say useless beings, that do not have brains.

Historically, women have not been treated equally, especially in the workplace. So how did they start the revolution in the workplace? Women first time enter the workplace was during the industrial revolution. It helped the factory to earn more profit. “It all started when Alexander Hamilton wrote his Report on Manufacturers in 1791...One of the biggest areas of opportunity, he wrote, was cheap labor in the form of women and children.”(BeBusinessed.com). Women and children were doing the same job as man but earning half the salary. Women entered the workplace because of their cheap labor. Which then threatened male laborers. During that time period, women were more competitive than men. Women continued to enter the workplace across America

The mill girls lived in these boarding houses in Biddeford Maine. They had this mother that was in charge of the boarding house. Most of the time these house wives would accomplish anything with help from the girls. They would save up their money for each other, sometimes for themselves, and the house. These women could make dresses, clothing, food, feed the chickens, and make milk and butter. These girls started working at the mills at the age of 13. These women and sometimes the girls would help pay for their brothers to go to college. Women worked as hard as men but they didn’t make as much money. The women that were in the mills didn’t get treated fairly like the men. About 800 women got recruited from the mills because they thought

Blame according to Dr. Brene Brown’s video is “simply the discharging of discomfort and pain.” It is a way that we discharge anger rather than being accountable. Wow, U.S. history is full of blaming and it affects student’s ability to learn about U.S. history. The irony is that the past is still repeating itself with the current crop of politicians. Republicans blame Democrats and vice versa and nothing gets accomplished in Washington D.C. for the American people. The market revolution bears responsibility (blame) for the beginning of the birth of a female labor force. According to writer, Gretchen Swen, the early 19th century “was fueled by the explosion of technological innovation, backed up by a lot of hard work.” The cotton gin was quickly increasing cotton production in the South; steamboats were churning up the Mississippi river; power looms were transforming the New England textile industry. Transportation was greatly improved, and people relocated in record numbers. The social and technological changes created what’s been called a “market revolution.”The market revolution is defined as growth of commerce, of buying and selling on commercial markets. The cotton boom fueled the first large scale manufacturing in the United States. Textile mills began to spring up across the northeast, and towns grew up around them to house their workers. This innovation not only changed the textile industry, it transformed the social landscape as well. Tom Dublin on camera