The Daily Worker Newspaper, December 28, 1929, Page 3

CUT THE WAGES, DOUBLE WORK, IN CHEROKEE MILL Stretchout 1 1800 in That Plant (By a Worker Correspondent) KNOXVILLE, Tenn. (By Mail). —There’s about 1,800 workers slav- ing hard in the Cherokee Mill, and about 1,000 of them are women. Most of the women in Cherokee are | weavers or work in spinning. | They have the 10-hour day inj Cherokee and 55 hours a week, The| wages are about an average of $9} a week in the mill. I was getting $12.40 a week as a doffer The workers in the Cherokee mill never have had any union. But they heard plenty about the fakers U.T.W. organization, because many of them worked at the Brookside mill when the U.T.W. left them flat and pulled out of town in the middle of a strike. The stretchout system is one of the worst things the workers in Cherokee mill complain of. When I started I was on 25 frames, then they made it 40 frames, so-you can KNOXVILLE, Enslaving | DAILY WORKER, NEW YORK, SATURDAY, DECEMBER 28, 1929 The Stretchout—“Need Roller Skates”, Says Mill Worker session Here's an idea of the stretchout system in the Tennessee tex- tile mills, which is so graphically described by worker cov respondents from the Knoxville mills. Above, one man’s slavery in the Bemberg Rayon Mill, Johnson City, Tenn. “I told the boss he'd have to give me a pair of roller skates or a motorcycle,” says a worker in the Cherokee Mill, Knoxville, who was gradually increased from 4 to 20 looms. Will Fight Under National Union Next Time see how the stretchout works. Near- | ly twice as much work. Do we get | more money for it? | Why, they even cut the wages. came on at $15.09 a week. They cut that to $12.46 a week. That’s how | the stretchout works. Fellow workers in Cherokee Mill, | join the National Textile Workers | Union. I was at the National Union | convention in Paterson, and fellow | workers, the workers from mills run | tkat convention. And they run the union too, the workers themselves. | —Mill Worker and a Union Mem- | ber, too. | Bethlehem Steel in Baltimore Lays Off Over 10,000) (By a Worker Correspondent) BALTIMORE, Md. (By Mail).—! The Bethlehem Steel Mills at Spar- rows Point, Md., are at the present | time working slack. All 48 tin mills closed up Friday, December 20, 7 a. m., and may reopen Sunday, Dec. 29, 11 p. m., a period of at least) ten days. The reason, according to Ray Horton, a shift foreman and | Jack Davis, one of Horton’s assist- | ant, is lack of orders. The rolls prepared for ten days from ten days from now are mostly small, which means more work and less pay for the workers when they return. ne twelve sheet-iron mills closed on} Saturday, Dec. 21 at 7 a. m. They} also will be down until at least Sun- | day, Dec. 29, at 11 p. m., also be-| cause of lack of orders. This will effect 6,000 workers. The closing of the tin and sheet | mills have an immediate effect on the open hearth furnaces, and the plate mills, which produce the iron for the tin and sheet mills. This will effect at least 3,000 workers. In addition to this it is expected that the | wire mills and the pipe mills where | 2,000 workers slave for ten hours a day, will also be effected by the slack. | This Christmas gift, coming after | many months of slack, will unques- tionably work havoc among the thousands of steel workers at Spar- row’s Point. Cases are known of workers, who after slaving for} months and receiving no cash pay, | are now being refused credit in the | company store. This means that) they and their families have no food —another gift from Charlie Schwab. The Metal Workers Industrial | League of the Trade Union Unity | League is faced with a task of or- | ganizing these workers in a struggle against piece work, against the long | hours and low wages and against rationalization. The workers will | eventually, if properly led, struggle against these conditions and for| the program of the T.U.U.L. —BALTO WORKER. | Send Greetings to the Workers | in the Soviet Union Through the Special Printing of The Daily | Worker in the Russian Language! | Build Up the United Front of the Working Class From the Bot- tom Up—at the Enterprises! N.T.W. Convention As Seen By 2 Bovs (By a Worker Correspondent) “KNOXVILLE, Tenn. (By Mail)— In, Knoxville there are eight cot- ton mills. Working about 3,000 in each. We work 10 hours a day and sometimes the super wants us to work overtime, but for that we don’t get extra pay. Our wages are $10 = week. Most of the workers in our mill are young. From 13 up. The boss- man always wants young folks in- stead of old because they can work -and do work faster and for less wages. We both worked as doffers. When we got into the mill we only had to run 14 and 15 sides. To 40 frames in the spinning room we had two | took 4 years to build it. | merchant, Hludow. |more for your paper. doffers and a side hand. Now we “We got no use for the U.T.W. because they sold the Elizabethy workers out,’ say worker correspondents from the Knoxville mills. The U.T.W. sold out the Brookside Mill hands in Knozville too. That's why they now follow the N.T.W. As for the Elizabeth- ton and Johnson City, Tenn. rayon workers they'll be fighting under the N.T.W. too. And th determined to fight, tho they were ton betrayed by the U.T.W. twice this year. These Tennessee mill hands are fighters, as the above photos prove. Top, a picketing demon- stration in Elizabethton carly this year. Below, women pickets jailed for their militancy in Elizabethton. RUSSIAN MILL WORKERS’ LIFE HELL UNDER CZAR ist Russia was Today we publish the first part |Hludow even in c of a letter from a Soviet textile|very well known for their cruelty worker, in the Yartzeva Mill. Hej to the workers. Old workers (who wants American mill workers, par-|are now heroes of toil who receive ticularly from the South, to answer }a pension from the insurance fund) his letter thru the Daily Worker by | say the owner was always drunk. writing and telling how they live. |The day of his marriage Michael The first part deals with times |Hludow wanted to “reward” before the Revolution. | worker: Near his private home, in the gar- Yartzeva Textile Factory Yartzeva, Western Region. Comrades, workers of America: We workers and clerks, worker, correspendents of the Yartzeva fac- | the greased post to get the tory send this letter to you thru the |ents.” workers’ paper, the Daily Worker, | In 1907 the factory owner, *Ma- | because up to this time you have|dame Hludova, spent half of her}, ‘on top of it put boots, clothes, ete. He had the post greased with soap, and told the workers to climb up heard really little about our country |money in a casino, sold the factory }; | and may have a wrong idea of how |to Prokhorov and left part of the |} There was little It we live, thru the capitalist press. | stock for herself. We will tell you of the past and 'difference under the new owner. the present of our factory. A Time Which Never Will Return. our factory. The working day was Our factory was built in 1869. se to 12 hours and more. Up to 1907! The workers: got a rouble and 10 the owner of our factory was a rich |copecks (55 cents) up to 3 rubles, The family of |8 copecks (about $1.55) a week. This small wage was reduced to |» nothing by a system of fining. Pay- day the worker drew nothing. Even This \cialist,” a director Perelov. trom Knoxville each run 40 sides. fined.” This is the first time I was ai Every day this gave the owner such a convention. I had never heard | |200 to 300 rubles profit. The other of a union before, but I do know we|posses were no different; they need one in Knoxville. return I am gonna take circulars | them. There was no protection of and application cards and get in lots workers. Women workers often of union members. I liked this con-| gave birth to a child near the ma- vention fine. I wish more delegates | chine, could have come from Knoxville and} Very young children worked in learned as much as I did. And wejthe factory. There were many ac- hope that the seven Gastonia boys | cidents; machines had no guards. are loose. We heard them speak|The houses were insanitary. The and we know that they are good | workers’ houses looked like jails. union members and should keep on! The children were not considéred. organizing in the South, That’s all we can say now. When luxurious home. and received wages we return to Knoxville we will write )20 to times more than workers. j Many 4 “ok, ‘not bow low enough, would say to {him as if the worker were a dog, “go to the office, where you will be —2 Young Knoxville Workers. the |; den, he put a post 8 feet high, and || “pres- | was very hard for the workers in|; ‘now old workers remember the “spe- | ; director, noticing a worker who did | And when I! forced women workers to live with | |Factory owners lived in private, ‘ U.T.W. SOLD QUT !#y%en42n<s FROM 4 LOOMS BROOKSIDE MEN: to National Uovon TO 201N THE CHEROKEE MILL’: | > (By « Worker Correspondent) HEY WANT NTLW | KNOXVILLE, Tell. (By Mail). "Pye worked four different times in| the Brookside Mill and it’s hell the| way they slave there, and each time I come back there to work I swear | |its worse of a hell than ever before. I was only 13 years old when I Brooks That’s Works in Knoxville (By a Worker Correspondent) 3 Times as s Much Work} sUnder Stretchout (By a Worker Correspondent) started to work in the ide | ge ss . Mill. They’ve got little kids work- | ‘ KNOXVILLE, Tenn. (By Mail).|ing there that are only 12, 13, 14| KNOXVILLE, Tenn. (By Mail). —They have got the stretchout in years old, although there’s supposed I’m proud to say I am a member N : , 2 g re’s supposed | : A the Brookside Mill, and that means |+, be some law against that, but 1;0f the National Textile Workers Union, and I sure was glad to be a delegate to the National Conven- tion in Paterson. I’m also being a st. started | delegate to the International Labor Defense Convention in Pittsburgh. I’m a read Red if ever there was ; | one. I want to tell about conditions in the Cherokee Cotton Mill here in Knoxville. The workers are real s in the Cherokee. 2 weavers average $18 a wee! | why you’re doing over three times as much work as before. As a doffer | an keep if they feel like. The law's in-the Brookside mill I can tell you| only against the workers. | that ae stretchout is enough to kill} | remember when I fit a man, let alone a woman worker, wane ct a React why t About 3,000 work in the Brookside had a strike. ‘That was about 1 Mil Of them about 2,000 at least: The U.T.W. pulled that strike. But are ‘women, working on both night| what did they do? They settled ey ue We were e 55-hour |things with the bosses and then Hs 10 hours a day, 5% days | pulled out of Knoxville with our dues j week. m and le: $ ‘0 back like My average wage has been $10} Neuen cay WAAR) EES guess’ its the law that the bc ey T ‘Here’s how the stretchout crept) Q i won’t ever sell us out, and we Jd | kee mill they had about 200 looms. ap.on us, like. You take when I . mie cond put two and two together and see|Then they put 200 Draper looms ae Ae why the Brookside workers |; Drapers they | | i | \v How Stretchout | Fage unre nree (ENN. MILL WORKERS LOOK TO N.T.W. f0 LEAD (HEM |Lumberton, N.C. ees ‘COT TO HAVE HAVE NTW Too, Says Worker IN APALACHEE Wheaties \ton mill workers Heat oe Gua e to Put Up (By a Worker Correspondent) MBERTO c. eyes Mail). “The Dreslen Spinning,” | |Old Lumberton Spinning,” “The | ” |Manfield Weaving Mill” and the| Some Battle | Workers Union has got to |Ford Workers to and-$11 a week. Now that ain't} Wel, that's one reason why its;The frame hands average about enotigh to live on, is it? No, it ain’t.|the National Union and not the;® week. We work a 10-hour day | Weavers in Brookside have been|y.T,W. that’s leading us this time. and a 55-hour week. averaging $14 a.week, and they sure) we Jearned from such fellows like| They put the stretchout system in have to do well to get that much.| Req Hendryx and Del Hampton, our |the Cherokee to make the bosses | They have to run 28 looms to do|own kind from the South, that |ticher and us mill hands poorer. | that. lthe N. T. W. and the Reds | When I went to work in the Chero- stgyted in the Brookside. That was| rom what they done before in Caro- 2nd then later 200 more Drapers. fduf years ago. Then it was 10 and |jina that they won’t sell us out. First I had to run four looms, | ideulooms for a man. Now it’s 28 So I believe the Brookside mill and they increased it to six looms. loo) | workers are going soon to be fight- | When they put in the first 200 extra increased each man’s 8 h wor ing under the N.T.W. in a big strike, are'willing to listen to the National| ang they'll win it, too. Knoxville Work to eight looms. When they put | Textile Workers Union and join it.| mill hands join our National U rion. in the second lot of Drapers they | It’s not like what the United Textile : made each man take care of 12 | Wérkers Union is that sold out here ca ces looms. inj Brookside in 1921, and this year | “ ce iaglisebethton: So join the N-T-W.,| _ Build the United Front of the , Brookside workers. Working Class From the Bottom —A Good National Unior Man. Up—in the Industries! looms. Well, couldn't see what ¥ I told them was of roller had to take care of. Well the } Union is now in Knoxvile, and Warns Workers Against Pe Anti-Soviet Outfit a Worker Correspondent) Jers and peasants. The 12th Anni-|lina workers. TTLE, Wash. (By Mail).—j|versary of the Revolution saw the | must not mi fov. 9th, the Union of Russian |completion of the 5 year plan of | Textile Workers, grants arranged what they | socialist construction. got no use fc ‘called a Celebration of the 12th An-| It is a well wn fact that the strikes in Tennessee, like at El niyersary of the Russian Revolution, | flood Ivanov: referred to occurred |bethton and at the Realizing that the workers of Seattle jover a year ago. The question |in Knoxville. were'wvery sympathetic to the work- |every real friend of Russian workers | —CHEROKEE WORKER. é€sj of Soviet Russia this anarchist | must ask is—What is this money yes | érganization utilized the anniversary |being raised for | ithe Russian revolution to spread! To answer this COMPANY UNION. ie and slander against the workers |know what the ion of Rus 5 3 = nment of Russia. |Immigrants is. This organi ‘| By @ Worker Cor ' hen this so-called celebration | which now poses as a friend of the (on ened, Mr. Ivanov, the leader of | Soviet Union an out and out ploiting firm, thes organization announced that the jouarchiet bunch. Ivanov, the leader Tailoring Co., | Rusgian workers were still in need/of the organization, was expelled) operator in the garment line. | ofgfipancial assistance after twelve jfrom the Soviet Union for his coun- [sees of Soviet power. He stated |ter-revolutionary activi | all the proceeds of this affair! On Dec, 28th the Union of Rus- Iwata go to help the “poor victims | sian Immigrants is planning to hold | oftthe flood in Siberia.” j; another dance to help the |, iPle workers of Seattle know that | flood victims.” Every real friend ae 12 years since the overthrow | of the Russian workers must refuse the czar and the bosses the Rus- jt help these enemies of the working ‘workers have succeeded in class in their struggle against work- hing up their country and im-,| ors Russia. ing the conditions of the work- —SEATTLE WORKER. Knoxville which we're tion we must | espondent) is the But that place. He then appeared before the ex- ecutive board demanding to be rein- stated on the job. The board unan- imously decided that this brother be put back to work. A committee was appointed to see Manager Becker- man for the reinstatement of that ‘discharged worker, but Beckerman rror Must Not p Viscose Company Rayon Mill Hands ("By a Worker Correspondent) ‘NCHESTER, Pa,,(By Mail).—The stose Company town police seized s that textile workers were yuting to the Viscose slaves as sswere leaving the mill after a ,day’s work. The leaflets were » by the N.T.W.U. and called the workers to attend a meet- being held here. This meeting led for the purpose of reor- ing the Chester local of the :U. and to elect delegates to 2 + He the Paterson convention, * officers as they seized the savagely threatened to ar- je workers who were distribut- Ake, and when they did not ear fast enough to suit him out, “Paddy, | come and take .U. leaflets and it is rumored By anyone caught distributing ts will be “dealt” with and run »Marcus Hook, | class conscious workers ly and now that the company ning to reduce the standards workers in Marcus Hook until are as miserably paid as the tiiérn workers, the rayon work- féan expect a reign of terror they attempt to organize. But thi orkers must fight to the end. ~ NAOHM BENDITSKY, Cellist DORSHA, Interpretive Dancer ational Textile Workers ~| A big sum! he was discharged for no apparent ies reason after seven years of work in Now they’re up to 20 Draper looms for a man, and 12 Crompton-Knowles that I happening over the end of the room, and |they’d have to give a man a pair skates or a motorcycle to get around with all the looms he| the same union that led’ the Caro- workers it up with the United all it sold out enough iza-| Brookside Mill | | said that the firm was right in most | 2 AMALGAMATED NOTHING BUT A worker who toiled for the ex- International | was known as a good | .CONDUCTORLESS SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA TAYLOR GORDON, Noted Baritone in a group of Negro songs |of October and the December pay- | been [from these enemies only when they ‘Jennings” Spinning and Weaving” | \Byia Worker Gorresnonaaat) are owned by Jennings. All mills]! xNOxVILLB, Tenn (By Mal) — are shut down for two weeks and|one mill here in Knoxville where when they open up the bosses plan| they haven't got no union, and that’s to take the workers back for less ithe Apalachee Knitting Mill. And the pay with more stretchout, | way they slave there I tell you they But the workers are darned S0re| have to have the National Textile about it. The biggest percent of | workers Union get to that mill. 0 ave be averaging e SUE es een a TeNREE oy There are about 1,500 hands work- DBL peruse ber Week AUyIGy ing in the Apalachee to a shift, or weavers have been running 12 to/| 3,000 24 looms and though they have been |}... ale ober getting from $12 to $16 per week} if the bosses’ plans are carried out b out | ‘The wages are not w they will only make from $6 to $10 8 hat a man or pee weeks he. National! Textile Sores, ou we Ome or Stare lead the |f@™ily. They pay such like wages as $15.40 a week in the card room, and the women who fold underwear, they get but $12 a week. There has never been any union a : in the Apalachee. But when they Slave Like Hell for (@ have the National Textile Work, That “Raise” & there they sure are going to put up some battle for better conditions in that mill. Yours for the National | Textile Workers Union. —A Knoxville Red, They work a 60- week, 5 nights a week, so that means 12 hours a day. fight here——Mill Hand. (By « Worker Correspondent) Detroit, Mich. Editor, Daily Worker: j To save his face, in view of the 20,000 men already kicked out. Will fact that Ford publicly announced | this extra money come out of Ford’s a few weeks ago that no men were | pocket? No. being laid off but that they were| The men who remain will be given only being transferred around, Ford |a raise and unless they keep produc- now thinks it advisable to let the | tion to par and show they “deserve” \classified men ‘out gradually, a few|the extra money they will be de- at a time. | moted to second or third class and | The hypocricy of the whole thing | transferred out into the street. is seen when the official announce-| At a time like this when workers ment of the company is read. “On|are begging for a job, Ford hopes the basis of the October payroll | to get the last ounce of energy from which registered 144,990 employees | those who are lucky enough to have |the monthly increase will amount to)a job, holding the incentive of a $1,628,451, or slightly in excess of |raise and the alternative of being | $19, 500,000 a year.” jfired over them as whip. In this An unlooked for gift|manner Ford hopes to get “his” |to his dear employe But let us |padded nineteen and a half million |be reminded that there is a big dif-| dollars back with interest. ference between the padded payroll But as long as the workers are unorganized they must tolerate such humiliation and abuse. Into the the classified men have along with the} after eliminated roll Auto Workers Union! Ki Yove cases. The International Tailoring has | the preference to hire and fire the tailors whenever it desires, because this was granted to them by the mis- leaders of the Amalgamated before and after the last strike. The firm is, therefore, taking the privilege of reducing wages at any time. The tailors will. rid themselves TH realize that the present administra- tion of the Amalgamated Clothing | Workers is serving the interests of the bosses, not the workers. One Anniversary union of the whole needle industry— }| ers Industrial Union, will solve the | present evils of the right to fire,) SEND GREETINGS wage cuts, piece work, ete. It will eliminate company unionism.—S. W. | FROM THE WORKERS IN |THE SHOPS AND _ FROM YOUR UNION, YOUR _FRA- TERNAL ORGANIZATIONS. | DISTRIBUTE _ THOUSANDS at shop, mine and mill gates, i. we~:ingclass neighborhooc Place Your Order Now! get subscriptions Ask your fellow workers in your shop to subscribe. Visit | workers who live next door to you for subscriptions. Subserip- tion blanks have been sent to every party unit. celebrate in your city Organize a mass meeting, hold a concert, an affair of some kind to celebrate the Sixth Anniversary of the Daily Worker. Elect Your Daily Worker Representative Every patty unit, section dis- trict must have a Daily Work- er representative. Every cit: where the party has maniben: ep must name a representa-— Ave, ROBERT MINOR ALFRED WAGENKNECHT Sbeakers: _ JAMES FORD All this to build a Mas: ’ MAX BEDACHT ‘ Circulation for the Hist Your Shap Mute in. the 155th Street and Eighth Avenue. ive for 5,000 New Members. . ROCKLAND PALACE Prices: '75c, $1.00 and $1.50 Tickets on Sale: Daily Worker DAILY WORKER. Your tasks in connection wif the Party Recruiting Dai'y Worker Building D;