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About 3,000 workers are employed in this country in the making of matches.About half of these workers aremen; the other half are women and children.They produce each year a product valued at over $5,500,000.Their wages are very small. About one-fourth of all the male workers and over one-half of all the female workers earn under $8 a week.Almost none of the women eve? earn more than $8 a yreek, and some of the men earn under $3 a week.Yet the making of matches is one of the most dangerous employments in the world.In one small factory in this coun* try twenty cases of phosphorous poisoning, or, as it is called “phossy Jaw,** have been reported.It is a peculiar and terrible disease that comes as a result of the poisoning of the teeth or of the gums.The gums become swollen and purple, the teeth become loose and drop out. The jawbone decomposes and passes away In the form of a disgusting pus.Sometimes the poison breaks out through the neck in the form of an abcess or oozes out through the mouth.Usually it is necessary to remove the entire jaw, even then the disease not infrequently ends in death.Hundreds of cases have been reported of this disease.The United States government and various state labor bureaus are sufficiently interested in the subject to prepare reports from time to time, describing the slow and horrible progress of this disease.“Phossy jaw” is such a terrible malady that nearly all the countries of Europe have prohibited the use of white phosphorous, the cause of the disease.In France, where the match-making industry is a government monopoly, the cost of caring for the poisoned workmen was so great that the French’ government discontinued the use of white phosphorous.In 1906 seven counties of Europe— Germany. France, Italy. Luxumburg, Switzerland and the Netherlands— came to an international agreement prohibiting phosphorous in the manufacture of matches.Two years later a British act was passed prohibiting the manufacture, sale and importation of matches madewith white phosphorous.Nearly all the countries of Europe have either prohibited the use of white phosphorous or endeavored to restrict most stringently its useiBut, of course, America has done nothing.Ohio,~New York, Pennsylvania, Oklahoma have endeavored to prevent employers from using children of tender years in match manufacture, but they do not succeed even in that.And so America enjoys the distinction of beinp in this, as in many other matters, the most barbarous country in the world.An inquiry has ben made into the subject by John B. Andrews, which is now published in Bulletin 86 of the Bureau of Labor at Washington.It is not pleasant reading, especially that part which deals with a score or more w’orkers w'ho have been poisoned in this industry.Anna was one of the match girls who died of phosphorous poisoning.She began work at fourteen years of age. After she had w'orked a few months she felt sensitive to cold and heat in a tooth that had been filled.The tooth was finally extracted, and it was discovered that at the roots there was pus from a poisoned jaw.An abcess extended down the side of the neck and the bones were involved.She suffered terrible agony; could not eat. and slowly starved to death as a result of the poison.The story of Anna is Just that of one little girl, but the scientific investigator at Washington tells of many other girls and boys who have suffered like Anna.He speaks, for instance, of one old w'oman who, as a result of poisoning, had lost her lower Jaw altogether. And for twenty years she masticated her food by pressing it against her upper jaw with her thumb.The investigator at Washington tells us there is a harmless substitute for white phosphorous that is readily available..Why, then, we ask, Is not tills substitute used?”The answer is very simple, says the investigator frankly. “Many manufacturers would gladly do so, but it comes Just a little more to make non-poisonous mathches.And for that excellent Christian reason Anna si/ffered agonies and died and an old woman uses her thumb for a lower Jaw for twenty years.
Newspaper Details
The Labor World
Duluth, Minnesota, US
Sat, Jun 18, 1910
Page 4
Full Page
Clipped by
Canton S.
OK, USA 27 Nov 2023
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