Democratic Sentinel, Volume 11, Number 17, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 27 May 1887 — OUR INDUSTRIES. [ARTICLE]

OUR INDUSTRIES.

Among the Mills, Mines, and Furnaces —Points of Interest in the Labor Horizon. Notes Gathered from Workshops, Mines, Railroads, and Other Busy Places. The Chicago Strike and Lockout. In Chicago, the chief seat of trade disturbances in this country, a strike of the bricklayers has been answered by a lockout on the part of their employers. As immediate results not only are many thousands of workingmen threatened with 1038 of employment, but great business interests intimately associated with the city’s welfare are endangered. In its origin the quarrel was of comparatively small moment. The bricklayers, demanded that payday be changed from Tuesday to Saturday, and that a slight advance be made in wages, threatening a general strike if their demands should not be complied with. Instead of yielding, the Master Builders’ Association responded with a circular ordering a complete suspension of work. It is estimated that by this combined movement of strike and lockout no fewer than 50,000 workingmen will be thrown out of employment. Moreover, as is usual in such cases, among the worst sufferers will be multitudes of families whose heads have not had the slightest share in originating the conflict. In behalf of the master builders the claim is made that this extreme measure of a lockout was taken in self-defense. The suspension of business operations in the mo6t favorable season of the year for building will be accompanied by great losses, and for this reason the builders say they would not have resorted to a lockout except from the necessity of resisting arrogant dictation on the part of their employes. To the Bricklayers’ Association belong nearly all the bricklayers and masons of Chicago. It is a local guild that has no connection with either of the national organizations of labor. Strange workingmen are not admitted to the association, and the certificates of membership of other labor unions are not recognized. masons and bricklayers, whether belonging to the organization or not, must pay into its treasury an initiation fee of $75 for the privilege of working at the high wageß paid in Chicago. There are other rules of the association under which the master builders have chafed, and when the last demand was made upon them they determined upon resistance. This is the excuse given by the master builders of Chicago for a lockout which, if continued for the season, must be attended by the most serious consequences.

Indiana’s Dig Gas Hoein. The discovery of natural gas in Indiana, at various and distant points with varying pressures, indicates a multiplicity of reservoirs that are hut feebly connected with one another, if, indeed, they be connected at all. The first well struck in Indiana has been giving ont 2,000,000 cubic feet per day, and since then two other wells have been bored in the immediate vicinity, from which still greater volumes are obtained. Well known as No. 2, which was struck on the 31st of November, has been flowing ever since at a rate of 6,000,000 cubic feet per dav. It is 916 feet 6 inches deep. Well No. 3 is 912 feet deep, and flows 7,000,000 cubic feet per day. Manufacturing enterprises will be transplanted to that locality as soon as possible. Influx of Foreign Labor. The extraordinary influx of foreign labor threatens in time to affect the rate of wages paid. The majority of the new-comers are seeking agricultural employment, and will in time become valuable consumers for our shop and mill products. The rush will continue for months to come, and it will be some time after the inducements disappear before the rush will be over. Skilled labor is’ anxious to escape from Europe and Great Britain as common or farm labor, and more or less correspondence is going on between the trades unions on both sides relative to opportunities here. Industrial and Labor Notes. A $1,000,000 company, composed largely of Philadelphians, is about introducing a new incandescent light system at St. Louis. A SIOO,OOO tack and nail company is about starting business at East St. Louis. A SIOO,OOO company has been organized for manufacturing hay-knives at East Wilton, Me. A Buffalo scale company has ;ust booked a contract for sixteen 90, 000-pound scales. The Cleveland ship-yards are overrun with boat orders. A Reading founder has just booked an order for three very large cotton-presses. The first one to be made will weigh 150 tons. The Bethlehem Iron Company has 800 men on its payrolls. The steam engine manufacturing companies throughout the East are all running a full force of men, ar.d the managers report flattering prospects. A new cottonmill is to be built at Holyoke, 344 feet long by 88 feet wid •, will have 30,000 spindles. The weavers of Fall River, Mass., are about forming .an organization similar to the Spinneis’ Ui_ion. Weaving has been advanced 12$ per cent, at the Troy blanket-mills. A Manchester cottonmill company has ju-t put in a l,00i)-horse power engjne. A new silk-mill has just be-’n started in Mansfield, Conn. Rail makers and the manufacturers of Tailway material generally are predicting an improving demand for material, on account of tt e steady increase of earnings on the leading ra.lrouds. The improving •commercial reports are also stimulating confidence, and leading to an enlargement of industrial operations. The reports of earnings of thirty-eight r ilroad companies for the fi:st quarter of the year show an increase of 21 per cent, over 1886. Tbe Schuylkill region has 120 collieries, employing 30,500 m ners. who mine 9,000.000 tons of coal and are paid $11,000,000 annually in wages. There are fifty-two collieries in the Lehigh region, employing 13,00:1 miners, and in the) Wyoming region there are 109 collieries, employing,39,ooo ■worke.s who are paid $,14,000,000. There are in all 251 collieries, employing 83,000 men. who earn $30,000,01:0 per vearJ General Francis A. Walker, in a recent article On the sources of business profits, holds tL at .profits do not enter into the price ■of prcthicey'and are ‘not"obtained’ by de-

duction from the wages of labor. In an article on the ‘Socialists” he claims that no permanent unity can be maintained among the people who advocated socialistic views. Real estate matters are very active in St. Paul, the aggregate of dealings for the first four mouths of this year amounted to $22,000,000, as against $7.000,000 for the same time last year. The building permits so far this year call for an expendi.ure of $2,000,000, against $1,250,000 for the same time last year. The American cheese manufacturers find their Scotch market leaving them. Last year’s imports at Glasgow were 3,H42 tons, as against 7,200 tons in 1884. 'The cheese makers are told they must manufacture more carefully and take more pains in shipping. The result of the active demand for satinets has been a large increase in the demand for shoddy snitalle for such goods. The use of shoddy and wool extract has increased during the last four years, owing to the competition and low price of goods. The New York workingmen are nearly all busily employed, and since the Ist of May have won a good many small strikes involving questions of unionism and wages. There is an increased demand for machinists and mechanical labor of all kinds in” the West and Northwest. Wages have been advanced in a good many shops. Bnilding operations are still greatly delayed at Omaha, and contractors are put about. Workmen were sent for to Kansas City, but the Knights there were on guard. The St. Louis printers expect to secure the nine-hour day after Sept. 1, and believe that it will be enforced generally by the International Union. The wages of lumbermen will likely be advanced during the coming season. The lumbermen are compactly organized, and are working in harmony. The brickmakers of Terre Haute, Ind., have decided to introduce molds into the union brick-yard that will leave upon each brick the union imprint. A new mill, to cost $275,000, is to be built at Fall River, and will have 20,000 spindles, to be used for the manufacture of yarn for the hosiery trade. A $1,000,000 malleable iron works is to be erected at Nashville; a bridge works at Rome, and a rolling-mill at Florence, to cost $150,000. The Somerset Iron Works, in Massachusetts, which cost $250,000, are offered for SBO,OOO. The Union Labor party of New York will hold a State convention at Elmira, June 15. All of the 200 union brewers of San Francisco have been discharged.