Evening Republican, Volume 23, Number 248, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 15 October 1920 — LOOKS LIKE A WINTER BREAD LINE IN CHICAGO [ARTICLE]

LOOKS LIKE A WINTER BREAD LINE IN CHICAGO

J Chicago, Oct 14.—A plentiful supiply of labor this winter was predictled here today by lodging house j keepers and proprietors of employI ment agencies on West Madison (street, Mecca of the middle west for I migratory workers. I With workers’ hotels packed to I the doors and barrel houses filled, j I labor shippers see a “bread line” in I Chicago this winter, they said toI day. | “CUcago is loaded with bums,” (said John Miller, who operates, a j I free employment agency for a large (industry. “They’re coming in from J I all parts ,of the country. Somej I can’t get work and others are preI pared to lay up* for the winter on I the proceeds of high wages made I during the summer. I “Unable to get a room to sleep in, many are spending the nights in barrel houses and in paries.” Labor, said Miller, is now begin- I ning to be a drug on the* market. I Instead .of hiring more men, said I ! Miller, railroads and other indue- I tries are cutting the working day I from ten to eight hours;' Most all western railroads have I

I already done this,” said Miller. I “Few shipments are being made I and wages are less in that workers I get paid for eight hours work where I before they worked ten.” - I Most of the workers, employment (agents said, are coming in from the I far northwest. Many also have come from Ohio, where wages it is i said were cut in many of the big industries. “We are turning many applicants away.” . Miller"'-declared there are now I more than 15,000 hoboes in China-I I