Part of a series of articles titled Lyddie - Books to Parks.
Article • Lyddie - Books to Parks
Lyddie: Chapter 13 - Speed Up
Lowell National Historical Park. Public domain.
Lyddie begins to worry about the petition for a ten-hour workday. Shorter days would mean less money. Diana asks her to come to a labor organization meeting and Betsy encourages her to read the newspaper that supports a ten-hour workday, but Lyddie refuses. She wishes her friends could understand about the family debt and why she works so hard.
The mills speed up the machines again and Lyddie continues to work without complaining, though she is tending four very fast looms. Many of the workers are leaving the mills, and Lyddie knows if she fails to keep up the pace, she will be fired and replaced. She has heard her overseer Mr. Marsden saying there are lots of Irish immigrants moving to Lowell who are willing to work at the mills for less money.
One day, Lyddie has an accident while tending her looms. The shuttle comes loose and hits her on the side of the head. Diana bandages her head with an apron and helps Lyddie back to the boardinghouse. They send for the doctor. Instead of the usual physician, the doctor who arrives is the man Lyddie saw with Diana during the summer break.
Fact Check: Injuries
Were there many injuries in the mills?
What do we know?
Working near fast-moving machines in a closely packed room had its dangers. Fingers could get crushed between gears, or cut in any number of ways, and the shuttle could come flying off a loom. Most injuries, including lacerations and contusions, were minor, but some were not.
What is the evidence?
Primary Source:
“New streets were opened, houses and stores were put up, churches were erected, canals were dug, manufacturing operations were extended, and within the ten years (1831-1841) the population of the town was multiplied six-fold. The increase was without parallel in any place, in any country…”
Miles, Henry Adophus, Lowell As It Was, and As It Is. Carlisle, MA: Applewood Books, Originally Published in 1845.
Primary Source:
“Ann Graham, if you know her, had her hand torn of[f]. It happened in the carding room. I heard she had it taken of[f] above her elbow. We don’t know but she will lose her life because of it.” - Barilla Taylor
Letter from Barilla Taylor to her parents, July 14, 1844
Virginia Taylor Collection, Tsongas Industrial History Center
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Primary Source:
ACCIDENT.—A man by the name of Charles Hamblett was killed, yesterday at half past 7 o’clock, P.M., by being caught in the wheel of one of the Merrimack mills.
Lowell Courier, vol. VI, no. 828. May 26, 1840.
A SAD ACCIDENT—We learn that a young man about 16 years of age, had his hand caught in a burring machine, in the Carpet mill, this forenoon, and before it was stopped it had taken in his hand and part of his arm. The arm had to be amputated a little below the elbow.
Lowell Courier, Vol. XI, no. 1652, September 3, 1845.
Center for Lowell History
Primary Source:
Lowell National Historical Park
Fact Check: The Voice of Industry
Lyddie’s boardinghouse has copies of a weekly newspaper, The Voice of Industry. Was this a real publication?
What do we know?
Yes, The Voice of Industry was published between 1845 and 1848. The periodical began as a workingman’s paper in Fitchburg, MA, founded by William F. Young, but the publication quickly moved to Lowell, where it was published by the Lowell Female Labor Reform Association, under the leadership of Sarah Bagley. Articles advocated for improved working conditions, hours, and pay, and addressed other social issues including women’s rights, the abolition of slavery, and moral improvement. Lowell was home to other periodicals as well. The Lowell Offering was published monthly between 1840 to 1845, then was revived as The New England Offering in 1848. These publications were literary magazines that provided workers with an opportunity to publish reflections on their lives through poetry, fiction, and essays. The Lowell Offering was started by the Reverend Abel Charles Thomas, but in 1842, mill workers Harriet Farley and Harriet Curtis became co-editors. Both of these publications were written for and by female operatives and were widely circulated in the United States and throughout Europe. The Offering was less obviously political, and some dismissed it as painting too rosy a picture of working life at the mills.
What is the evidence?
Primary Source:
Center for Lowell History
Secondary Source:
“...they were also beginning to write and publish their own literary magazine, the Lowell Offering (1840-45), soon to be skillfully shaped by editor Harriet Farley. Emboldened by their newfound capacity to signify [represent themselves], working women examined—but did not necessarily emulate [copy] —middle-class forms of conduct and self-expression. In the process, they created a body of literature about their own lives that proposed—sometimes playfully, sometimes very seriously—that they, and not the [wealthy] ladies, were the real heralds of the modern American woman.”
Cook, Sylvia Jenkins. “‘Oh Dear! How the Factory Girls Do Rig Up!’: Lowell’s Self-Fashioning Workingwomen.” The New England Quarterly 83, no. 2 (2010): 219–49.
Secondary Source:
“The Lowell Offering began its five-year run in 1840 as a collection of stories, poems, and essays written by women mill workers in their self-improvement circle. To demonstrate ‘what factory girls had power to do,’ the women, together with Lowell's Universalist minister, Reverend Abel C. Thomas, issued the monthly thirty-page serial. It was the first serial written and published by American factory women, and it met with an overwhelmingly positive response. Not only did mill workers and their families purchase subscriptions, but Americans and even Europeans interested in the intellectual endeavors of factory workers supported the serial.”
Husband, Julie. “‘The White Slave of the North’: Lowell Mill Women and the Reproduction of ‘Free’ Labor.” Legacy 16, no. 1 (1999): 11–21.
Secondary Source:
“When the Offering's authors describe the attraction Lowell holds for them they do not only- not even primarily- point to the lure of goods [things one can buy] but to that of texts: to Lowell's libraries, evening schools, or improvement circles. Although material goods define these women's identity as 'factory girls,' they draw authority from the consumption and production of texts. The factory … is largely absent …; instead, they highlight the lyceum, the church, and most often, the boarding house.”
Kanzler, Katja. “Texts, Commodities, and Genteel Factory Girls: The Textile Mill as a Feminine Space in Antebellum American Literature.” Amerikastudien / American Studies 50, no. 4 (2005): 555–73.
Photos & Multimedia
360 degree view of weave room “Technology and Worker Safety”
https://portal.guided.space/?redirect=true&session=195622
Writing Prompts
Opinion
Lyddie, Amelia and Betsy all thought differently about the ten-hour petition. Explain each girl’s feelings. Which opinion do you agree with and why? Include concrete details from the text.
Informative/explanatory
Lyddie experienced speed-ups, when the machines operated at higher speeds, and stretch-outs, when the overseer gave her more machines to operate. Lyddie was happy for the extra work because she could make more money, but what were the consequences Lyddie faced due to this extra work? Include details and emotional language from the text.
Narrative
What would your reaction be to the speed-ups and stretch-outs? Use concrete examples and details.
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Last updated: December 7, 2024