Boott Mills

Boott Mills

The industrial revolution was rushing on at full steam and manufactured goods were at record demands. At a time when men were needed to dig the ditches build the bridges and do heavy manual labor there was still a need for lighter more tedious and just as perilsm jobs that required a specialized worker that of a smaller stature and with nimble hands and bodies that could navigate the crouded workspace of the "modern day" factories.

The cotton mills in Lowell, Massachusetts were home to many young women that were in need of work. Girls as young as ten years old were off working in the cotton mills trying to earn money for their families. The girls couldn't work out on the farms in the fields so they had to resort to the mills to make a living. Life was not easy for these young girls, but because their families were so poor they had to deal with it so that they were able to send money home. The girls were pushed to their limits by the people running the mills, yet they continued to work and work hard. The working conditions were almost unbearable in the mills because the girls received poor pay, the work was dangerous, and they worked extremely long hours.

The wages for the mill girls was extremely low for how much work they were putting into their jobs. Women didn't have much independence at all during these times and that was one of the main reasons their wages were so low. Also, women were not expected to be supporting families so their wages could be lower. It was not fair to these girls trying to make a living by working in the mills. All they wanted to do was have enough money to help out their families at home, but they would never get paid enough because of the fact that they were women. Since women during those times did not have power at all, they were not able to complain or protest against these poor wages. They just had to accept the fact that they weren't being treated fairly by their employers. It was just so unfair for them because the girls worked so hard and so many hours and received hardly anything in return. Women would not receive fair wages until they were recognized by society as independent people that could make decisions for themselves and not have to be controlled by men.

Not only did the women working in the mills receive poor wages, but the work that they did was extremely dangerous. The ones in the most danger were the younger kids that they had working in the mills. They used these kids to repair the machines that were broken. The kids had to do this job because they had the smallest fingers and arms so they could fit their hands into the hard to reach parts of the broken machines. This often would result in the kids losing their fingers sometimes part of their arm. In those times the mill workers did not have health insurance so