Talk:Mule scavenger

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Nice to see some-oone else who cares about cotton. Now a few points

A few thoughts
I had never seen scavangers refered to as mule scavangers. What does recoup mean? Other forms of wastage. The cotton dust was a fore hazard- but scavanging was more necesssary in the carding room. 12 to 20 % of the cotton became waste of some type Joseph Naismith Students cotton spinning (1896) - para 335-341 deals with this. Legislation in UK was 1819 but in the states it was in the 1920s. You miss the biggest danger- the dust got onto the lung causing disease, stunting growth and causing an early death.

Somewher you mention Cork? Are we talking Flax- weren't they using Jennies for that? JD You mention weaver- but we are talking of spinning. Reference 2 (cotton Times) seems to be poor- omitting items when it doesn't suit, or the language is inappropriate for a ten year old. We do not report the positive- women could work in the mills because they were allowed to bring in their bairns, that the bairnes must work fifteen minutes an hour sweeping- but then had 45 to play. The alternative was to leave then alone at home in an unheated house- and it was warm in the mill. Or up on the fells minding the sheep. Where does the 14-16 hours a day come from- in what year?

Illustrations. I believe the original caption referred to the youngster as a scavanger- not a mule scavanger wasn this Baines 1831. There is a difficulty here self-acting mules only came in in the 1831, and till then the dangerous push stroke was performed manually so the child was in little danger. It seemed to shock the later writers who fantacised a bit- and got confused. The second illustration was from Lowell, where mules were never used- the 12yr old tenter is tending a ring frame and certainly not scavanging. The scandal here is many fold- that there were no child labour laws in the States in 1920. Most child workers were children of former slaves.-- and more

Legislation

You must mention part-timing- the millowner often providing the schooling at his expense. The faith of the millowner- the Sunday School movement are all factors. Basically when a child was too big for piecing (fingers too big) he needed to be literate and numerate to be any use as a worker. About half of the workers in Manchester and Stockport cotton factories surveyed in 1818 and 1819 had begun work at under ten years of age. This needs a reference- what is a cotton factory? Spinning or weaving mill or finishing, which? It is unlikely in 1818 it was weaving- as this was still outworked- see Geoff Timmins on this. The role of cotton in defining the factory acts was critical- and there is room for a lot more wikiwork here.

Conclusion

I am short of time at the moment but I have put this on the watch list. I would really like to extract the truth from the Mary Barton melodrama and tearjerking Daily Fail stuff- I think it is wildly more interest told straight. --ClemRutter (talk) 12:37, 4 September 2011 (UTC)I have


 * I very much bow to your superior understanding of the industry and this role. There is certainly more to it and perhaps all of it needs to be brought together in an article such as child labour in the cotton industry.  I believe that "scavenger" was the term used rather than "mule scavenger" but it worked nicely to disambiguate it from the other articles.  violet/riga [talk] 13:17, 4 September 2011 (UTC)


 * I note you are distinguished in your own right- and can actually write in good English which I merely aspire to. As I said, it is great to have someone with experience showing an interest in cotton- there is so much left to do. And there are so many implications. I love the fact that I can tell you the date and even the time that the Industrial Revolution started- none of your fuzzy rubbish here. 10th June 1761, was when the Bridgewater Canal was opened from Worsley to Castlefield, so allowing coal to reach Manchester on the first direct rather than a contour canal- to allow the mills to use steam to refill their lodges- and generate a greater head of water for the waterwheels- but of course this was all lost knowledge- and I think deliberately lost knowledge. (And it will be lost again if I don't document it before my memory makes a final farewell. As to child labour, I have tackled Chimney sweeps which is a bit outside my subject area- but there do seem to have been so many opportunity to keep school refusers occupied. --ClemRutter (talk) 17:07, 4 September 2011 (UTC)

POV tag
I have highlighted some problems. I suggest folk ignore the Robinson popular book, and treat the Daily Mail with the contempt it works so hard to deserve. Go to Baines (1835)(its online) where the illustration is sourced and read Trollope in context. Remember why Cotton Times was published- for students. Then suggest article is moved to Scavenger (Mule-spinning). But we do need to read the new UKP60 text. --ClemRutter (talk) 09:00, 9 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Apologies if this sounds a little blunt- I am in the midst of tagging and uploading some holiday photos from France- and there are too many- and most require that the en:stub is translated first from a fr:stub and those need some cleaning up first! Poke me if you want to growl.--ClemRutter (talk) 16:22, 9 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I've removed this template per #3 in the instructions at Template:POV:
 * This template is not meant to be a permanent resident on any article. Remove this template whenever:
 * There is consensus on the talkpage or the NPOV Noticeboard that the issue has been resolved
 * It is not clear what the neutrality issue is, and no satisfactory explanation has been given
 * In the absence of any discussion, or if the discussion has become dormant.
 * This is without prejudice to Clem's arguments above, which I'd have no objection to his acting on. -- Khazar2 (talk) 03:19, 3 December 2012 (UTC)

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