This is my eighth grade term paper we choose the following topics child labor, and tenements. We will be discussing the life styles and living of the people who had to go through the brutal times
During the industrial revolution young children were put to work .the children were put to work either because they were immigrants or if their family was poor Children at the age of four years old were put to work in factories and sweatshops trying to make money for their family to eat. At the factories the smallest kids were employed to retrieve cotton ribbons from under the machines. Twelve year old boys were employed by the chimney sweeping company, and were also employed to work in coal mines to crawl through tunnels too narrow and low for adults.
As early as 1802 and 1819 factory acts were passed to regulate the working hours of workhouse children in factories and cotton mills to 12 hours per day. A Royal Commission recommended in 1833 that children aged 11-18 should work a maximum of 12 hours per day, children aged 9-11 a maximum of eight hours, and children under the age of nine were no longer permitted to work. This act however only applied to the textile industry, and further agitation led to another act in 1847 limiting both adults and children to 10 hour working days. Some children enjoyed running errands, selling matches, flowers and other cheap goods. A high number of female children were employed into prostitution.
Most children died by the ages of twenty-five or thirty-two .In the 1900’s 1.7 million child laborers were reported in American industry by the age of fifteen that number doubled in 1910. The industrial revolution caused unspeakable misery both on England and in America. In the Lancashire cotton mills children worked from 12 to 16 hours a day; they often began working at the age of six or seven. Children had to be beaten to keep them from falling asleep while at work; in spite of this, many failed to keep awake and were...