(Cartoonist’s note: I’m repeating another post today, from 10 years ago. It’s a busy week, and I’m doing this instead of simply skipping a day, as is my wont. I do go to some length to show you something I consider worthwhile.)
I don’t know about the rest of the country, but the American south not long ago was littered with what were generically known as “sewing plants.” It wouldn’t be much of an exaggeration to say most towns had one, an almost invisible manufacturing facility tucked away in a second- or thirdhand warehouse where an endless array of sewn goods, from baseball caps to shirts to throw pillows, were produced. Mostly women worked in these places, for not much money, but the plants did provide a significant number of jobs in a lot of towns. We’re not talking long ago, but sewing plants are mostly gone now, to other countries. I don’t know the moral of this story, but I do know having a low-paying, unappreciated job does not mean it won’t be taken away from you.
(addendum: There was a sewing plant in an old cotton warehouse, visible from my front porch. About the time I originally posted the above , it closed. A few years later, the roof fell in. A couple of years ago, they tore it down. I guess I get my ideas on my front porch.)
71 responses to “Reaping What We Sow”
Yep, if they wanted to remake “Norma Rae” these days they would have to set it in one of the Asian countries.
When I was a kid, made in America meant a well made reliable product. We were not rich and my microscope was a Japanese knockoff. My how times have changed.
I wonder if there’s any point any more in looking for the union label?
With the comments, this sure shows the ‘benefits’ of globalization. It’s the same story in the rust belt.
In the 50s all the mills in NE went to the South.
Lest we forget — today is D-Day
But it doesn’t only happen here. Most of the Japanese companies famous for consumer electronics are having them made in China or another country now.
My town used to be an upstanding, blue-collar town with many factories. Now…
It’s hard to talk about.
Snoopy and Ike: https://www.gocomics.com/peanuts/1998/05/31
https://schulzmuseum.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/661993.jpg
When I worked at Penney’s (1969 – 1971) J.P. Stevens was a major supplier for our “White Sales” which I see merger with other companies in 1980’s or so. They probably don’t quite fit the bill for the other business’s that you mentioned. I never got the impression that their hourly workers were the highest paid around, but back then none of us hourly workers were “highly paid” by those standards or today’s.
The talk of clothing labels made me curious enough to look at the shirt I was wearing. Found out that the t-shirt with the name of an old line work clothing maker, bought at a major retailer, was made in Lesotho!
IMO, today’s One Big Happy is neat.
https://www.gocomics.com/onebighappy/2018/06/07
Peace,
Ken: In late ’50s, I worked a summer month or two for J. P. Stevens (textiles) in their corporate headquarters in NYCity. They received daily teletype reports from places in, I think, NC. Those reports were exceptionally long and I often wondered if the knowledge therein was actually used enough to warrant daily contact of such length. Job taught me a bit about teletypes and another message milieu whose name escapes me: featured a rotating drum with a metallic paper-like removable surface upon which the message became visible. Can anyone supply the name of that latter device?
My immediate boss was no treasure, so I left for college – maybe 2 weeks earlier than planned – upon her return from vacation.
CXP, would that be a “ditto machine”?
I remember way back when I was a Production Planner on the Apollo Space Program, we would write production work orders by hand. Then usually a young lady would type a master copy on a “Friden Flexowriter.” The master would would then be place on a “Mimeograph Machine” or a “Ditto Machine” for copying.
cx-p, sounds like the original fax machine. Original placed on rotating drum and scanned. Image transmitted line by line and reproduced on rotating drum at receiving station.
When I was in the Navy, that is how the onboard meteorological shop got weather forecast maps from the main facilities.
Thanks, guys. Sounds as if “fax” is the winner. I am familiar – VERY – with both ditto and mimeograph, and this was neither. Transmission line-by-line was its feature.
If this was the late ’50s, cep, it was probably telex, as the first fax machine that used regular telephone lines wasn’t patented until ’64.
If telex worked in that same fashion, I bow to superior knowledge…no idea whether regular phone lines were used, though. [I can verify, however, that no smoke signals were involved on the NY end of things!]
Barry Fitzgerald’s The Naked City, or maybe another earlier Noir movie showed a cross country photo facsimile transmission of a suspect’s mugshot. Depicted as needing several minutes to complete. Not sure if it was a Bell telephone line or dedicated circuit made for purpose. Made me reconsider slightly the pace of technological advances before and after 1970.
https://faxauthority.com/fax-history/ Everything you wanted to know about faxing, and probably more.
Sahshimi time, nr Baltimore.
https://explore.org/livecams/birds/osprey-cam-chesapeake-conservancy
Peace,
https://scontent-dfw5-1.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-9/34158592_1561866460589966_5829392294331023360_n.jpg?_nc_cat=0&oh=f5b7083b46c3f79ab8411c1be8d362e8&oe=5B808ACF
“Growing old is mandatory; growing up is optional.”