BOOTBLACKS, PEDDLERS AND MARKET CHILDREN
_Bootblacks_
The itinerant bootblack is gradually disappearing from our cities, but
he is still found in Boston, Buffalo, New York City and a few other
places. He is being supplanted by the worker at stands, which are
conducted almost invariably by Greeks. As a result of this change the
bootblacking business will soon cease to be a street occupation; it is
discussed here because of the abuses it involves and because it is
unregulated in many states, owing to its omission from the list of
employments covered by child labor laws.
_The Padrone System_
The New York-New Jersey Committee of the North American Civic League
for Immigrants reports that: "The condition of Greek boys and young
men in such occupations as pushcart peddling, shoe-shining parlors and
the flower trade is one of servitude and peonage. It has been found
that many boys apparently from fourteen to eighteen years of age
arrive here alone, stating that they are eighteen years old, but in
reality less than this, and that they are going to relatives. They
have been found working in the shoe-shining parlors seven days a week
from 7 A.M. to 9 P.M. and living with the 'boss' in groups varying
from five to twenty-five under unsanitary conditions, overcrowding and
irregularity of meals wholly undesirable for young boys. They are
isolated from learning English or from American contact, and receive
for their work from $7 to $15 a month and board and lodging. The
majority of the flower peddlers have been unable to obtain permits,
with the result that the boys who work for them are arrested for
violating the law. Boys who have been in the country from three months
to a year state they have been arrested several times--their first
experience in this country--and are already hardened so that they
think nothing of paying fines."[67]
The bootblack business is the chief industry to which the Greek
padrone system is applied. The United States Immigration Commission
found[68] that boys employed as bootblacks live in extremely
unwholesome quarters. Wherever the room is large enough, several beds
are gathered together with three and sometimes four boys sleeping in
each bed. In some places the boys merely roll themselves up in
blankets and sleep on the floor. The bootblacking stands are opened
for business about 6 o'clock in the morning, consequently the boys are
obliged to rise about an hour earlier, and wherever their sleeping
quarters are located at considerable distance from the stands, they
have to get up as early as 4.30. Arrived at the stands, they remain
working until 9.30 or 10 at night in cities, and on Saturday and
Sunday nights the closing hour is usually later. The boys eat their
lunch in the rear of the establishment, this meal consisting generally
of bread and olives or cheese. Supper is eaten after the boys reach
"home," and after having eaten it they retire without removing their
clothes. Even after their excessively long work day, two of the boys
are required to wash the dirty rags used for polishing the shoes daily
so they can be used the next day.
These boys are compelled to work every day in the year without
vacation. The Immigration Commission found that they are under
constant espionage, as at every stand the padrone places relatives who
both work for him and act as spies on the other boys. Their employer
instructs them to make false statements to questions asked by
outsiders relative to their ages or conditions of work; many padrones
also censor the letters written by the boys to their parents or others
and examine all incoming mail, so as to forestall any efforts made by
outsiders to induce the boys to leave for other places.
The majority of them cannot read or write their own language, and are
unable to secure any education in this country because of their long
work hours. According to the Immigration Commission their mental
development is perceptibly arrested by the physical fatigue they
suffer as a result of their long-sustained work without recreation.
They receive no good advice, nor do they hear anything that would
tend to elevate them morally. The Commission does not hesitate to
brand these conditions as deplorable; it declares that the ravages on
the constitutions of these boys laboring in shoe-shining
establishments under this system are appalling. It attributes these
effects to the following causes: long hours, close confinement to
their work in poorly ventilated places, unsanitary living conditions,
unhealthful manner of sleeping, excessive stooping required by their
work, inadequate nourishment due to the "economy" of the padrones who
furnish the food, the microbe-laden dust from shoes, the inhaling of
injurious chemicals from the polish they use, the filthy condition of
their bodies resulting from their failure to bathe and the lack of
proper clothing for the winter season.
The Greek Consul General at Chicago, himself a physician, in a letter
to the Immigration Inspector of that city under date of November 16,
1910, declared that as a result of his experience in examining and
treating boy bootblacks he was convinced that all boys under eighteen
years of age who labor for a few years in shoe-shining establishments,
develop serious chronic stomachic and hepatic troubles which
predispose them to pulmonary disease; he further declared that
because of the conditions under which they work the majority of them
ultimately contract tuberculosis, and that in his opinion it would be
more humane and infinitely better for young Greeks to be denied
admission into the United States than to be permitted to land if they
are intended for such employment. Similar statements are made by other
Greek physicians of Chicago.
The importation of Greek boys for use as bootblacks in the United
States started about 1895, when the Greeks began to secure their
monopoly of the industry by taking it away from the Italians and the
Negroes, confining it, however, to stands or booths. Most of the early
padrones have become financially independent. Their success attracted
other Greeks to this industry, and in a short time almost every
American city with a population of more than 10,000 had bootblack
stands operated by them. Thus the traffic in Greek boys began to
flourish.
The Bureau of Immigration helped to have a number of padrones indicted
and convicted for offenses against the conspiracy statute and the
Immigration Act, and these prosecutions made the importers very
careful as to their manner of procedure. They now bring the boys here
through the instrumentality of relatives in Greece in such a way that
the padrones are almost beyond the reach of our criminal statutes.
In some cases it has been found that on leaving Greece for this
country the boys are told to report to a saloon keeper in Chicago or
in some other western city, hence they do not know their final
destination. The saloon keeper has his instructions from the padrones
and acts as their distributing agent. Padrones who operate in places
distant from ports of entry easily avoid detection in this way.
In most cases these padrones derive an income from each boy of from
$100 to as high as $500 a year. The Commission explains this as
follows: The wages paid by the padrones now to Greek boys in
shoe-shining establishments range from $80 to $250 per year, the
average wages being from $120 to $180 per year. The boys are bound by
agreement to turn their tips over to their padrones: in most cases as
soon as the tipping patron has departed the boy deposits his tip in
the register, while in other places tips are put into a separate box
to which the padrone holds the key. In smaller cities and even in the
poorest locations each boy's tips may exceed the sum of 50 cents per
day, while in large cities they average higher. The Greek padrone,
therefore, receives in return from tips alone nearly double the amount
of wages paid. By deducting the wages and the annual boarding expenses
for each boy--an expenditure seldom exceeding the sum of $40 per
year--there is still a sum left to the padrone to pay him for the
privilege of allowing the boy to work in his place. In other words,
from the total amount of tips--money that belongs to the boy by
right--the padrone is enabled to pay the boy's annual wages and still
have a respectable sum left, all this independently of the legitimate
profits of his business.
Relatives of the padrones in Greece often pay the steamship passage of
boys with the understanding that they are to go to the United States
and serve the padrone for one year to reimburse him for the passage
money advanced. A mortgage is placed on the property of the boys'
father as security, purporting that the father is to receive in cash
an amount equal to the wages commonly paid to Greek bootblacks for
one year in the United States, but as a matter of fact a steamship
ticket and $12 or $15 in money are all that is given. The cash is to
serve as "show money" to help secure admission to this country past
the immigration officers at the ports of entry. Advertising is
systematically carried on throughout all the provinces of Greece with
a view to exciting the interest of the parents so that they will send
their boys to the United States, and no efforts are spared in letting
it become known that there is a great demand here for boy labor at the
bootblack stands. The padrones themselves even go to Greece every two
or three years, and while there manage to become godfathers to the
children of many families; this relationship gives them great
influence, and through it they are able to secure many boys for their
service.
Concerning the prevention of these abuses, the report says: "In the
investigations conducted by the Bureau of Immigration many conferences
were held with United States attorneys in various jurisdictions with
the view of instituting proceedings against padrones, if possible,
under the peonage statutes. The attorneys generally agreed that under
the evidence submitted to them those laboring in shoe-shining
establishments are peons, but as the elements of indebtedness and
physical compulsion to work out the indebtedness are missing, peonage
laws cannot apply.
"Our immigration laws as now on the statute books provide specifically
for the exclusion of boys under sixteen years of age only when not
accompanied by one or both of their parents. This provision cannot
apply to those boys that come in company with their parents, nor to
those who have their parents in the United States, nor to such as
successfully deceive immigration officers by posing as the sons of
immigrants in whose charge they come. If held for special inspection
at the ports of entry, these aliens can only be excluded if it appears
that they are destined to an occupation unsuited to their tender
years. In the absence of any such evidence, the boards of inquiry
generally admit. Once landed, it becomes a hard matter to trace them
and almost impossible to secure evidence in the majority of cases, for
the boys understand that they will be punished by deportation. This
knowledge makes them persistent in withholding any information as to
the manner of their entry into the United States."[69]
Quite recently a young Greek bootblack who was working at a stand in
an Indianapolis office building confessed to a truant officer that he
was twelve years old, whereupon the chief truant officer of the city
went to the place, but on his arrival the boy had changed his mind and
declared that he was fourteen years old, and every one connected with
the stand supported the statement. Nevertheless the chief truant
officer proceeded with the case and found that the boy had been in
this country only about six months, his parents being still in Greece.
An older brother had a position as a railroad porter but did not stay
with the little fellow even on the few occasions he was in the city.
The boy lived at the home of the proprietor of the stand, whose
relationship to him was a combination of employer and guardian. This
man operated four stands in the city, and his dozen or more other
employees all lived at the same place. The chief truant officer
charged the man with having worked the boy from 7 A.M. to 9 P.M.
seven days in the week, which was admitted before the Juvenile Court
by the defendant, who also volunteered the information that the boy
worked until 11 P.M. on holidays and on Saturdays. Of course the boy
was being kept out of school.
In its issue of August 12, 1911, the _Survey_ published a letter from
a correspondent concerning a case of peonage among bootblacks in the
city of Rochester, N.Y. This particular case was of a pale, thin,
under-sized Greek lad who worked at a large stand in a local office
building. He explained that he worked every day in the week from 7
A.M. to 9 P.M., including Sundays, and that on Saturdays the hours
were lengthened to 11 P.M., adding that he had not been absent from
his stand one day in four years except at one time when he was sick in
the hospital.
A letter which was written by a Greek in Syracuse, N.Y., on May 4,
1911, to the editor of the Syracuse _Post-Standard_ was printed in the
same magazine.[70] This letter recites the wrongs of the bootblacks
and is reproduced below because of its value as one of the rare
protests which come from the victims of the system:--
"Before I came to this country from Greece, I heard that this country
is free, but I don't think so. It is free for the Americans, not for
the shoe shiners. In this city are too many shoe shiners' stands, and
the boys which work there--they work fifteen hours a day, and Sunday,
and almost eighteen on Saturdays. They make only from $12 to $18 a
month and board, but we don't have any good board neither, but our
patrons give us bread, tea and a piece of cheese for dinner, supper,
but no breakfast. We don't have any time to go to the church, not in
school, and without them we won't be good citizens. They won't let us
read newspapers, because they are afraid if we learn something we will
quit, but we can't quit because we can't speak English, and we can't
find another job. Now I don't mean the boys working in the barber
shops. They make $10 to $18 a week, and they don't work as hard as we
do. We wish to work as they do. We want the public and Mr. Mayor to
cut the hours from fifteen to ten, not Sundays, because we want time
for school, and weekly work, not monthly. I think I wrote enough."
_Peddlers and Market Children_
The licensed peddlers of Boston are under orders not to engage little
children to sell for them with or without compensation. "These
peddlers have hitherto crowded the markets of this city by inviting
children to help them in the business, frequently for no other
compensation than the offal of their pushcarts or stands."[71]
The peddling of chewing gum is a common form of street occupation for
children. In reality it is merely begging in disguise. The Chicago
Vice Commission reports that its agents found boys under fourteen
years of age selling gum late at night in the segregated districts of
the city. At intervals of from two to three hours their investigators
returned to the same neighborhood and found these little children
still engaged in this very questionable form of work. One agent
reported having seen two little girls of about eleven years in the
company of a small boy of about eight years selling chewing gum in
front of a saloon in the vice district between nine and ten o'clock at
night.[72]
The following table gives the sex, age, nationality, standing in
school, orphanage and occupation of seventeen children found by one
person in a single trip through the markets of Cincinnati:--
====+=====+====+=====+===========+==========+==========+==============
| | | | | FATHER | MOTHER |
| | | | | LIVING | LIVING |
| | | | +-----+----+-----+----+--------------
BOYS|GIRLS|AGE |GRADE|NATIONALITY| YES | NO | YES | NO | SELLING
----+-----+----+-----+-----------+-----+----+-----+----+--------------
1 | | 9 | 2d | Italian | 1 | | 1 | | baskets
1 | | 10 | 4th | American | 1 | | 1 | | fruit
1 | | 10 | 3d | German | | 1 | 1 | | vegetables
1 | | 10 | 2d | Italian | | 1 | 1 | | fruit
| 1 | 10 | 4th | Italian | 1 | | 1 | | fruit
| 1 | 10 | 3d | Italian | | 1 | 1 | | baskets
1 | | 11 | 4th | Italian | | 1 | 1 | | fruit
1 | | 11 | 3d | Italian | 1 | | 1 | | baskets
| 1 | 11 | 6th | German | 1 | | | 1 | vegetables
1 | | 12 | 4th | American | 1 | | 1 | | vegetables
1 | | 12 | 3d | American | 1 | | | 1 | baskets
1 | | 12 | 4th | American | 1 | | 1 | | sassafras
1 | | 12 | 6th | Italian | 1 | | 1 | | fruit
1 | | 13 | 5th | Italian | 1 | | 1 | | baskets
1 | | 14 | 3d | American | 1 | | 1 | | sassafras
1 | | 14 | 8th | American | 1 | | 1 | | vegetables
| 1 | 14 | 4th | Italian | | 1 | 1 | | fruit
====+=====+====+=====+===========+=====+====+=====+====+==============
Of these seventeen children nine were Italians, six were Americans,
two were Germans. Five of the children, all of whom except one were
Italian, were engaged in selling baskets to the passers-by in markets.
Six of the children, all of whom except one were Italian, were selling
fruit. Six of the children were selling vegetables and herbs, all of
them being Americans and Germans. The occupational characteristics of
these different peoples are shown by their children, the Italians
predominating in the sale of fruit, the Germans in the sale of the
products of their market gardens, the Americans, all of whom were
boys, in the sale of the herbs they had gathered or the vegetables
cultivated on their home farms.
Of these seventeen children nine were in their normal grades at
school, while eight were backward and none ahead of their proper
grades. This large percentage of retardation is due principally to the
lack of time for preparation of school lessons on the part of these
children, as much of their afternoons and evenings is taken up either
with the work of selling in the markets or with the work of assisting
with the garden duties at home. Of the eight backward children, four
were Italians and four were Americans. One of the backward Italian
girls was fourteen years of age and had left school three weeks prior
to the inquiry; she was the oldest of six children; her father was
dead, and she was working for her mother in their fruit store selling
the fruit from early morning until midnight every day in the week
except Sunday. As she was the oldest child in the family, it is of
course easily seen that her retardation in school was largely due to
her having been kept at work in the shop during the afternoons and
evenings while she was still attending school. An American boy, who,
although twelve years of age, was only in the third grade at school,
was employed by his parents to sell baskets in the market, in spite of
the fact that his father had a store and was fully able to support the
child properly. This boy was found, as were many other such children,
selling baskets in the market at eleven o'clock at night after having
been there since early in the morning. A thirteen-year-old Italian boy
was only in the fifth grade; he was selling baskets in one market in
the morning and in another market during the afternoon and evening;
both of his parents were living, and his father had a "city job."
There were six children in the family, two of whom were older and
employed. The entire family of eight persons occupied two rooms.
It is noteworthy that the fathers of twelve of the children were
living, only five being dead; while the mothers of fifteen were
living, only two being dead. Not a single child was a full orphan. In
the great majority of cases it was not necessary for these children to
work so prematurely.