consciousness is expressing itself. The movement for a greater
Pittsburgh now consummated in the union of Pittsburgh and Allegheny with
a few adjacent towns, arises no doubt in the general effort toward power
and prestige; but the step toward inclusiveness is entirely normal, and
has gathered up into a public movement aggressive impulses which had
never before run in that channel. Happily the expansion was preceded by
the election for the first time in a generation of a reform mayor. The
movement came directly as a result of the impudent interference of the
state machine in unseating a mayor who had been elected by an opposing
local faction. This action, carried out under the forms of legislation,
brought Pittsburgh people into a new feeling of municipal self-respect,
and led to their electing on a democratic ticket George W. Guthrie, who
is in every respect one of Pittsburgh's first citizens and has for many
years been earnestly interested in the cause of municipal reform.
The date 1898 may be taken as marking a kaleidoscopic shifting in
the Pittsburgh ensemble. Then the city emerged into the day of large
things,--into the great concentration of capital, and the incidental
liquidation which gave many families overpowering fortunes of cash
in hand; the assembling of vast heterogeneous multitudes of laborers
to keep up with the demands of a period of unparalleled prosperity;
the ampler civic sense signalized by the Carnegie institutions with
their unusual cultural opportunities, and embodied after a time in
solid municipal reform and progress, in a truly enlightened Chamber of
Commerce, and in excellent forms of social service. On the one hand,
irresponsible individuals have gone forth with boundless power to
represent the city to the world at her worst. On the other, Pittsburgh
is gradually and quietly taking to herself the world's lessons in the
making of the modern city and in the building up of citizenship. The
former phenomenon, in which to many this city is allegorized, is but
the froth and the scum; the latter has the beginnings of a tidal energy
behind it.
[Illustration]
THE NEW PITTSBURGHERS
SLAVS AND KINDRED IMMIGRANTS IN PITTSBURGH
PETER ROBERTS
INDUSTRIAL DEPARTMENT, INTERNATIONAL YOUNG MEN'S CHRISTIAN ASSOCIATION
The day laborer of a generation ago is gone,--a change which has been
swifter and more complete in Pittsburgh than in many other of our
industrial centers. "Where are your Irish? your Welsh? your Germans?
your Americans?" I asked an old mill hand. "Go to the city hall and the
police station," he said. "Some of them are still in the better paid
jobs in the mills; but mostly you'll have to look for them among the
doctors and lawyers and office holders; among clerks and accountants and
salesmen. You'll find them there."
The day laborer in the mills to-day is a Slav. The foreign-born of the
steel district comprise, it is true, every European nation, but I shall
deal here only with the races from southeastern Europe, which for twenty
years have been steadily displacing the Teutonic and Keltic peoples in
the rough work of the industries. The tendency of the Italians is to go
into construction and railroad work, a few entering the mines, rather
than into the plants and yards; and my group narrows itself down to the
dominant Slav and Lithuanian. What I have to say of them in Pittsburgh
and Allegheny City is in the main representative of the manufacturing
towns of the whole district.
Roughly speaking, one-quarter of the population of Pittsburgh is
foreign-born. The foreigner is nowhere more at home than here, and
nowhere has he been more actively welcomed by employers. The conflict
of customs and habits, varying standards of living, prejudices,
antipathies, all due to the confluence of representatives of different
races of men, may be witnessed here. The most backward of these
foreigners are superstitious and ignorant and are the victims of
cunning knaves and unscrupulous parasites. On the other hand, the
whole territory is thrown into a stern struggle for subsistence and
wage-standards by the displacements due to these resistless accretions
to the ranks of the workers. The moral and religious life of the
city is not less affected by this inflow of peoples. Their religious
training differs widely from that of peoples of Protestant antecedents,
and institutions that were dear to the founders of the city are fast
undermined by the customs of immigrants from southeastern Europe. Yet as
a whole, they bring with them physical and cultural resources which the
English-speaking community fails to elicit or thoughtlessly wastes.
Such an exhaustive study as could be made of the immigrant population of
the steel district is outside the possibilities of this paper. I shall
set down only what a month brought me as I visited the lodging-houses
and the courts and the mills of Greater Pittsburgh; as I talked with
priest and leader, policeman and doctor, banker and labor boss, the
immigrants themselves and those who live close to them; but I shall put
it before you in the light of many years' residence in the anthracite
coal communities, where in another section of Pennsylvania, at Mahanoy
City and Wilkes-Barre and Scranton, I have known the Slav and the Lett
and their efforts to gain a foothold in America. I shall deal with
the situation, not as I have seen it in my visits of the past year,
during which the immigrants have returned home by thousands, but as I
came to know it in the heyday of prosperity, the early fall of 1907,
when conditions were as they are likely to be again when industrial
prosperity returns. This is the situation which we must reckon with in a
permanent way.
In 1880, Slavs, Lithuanians and Italians did not form one per cent of
the population in either Pittsburgh or Allegheny. By 1890, they had
reached four per cent, and out of an army of 90,000 wage earners, one in
every ten was an immigrant from southeastern Europe. By 1900, one-third
of the foreign-born were of this new immigration, and the movement
of the Teutonic and Keltic races had practically ceased. We must wait
until the census enumeration of 1910 before we may definitely know what
proportion these newcomers form to-day, but it may safely be assumed
that the percentage of foreign-born in the greater city will equal that
of 1900, thirty per cent, or roughly, 200,000, half of whom will be from
southeastern Europe.
Poles, Italians and Jewish immigrants lead the list. Lithuanians,
Croatians, Servians, Slovaks and Ruthenians are numbered by the
thousands, and Magyars, Greeks, Bohemians and Roumanians are here in
lesser groups.
The representatives of these nations touch elbows in the streets so
that the languages heard when the people are marketing in the foreign
quarters on Saturday night are as numerous as those of a seaport town.
Twenty dialects are spoken. Yet the polyglot mass that confuses the
visitor and induces pessimistic impressions as to the future of the
city, is each morning marshalled without tumult. The discipline of the
industrial establishments converts this babel of tongues into one of the
chief forces of production. Therein lies an appraisal not only of the
American _entrepreneur_, but also of these men coming from nations of
low efficiency, who are able so quickly to fall into line and keep step
in an industrial army of remarkable discipline and output.
There is no way of knowing the annual inflow of immigrants into
Pittsburgh, for the city is a distributing point. The records of the
ports of entry show that in 1907, 187,618 persons gave Pittsburgh as
their destination, but many of these scattered to the neighboring
Pennsylvania towns and many undoubtedly went to the mills and mines of
Eastern Ohio. Every day brings its quota of immigrants in normal times;
occasionally they come by the carloads. Owing to the shifting of the
newcomers, however, the outflow may often equal the inflow. Conditions
of the local industries determine which of these two currents runs the
swifter. During the first seven years of the century, the city possibly
added 15,000 annually by immigration.
Before taking up the living conditions in Pittsburgh as they especially
affect these immigrant laborers, let us consider for a moment certain
characteristics of these people, and their relation to the general
economic situation. First, it is the wages that bring them here. The
workers in the mills of Galicia, the vine-lands of Italy, and the
factories of Kiev, earn from twenty-five cents to fifty cents in a day
of from twelve to sixteen hours. When the American immigrant writes
home that he works only nine, ten, or twelve hours and earns from $1.50
to $2.00, the able-bodied wage earner in the fatherland who hears
this will not be satisfied until he also stands where the shorter day
and the higher wages govern. It is these home-going letters more than
all else which recruit the labor force. They are efficient promoters
of immigration. "There are no able-bodied men," said Big Sam to me,
"between the ages of sixteen and fifty years left in my native town in
Servia; they have all come to America."
[Illustration: DIRECT FROM THE FIELDS OF MID-EUROPE.]
Up to September, 1907, the men in charge of furnaces, foundries, forges
and mills, in the Pittsburgh district, could not get the help they
needed. The cry everywhere was, "Give us men." A foreman, therefore,
could assure Pietro and Melukas that if their brothers or cousins, or
friends were sent for, they would get work as soon as they arrived. More
than that, the Slav and Italian are no longer dependent on the English
boss in the matter of finding work for their countrymen. The inflow of
immigration from southeastern Europe has assumed such proportions in the
industries of the cities that superintendents have, in some instances,
appointed Italian and Polish and Lithuanian foremen; and with these, as
with German and Irish, blood is thicker than water. They employ their
fellow countrymen. They know the condition of the labor market and can
by suggestion stimulate or retard immigration.
The tonnage industries of Pittsburgh have expanded tremendously in
the last two decades. Such industries need manual laborers as do no
others. The Slavs have brawn for sale. Herein, at bottom, is the drawing
force which accounts for such a moving in of peoples and the readiness
with which they find their places in the specialized industries of
the district. Pittsburgh has clamorous need for these men. Take the
average Lithuanian, Croatian, Ruthenian, or Slovak, and his physique
would compare favorably with that of any people. Most of the immigrants
are from agricultural communities. Their food in the fatherland was
coarse, their habits simple, their cares few. They had an abundance of
vegetable diet, pure water, pure air and sunshine, and they developed
strong physical organisms. Taking them as a whole, we get the best of
the agricultural communities. The day has not yet come when the weak
emigrate and the strong stay at home. No ship agents, however active,
can reverse the natural order of the tide of immigration, and natural
selection added to federal scrutiny gives us a body of men physically
most fit for the development of our industries. Nowhere has this been
better illustrated than in Pittsburgh.
These men come to be "the hewers of wood and carriers of water." There
are representatives of each race far removed from the lowest industrial
stratum, but taking these people as a whole, it is safe to say that
the bulk of the unskilled labor in the city,--the digging and carrying
in the streets, the heavy labor in the mill, the loading and unloading
of raw material on railroad and river, the rough work around forge and
foundry, the coarse work around factories, and the lifting necessary in
machine shops,--all is performed by them.
[Illustration: YOUNG SLOVAK.]
This is the level at which they enter the economic order. What trade
equipment do they bring into the work with them? Their industrial
efficiency is low and I should estimate that ninety-five per cent have
no knowledge of modern machinery or methods of modern production; they
are children in factory training. Further, those who have trades find
themselves in an industrial environment where their previous training
is of little value. They are in ignorance of the English language, and
the few mechanics and tradesmen among them can do no better than join
the ranks of the common laborers. We must bear in mind, however, that
those of them who know how to use tools, once they are put to work that
requires some skill, adapt themselves quickly to the situation. Hence we
meet not a few Slavs and Lithuanians who execute work of a semi-skilled
nature. Sons, also, of men of these nationalities who settled in the
city a generation ago have risen to positions of standing in the
industries. Thus it is not unusual to hear of this man or that who has
become a foreman in the mills or taken a place in business or in the
professions.
But on several counts the average Slav, Lithuanian and Italian are not
as acceptable as day laborers as were the immigrants from northwestern
Europe. The common opinion of American employers is that they are stupid
and that the supervisory force must be much larger than if they had
English speaking help. Many employers would no doubt, prefer the latter;
but they cannot get them for the wages offered; they must take the Slav
or run short handed. The United States commissioner of immigration
in Pittsburgh is constantly besieged by employers of labor who need
help. Many stories are told of one firm stealing a group of laborers
marshalled at the ports of entry and forwarded to another.
[Illustration: YOUNG SERVIAN.]
I have spoken of the influence which letters and money sent home
have in recruiting immigrant workmen. These people make little or no
use of labor agencies unless the saloon and the small bank may be so
denominated. There are men in each nationality, acknowledged leaders,
who play the part of intermediaries between superintendents and their
people. But such investigations as I have made at Ellis Island do not
lead me to believe that the employers of labor in Pittsburgh violate
the contract labor law. Labor agencies in New York city make a specialty
of distributing Slavs, Lithuanians and Italians to firms in need of
hands. The leader who supplies men to a mill or mining concern gets so
much for each man supplied. Whatever contract there may be is executed
this side of the water. For instance, a leading Croatian had a specific
understanding with one of the mills of Pittsburgh that all men he brings
will find employment. No contract was executed and in the opinion of the
local immigration agent, there was in it no violation of the contract
labor law.
[Illustration: YOUNG CROATIAN.]
I have noted the drawbacks to the new day laborer as such. On the other
hand, it is a common opinion in the district that some employers of
labor give the Slavs and Italians preference because of their docility,
their habit of silent submission, their amenability to discipline, and
their willingness to work long hours and over time without a murmur.
Foreigners as a rule earn the lowest wages and work the full stint of
hours. I found them in the machine shops working sixty hours a week;
at the blast furnaces working twelve hours a day for seven days in the
week. The common laborer in and around the mills works seventy-two hours
a week. The unit of wages is an hour rate for day labor and a Slav is
willing to take the longer hours (twelve hours a day for men who work
fourteen and sixteen in the fatherland) with extra work on Sundays,
especially in connection with clearing the yards and repairing.
Possibly sixty to seventy per cent of the laborers in the mills come
out Sundays and the mechanics and other laborers on occasions work
thirty-six hours in order that the plant may start on time. In one mill
I found Russians (Greek Orthodox) in favor for the reason that they
gladly worked on Sundays.
[Illustration: YOUNG SERVIAN.]
My belief is that certain employers of labor have reaped advantage from
racial antipathies. The Pole and the Lithuanian have nothing in common
and each of them despises the Slovak. Foremen know this and use their
knowledge when foreigners are likely to reach a common understanding
upon wages or conditions of labor. All these considerations have helped
make it less difficult for factory operators to keep open or non-union
shop in Pittsburgh. The constant influx of raw material from backward
nations into the industries of the city has had somewhat the same
effect as the flow of water at an estuary when the tide is rising. All
is commotion. It will continue to be so as long as the inflow of Slavs
and Italians continues as it has in the last decade. But when they have
become permanently placed and their average intelligence and grasp of
American conditions rise, racial prejudices will give way to common
interests. When this time comes, Pittsburgh will witness the rise of
stronger labor organizations than were ever effected by Teuton and Kelt.
We have seen, then, the Slavic day laborers coming into the steel
district in vast numbers. Of their strength and lack of skill at
the outset there is no doubt, and we have noted some of the snap
judgments that are current about them; such as, that they are stupid,
and submissive. All this puts us in better position to consider more
in detail my first statement that it is the wages that bring them to
Pittsburgh, and to see what advances they make once they have gained a
foothold. The Slav enters the field at a rate of pay for day labor which
is higher than that which brought the Germans and the Kelts. The lowest
wage I found Slavs working for was thirteen and one-half cents an hour.
The wage of common labor in the average mill is fifteen or sixteen and a
half cents. The day laborer around the furnaces gets from $1.65 to $1.98
a day.
But the newcomers know nothing of a standard wage, and when work is
scarce, they will offer to work for less than is paid for common labor.
Such was the case of a band of Croatians who offered their services to
a firm in Pittsburgh for $1.20 a day. When the superintendent heard it,
he said, "My God, what is the country coming to? How can a man live in
Pittsburgh on $1.20 a day?" The foreman replied, "Give them rye bread,
a herring, and beer, and they are all right." [I have known a coal
operator in the anthracite fields to pay Italians and Slovaks ninety
cents a day, and ask neither what was the country coming to nor how they
could subsist.] More, the Slavs will consciously cut wages in order to
get work. A man who knows something about blacksmithing or carpentering
will work at a trade for $1.65 or $1.75 when the standard wage may be
$2.50. They count their money in the denominations of the fatherland
and estimate its value according to old country standards. I have known
foremen to take advantage of this. Again, those who are skilled will at
the command of the boss render menial services without a murmur. "These
fellows have no pride," said an American craftsman to me, "they are not
ruled by custom. When the foreman demands it they will throw down the
saw or hammer and take the wheelbarrow."
So the Slav gains his foothold in the Pittsburgh industries, and in the
doing of it, he undermines the income of the next higher industrial
groups and gains the enmity of the Americans. Shrewd superintendents
are known not only to take advantage of the influx of unskilled labor
to keep down day wages, but to reduce the pay of skilled men by a
gradually enforced system of promoting the Slavs. In the place of six
men at ten dollars a day, one will be employed at fifteen dollars,
with five others at half, or less than half, the old rate, who will
work under the high-priced man. Inventions, changes in processes, new
machines, a hundred elements tend to complicate the situation and render
it difficult to disentangle the influence of any one element. But this
much is clear, the new immigration is a factor which is influencing the
economic status of the whole wage-earning population in Pittsburgh; it
is bound to be a permanent factor; and its influence will be more and
not less.
My estimate is that possibly twenty per cent of these laborers from
southeastern Europe now work at machines which require a week or two
weeks to acquire the skill needed in their operation. To be sure, they
are machines "so simple that a child could operate them, and so strong
that a fool cannot break them." Many Slovaks work in the Pressed Steel
Car Company in Allegheny, as riveters, punchers, and pressmen, while
others are fitters, carpenters, and blacksmiths. Some Croatians and
Servians are rising and are found in the steel mills as roughers and
catchers. I saw Ruthenians feeding machines with white heated bars
of steel. It was simple, mechanical work, but of a higher grade than
that of scrap-carrier. The Poles who in recent years emigrated from
Russia and Austria-Hungary are as industrially efficient as any group
of immigrants and work in both mills and foundries. A foreigner who
has a chance to become a machine operator generally goes into piece
work and earns from $2 to $2.50 a day. But all men at the machines
are not on piece work. A foreman explained this to me as follows:
"If the machine depends upon the man for speed, we put him on piece
work; if the machine drives the man, we pay him by the day." The man
operating a machine by the day gets from $1.75 to $2. Many boys and
young women of Slavic parentage work in the spike, nut and bolt, and
steel wire factories. They sit before machines and pickling urns for
ten hours for from seventy-five cents to $1 a day. The Slovak riveters,
punchers, shears-men and pressmen in the Pressed Steel Car Company's
plant are paid by the piece, and for the most part make from $35 to
$50 in two weeks. Fitters, carpenters, blacksmiths and painters are
getting from $2 to $2.50 by the day. Mr. Bozic, the banker, told me
of Croatians and Servians who made as high as $70 in two weeks, and
others who made between $3 and $4 a day--many of them in positions
which once paid English-speaking workmen twice those sums. High and
low are relative terms and they signify very different standards to a
Slav and to an American. But it is a mistake to imagine that the Slav
or Lithuanian cannot adapt himself to modern industrial conditions.
There is considerable of prophecy in the thousands of them already
doing efficient work in the mills. The sooner the English-speaking
workers recognize this and make friends of these workers, the better. No
class of work is now monopolized by Teutons and Kelts, and the service
rendered by the Slav and Lithuanian will before many years equal theirs
in market value.
With this rapid statement of the economic position of the Slavs, we can
more intelligently approach the problem of their living conditions. But
first let us bear sharply in mind that their work is often cast among
dangers; is often inimical to health.
Many work in intense heat, the din of machinery and the noise of
escaping steam. The congested condition of most of the plants in
Pittsburgh adds to the physical discomforts for an out-of-doors people;
while their ignorance of the language and of modern machinery increases
the risk. How many of the Slavs, Lithuanians and Italians are injured
in Pittsburgh in one year is not known. No reliable statistics are
compiled. In their absence people guess, and the mischief wrought
by contradictory and biased statements is met on all hands. When I
mentioned a plant that had a bad reputation to a priest, he said, "Oh,
that is the slaughter-house; they kill them there every day." I quote
him not for his accuracy, but to show how the rumors circulate and are
real to the people themselves. It is undoubtedly true, that exaggerated
though the reports may be, the waste in life and limb is great, and if
it all fell upon the native born a cry would long since have gone up
which would have stayed the slaughter.