11.11 Girls at Work in the Industrial Age

Her Half of History

The Industrial Revolution did not invent child labor, but it changed how people viewed it. A growing middle and upper class provided their kids with long childhoods filled with play, education, and preparation for a productive adulthood. The poorer classes sent their children to work in factories and fields where they worked long hours at dangerous jobs and learned very few skills. Girls in particular worked in textile mills, breathing in lint and climbing over whirling machinery. But girls also worked in fields to supply the factories.

Reformers argued for child labor laws almost as soon as the Industrial Revolution set in, but the new laws had very little effect until after World War One. Even today, child labor remains a problem, especially in Asia and Africa, but also even in the United States.

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