Linda,

Try looking at Peter Way's book _Common Labour:  Workers and the Digging of
North American Canals, 1780-1860_.  He's pretty left, and might offer up
some clues in this area. I remember a particularly disturbing passage in
which he describes the blasting of rock--the canalers would raise their
shovels over their heads to protect them from the scattered debris--which
worked fine except in cases where big boulders flew loose, and they were
crushed.  Not the life for nervous academic types, I suppose.

Mike

At 08:12 AM 9/27/99 -0500, you wrote:
>I could really use a little help here.
>
>Now, for some background on why I need help.I am currently working on a
>history of the Washington County Poor House. It's amazing how much of the
>history that often is NOT told can be inferred from the demographics of the
>Poor House. And it leads me to research some rather obscure subjects.
>
>The sudden influx of (Champlain)canal "boatmen" into the PH every winter was
>something I at first considered merely a weather indicator: that was when it
>got COLD in NY! (Even I knew that.) But their seasonal stay every year until
>spring turned out to relate to the fact that the canal FROZE OVER every year
>and stopped functioning. That meant that canal workers (who were almost all
>transient by definition)-- especially those who were single -- were actually
>seasonal workers who became unemployed & homeless each winter and went into
>the PH. That all by itself was rather fascinating -- but then I began to
>notice the incredible proportion of boatmen  whose "cause of dependence" was
>"loss of an arm". I haven't crunched all the statistics yet; but it is
>patently obvious that there was not yet any OSHA to pester people about safe
>working conditions! Then I went looking for information about working
>conditions on the canals in the 1800s.
>
>I'm having a heck of a time finding anything except "glowing" histories of
>the glories of the canal era. Apparently not too much was published about
>the downside in human terms. Several years ago I found a reference on-line
>that intrigued me; now I want to follow up on it. The Yale newspaper
>reported on an exhibit at which a man named Daniel Bender spoke. Here's what
>the article said:
>------------------------------------------------------------------
>American history major Daniel Bender '95, who recently published an article
>in the Connecticut History Journal, presented a lecture on the "uneasy
>peace" that Irish laborers on the canal experienced between 1828 and 1848.
>
>Unlike most other canal workers in the country, Bender noted, the laborers
>made no discernible attempts at resistance despite barely tolerable working
>conditions.
>
>"The contractors were the undisputed masters," Bender said. "They provided
>housing, food, alcohol, and wages. The Irish were separated by their
>lifestyle, their religion, and their accents. The canal was
>all they had."
>
>Bender discussed the hardships of daily life on the canal: the routine
>danger, endless workdays, and unfair paltry wages. "This system was one of
>the most oppressive forms of labor to exist in the
>United States," he said.
>--------------------------------------------
>
>Now, that's a man I'd like to communicate with. He may have some answers to
>my questions about all those lost arms! (Or he may be able to refer me to
>some good sources.) I'd like to start by reading the "paper" they refer
>to -- but the article doesn't cite his paper very well. It must have been
>published in 1994 or 1995 in the Connecticut History Journal. Unfortunately,
>I haven't
>found (here in Texas) any way to get a list of what articles they published
>those years. And if I subscribe to even ONE MORE historical society -- I may
>have to go to the PH myself! Can anyone help me track this article and/or
>this author down? It will be much appreciated. Thanks, Linda
>
--------------------------------------
Michael R. Fein
Research Associate
Harvard Business School

(v) 617-496-7385
(f) 617-496-7366
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