with the Thread Company failed, the union members at Willimantic were called out on strike. Non-union operatives immediately quit work and joined the United Textile ranks. The mills were forced to close. A conference, arranged in April between employers and employees, came to naught, as neither side would make any concession. In May the strikers were warned by advertisements in the local papers that all who did not return to work would forfeit

their service and pension rights and that their places would be filled by others. Not a single striker returned.

Strike-breakers were imported from Manchester, New Hampshire, and Lowell, Massachusetts, and the State Police were called in to insure their safety going to and coming from the mill gates. In July the Company obtained summary process writs and forced the strikers to vacate the mill-owned houses. A picturesque tent colony was then set up by the union to shelter those evicted from their homes. Fall weather set in. Many of the men folk scattered to other cities and adopted other trades. A small percentage of the strikers gave up their union cards and returned to the mills. But a thousand or more remained in their native town without shelter and without income. The hardihood and tenacity of purpose of these New England folk (most of them women now) has been truly remarkable. The tents were abandoned. The union found tenement homes for the homeless and doled out short rations of food to them. All this time, and up to the present day, the strikers have been meeting daily-buoying up one another's hopes that the millowners will finally be forced to ask their return. Encouraged by the union offi

Inasmuch as the American Thread Company paid a ten per cent dividend in 1924 and added $1,380,000 to their reserve fund in that year (the last year we worked), .they had no just cause to reduce our wages. [The 1925 dividend was six per cent, the lowest since 1916.]

The mills are out to destroy our union -the organization that gives us the only hope of bettering ourselves.

We did not strike when the cut was put into effect, but tried by conference to make the company officials see the error of their ways. of their ways. After two months we walked out, but we have at all times been ready to meet our employers in conference. We have offered to submit our case to arbitration, but this has been refused.

During the last year of our employment we were given only three days? work a week. This cut the average of our weekly earnings to $8 or $10. We are no different from other people. We wish a family life, a living wage, and a chance to educate our children. How could we do it on such an income? Bricklayers (who are no more skilled workers than we are) get $12 a day. We

have been getting less than that per week.

Some of our families have worked in the mills for three generations. Some of the present strikers have forty and fifty years of service to their credit.

The American Thread Company had never failed to pay a ten per cent dividend on its common stock besides a five per cent dividend on its preferred stock each year and put by a comfortable surplus at the same time. The rate of the dividends paid on common stock and the amount in dollars paid during the past five years are as follows: 15 per cent. 14% per cent

$1,350,000

1,320,000

1,080,000

1,296,000

1,080,000

Since 1915 the strikers claim that this company has paid out in dividends 250 per cent on its capitalization of $15,000,000 and that it has added a surplus of over $13,000,000 to its treasury. The company has enjoyed such prosperity and the stock has earned such large dividends that the British stockholders have refused to sell their holdings. [The controlling interest in the common stock is owned by the English Sewing Cotton Company, Ltd., of Great Britain.]

The Willimantic people feel that these figures do not demonstrate any need for a reduction of wages. "Is it right that we should be made to suffer," they ask, "when profits have been so large and so constant?"

HE American Thread Company's side of the case, as I understand it,

Business has been bad. In cutting wages ten per cent we were simply fol

lowing the lead of the other textile manufacturers in New England. The Willimantic wages are 106 per cent better than they were in 1916. The Willimantic workers are the highest paid textile operatives in this section of the country. Ours is a highly competitive business. We can only operate the mills to the extent that we have orders in hand. At the reduced wage we hoped to give these people steady work. At the old wage we could not do so and meet the competition of fifty

other thread manufacturers in this country.

During the year 1924 we had two choices: either to discharge half our force or to keep the entire force on halftime. For business reasons we would have preferred the first, but for humane reasons (knowing that those discharged could not find employment elsewhere) we decided to share what work we had with all.

The union has stirred up the spirit of antagonisms among the splendid working force that had been with us for years. This has made them disgruntled and unmanageable. We cannot recognize the

I

7

union again. We must be left free to run our own business.

We supplied our workers with very livable houses at rents of eight and ten dollars per month. We allowed them to remain in the houses for five months after the strike, in many cases without rent. During this time they gathered around the mill gates each morning and reviled those who wished to continue their work in peace. We always felt that our employees had a right to organize and a right to quit work if they wished

to; but we do not believe that they have any right to intimidate those who do want to work.

The strike has hurt us a very great deal. Naturally, our competitors have taken advantage of it and we have lost business. At first our new working force was not as productive either in quantity or in quality as the old workers, but now they are every bit as effective. They are very happy in their new environment. They are in a better frame of mind to do good work than our old force. We have all the help we want. We are sorry for those who are out of work, but we gave them ample warnings and only did

what they forced us to do. We are in business to make money. We have duties to our stockholders. We have done our best by our old employees. Unfortunately, they have unknowingly been used as pawns by their union leaders. If we had this year to live over again, we would have to act exactly in the same way. We have nothing to regret and would prefer to let the matter drop and have nothing more said about it.

H

ERE we have both sides of a controversy between the hightest type of employees in the textile field and a corporation which probably has done more than any of the others in providing what it considers good working conditions. Both sides have lost heavily. Nothing has been accomplished. The whole question of a living wage for textile workers still remains unsolved. The efforts of the conservative old-time union are proving unsuccessful. The field is left wide open for the Communistic agitators who are now so busily engaged in spreading their doctrines to the 15,000 textile strikers of Passaic, New Jersey.

HAVE spent a month studying the south of France as a resort. I am impressed with three things:

First, the great wealth of the country in roads and bridges, which have been built principally in the last hundred

By WILLIAM C. GREGG

years. They follow the ridges up to great heights. We left Nice one morning at 10 feet (sea-level) and lunched 5,500 feet up. Almost every foot of the way is stone-walled or cut out of solid rock, with dozens of stone-arch bridges and

occasional short tunnels. We made many such excursions, returning through valleys and deep gorges splendidly scenic.

Second, the tourist business is very large. I found Nice with her four hun

The hand of man is only second to the hand of God in the French Alps near Nice

dred hotels (large pensions classed as hotels) full during three months of the winter. The total number of guests (average) is probably around 80,000. I heard as high as 135,000. The average expenditure per person of five dollars a day would make the gross income of Nice for three months about $36,000,000. From what I saw, I should judge that Nice has one-third of the tourist business of the Riviera (extending from Marseilles to Mentone). If that is so, the business of the Riviera for the three winter months is about one hundred million dollars. I cross-checked this rough estimate by talks with banks paying out money on letters of credit and other credits and exchange. One bank told me that it was paying out about five million francs a day. That was nearly $200,000 a day for only one bank in Nice. It is interesting to see people

from every country in the world standing in line in the banks, and Thomas Cook's, and the American Express Company, waiting to draw money or exchange foreign money.

No Real Estate Boom

THIRD, the Riviera has been a tourist

country for a large part of a century-ever since the pirates were driven permanently from its Mediterranean shores. The cities and towns line the coast for one hundred and fifty miles. Hotel and residence property, well located, is valuable. Property cannot be bought in many places, but where lots in the best business part of Nice are for sale they will bring from $300 to $500 a front foot. Go a little way out, but still in the city, and you can buy for one-tenth of these prices.

I find that, roughly speaking, the real estate values have doubled since 1913. That is no more than the increased value of city lots and farm lands in almost every part of the United States for the same period. I saw no evidence of a Riviera real estate boom.

If any Florida fakers come over to jazz up values, the only result will be to injure the legitimate tourist business of southern France.

Real estate values in Europe depend on the income of the property. If there is no income, there is little reason for buying. What a revolution we would have in America if the value of real estate depended on the income the prop erty produced! What a lot of "realtors" would have to go back to the desk or the ditch, and what a lot of property would have a new low and legitimate price put on it which would permit it to be used usefully, even if modestly, for grazing or forestation or recreation!

W

By CHARLES STELZLE

W

IX

HEN the editors of "Who's Who in America" asked me how I preferred to be designated in the volume which is supposed to contain the names of men and women of prominence in the United States, I told them to put down "sociologist.' This has been the cause of no end of trouble and misunderstanding, although the Standard Dictionary informs us that sociology is "the science that treats of the origin and history of society and social phenomena, the progress of civilization, and the laws controlling human intercourse."

I confess that as rather an ambitious designation. But, strangely enough, un-. thinking people have insisted that the word "sociologist" is synonymous with "Socialist." Here it is that I have had my troubles.

I am not a Socialist. I follow the Socialists in their protests against unjust social and economic conditions to-day, but I cannot accept their program. A former moderator of the Presbyterian General Assembly once brought charges against me secretly for alleged Socialistic teachings. Without my knowledge he appointed a committee of three to study the books and articles which I had written and to listen to some of my addresses, in order that his charges might be substantiated. The first intimation I had that I was being watched by this august body was when a press-clipping bureau sent me newspaper cuttings from various parts of the United States containing my photograph with the statement underneath, "Prominent Presbyterian minister charged with being a Socialist."

Courtesy of the Near East Relief Committee

Cleveland H. Dodge

"I thought you were a radical," said Mr. Dodge to Mr. Stelzle, after listening to one of the latter's addresses into which the speaker had put what he supposed were some of his most progressive ideas

seen the newspaper stories said that I should have insisted that the New York Presbytery, the local body of ministers of which I was a member, should defend me. After I had thought further about the matter, it seemed to me that it was only fair, since the charges had been given such publicity, that the findings of the committee should also be brought to the light. I insisted upon appearing before the Executive Commission, which had the entire matter in charge, and had the entire matter in charge, and presented my contention that the Presbyterian Church had no right to take any action concerning my sociological convictions or teachings, that its concern was only with my theological teachings, and even though it had been proved that I was a Socialist, that was really none of its business. I took that position, not for my own sake, for it affected me not at all in my work; but for the sake of many young men in the ministry who had progressive sociological ideas and

who should be given the opportunity to speak of them as occasion required. The Commission accepted my position fully, and so reported to the General Assembly, adding that an apology was due me because of the manner in which I had been misrepresented in the press due to the attitude of the previous Executive Commission, of which my friend the exmoderator from the West was the chair

man.

Being a "sociologist" in the Church is not a very popular thing. One rarely receives gifts from the wealthy, and not very often is one honored by degrees or positions of prominence. There are too many interests to be conserved, there is too much money to be raised, to run the risk of giving such an allegedly dangerous person any place of authority.

Fortunately, rich men are not entirely lacking in the Church who are largehearted and level-headed enough to see that it is necessary to speak frankly about certain social conditions that need to be remedied. Perhaps because an audience of rich people always tempted me to be somewhat more extreme than I was ordinarily, one Sunday morning, in the Presbyterian church at Riverdale-onHudson, I expressed myself as plainly as I knew how about certain injustices, and the remedy which I thought the Church should apply to improve social conditions. The audience consisted of a number of prominent millionaires, although the church was very tiny. I noticed on the very front seat a big, impressivelooking man who sang most lustily and who helped take up the offering. After the address this man reached out his hand to me, and said:

"I am Cleveland Dodge. I was mighty glad to hear your address this morning because I had always heard that you were a radical."

I confess that I was taken aback by this comment of one of America's leading industrialists, from whom I might have expected a very strong disagreement with my presentation. Not content with this assertion, he insisted upon

International

walking home with him; and we talked fully and frankly about his own labor problems, but mostly about the need of a more progressive spirit in the Church.

CCASIONALLY I felt the necessity of taking a "swing about the circle," visiting some representative cities, not only for the purpose of giving formal addressses to selected audiences, but of talking out with employers, workingmen, ministers, social workers, and others the particular problems by which they were faced.

After I had addressed a Rotary Club in a northern Pennsylvania city-I had been limited to ten minutes because it .was feared that I was a radical-the owner of the largest foundry in the city asked me if he might not come to my hotel so that I could finish my address to him in person. He said he had some very definite questions to ask me about conditions in his own plant. At the hotel he talked steadily for an hour, unburdening himself regarding the things he was facing.

"One day the men in one of my departments struck for higher wages," he said to me. "I knew nothing about it 'ntil after the thing had happened.

The Capitol Theatre of New York Sunday is the Capitol Theatre's biggest day

When the superintendent told me that the men had gone out, I asked him whether he didn't think that they should have had their wages raised. He replied that there was no doubt that they were getting less than they should. I said to him: 'You damned fool, why didn't you give it to them? I've got to depend on you for things like that. It's your business to see that the men get a square deal. I can't keep track of all the details of the shop.' Then the superintendent told me that he thought he was doing me a favor by keeping wages down as low as possible.

"But," turning to me, this employer said, "that superintendent not only misrepresented the men to me, but he misrepresented me to the men. I fired him because of his injustice to both.".

As a rule, I have found employers of labor to be far more liberal toward their men than those who are supposed to represent them.

The leading minister of another Pennsylvania steel town piloted me through the mills there, accompanied by the superintendent, to whom I was introduced as "the Reverend Charles Stelzle," with nothing said about my interest in sociological matters.

I remarked casually to the superin tendent: "I suppose that all your men are members of the labor union, aren't they?"

He replied, with a smile: "No. So far as I know, not any of the men in this plant belong to the union."

"How do you find out whether a man is a member of the union or not?" I asked him.

"Do you see that man on the top of that pile of slag?" pointing to rather an ordinary-looking laborer. "Well, that man may be a spy employed by a detective agency in Pittsburgh. This mill is full of men of that kind. If anybody speaks to them about joining a labor union, or if they discover any man who is a member of a union, it is so indicated in the report which they mail to headquarters that night. These spies never report in person. Everything is done through the mails, to protect them. That way they can do their work more effectively."

"Do the men in the mill know that they are being watched in that way?" I asked the superintendent.

"Of course they do," he replied. "That makes them all the more careful in their labor agitation. It is absolutely