range from $9.00 per week to $45.00 and $50.00 per month. Increases were granted which fixed wages at from $12.00 per week to $50 $55-$60 per month. Ten hours constituted a day's work prior to the strike and since. All employees returned to work. Packing House Strike. The Amalgamated Meat Cutters and Butcher Workers Union of America called a strike July 12, 1904, of all members employed in the packing houses of Armour and Company, Cudahy and Company, Swift and Company and the National Packing Company located at South Omaha. This strike resulted from a reduction in the wages of common laborers. The wages of the latter prior to the strike, were 19 cents per hour with hours of labor per day irregular, depending upon amount of slaughtering done. Hours per day ranged from two to ter This strike was but an extention of the general packing house strike which existed in all packing house centers in the United States. In South Omaha the strikers numbered about 5,000, fifty of whom were females. The period covered by the strike was two months, during which time several violent demonstrations occurred, directed mostly against imported non-union strike breakers. During the last two weeks of the strike period the packing houses closed. On September 10, 1904, the Amalgamated Meat Cutters and Butcher Workers union called off the strike and submitted to the terms of the packers. About three hundred employees lost their situations and those common laborers who did resume work did so under a reduction of wages from 19 cents per hour to 172 cents per hour. FIRE ESCAPE ENFORCEMENT In the enforcement of the fire escape law an official comes into full realization of the value that the average citizen places upon human life, and to what extent the commandment "Be thy brother's keeper" secures practical application. It is a surprising and greatly to be regretted fact that the ordinary owner of public buildings in the erection of the same and in supplying it with modern conveniences, never gives a moment's thought or attention to providing even the minimum of protection against fire to the lives which may inhabit his building or buildings. In my enforcement of this law, I have had to deal very much with those who in the past have opposed it and have refused compliance therewith. Since the horrible catastrophy resulting from the burning of the Iroquois theatre in Chicago, it might be supposed that the minds of men might be compelled to appreciate the value of the lives of the public that gather in their public meeting places, and that they would realize the absolute necessity of surrounding their buildings with every possible means of protection and safety, but it is hard indeed to move men's minds when it means the expenditure of the "Almighty Dollar." During the past biennium every city in this state, which contains buildings subject to the present statute, has been visited, and the law enforced in every possible case. Especially have I made effort to secure the proper protection of all hotels, theatres and public halls. During the biennium I have ordered fire escapes constructed an one hundred and thirty buildings in the state. Seventy-seven buildings have been properly equipped and the fire escapes approved, and I have escapes on seven buildings now in course of construction. |