Occupational Health & Safety in Textiles
Alina Chrostek
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In the textile mills, children stood all day on their feet and worked twelve hour days, six days a week. Children were sometimes used to oil machines, change bobbins, and remove loose threads from inside moving machines. Their small hands could fit into narrow places that adult hands could not. Children sometimes got their fingers and hands ripped off because they were not fast enough. Children also had to be careful and not let their hair get too close to the moving machines because the machine wheels would mistake hair for thread and rip the scalp from the child’s head. Injuries to children were very common in the early textile mills.