2011 BY Mack Lewis, All Rights Reserved www.readaloudplays.com Stolen Childhoods, Page 2 of 8

An Original Play by Mack Lewis www.readaloudplays.com

Cast

HISTORIANS 1 & 2 NARRATORS 1 & 2 CRUSADERS 1 & 2 – NCLC leaders LEWIS HINE – a photographer SARA – his wife

LEO – a child laborer MARTHA – his sister FLOYD – their younger brotherMA & PA – their parents OVERSEER BOSS BOY – another child laborer

Scene 1

HISTORIAN 1: In the late 1890’s, recession swept across America.

HISTORIAN 2: To make more money, factories replaced many of their adult workers with low-paid children.

NARRATOR 1: It’s 5 a.m. on a spring morning in 1904. Leo and his sister Martha are trudging to work at a textile mill in Georgia. Their little brother Floyd skips along behind them.

NARRATOR 2: Leo is ten years old. Martha is nine. Floyd is just six.

NARRATOR 1: Their parents are unemployed.

LEO: Why are you so giddy?

FLOYD: I’m finally gettin’ to work!

LEO: You’ll soon wish you were back at the school house.

FLOYD: Hope I get to be a spinner. Sounds like fun.

2011 BY Mack Lewis, All Rights Reserved www.readaloudplays.com Stolen Childhoods, Page 3 of 8

MARTHA: Spinners are usually girls, but there ain’t nothin’ fun about it.

LEO: You need to make sure you work hard. Ma and Pa are countin’ on us.

NARRATOR 2: Once inside the factory, the overseer immediately puts them to work.

NARRATOR 1: The giant spinning machines wind cotton thread around hundreds of large bobbins.

NARRATOR 2: Leo spots another bobbin filling up. He leaps on to the machine.

NARRATOR 1: The overseer watches him as he quickly takes off the old bobbin, slides a new one in place, and fastens the thread.

OVERSEER: Boy, you ain’t workin’ fast enough. Step it up!

NARRATOR 2: Down the aisle, a girl is having a coughing fit. Floyd pauses, curious.

LEO: It’s her lungs. Get back to work before the overseer catches you nappin’.

HISTORIAN 1: The air inside textile factories was heavy with dust and lint. Workers sometimes developed lung diseases such as tuberculosis.

FLOYD: How much longer we gotta work?

LEO: You only been sweepin’ a couple hours. There’s ten more to go!

Scene 2

HISTORIAN 1: The National Child Labor Committee vowed to end child labor.

HISTORIAN 2: It wasn’t concerned with kids doing chores, but with what it called “child slavery.”

HISTORIAN 1: Its most important crusader was a photographer named Lewis Hine.

NARRATOR 1: Hine is showing his latest photographs to leaders of the NCLC.

HINE: I took this at a factory in Pennsylvania. The poor child had terrible burns from working around the industrial boilers.

CRUSADER 1: Did you have any trouble

getting the shot?

CRUSADER 2: We worry about your safety.

HINE: I’ve had my scares, but it’s worth the risk. Look at the boys in this picture. They were working twelve hour days in a coal mine. Not one of them knew how to read.

2011 BY Mack Lewis, All Rights Reserved www.readaloudplays.com Stolen Childhoods, Page 4 of 8

CRUSADER 1: These will show the public how miserable it is for such children.

HINE: I hope so. I want each flash of my camera to shine a light on their hardship.

CRUSADER 2:Your photos are powerful. They show what words can’t.

HINE: If I could tell their stories in words, I wouldn’t have to lug around a camera.

CRUSADER 1: Well, humanity will be glad you did.

CRUSADER 2: But be careful out there. As you know, there are many people who would do almost anything to keep child labor hidden.

NARRATOR 2: Before departing, Hine photographs the NCLC staff.

NARRATOR 1: After setting up his tripod and box camera, he dusts his flashpan with powder. He holds the pan in the air and ignites it.

NARRATOR 2: There’s a roar of flame, a shower of sparks, and a perfectly timed click of the shutter.

Scene 3

HISTORIAN 1: In the early 1900s, two-million children were working in American factories, coal mines, and canneries.

HISTORIAN 2: They worked day and night in deplorable and sometimes dangerous conditions.

NARRATOR 1: It’s 1908. Floyd, now ten, is working in the aisle where Martha is a spinner.

NARRATOR 2: Martha walks the long aisle brushing lint from the

machinery and watching for breaks in the thread.

NARRATOR 1: When a break occurs, she must quickly climb up the machine and tie the ends together. She has to be careful reaching into the spinners.

NARRATOR 2: As Martha climbs the machine to mend a break, Floyd begins coughing.

NARRATOR 1: Martha pauses. Floyd can’t seem to stop.

MARTHA: You sick?

FLOYD: Naw. Just feeling wheezy.

NARRATOR 2: Martha reaches into the machine, but she’s distracted by Floyd’s worrisome cough.

NARRATOR 1: There’s a loud clunk and an explosion of loose thread. Martha screams and falls to the floor clutching her hand.

NARRATOR 2: An overseer runs up the aisle.

0VERSEER: What have you done?

NARRATOR 1: He deftly re-threads the bobbin and checks the mechanism for damage. He barely glances at Martha.

2011 BY Mack Lewis, All Rights Reserved www.readaloudplays.com Stolen Childhoods, Page 5 of 8

OVERSEER: What’s the idea? Get cleaned up and get back to work!

NARRATOR 2: Floyd helps Martha up.

FLOYD: How bad is it?

NARRATOR 1: She reveals her hand. Two of her fingers are mangled. Much of a third is gone.

Scene 4

NARRATOR 2: Lewis Hine enters a glassworks factory in Virginia. Because of the open furnaces, it’s well over 120 degrees.

NARRATOR 1: A smoky haze fills the building. Shards of glass litter the floor. Boys run from place to place carrying hot glass.

HINE: Hey young fella, how about a picture?

NARRATOR 2: A smudge-faced boy of ten responds but keeps hustling across the floor.

BOY: Sorry, mister. Can’t stop. Gettin’ paid by the piece.

NARRATOR 1: Hine sets up his tripod and focuses his camera on an open area. He sprinkles powder on his flash pan.

NARRATOR 2: As the boy hustles past, Hine calls out.

HINE: Hold there!

NARRATOR 1: The boy wipes the sweat off his face, hitches up his hand-me-down pants, and looks straight at the camera.

NARRATOR 2: Hine ignites the flashpan. There’s a roar of flame, a shower of sparks, and another perfectly timed click of the shutter.

NARRATOR 1: The boy is off again, but the flash catches the attention of the boss.

BOSS: You there, what’re you up to?

HINE: Just taking a photograph of one of your hard-working lads.

BOSS: There’ll be no pictures!

HINE: Do you think children should have to work like this?

BOSS: It’s good for ‘em. They’re learning a skill.

HINE: They should be in school learning to read.

NARRATOR 2: The boss picks up the long paddle used to take glass from the

furnace. He shoves Hine with it.

BOSS: Get on outta here or I’ll run you out myself.

NARRATOR 1: He shoves Hine again, nearly knocking him down.

HINE: I’ll leave, but there will come a day when you won’t be able to exploit these children any longer, a day when society will finally see the light.

2011 BY Mack Lewis, All Rights Reserved www.readaloudplays.com Stolen Childhoods, Page 6 of 8

Scene 5

HISTORIAN 1: Hine’s powerful photos showing bedraggled children working under dangerous conditions soon began appearing in newspapers and magazines.

HISTORIAN 2: But it made getting inside factories harder, so Hine often had to disguise himself.

HISTORIAN 1: He’d pretend to be a salesman, a photographer of machinery, or even a hobo.

NARRATOR 1: Hine presents himself to an overseer as an industrial photographer.

HINE: I’m supposed to take photographs of your spinning machine. I’m told it’s the biggest in the area.

OVERSEER: Best in the state, I’d wager.

NARRATOR 2: Hine is led deep into the mill where scores of children are working. There are almost no adults.

NARRATOR 1: He sets up his camera.

HINE: Let’s put a worker next to the machine to give it a sense of scale. How about that young lady there?

OVERSEER: You there. Come here!

NARRATOR 2: As the overseer leaves Hine to his work, a barefoot girl shyly approaches.

NARRATOR 1: Hine dusts his flashpan and directs her to pose. She attempts to smile.

NARRATOR 2: Hine ignites the flashpan. There’s a roar of flame and a shower of sparks. It’s as

Hine clicks the shutter that he notices the girl’s disfigured hand.

HINE: What happened?

NARRATOR 1: The girl hides her hands and glances down the aisle. She doesn’t answer.

HINE: What’s your name?

MARTHA: Martha.

HINE: How long have you been working here, Martha?

NARRATOR 2: Martha thinks for a moment.

MARTHA: I don’t remember. A long time.

NARRATOR 1: Hine pulls out a notebook and jots down Martha’s name, her age, and a few other details.

HINE: Have you ever been to school, Martha?

MARTHA: No. I’d like to go . . . but I work all the time.

HINE: What do you do here?

MARTHA: I’m a spinner. My brother’s a doffer. Had a little brother, too.

HINE: Had?

2011 BY Mack Lewis, All Rights Reserved www.readaloudplays.com Stolen Childhoods, Page 7 of 8

MARTHA: Um, I better get back to work.

NARRATOR 2: Hine takes photos until again meeting up with the overseer. The shots leave him emotionally drained.

HINE: Your machinery is impressive. Do you have many accidents?

OVERSEER: Naw. Once in a while a finger gets mashed, but it don’t amount to nothin’.

HINE: You have a lot of children working.

OVERSEER: Sure, but they’re not expected to work hard. They enjoy it!

NARRATOR 1: But the frowns on their faces speak otherwise, frowns Hine had made sure to capture in his camera.

Scene 6

HISTORIAN 1: Hine worked tirelessly. He photographed children working under deplorable conditions all over the country.

HISTORIAN 2: His photojournalism led to many laws being proposed, but factory owners stopped them from being enacted or enforced.

NARRATOR 1: It’s well after dark. Leo and Martha have just gotten home.

MA: Sit down and eat, children. The beans are getting cold.

PA: Sure don’t like seein’ you kids workin’ so hard.

MARTHA: A man came to the mill today and took a picture of the spinning machine. There was a flood of light.

MA: Is that right? …How much you make today?

MARTHA: Forty-two cents. Got a penny bonus for working an extra side.

PA: That’s my little girl! Now finish your dinner so you can get some sleep.

MA: In just a few hours you have to be back at the mill.

Scene 7

HISTORIAN 1: Hine spent ten years shining his flashpan on child labor.

HISTORIAN 2: But by the end of the Great Depression, his reputation had faded and he was unable to find work.

NARRATOR 1: It’s 1938, Hine is broke and largely forgotten.

NARRATOR 2: He and his wife are sitting in the park reading a newspaper.

SARA: Lewis, this article says child labor has finally been outlawed. The President has signed the Fair Labor Standards Act into law.

HINE: It’s about time.

SARA: And look here. It says your photos had a lot to do with it.

HINE: I remember watching two breaker boys fall into a coal chute, and little oyster shuckers with swollen, bleeding fingers. I remember a young spinner with a mangled hand, and so many others.

NARRATOR 2: Hine turns away, momentarily silent.

2011 BY Mack Lewis, All Rights Reserved www.readaloudplays.com Stolen Childhoods, Page 8 of 8

HINE: It’s good to know the next generation of children will get to keep their childhoods.

HISTORIAN 1: Today, Lewis Hine is remembered as one of the nation’s first great photographers and a crusader against child labor.

HISTORIAN 2: Although child labor is illegal in the United States, it remains a problem elsewhere inthe world.

HISTORIAN 1: According to UNICEF, there are 250 million child laborers worldwide.

HINE: Light is still required in our world. Light in floods.

Sources

“Child Labor in America, 1908-1912.” The History Place. www.historyplace.com/unitedstates/ childlabor/ (June 2011)

“Child Labor in U.S. History and Causes of Child Labor.” University of Iowa.

www.continuetolearn.uiowa.edu/laborctr/child_labor/about/us_history.html (June 2011)

Freedman, Russell; Lewis Hine and the Crusade Against Child Labor, New York, Clarion, 1964

"The Industrial Revolution". The Web Institute for Teachers.

"Photographs of Lewis Hine: Documentation of Child Labor". The U.S. National Archives and Records Administration.

All photos shown are by Lewis Hine and in the public domain.