Thing #7

    

Hey guys!  Well, I must admit to learning something new today.  I have heard all my friends talk about Flickr, but I just never thought I'd use it!  So, learning this step in our 23 Things was a challenge.  But, I believe I figured it out.  :)  I chose the above picture for my Thing #7 because in a small way, it's sort of personal.
     You see, I lived in Sylcauga, Alabama for 12 years.  My daughter did a history report in 5th grade for her school on child labor in Alabama.  (She won first place, by the way.  Proud Momma moment here!!!! )  Anyways, we began to research child labor laws and were amazed to discover that the Avondale Mills plant in our town was one of the largest factories in our portion of the state to employ child labor.  The picture listed above, which you can view for yourself at http://www.flickr.com/photos/dystopos/167337060/ was taken at the Avondale Mills plant in Birmingham by  Lewis Hine for the National Child Labor Committee, November 1910. 
     My daughter and I stood outside this plant and took many pictures of what it looks like today.  As we stood there, we discussed what it would have been like back then to have to allow your children to go to work in factories that were dangerous to adults, long enough to children.  Kids as young as 4 picked up yarn from the floor of this plant.  Others were hired to sweep the floors and to keep coal in the furnace.  Most days these children were forced to work 16 hours with little or no food.  And of course, an education was out of the question.
     I don't know about you.  But I am very thankful that economic times do not require my children to leave school and get a job in order for my family to have food on the table.  As we walked through this factory, which had been shut down due to a fire a few years earlier, you could almost hear the voices of the children......lives lost, childhood's taken away.  Child labor in America should make us hang our heads today as we look at the past.  You may be asking yourselves, "How could society have allowed this?"  That's a question I can not answer......................