Opportunity Denied: Limiting Black Women to Devalued Work

Chapter 4. Existing on the Industrial Fringe: Black Women in the Factory

71 Although the majority of Black women remained mired in domestic service and farm labor through the mid-twentieth century, a significant number were able to leave the farm and ultimately the household to enter the world of factory work. Their transition, however, was a slow one marked by periods of progress and setbacks. Black women were prized as farm laborers and domestic servants, and industrial employers were hesitant to disrupt the “natural order” of things by providing them with an alternative to jobs that amounted to lifelong servitude. By no means was factory work ideal—it presented its own share of hardships—but it offered Black women benefits that were entirely absent in the other occupations available to them, including a degree of independence from employers, relatively consistent pay, set hours, and days off. The late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries brought about innovation and industrialization that radically changed employment opportunities for unskilled laborers.The changes in the structure of the labor market heightened the distinction between skilled and unskilled laborers. It became the dividing line within the factory that determined men’s and women’s work and the worth of that work. Unskilled and semiskilled workers, laborers, and operatives were seen as easily replaceable , extensions of their machines, workers who did the preliminary tasks necessary for the machines to do the real work. In contrast, skilled workers or craftsmen, who were primarily White men, performed tasks that machines alone could not do. They often received specialized training and frequently supervised unskilled workers.1 Chapter 4 Existing on the Industrial Fringe Black Women in the Factory O p p o r t u n i t y D e n i e d 72 Opportunities to work as craftsmen or operatives were largely limited to White men and women. Keeping Blacks in their place despite their newfound freedom was the stated objective of southern employers after the Civil War, and they accomplished this goal by preventing Black workers from entering new and more desirable occupations. However, Whites were perfectly willing to hire Black men for jobs that involved cleaning and heavy lifting; this practice did not challenge racialized conceptions of appropriate labor for Blacks. Figures 4.1, 4.2, and 4.3 illustrate the extent of Black women’s exclusion from factory work nationwide from 1860 to 1960, particularly the stark division between skilled, semi-skilled, and unskilled labor and the associated gendered division of labor.2 Although most factory Figure 4.1 Proportion of White Male, Black Male, White Female, and Black Female Workers Employed as Craftsmen, 1860–1960 Source: Author’s analysis of data from the Integrated Public Use Microdata Series, Version 5.0. 0 5 10 15 20 25 30 1860 1870 1880 1900 1910 1920 1930 1940 1950 1960 Census Year White Men Black Men White Women Black Women Existing on the Industrial Fringe 73 operatives were White women, Black and White men also filled this role. But Black women were rarely hired as skilled craftsmen. Less than 1 percent of Black women were employed as craftsmen in 1960, and this is the high over this 100-year period.The picture for White women is similarly grim; the nearly 4 percent of White women that worked as craftsmen in 1860 is the high for the period. By 1960, less than 2 percent of White women were employed as craftsmen. Yet the true significance of the occupational restriction of women is not understood until you consider the vastly different economic realities of craftsmen and operatives.Through 1940, virtually all women employed as craftsmen escaped working poverty, whereas nearly half of all White women operatives in 1860 and more than two-thirds of Figure 4.2 Proportion of White Male, Black Male, White Female, and Black Female Workers Employed as Operatives, 1860–1960 Source: Author’s analysis of data from the Integrated Public Use Microdata Series, Version 5.0. 0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 1860 1870 1880 1900 1910 1920 1930 1940 1950 1960 Census Year White Men Black Men White Women Black Women O p p o r t u n i t y D e n i e d 74 0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 1860 1870 1880 1900 1910 1920 1930 1940 1950 1960 Census Year White Men Black Men White Women Black Women free Black women were members of the working poor...