Women working in tobacco plant

Women working in tobacco plant

Women in the workforce, Labor, Women

In this picture, an African-American woman strips the center stems from tobacco. In some factories, employers paid women by "piecework" whereas others would pay by punch cards. Each pan of tobacco was one punch, generally worth about twenty-five cents. If workers could not make about eight punches per day, the factory would likely fire them.

United States Department of Labor

Records of the Women's Bureau (1892-1995), General Photographic File (1893,1945), National Archives

WCU, HIS 601/HON 451 Great Migration and Digital Storytelling, Spring 2016

January 19, 1922

Erica Knorr, Jason Miller

JPG

Photograph