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8 THE MARINE RECORD. JuLy 27, 1899. SF GRAIN SHOVELING AT BUFFALO. ‘CAUSES LEADING UP TO THE STRIKE OF THE GRAIN SHOVELERS—COST OF HANDLING GRAIN SINCE 1865. @ It is necessary to review briefly the changes in the grain shoveling*business at Buffalo in order to properly appreciate the motives which led to the strike against the contractor in May, 1899. : The charges for shoveling grain at Buffalo were estab- lished, at least as early as 1865, at $4 a thousand on sail vessels, and $4.50 a thousand on steam vessels. When the steam shovels came into use, in the late sixties and early seventies, the charge was divided between the men and the shovels ;Zthat is the men received #2.25 cents per thousand, and the owners of the shovels the same while working on steam vessels, and each received $2 per thousand while working on sail vessels. After the patent expired on the steam shovels, in 1882, 50 cents a thousand, which had been paid to the patentees as royalty, was thrown off by the elevators, and the charge became : $4.50 for hand shoveling on steam vessels. 4.00 for steam ue or us 4.00 for hand. 3.50 for steam All money collected for hand shoveling went to the men, as before. The steam shoveling charge was divided, the men getting the same amount as before the reduction, while the shovels got $1.75 on steam vessels and $1.50 0n sail vessels. This charge con- tinued until 1894. In that year, after considerable trouble with the vessel men, who were anxious to get the charge re- duced, the elevators made a reduction of 25 cents a thousand on the shovel charge on steam vessels, bring- ing it down to $3.75, of which the men had their $2.25 as before. — ; This brings the record down to 1895, when the first contract went into effect. Every reduction down to that year had come from the shovels and the pay of the men was the same as it had been for years. Up to this time all grain carried between decks or in the fantail holds had been figured as “hand shoveled,’ although the steam shovels were frequently used on the between decks grain. Under the contract the $1.50 to the shovels was paid on all grain elevated, whether from deck or hold. The first contract, made as an experiment, and with not a few doubts in the minds of its makers as to its success, provided for the payment by the vessel of $3.50 a thousand flat, without regard to deck loads or class of vessel, and this amount was divided as follows : : $1.85 to the men, 15 cents to the contractor, and $1.50 to the shovels. In order to compare the earnings of the men under the new plan with their earnings under the old system, it was necessary to makea careful study of the records for several years before the contract went into effect. Greater Buffalo has had this done, and the result is as follows : es ‘¢ sail ef “ “ce “ce “ce Total cost to vessel, 1880 to 1893............... $4.00 Earnings of men, average, 1880 to 1893........ 2.50 a ‘shovels ‘' HOE cae ose uae 1.50 Total cost to vessel, 1894..........-20 cece eee 3.82 Earnings of men, average, 1894............... 2.50 ss ‘shovels ‘‘ CEREALS AS tata RTS 1.32 Total cost to. vessel, 1895... .60----scs seer seers 3.50 Earnings of men SE ARUR AS SRA ihenreae 1.85 sh RS COMULECLOD reir nes aimiaier any ciel 15 ES MERHOVEIBG ot se su aea eu ctiestne ns a 1.50 From these figures it will be seen that the men, who had averaged'$2.50 for many years, were cut by the con- tract to $1.85, while the shovels, which had received $1.50, with the exception of 1894, continued to receive the same amount, and were in fact paid 18 cents a thousand more on the whole number of bushels than in 1894. The contract for 1896 was the same as that of 1895. The contract for 1897 was for $3.35, divided asfollows : $1.85 to the men, 15 cents to the contractor, and $1.35 to the shovels. The contract for 1898 was for $3.10, divided thus: $1.85 to the men, 5 cents to the contractor, and $1.20 to the shovels. The contract for 1899 was made with the contractor at the same price as in 1898, but the contractor attempted to make a different division of the money, as follows : 25 cents an hour to the men, $1.20 to the shovels, and the balance to the contractor. WATERWAY. This schedule would figure out as follows : Cargo, 100,000 bushels ; 6 hours; 75 men. Earn per man, $1.50; the gang earns $112.50. The contractor receives $190, of which $77.50 is profit. On this same cargo, the men would have received in 1898, $2.46 apiece. In 1894 or any previous year, they would have received $3 apiece. While this new schedule figures out as above on a single cargo, yet the delays and accidents of business would in- crease the time required to handle grain, and would on the average reduce the contractor’s profit to about $50 on each 100,000 bushels. On this basis the men would receive about $1.90 apiece. The result of this attempt to lower the wages of the men was a strike which tied up Buffalo harbor for three weeks. But this attempt to cut wages was not the only cause of the strike. The shoveling charges were fixed, under the old system, by the union, of which every man who worked on the shovel WQoalena a | | \ ae Rock ford ' X& \ , ‘i Clinton 5 | Yi, Davenporio 4 4 [e) ttawa, Joliet A), wo? Roch Island of Morris © (@) La Salle Hennepin 5 & LS Af Wavanna oe Lee Ee ee sgticld@® ee Vandalia O° THE ILLINOIS Lake Michigan TO THE Mississippi: River. gangs wasa member. The bosses were appointed by the elevator owners, and the gangs at different elevators were entirely independent of each other. This resulted in at- tempts by the gangs at the less-used elevators to secure business, and led toa system of rebates, which averaged about 50 cents a thousand bushels. This rebate was paid by the boss of the gang to the consignee or owner of the grain, to secure the sending of the grain to the elevator at which the boss worked. On a large part of the business, then, the men never received the full amount which the vessel paid; this was especially true of grain that came into Buffalo for canal shipment. The apparent reduction of the men’s pay under the contract is thus shown to be more in the nature of stopping an old abuse than to be a real reduction. The bosses were all, or nearly all, saloonkeepers, and from their saloons they made the larger part of their income, for they were only allowed one man’s pay by the gang. There were, no doubt, many chances for the boss to deceive the men as to the amount of rebate which he had paid to secure a cargo, and many complaints were made that the bosses were robbing the men. In most cases these claims Kankakee were probably based on a misapprehension of the amount earned, but there were cases where the bosses did contrive to line their own pockets at the expense of the men. It was, of course, understood that the men must drink at the saloon kept by the boss under penalty of dismissal, and while there were exceptions to this rule, they only served to point the moral more plainly. Under the new contract, the same old bosses were for the most part retained, and this probably led to the continuance of some of the old abuses. At any rate, it was hard for the men to believe that the same bosses, who had formerly seized every opportunity to enrich themselves, had been con- verted to better ways in so short atime. While there was much grumbling among the men when the contract went into effect, yet the wiser course was followed, of trying the new system on its merits. The abuses which were complained of, and which were no doubt more or less prevalent, were the carrying of dummies on the pay-rolls, the forcing of men to drink at saloons in which the bosses were interested, and the forcing of the men to obey the dictation of the bosses at the polls. While these charges were very hard to prove, yet there seems to be no doubt that these practices existed to a coniderable extent, and that the men suffered both in loss of pay and in loss of that freedom which is necessary to contentment. . The contractor promised to stop all these abuses in the spring of 1899, at the same time that he put the new rate of pay into effect, but the men struck at once without giving him an opportunity to prove his good faith. A most annoying feature of the old scale of prices was the extra charge for damaged grain. The rates 4 fixed by the Shovelers’ Union applied only to sound grain, anda rate of from $8 to $20 a thousand was charged for grain in any way damaged. This extra a charge went to the men and increased their earnings a Blooun! ngton pees Ea to a considerable extent. A very slight amount of damaged stuff was often made the excuse for charging extra rates on a large cargo, and the practice became costly to the vessels. Besides this, the shovelers would not work on certain vessels, which were built so that it was difficult to unload them, without extra pay. These extra charges. bringing the element of uncertainty into the business had more todo with the adoption of the contract than any other one cause. Of course, under the contract, all these extra charges were done away with at once, —— accurately what it would cost to get his boat unloaded \ at Buffalo. The result of experience with the contract system was very satisfactory to all parties up to spring of 1899. The cost of shoveling to the vessel was reduced from an average of $4.00 per thousand bushels, with an extra charge for damaged grain, to a flat rate of $3.10. The wages of the men were reduced from an average of $2.50, with extras, toa flat rate of $1.85, but their wages are now real wages, and no part has to be paid back to secure work. The shovel-rent was reduced from an average of $1.50 under the old system, to $1.20 under the new. The strike of 1899 was, then, a protest against fur- ther reduction of pay, and was more formidable on account of the abuses which the old bosses had brought with them from the days of separate gangs and saloon influences. Under the settlement which was brought about by the Roman Catholic Bishop, the old abuses will have no chance to flourish, the pay of the men remains the same as before the strike, and an inspector appointed by the Bishop will see that the terms of the settlement are lived upto. The expense attending the strike, and the salary of the inspector, are to be paid by the Lake Carriers’ Association, and for this purpose the shoveling charge has been raised from $3.10 to $3.13, the extra three cents going to pay these expenses. *From the July number of ‘Greater Buffalo.” or oo H. M. S. Hermes has carried out an eight-hours’ trial to de- termine the power required to give the vessel her designed speed of 20 knots, the mean results of which were as follows: Steam in boilers 260 lbs. per square in.; steam at engines, 246 lbs per square in.; vacuum in condensers, starboard, 25.1 in., port, 25.2 in; revolutions per minute, starboard 174.4 port 176.8; i.h.p., starboard 4636, port 4557; total i.h.p., 9203; air pressure in boiler rooms, 0.10 in.; speed of vessel, 20 knots; and coal consumption, 1.54 lbs. peri.h.p. per hour. and it became possible for a vessel owner to figure.