Excerpt from Machinery, Vol. 8: A Practical Journal for the Machine Shop; September, 1901, to August, 1902

We do not know what shop this is, or anything about tbs circumstances of the case. The laborer may or may not have made a good planer hand, and the conditions may or may not have warranted the step that was taken. These features are of no particular moment, since it is the principle is volved rather than the particular incident that we wish to comment upon. The policy is above outlined of employing men upon general work who have been broken in so as to mechanically perform this or that operation, . But who have had no particular mechanical training such as a skilled mechanic of sound judgment must have. This policy we take exception to.

We are well aware that men of genius may be found in the ranks of laborers as well as among those in better circum stances, and we are glad when they have the Opportunity to show their ability. No laborer, however, can become a com petent planer hand without the experience and training oom mensurate with the work that a planer hand has to do. He may get this experience while he still goes by the name of laborer, or he may get it afterward, but he must somehow obtain it. We predict that in the above-named shop the actual planer hand was not the laborer at all, but was his tour - dollar a-day foreman who might better have devoted his time to saving the company dollars per hour than in assisting the laborer in saving the company cents per day.

Suppose, Mr. Manager, that the treasurer of your company were a practical man, and that he decided your sen vices were no longer needed. Suppose he thought that your young assistant could run the shop at a year, by keep ing one eye on affairs himself. This would be carrying your policy to an extreme, it is true, but it is a poor rule which does not work up and down the line. Suppose, moreover, that you adopted the plan of employing men, who were not skilled mechanics, on all the machines in the shop. Where would you nud a man for responsible work when you had such work to be done, and where would you obtain a foreman when you needed one?

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