Jack Battuello Memoir #1 - University of Illinois Springfield

Jack Battuello 12
But there were many mines--especially where there wasn't a close-knit
organization, where there wasn't any militancy, where there wasn't
any cohesion, where they were newly founded and inexperienced, and
perhaps lacking in a little militancy--where it was nothing unusual
for miners to go into the mines and be there twelve hours, although
it was an eight hour day in effect.
Q. Let's touch up on a few other items along this line. Was there
any overtime paid? Were there any insurance provisions, were there
any items that today generally are classified as fringe benefits,
safety precautions, et cetera? Would you like to comment on this?
A. I'd be delighted to talk on that subject, For many years, after
I started in the coal mines, there was nothing like compensation,
there was nothing like safety laws, and . . . . (interruption) As
I was saying in the early period of my mining career and for many
years after that, thcre was no compensation of any kind, no industrial
compensation, no unemployment compensation. Safety laws, if any,
were practically unknown. The union was very young and not totally
organized in that period and as a consequence, seniority rights as
we know them today were unknown. There was no overtime payment for
any thing.
T think perhaps I can cxplain that better by saying, that we were
not even free citizens in our community. The company, in the early
period of the union, owned the houses in the community--company houses
we called them--they owned the company store. In some cases they
issued their own scrip for money and this kind of business you needed
some change in as much as 30 to 35 per cent. The prices at their
company store was about 15, 20, 25 per cent higher than in private
store perhaps ten to Fifteen miles away.
And rhe composition of those communities, like all communities, had
its churches and its rectors and its priest-not too many in numbers
but we had a church here and thcre, and a preacher here and there.
But even the preacher, the tax collector and the sheriff and the
judge, all belonged in the pocket of the coal company. We were virtual
prisoners. And so, when we lamented too strongly about bad
conditions, there being seniority and not too much of a union to
protect us, we were liable to be taken off of a job and demoted to
a worse job.
For instance, if we had a good working place that was fairly safe
and fairly productive and fairly profitable--if I may use that term--
and we became disenchanted with what was going on in the coal mines
and in the community, by the virtual control of the company, if we
lamented too loud, as I say, we were placed in a working place that
was filled with water and in which we could not make a living. So
by this method of terror and intimidation, we were careful sometimes,
a little bit careful about making too much noises.
Jack Battuello Memoir -- Archives, University of Illinois at Springfield