The ‘business model’ of companies like Walmart and Amazon were inherited. Montgomery Ward’s massive mail order center in Chicago is described by one of its ‘slaves.’

‘Montgomery Ward Conditions’ by A Slave from Solidarity. Vol. 7 No. 342. July 30, 1916.

Although not nearly as terrible as in most large concerns (there is not one place of business that is run for the benefit or interest of the employe), the conditions at Montgomery Ward & Company are bad enough, indeed; and should be exposed as well as every other place of toil, sweat and labor.

About four thousand workers are employed, estimating one thousand men and the remaining three thousand, women and girls. The main body of employes, both men and women’s wages range from $6 to $12 per week. A few, such as managers, etc., receive a little more for their services as “slave-drivers.” There are men with large families getting $12, and women supporting their children and invalid husbands, receiving $8 per week. How do they make ends meet? Well, when they are at the verge of starvation, perhaps, they complain or sniffle around the boss, who tells them he will do all he can for them. Of course we think he intends to fatten the pay envelope, but he does not.

He sends the Charity or Welfare Committee around, that takes care of just such circumstances. This Welfare Division receives donations from the employes of the firm, the donations consisting mostly of old clothing

“They thank the boss that hires them,
They kiss the hands that drive them,
And when their shirts become shabby and torn,
(Every day of the week that shirt’s been worn,
And to buy a new one they cannot afford;
‘Tis all they can do to pay the board,)
So they go to the “Charity,’ and look like a lord
In the shirts of the bosses of Montgomery Ward.”

In order to impress upon the minds of the employes the kindness and charity they show their half-paid slaves, these charitable acts are published in “M.W. & Cos. Store News,” a little paper published frequently by and for the company.

About one-fifth of the women are cripples who ought to be at leisure, spending their time in the parks with nature and study instead of hobbling around on crutches or carrying an empty sleeve, taking the place of the strong, healthy person who will not work for the minimum wage the cripples and deformed are glad to get. Under the present system of capitalism they are compelled to work for a living and when we do away with it, just as sure are we going to do away with child labor and allow the aged to rest, in peace and comfort after their long, hard struggle for existence.

Montgomery Ward & Co. employ girls of from 12 to 15 years of age at $4.50 a week, robbing them of their education, not allowing either their brain nor muscles to mature and develop.

They drill them and train them to become a human machine that rings in her time at eight in the morning and goes over the same grinding routine of from eight to ten hours of toil, day after day and year after year (if she lasts that long and proves efficient for every “speed record” and schedule adopted).

One girl started to work for the firm more than three years ago. She was 15 years old then and received $6 a week. About a year later she got $7 and they promised to raise her wages to $8 in three months. They have been promising ever since until a week ago she, with several other girls who also were expecting their promised raise, was called to the doctor’s office and the “Doc” put her. through a “would-be” examination and discovered that she was in the first stages of consumption and she was told her services were no longer required. He told some of the other girls the same mournful lie and others were “anemic” and every one of them were laid off.

The doctor’s service and medicines, we are told, are for the benefit of the employes and every care will be given anyone needing it, free of charge. A girl who is compelled to work is paying quite a price when her job is taken from her and she is sent away to starve or rot for all they care. Nor would such act be called “contributing to the delinquency” should the girl be unable to get employment elsewhere and adopt other means of making her livelihood.

Occasionally M.W. & Co. receive large groups of visitors, such as delegates of conventions, employes of other large corporations, and Suffragettes who wish to “look over” the plant of this immense mail order house.

On such occasions the visitors are very well received and entertained. They usually come around noon time; so they are, first of all, taken to the restaurant, where everything has been prearranged for their coming White table cloths on the tables (we workers don’t have any), vases containing flowers here and there upon it, waiters standing around in full dress suits (hired from Hotel La Salle to wait upon the guests) and band concert going on.

We always know when “company” is coming. Here are a few symptoms. We are told to keep the floors clean and our desks tidy and ourselves looking nice and businesslike. Next thing someone comes into each division wheeling an invalid on a wheel-chair. (Preparedness, understand? To show the visitors that they are prepared to “haul” a girl out in case she faints from over-work of pose ventilation).” Another thing we notice are the porters (who otherwise, are garbed in dirty kakai suits) all “togged up” in white, even to the cap; altogether, not unlike the street cleaner’s outfit, and the porters themselves looking “proud as you please”

In the wash-rooms there are racks containing sanitary towels, but we employes must not touch them (we are furnished with a clean one once a week).

And to think we are expected to act as though we were used to all these things when visitors come! We are to make believe they are everyday occurrences and some of these representatives from other cities or towns go home and tell their people what a “wonderfully kind person” Montgomery Ward & Company is. Some country gentlemen have gone so far as to get out pamphlets telling all about the place and stating how “extravagantly kindly” the employes are treated. Sounds like a clergy who thinks we are getting too much out of this world.

A Slave.

The most widely read of I.W.W. newspapers, Solidarity was published by the Industrial Workers of the World from 1909 until 1917. First produced in New Castle, Pennsylvania, and born during the McKees Rocks strike, Solidarity later moved to Cleveland, Ohio until 1917 then spent its last months in Chicago. With a circulation of around 12,000 and a readership many times that, Solidarity was instrumental in defining the Wobbly world-view at the height of their influence in the working class. It was edited over its life by A.M. Stirton, H.A. Goff, Ben H. Williams, Ralph Chaplin who also provided much of the paper’s color, and others. Like nearly all the left press it fell victim to federal repression in 1917.

PDF of full issue: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/solidarity-iww/1916/v7-w342-jul-30-1916-solidarity.pdf