THE SHINGLE MACHINE
Jon Carr Farrelly 2016
The Everett, WA waterfront of 1916 was dominated by machines, not just the ships, steamers, boats and trains, rather by the largest machine of the period - the Factory.
A machine made up of smaller machines and millions of parts, including thousands of workers who were treated as just parts - replaceable parts that were treated with less respect than the machines of iron, steel and steam they served. Sawmills, Pulp and Paper Mills, and Shingle Mills were the dominant Everett form of the factory machine engaged in the endless process of turning the massive forests of the Pacific Northwest into lumber, paper and shingles. The Shingle Mills in particular were brutal places to work, each shingle weaver sat next to a large, unguarded circular saw spinning at high-speed and sliced bolts of timber into shingles, and then wove them into stacks. “A journeyman shingle weaver could handle 30,000 singles in a ten hour shift. Each time - 30,000 times a day - when he reached for one of those flying pieces of cedar, he gambled the reflexes of eye and muscle against the instant amputation of his fingers or his hand."
1 The working conditions in the mills of all sorts led to labor strife, unionization and, eventually, the presence of the Industrial Workers of the World and the events of November 5, 1916, The Everett Massacre.
http://epls.org/nw-history/digital-collections/everett-massacreThis piece represents those machines and those Workers, both now long gone, this shingle machine has produced a stack of unexpected shingles - the mugshots of the 74 I.W.W. members arrested following the events of the Everett Massacre.
Mixed-media (wood, plastic, metal, paper, plastic model parts, printed I.W.W. mugshots attached to veneer) 14.5” X 16” X 5”
1. Andrew Mason Prouty, More Deadly Than War: Pacific Coast Logging, 1827-1981, New York; London Garland Publishing, Inc. 1985
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