We all Want Something in Life

When you are a teenager it seems as if you have no freedom to do what you want. You are living under your parents roof so whatever they say goes. But sometimes if you really want something you can persuade them to say yes. This was the case of many young girls living when the mills first opened.

Girls were getting too old to just sit at home and do nothing,they must start working.Women, like Lucy the main character in the "Daughters of Free Men" video worked to help provide money for her family. That was not the only reason why Lucy went to the city to work. She went to the city to work to explore and see the world and to be independent.Everything has benefits and costs just like working on the mills did. In the "Mill Girls"video some benefits to working on the mills were getting paid, being independent, having more opportunities and living in the city. Some Costs of working on the mills were getting treated poorly,low pay,health risks, and you could not talk to men.  Women soon realized that they were working too hard to be treated like this. In the 1800's  Lucy and all of the other girls that worked on the mills boycotted and protested down the streets. As a result these companies hired new girls.

The girls that worked on the mills pictured their lives to be a whole lot different. Although they did gain independence and get to travel to the city their were many down sides to this.  The girls realized they had been working too hard to be treated like this and had enough.

(This is a drawing of a girl working on the mills making cloth)

Winslow Homer, illustration for William Cullen Bryant, “Song of the Sower”