How Our Health and Long Life Are Affected by Our Different Employments

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HOW OUR HEALTH AND LONG LIFE ARE AFFECTED BY OUR DIFFERENT EMPLOYMENTS.

The great requirements, in choosing an occupation for life, or in adjusting one's self to the trade he already works at, are, not only what will pay the most money, but to avoid as much as possible what will shorten life and result in physical discomfort—in short, what will coincide with the most health.

In reading the following paragraphs, it must be remembered that there is hardly any trade or employment but what may be made unhealthy; and also that almost every one may be so modified and arranged as to be healthy.

Farmers.—What is the actual physical condition of agriculturists as a class? That they are not universally or even generally perfectly healthy, robust, and well-formed is clear to every observer. Consumption, Liver Diseases, Rheumatism, Fevers, and even Dyspepsia prevail widely and fatally among them. Are these and the rest of the long catalogue of ailments to which they are subjected, the results of their active out-of-door-life—of exercise, pure air, and sunlight? Of course not. We shall find their origin in bad habits and general disobedience to physiological laws. They are none of them the necessary concomitants of the employment.

The American farmer breathes pure air all day in the fields, but shuts himself up in a small unventilated bedroom, and breathes carbonic acid all night; he has, or may have, abundance of the best materials for a whole-some diet—the cereal grains, fruits, vegetables, pure milk, etc., but in utter contempt of these luxuries, he often fills his much abused stomach with pork and other gross and deleterious kinds of food, washed down with strong tea and muddy coffee.

Saying nothing of tobacco, rum and whiskey in connection with which farmers sin in common with other classes, we have certainly found a cause for much of the ill health which prevails among our agricultural population; but there is one other circumstance unfavorable to health, which should be adverted to in passing. This is the intellectual and social stagnation which is often permitted to prevail in farming communities. Farmers read, study, and think too little, and allow their lives to be too monotonous. Perfectly physical well being, as we have seen, requires the constant and pleasurable exercise of the intellect and the social affections, as well as the body.

Teamsters, etc.—Teamsters, Cartmen, Coach Drivers, Cattle Dealers, Drovers, etc., lead an active life in the open air, and are generally robust and free of disease in proportion to their temperance and the correctness of their personal habits generally. They are, it is true, more exposed to atmospheric vicissitudes than the preceding classes, and cannot, in all cases, keep up equally regular habits in reference to eating, rest and sleep; but their worst enemy is intemperance.

Butchers.—The Butcher is exposed to the disgusting atmosphere of the slaughter house, but that seems to have no serious ill effects, in fact, it is generally supposed to be favorable to health and vigor. Be this as it may, Butchers are generally robust, fresh looking, and apparently healthy; but at the same time they are not as a class, long lived. Thackrah says, "Butchers, in fact, live too highly—not too highly for temporary health (perhaps,) but too highly for long life. Does not high living produce that plethoric state which gradually leads to disease? I believe so. Congestion of blood, affecting chiefly the vessels of the abdomen and head, shortens the lives of numbers who are plump, rosy and apparently strong. The preventive is obvious."

Stone Cutters, etc.—Men employed in quarrying stone and preparing it for building purposes are liable to injury from too severe muscular exertion, and from the dust received into the lungs. They are seldom able to continue the occupation more than ten or fifteen years, without great danger of a permanent loss of health.

Masons.—Masons have an active employment, mostly in the open air, and are generally robust and comparatively healthy; they are, however, liable to injury from the dust and stony particles to which they are exposed, and sometimes, perhaps, suffer from the caustic quality of the lime which they use.

Carpenters, etc.—House Carpenters, Ship Carpenters, Boat Builders, Millwrights, and Wheelwrights are not necessarily seriously injured by their employments. Their exercise is full and varied, they have all the benefits of the open air, and at the same time they are generally sheltered more or less from atmospheric inclemencies. The hearing of ship carpenters is sometimes impaired by the noise of their employment, and they are somewhat subject to pains which are called rheumatic, but which are probably the result of strain on particular muscles.

Coopers.—Coopers have good muscular exercise of a varied character, and the employment may be considered, on the whole, a healthful one; but the stooping posture sometimes produces pains in the loins, and unless that result is guarded against, is liable to permanently injure the form. Ropemakers suffer from a similar position.

Sailors.—Sailors seem generally robust and hardy, but they are not, as a class, either truly healthy or long lived. Exposure, night watching, restraint, intemperance, and the vices to which they are peculiarly addicted when on shore, frequently bring them prematurely to the hospital and the grave. Under proper physical and moral training, were this possible, their health and comfort might be greatly improved, and heir​ lives much lengthened.

Blacksmiths, etc.—The occupation of the Blacksmith is remarkably conducive to muscular power, especially in the arms. For young men of strong constitution it is an excellent employment, but there is liability to excessive muscular exertion, which must be guarded against. The dust and smoke to which Blacksmiths are exposed are more annoying than injurious, although they can not be wholly innocuous. Nailmakers, Cutlers, Silversmiths and Gold Beaters may be considered as having healthful employment. Some of these processes, however, are less so than others, and the workmen are sometimes compelled to breathe confined and impure air.

Machinists.—The occupation of the machinist is a laborious one in some of its departments, but is not in this respect peculiarly injurious. The filing of cast iron is, however, exceeding hurtful from the minute metallic particles received into the air tubes. Consumption is very prevalent among those engaged in this employment—in fact, it can hardly be followed for many years without fatal results, unless wearing magnetic mouth pieces or some precautionary measures be adopted.

Iron and Brass Founders, Glass Blowers, Plumbers, &c.—Iron founders are subjected to great [torn away] from which they often alternate to the open air. The employment does not, however, necessarily lead to any specific disease, but gradually reduces vitality and shortens life. Similar remarks will apply to the Glass Workers, except that the muscular exertion is less severe.

Brass Founders, Brazlers, Coppersmiths, Plumbers, etc., are all seriously affected by the noxious exhalations arising from their employment, and are seldom healthy. Tinplate workers are injured to some extent by the fumes to which they are subjected, but are sometimes tolerably healthy. Something might be done in the way of preventive, by passing rapid currents of air through the places in which these employments are carried on, to remove quickly the noxious vapors.

Painters.—These artisans suffer not only from the action of the lead to which they are subjected, but from the fumes of the spirits of turpentine employed in mixing their paints.—They are pale and unhealthy looking as a class, and seldom live to an advanced age. They are much subject to dyspepsia, rheumatism, and nervous disorders, and frequently have what is called lead colic. Perfect cleanliness, when not actually at work, and all possible precautions to keeep​ their paints from contact with the skin, should be insisted upon as preventives.

Operatives in white lead manufactories, Lead miners, Paper Stainers, and Potters also have their health destroyed and their lives shortened by the poison of lead. Looking-Glass makers have a still more unwholesome employment, as they are subjected to the action of mercury instead of lead. If long continued, their employment is almost sure to prove fatal.

Hatters.—Operatives employed in the manufacture of "hat bodies" are exposed to injury from dust, and are not healthy-looking. In felting, hatters often have their fingers corroded and sore from the effects of the sulphuric acid employed in the process.

Printers.—Printer are liable to the lead symptoms, from contact with the types, which are composed of lead and antimony. A careful attention to cleanliness, frequent bathing, and a thorough ventilation of the rooms in which they work will, however, in a great measure at least, prevent ill effects from this cause. They should by all means avoid holding types in the mouth. The constant application of the eyes to minute objects and almost illegible manuscripts (shame on the writers who furnish such!) sometimes enfeebles those organs. But the greatest injury to health probably results from the the too confining nature of the employment and the standing posture, so long maintained, which predisposes to dyspepsia and kindred diseases. Compositors should contrive to sit a portion of the time during the day, and should patronize the gymnasium and the bath.

Cabinet Makers and Carvers.—In Cabinet making, wood carving, and similar occupations, there seems to be no hurtful accompaniment except dust, from which, as a general rule, no very serious injury results.

Bakers, etc.—Bakers are subjected to a high temperature, which gradually reduces vitality and induces susceptibility to disease. They also suffer from the dust which is largely inhaled. They are generally pale and sickly looking. Cooks and Confectioners suffer from heat, and also probably from a too frequent tasting of the article about which they are employed.

Factory Operatives—Operatives in cotton and woolen manufactories, though far more favorably situated in this country than in Europe, are, as a class, far from being robust and healthy. The atmosphere they are compelled to breathe is always more or less impure and dusty, and the temperature of most mills is kept much too high during the winter. The hours of labor generally enforced are too many, and the time allowed for eating, rest, and recreation too short. The regularity of the life the operative is compelled to lead in reference to meals, sleep, and work is a favorable condition.

Tailors.—Hardly any occupation is more unhealthful than that of the Tailor. He generally works in a close, unventilated, and perhaps crowded room, and in a position which renders it impossible that either respiration, circulation, or digestion should be properly performed. Disorders of the stomach and bowels are, as would naturally be inferred, frequent and obstinate. Pulmonary consumption is also very common. A fresh, rosy, and truly healthy tailor can hardly be found. We hope to see the trade, as at present conducted, entirely abolished by the great benefactor, the sewing-machine.

Shoemakers.—Shoemakers are only a little more favorably situated than the tailors. Their posture is a very bad one, compressing the abdominal viscera, and especially the stomach and liver, and causing frequent indigestion, headache, bilious disorders, and bowel complaints. Bad air, and not unfrequently bad habits, in respect to eating and drinking, greatly increase the evils, already too great, under which they labor. Saddlers and harness-makers have a more favorable employment.

Seamstresses—A most unfortunate class. Crowded, unventilated apartments, a bent posture, long hours of labor, bad diet, starvation prices for their work, and a life of constraint, repression, and temptation, leaving little room for their state to become worse. No wonder that the sewing girls become pale and thin, that they have pains in the chest, bad digestion, palpitation of the heart, and affections of the spine and ganglionic nerves. The remedy for this state of things—so far as a remedy is possible under existing industrial organizations—must be found in the reduction of the hours of labor, increase of remuneration, a better diet, frequent bathing, and exercise in the open air. But how shall even this partial reform be effected?

The sewing-machine will abolish this occupation, and at the same time new spheres of activity, it is to be hoped, will be opened to young women who are dependent upon their own exertions for a livelihood.