The Kiss of Death Story

By HORATIO ROGERS, M.D.l

PERSON of an historical turn of In 1882 the German bacteriologist mind living in the Merrimack Robert Koch succeeded in isolating the A Valley can hardly escape becom- tubercle bacillus from the sputum of con- ing interested in the early days of the tex- sumptive patients. Pasteur had already tile industry which once flourished here. advanced the germ theory of disease. In Among the fascinating details bound to 1895 Roentgen discovered the X-ray, come to his attention is the story of the and it soon became possible to demonstrate “kiss of death” shuttle. the diseased lungs of patients whose spu- Historians have been unable to place tum contained tubercle bacilli. Tubercu- the date of the earliest use of shuttles in losis became known as “the Great White weaving; some time in the Middle Ages Plague.” Popular campaigns complete is as close as they dare to come. But it is with exhibits were staged against it by known that ever since then a boat-shaped Public Health agencies, even in small object called a shuttle has been used to towns. I must have been about seven carry the weft thread across the loom in when I was taken to one of these. I was the process of weaving cloth. This shuttle so scared that for several nights I slept on contained a hollow space for holding the a board with my head outside the window, spool of weft thread and a hole or “eye” much to the distress of my parents. through which the loose end of the thread At about this time observers remem- emerged. (See Fig. ra.) Old books say bered about the weavers’ habit of sucking that the weaver, in reloading his shuttle, the thread end through the shuttle and “draws the loose end through the hole realized that by contaminating a number with his breath.“’ of shuttles a single tuberculous weaver No one could object to this unsanitary could infect a whole weave room. Own- habit so long as weaving took place only ers and superintendents of textile mills in the weaver’s home. Even later on, quickly made rules against the old practice when professional weavers were brought of sucking through. As might be expected, together in “manufactories” and later they were largely ignored and the “good still in the weave rooms of textile mills old way” prevailed. (Fig. I b), no one saw reason to object. In some mills each weaver was pro- Certainly no one connected this habit vided with a small metal hook (see Fig. with the observation, made sometime in IC) with which to pull the weft end the nineteenth century, that weavers were through the shuttle eye. Weavers still dying of what was then called consump- preferred the “good old way.” Massa- tion at a higher rate than was the general chusetts passed Chapter 281 of the Acts public. of 191 I making the use of the kiss of death shuttle unlawful.3 One of the at- 1 Trustee of the Merrimack Valley Textile Museum, North Andover, Massachusetts. 3 Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Manual s William S. Murphy, “The Textile In- of the Labor Laws, June, 1915, page 68. Suc- dustries. ” London, 19 I I. Vol. IV, I so. The tion Shuttles. Acts of I 9 I I, Chapter 28 I. Suc- weaver . . . “leads the loose thread along to the tion Shuttles. Section I. It shall be unlawful for hole, and draws it through with his breath.” any proprietor of a factory or any officer or

57 58 Old-Time New England

FROM LEFT TO RIGHT: FIG. IA, IB, IC, ID, IE tempts to conform to this law was the through was impossible-unless the production of shuttles having a small weaver first scraped out the offending bunch of woolen yarn at the inner end of obstruction. the eye (see Fig. Id) so that sucking It was not until the introduction of the self-threading shuttle (see Fig. re) that the problem was finally solved. Modern agent or other person to require or permit the use of suction shuttles, or any form of shuttle in looms now reload the empty shuttle auto- the use of which any part of the shuttle or any matically, and modern shuttles rethread thread is put in the mouth or touched by the themselves. The “Kiss of Death” shuttle lips of the operator. It shall be the duty of the has had its day. Now it may take its place state board of labor and industries to enforce with the vast company of solved prob- the provisions of this act. Section 2. Violations of this act shall be punished by a fine of not lems which mark the progress of textile less than fifty dollars for each offense. history from the earliest times.