Men at Work, page 12
“It is most desirable,” Ludlow wrote in 1929, “to put the whole matter where it deserves to be placed,—on the high plane of great and splendid service not only to the building industry but to every individual concerned,—for the stirring of ambition to do nothing but a high grade of work ennobles a man’s whole life, brings him a contentment that he has not known before, makes him a man of finer ideals, and in a word does something to create a better citizenship as well as a far worthier nation.”
Because the ethos of Ludlow’s “craftsmanship movement” was craft for craft’s sake, any suggestion that the award should entail a monetary component was emphatically rejected. In an article the committee placed in the trade journal Building Age in June 1927, the author states, “Cash payments are recognition for services performed. Gold lapel buttons and framed certificates are evidence of something just a little bit above the plain duty owed to one’s employer; a recognition of something that has been done by the worker for the good of his own soul and for the best interest of the trade in which he works.” Giving explicit expression to this ethos, John D. Rockefeller Jr. spoke at the ceremony for award-winning workmen on the Riverside Church in June 1930, saying, “on this work I am positive that no one thought of his own appointed task merely as a ‘job’—something done solely for economic reward. And there was no shirking. We are impressed with the loyalty, devotion and fine class of craftsmanship you have put in this structure.”
Unlike Colonel William A. Starrett, who surveyed the labor conditions of workers subjected to the industrialization of their craft and concluded the problem lay with labor unions, William Orr Ludlow, chairman of the Committee on Craftsmanship, observing these same conditions, diagnosed the problem as spiritual. And this spiritual malaise, according to Ludlow, was pervasive, afflicting not only workers but owners as well.
For Ludlow, the Committee on Craftsmanship’s mission was not restricted solely to elevating workers to a higher plane. Professionally situated between building owners on one side and trade laborers and unions on the other, the architects who led the committee found themselves fighting a two-front war against decadence. In a pamphlet entitled, Recognition of Craftsmanship: How It Is Put into Effect, Ludlow delineates the incentives for each party to participate in the program. The architect, he confesses, “is glad of a certain amount of acclaim which will come to him as the architect of the building.” Above all, however, the architect “is the one, more than any other, who is interested in insisting on the good quality of the workmanship that goes into his building.” The owner’s motivation, by contrast, “is rather more sordid.” At a total expenditure of approximately ten dollars apiece, the Craftsmanship Awards represented “a comparatively small item on a building enterprise involving hundreds of thousands of dollars.” Nevertheless, in Ludlow’s estimation, the compelling factor for the building owner to join in the craftsmanship movement was narrow self-interest. “The owners readily recognize the considerable advertising advantage which they get from awards being made on their buildings, even though they may not have a broader vision of the splendid ideals upon which the movement is founded.”
“As to the men themselves,” Ludlow concludes, “little need be said as to why they appreciate this recognition. One simply has to imagine oneself in the place of these men to know how he is likely to feel when in the presence of his fellow workmen, he is called to the platform to receive from the hands of the representative of an impartial body a handsomely framed certificate and gold button and told he has ‘made good.’”
The social hierarchy is clear: Architects are the keepers of the craftsmanship ideal. Owners, lacking vision, care only for their own advantage. Of the men themselves, little need be said. The highest inducement to perform their jobs with pride, Ludlow believed, was the hope of receiving approval from above in the presence of their peers. Their motivations are so simple and childlike, anyone can easily imagine them.
In this way, the idea of craftsmanship has become a question of spiritual fitness, and any physical connection to the men’s actual labor has been erased. What makes a “good” craftsman? In the 1929 pamphlet, Recognition of Craftsmanship, Ludlow gives this definition: “The craftsman is distinguished by his love of good work for its own sake and for the character molding values of integrity, thoroughness, intelligence, reliability, loyalty and cooperation.” Like the word “craftsmanship” itself, the term “good,” rather than signifying any quality of the work, has now come to have a moral or behavioral meaning, identifying desirable and aspirational qualities in the men themselves.
Far from an aberration in Ludlow’s usage, these terms became definitive for the Craftsmanship Awards in general. Colonel William A. Starrett, speaking at the Craftsmanship Award ceremony held at 40 Wall Street in late 1929, saw the awards as the solution to the problem he had diagnosed a year earlier in his book. Referring to the barrier that modern labor practices had established between workers and employers, Starrett said, “We have given thought for twenty or thirty years as to how we could possibly break it down and find means of expression in the real soul of the building business which is the contact of the artisan and the employer. We have found it through this medium. These certificates go to you because of your excellence, not because any particular man is the fastest worker in the world, but because of his general workmanship, his ability as a worker, a true craftsman.”
If Starrett’s definition of “a true craftsman” is too vague, we can find clarification in the speeches held at the Empire State’s two award ceremonies. At the first, in October 1930, John J. Collins, secretary-treasurer of the Tunnel and Subway Constructors’ International Union, who served as the Craftsmanship Committee’s labor representative, assured the assembled workers: “Labor is proud of you men and to those who do not today receive certificates let me point out that you may merit one on some future building measuring up to the qualifications expressed on the certificate which are energy, loyalty, cooperation, service, thoroughness, industry, intelligence, and reliability.” Speaking at the second award ceremony in February 1931, R. H. Hunter represented the builders, Starrett Bros. and Eken. “This building is an example of all the qualities expected of a master craftsman,” Hunter said, “energy, industry, reliability, loyalty, cooperation, intelligence and service.” And in case the honored workmen had not followed the list of expected virtues attentively, they were inscribed in the borders of the Honorary Craftsmanship Membership Card that each man received: “Energy, Service, Thoroughness, Cooperation, Loyalty, Industry, Intelligence, Reliability.”
Honoring the men at the first award ceremony, October 8, 1930.
Some workers at the time uncontestably considered their work a craft. The New York Society of Craftsmen, the successor organization to the National Society of Craftsmen, was active in the 1920s, providing exhibition space and educational programming for all those “devoted to the applied arts and handicrafts.” The crafts that the society represented included many fine arts such as painting and sculpture, but also applied arts and crafts, including bookbinding, ceramics, needlecraft, jewelry, stained glass, and furniture. In 1921, together with six other New York-based applied arts organizations, the Society of Craftsmen created the Art Center on East Fifty-Sixth Street, dedicated to decorative and ornamental design and “the practical application of American Art to trade and industry.”
Workers in the construction industry, by contrast, were more typically referred to as “mechanics,” as seen in the headlines announcing the Craftsmanship Awards: “Empire State Mechanics Rewarded for Good Work” in the New York Herald Tribune, or “Mechanics Hear Chrysler” in The New York Times. Contemporary usage of the word “craftsmanship” was reserved almost exclusively for the fine arts, musical instruments, or to enhance the appeal of luxury goods. On the same day the first Empire State Craftsmanship Awards were reported, for comparison, the only other appearance of the word across the largest New York City newspapers was an advertisement for a new Victor radio with “the most striking cabinet Victor ever designed . . . superb Victor craftsmanship . . . acoustically perfected.” Similarly, with the exception of the Craftsmanship Awards, the word would be used in relation to workers only in advertising, to enhance the status of both the men and the products for sale. “The Work Shirt that Helped to Build the World’s Highest Building—The grueling work with steel, stone, and mortar demanded the finest of craftsmen as this giant towered to its dizzy height of 110 stories—1260 feet— almost a quarter of a mile into the skies. What a testimony to Gladiator Work Shirts that most of the prize workmen in all branches of construction wore this sturdy work shirt, as did the superintendent of construction for Starrett Bros. and Eken, the builders.”
In choosing to honor the work of building mechanics with the title of “craftsmanship,” then, the members of the New York Building Congress had seized on a word with an elevated, yet also nostalgic and ill-fitting, ring. Beyond the word “labor,” which described the men’s activity but also referred to labor unions, and so was too grounded in the practical, contentious struggle over working conditions, there was no term that accurately captured the modern, industrial nature of the men’s work. Just as the skyscraper escaped its mundane function as an office building in the transformation into a symbol of national aspiration, so the nature of work and the conditions of the building mechanics’ workplace were “transcended” and rendered anodyne by the ideal of “craftsmanship.”
Perhaps the fullest expression of William Orr Ludlow’s craftsmanship ideal appeared in a richly illustrated pamphlet, What Is a Good Craftsman?, published by the Building Congress in 1928. The twenty-six-page document resides in its own folder in the Building Congress’s archive. Replete with photos of Craftsmanship Award ceremonies, as well as an image of the bronze plaque mounted on the wall of the Central Savings Bank, now the Apple Bank for Savings, at Broadway and West Seventy-Third Street, the pamphlet closes with the text of a speech Ludlow gave at a luncheon for award winners in Carpenters’ and Joiners’ Hall on Madison Avenue on December 7, 1927.
“A good craftsman first of all is a man who does first class work in his trade; he is known by his workmanship; nothing he does is shoddy, ugly or of poor quality,” Ludlow begins, addressing the question of physical skill in a sentence that defines good work by what it is not. The remainder of the speech focuses on virtues. “The good craftsman,” Ludlow continues, “is loyal to his union. A good craftsman is loyal to the men of other trades.” As if anticipating the spat between Belle Moskowitz and Edmund Wilson, Ludlow elaborates, “If he is a carpenter, he doesn’t draw pictures on white plaster walls, and if he is a plasterer he doesn’t drop mortar on a newly laid floor.” When Ludlow does refer to the men’s work, he reduces it to the level of a basic commodity. “A good craftsman is loyal, also, to his employer and the owner for he knows that he has sold to them his eight hours a day and has sold to them his skill, and he would no more expect to loaf on the job or do poor quality work than he would expect his grocer to take his money for a barrel of potatoes and then give him a barrel half full, or potatoes that were half rotten.”
A craftsman, then, is a man who fills the barrel of his job. A superior craftsman, Ludlow emphasizes again and again, is more than this: He is a good person. “He is never a grouch, and when he is about, things seem to go better on the job.” His good behavior becomes its own reward. “A good craftsman is a man with a happy look on his face. Why shouldn’t he have a happy look, his day’s work is no mere grinding out of so many hours for so many dollars, he has given to his work the most precious thing he has, his interest, his skill, his best effort.” The virtues embodied in “goodness” thus represent the path upward, by which the not-quite-complete worker, subject to his machine, to his union, and to his own inadequate education, rises above the status of rivet or automaton to become a full human being. Having achieved this higher state, then, the beneficial effects of his “craftsmanship” radiate beyond the worksite. “Every day when he quits, he looks over his work with pride, for he knows he has done a good job, and he brings home to his wife and ‘kiddies’ contentment and happiness. Because he is a good craftsman, he is a good fellow, a good husband and a good father, a worthwhile man in his community—a good citizen.”
As befits a splendid ideal, however, the ultimate goal of Ludlow’s oration is not to be found on the earthly plane, at the worksite, or in the home. “Some day perhaps we shall stand before the Great Craftsman who made all things,” he sums up, “and perhaps we shall be asked, ‘What have you done?’ I think the good craftsman will answer ‘I did the best work I knew how.’”
SIX
“WHAT THE MEN THINK OF IT”
The Empire State Craftsmanship Awards were supposed to recognize men for their work. Perhaps as the men were handed their Certificates of Superior Craftsmanship at the award ceremonies, they felt pride in their labor, as the award givers hoped. What the men thought of the award, however, and more importantly, what the men thought of themselves, has not been preserved in the historical record. We might believe, like William Orr Ludlow, that their feelings would be easy to imagine. But the ease with which others assumed they could speak for the workers, and so define who these men were, is the most glaring of the many ways the culture worked to erase or disguise their actual lived experience.
The erasure of the workers’ individuality extends beyond their photographs to their words as well. In the promotional pamphlet Recognition of Craftsmanship, the New York Building Congress helpfully included a page of quotations under the heading “What the Men Think of It.” Like the statements attributed to workers in newspaper articles, however, the consistency with which the men express the exact sentiments desired by the Craftsmanship Committee leaves little in these statements that rings authentic. Sheet Metal Worker: “It is a pleasure to receive this award. I think occasions like this will cement the spirit of friendship and cooperation between employer and employee more than anything else.” Hoisting Engineer: “I feel highly honored by receiving the certificate and the Missus feels that way also.” Elevator Constructor: “The money in the pay envelope doesn’t recognize craftsmanship—all journeymen get the scale. The award is different. It recognizes things that wages can’t cover and it gives a man a lot of satisfaction to get one.” Hoisting Engineer: “I feel honored in being selected to your membership, and I shall do everything possible to prove worthy of my connections with so encouraging an organization that sees fit to raise the Mechanic to so high a plane.”
Among the journalistic profiles of workers who built the Empire State, a few mention the Craftsmanship Awards. But again, the oddly affected quality of the language renders it questionable whether these statements are, indeed, “what the men think.”
Writing for the London Sunday Express, Ivor Griffiths relates his visit to the highest point of work on the Empire State:
I came on a curious sidelight on America’s handling of labour. I passed some casual remark about the pride and interest that the 5,000 workmen must feel at being concerned in putting up the world’s tallest building. “Sure,” said my guide. “And we help a man to take pride in his work here. A number of our men—engineers, metal-workers, stone-cutters, and labourers—have been given certificates and gold buttons by the New York Building Congress in recognition of their skill. The presentations were made publicly by Mr. Alfred E. Smith, president of the company that is putting up this building.”
Margaret Norris, in her profile of ironworkers, also mentions a winner of a Craftsmanship Award, although not for work on the Empire State. Norris not only gives the man a voice, she identifies him, an ironworker called “Whitey,” whose real name was Paul Rockhold. But little about Norris’s depiction of “Whitey” survives closer scrutiny. She creates a character to fit her idea of who an ironworker should be. “Whitey is a young man around thirty, with a mop of tawny, wavy hair and shoulders at least half again as broad as his slim waist and hips. He comes from New England, of a family resident there for several generations and back of that English, and he is proud of it.” In this instance, it is possible to document Norris’s mythmaking in action. The record tells a different story. Paul Sommerville Rockhold was born on May 6, 1900, in Wirt County, West Virginia. Both his parents were also natives of West Virginia.
Almost every utterance about the men by the award givers and by the journalists who shared their orientation expresses an implicit or explicit wish to make the men into something else, something other than who they are, something “better.” The men must be cleaned up, it seems, to be presentable in public. Whether with journalistic mythmaking or moral-spiritual uplift provided by the Craftsmanship Award’s splendid ideals, the educated and upper-class figures betray their aversion to seeing the men as they are, in the actual conditions of their jobs. Beyond this lens of class privilege, only the smallest scraps of information remain, contained in documents, in the private recollections of their families, or in stray remarks captured almost by accident.
A letter to the editor of The Brooklyn Daily Eagle in August 1931 might provide one such fleeting insight. Noting the newspaper’s contention that maintaining day wages for workers in the building trades would be difficult under prevailing economic conditions, the writer, a Joseph Brown from Brooklyn, explains, “Even if a skilled worker in the building trades were to work every day in the year he would earn no more than a policeman or fireman and little more than a milkman or a pie wagon driver. However, even in good years, he loses many days’ work, pays $50 to $100 a year for dues and receives neither vacation nor retirement. He spends many days looking for work, furnishes his own tools and has practically no chance of advancement. His work is dangerous and disagreeable.” Alongside this recitation of difficulties, however, Brown expresses something else worthy of attention. He concludes his letter with this simple statement: “The men who made the Empire State Building out of architects’ drawings and raw material were building trades mechanics directed by foremen.” The tone is subtle, and yet the demand for recognition of the mechanics’ skill and significance is clear. We celebrate the Empire State Building, he implies, and yet we forget the men who actually built it.
