Poetry Tour Visits Auto Shop

Where can you see a poet reading her work underneath a gray sedan? Tonight, Wayne’s World of Automotive Services in Beverly, Massachusetts hosted a reading where poets stood at a podium underneath an auto lift, surrounded by tools and fluorescent lights.

When she isn’t standing underneath cars, Colleen Michaels teaches writing at the Montserrat College of Art.

The event was part of the Improbable Places Poetry Tour, a rotating performance night which has also visited a bike shop, a tattoo parlor, a swimming pool, a roller skating rink, and other locations. In each setting, the poets set up shop for one night, surrounded by a cheerful audience and a cameraman from Beverly Community Access Media.

A red light from a passing emergency van illuminated the poetry reading.

What’s poetic about cars? One might ask. In the red light of passing tow trucks and emergency vehicles, the audience heard how cars become part of one’s family and one’s life story. One poet even said her dress matched her father’s car. It was clear that cars are objects of affection to which we ascribe personalities. We also associate cars with being teenagers. Each generation remembers different cars and knows what it feels like to drive them.

The language of cars – “revved up,” “full throttle,” “shifting gears” – permeates American vocabulary the same way sports metaphors echo down the halls of Midwestern businesses. Like sports, cars are one of our central metaphors. When we play the game of life, cars are always by our side.

The poetry reading took place next to mechanics’ uniforms, toolboxes and an American flag.

Every day, we are surrounded by cars. Some of us evaluate strangers based on their car choices. When we meet a new person on the highway, we see the car he or she is driving, not the person at the wheel. Many of us depend on cars continually, driving for even short errands.

So it’s not surprising that we feel symbiotic with our cars. Hearing poets describe their relationships to cars tonight cemented that awareness for me.

An audio clip I recorded while listening to a poet named J.D. expresses this sentiment in one concise line:

“We were baptized in grease.”

Lessons Remain to Be Learned 100 Years after the Triangle Fire

The article below is an edited reprint of a story about worker safety which I wrote last year. I’m posting it in honor of May Day. 

On Saturday, March 25, 1911, 146 garment industry workers – mostly young Jewish and Italian women – died during the Triangle Shirtwaist factory fire in New York City’s Greenwich Village. The safety flaws that led to this tragedy – locked stairwells and exits, unsafe fire escapes, and lack of communication systems between floors  – seem nearly unthinkable today.  Yet the employer resistance to health and safety improvements that cost these women their lives 100 years ago sounds disturbingly similar to arguments that we hear today from industry trade groups opposing safer chemicals policies.

After the fire, New York Governor John Alden Dix created a commission to investigate health and safety in New York factories.  The commission visited over 3000 factories in 20 industries. As a result, the state created its first workplace safety requirements, a set of 25 different laws passed over the objections of business owners and industry representatives. 100 years later, although some companies are adopting responsible practices, industry groups still use very similar objections to obstruct modern health and safety legislation.

Here are quotes from 100 years ago followed by similar statements that industry groups make today.

1911: Obstructing Factory Safety

1: Industry says: The chemicals are safe

Before the Triangle Fire, there were no chemical safety rules for New York factories. After the fire, companies were required to provide hot water so employees could wash after handling chemicals. (Today, we know that this is highly inadequate, but it was a major step forward then.) One manufacturer downplayed the health and safety threat by saying the chemicals his workers used (such as lead) were not dangerous to workers unless they were careless.

“The only tendency toward illness comes to men who are intemperate in their habits.  In every case of poisoning I have heard of, the man was an exceedingly hard drinker….Where the men are temperate in their habits I never found a case…”
– Arthur S. Summers, a dry colors manufacturer

2: Industry says:  Products will not be available

In the days before the fire, employees in cellar bakeries faced unsafe working conditions due to poor ventilation. Despite the cries of bakery owners and the real estate industry that the cost of bread would skyrocket and bakeries would vanish, the legislature prohibited opening new cellar bakeries.

“If you eliminate further bakeshops in the cellar… the poor man is going to suffer, and we are crying now for the high cost of living. If you will wipe out the cellar bakeries, the poor man will get a smaller loaf of bread.”
– Dr. Abraham Korn, president of the United Real Estate Owners’ Association

3:  Industry says: Employers will leave the state

When New York considered legislation after the fire, there was a massive outcry. Business organizations made threats that factories would flee the state if the new workplace safety rules became law.

“The Real Estate Board of New York is informed that thousands of factories are migrating to New Jersey and Connecticut in order to be freed from the oppressive laws of New York State.”
– Op-ed by George W. Olvany, special counsel to the Real Estate Board, “The Fire Hazard in Big Buildings,” New York Times, May 3, 1914.

However, these predictions appeared to be unfounded.

“Notwithstanding all the talk of a probable exodus of manufacturing interests the commission has not found a single case of a manufacturer intending to leave the State because of the enforcement of the factory laws.”
– From “Seeks To Simplify Building Inspection,” New York Times, July 27, 1914.

2010: Stalling Chemical Safety Measures

100 years later, industry groups often raise similar warnings and brush aside the need to introduce safer alternatives to toxic chemicals. The following quotes are taken from public testimony by industry representatives fighting the passage of the Safer Alternatives Bill in Massachusetts and the regulation of BPA by the Massachusetts Department of Public Health.

1: Industry says: The chemicals are safe

Based on industry studies funded by the chemical industry, the FDA still classifies BPA as safe, although it is currently reevaluating that assessment. However, medical evidence of BPA’s toxicity, in particular at low levels, continues to accumulate in independently funded studies. The chemical industry continues to tout the safety of BPA.

“BPA is not a risk to human health, including the health of infants and children, at the very low levels that are present in consumer products.”
– American Chemistry Council statement on Massachusetts BPA regulation

2: Industry says:  Products will not be available

As Massachusetts regulators considered a ban on infant formula bottles containing BPA, industry representatives claimed that baby bottles would not be available despite the already widespread use of BPA-free bottles.

“This action is both unnecessary and not in the interest of Massachusetts infants and caregivers, as it would reduce the availability of infant formula products currently available in the Commonwealth.”
– International Formula Council statement on Massachusetts BPA regulation

3: Industry says:  Employers will leave the state

Despite solid union support for the Safer Alternatives Bill, which will create a program in Massachusetts to replace toxic chemicals with safer alternatives whenever feasible, industry groups regularly promote the fear that jobs may leave the state if the bill passes.

“We urge you to consider the negative impact of this bill on jobs and investments in your district…”
– Associated Industries of Massachusetts statement on the Safer Alternatives Bill from testimony provided to the Joint Committee on Natural Resources, Environment and Agriculture in 2009

Jobs vs. Safety: We Don’t Have to Choose

When businesses, unions and legislators support safety for customers and workers, they can prevent disasters like the Triangle Fire. The following quote from a worker at the garment factory shows the value of forethought and responsibility.

“If the union had won we would have been safe. Two of our demands were for adequate fire escapes and for open doors from the factories to the streets. But the bosses defeated us and we didn’t get the open doors or better fire escapes. So our friends are dead.”
– Rose Sabran, Triangle Waist Company employee

Today, the Massachusetts AFL-CIO – and many other organizations – support the Safer Alternatives Bill.

“We owe those who work in our state the safest and healthiest workplaces we can possibly provide. Where safer alternatives exist, there is no excuse for putting the health and welfare of workers at risk by making them work with completely avoidable toxic chemicals…. The many workers who will no longer be at risk of chronic disease or workplace injury and [their] families… will be profoundly grateful for your role in passing this legislation.”
– AFL-CIO statement on the Safer Alternatives Bill

The story of the Triangle Shirtwaist factory fire and the changes that came about afterwards gives us hope that when we stand up for the human right to a healthy and safe workplace and community, we can win the protections that we deserve.  It also reminds us of the terrible tragedies that happen when we let age-old myths about regulation being damaging cloud our thinking and prevent us from taking basic steps to protect our health.

Sources:

• State of Massachusetts. Ban on Bisphenol-A in Children’s Food and Beverage Containers: Public Testimony.
• Coalition for Occupational Safety and Health. Cry Wolf Project: The Triangle Waist Company Fire.
• Massachusetts AFL-CIO. Letter of support for the Safer Alternatives Bill.
• Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Plastics industry behind FDA research on bisphenol A, study finds.

Tolle Graham of the Massachusetts Coalition for Occupational Safety and Health and Elizabeth Saunders of The Alliance for a Healthy Tomorrow also contributed to this article.

Where in the World Are Your Cell Phones Going?

“That’s the infuriating part of this — people who are really trying to do the right thing [and] going to the trouble of taking their old stuff to some place thinking it’s going to be recycled have no idea that it’s not going to be recycled at all.”

– Barbara Kyle, Electronics TakeBack Coalition

Miller-McCune published an article on electronics recycling last month. After recycling enthusiastically for years, I was disappointed to learn that many of my electronics may have ended up in “acid baths and burn pits.” As a consumer, I want to know where my electronics are going – especially if they are being used unsafely overseas.

What does one call “recycling”? It’s an interesting question. Should there be a definition? I doubt that shipping material to sites where people will burn electronics in open pits would meet an international standard for recycling.

This is a classic example of misaligned incentives. Manufacturers, recyclers and consumers don’t pay the full cost of cheap disposal of electronics, so we collectively lack the motivation to change this situation. Somehow, the fact that we live in a closed ecological system doesn’t enter the equation.

Let's use our brain circuits before we burn our electric circuits.

We pass on the residue of our mistakes to future generations.

Communicating about Local Chemical Hazards

Every time I drive down Route 107 toward Boston, I pass a site where General Electric manufactures aircraft engines.

A Google street view of Route 107 in Lynn

This factory has been open since before World War II. A local business directory estimates that it employs 5,500 people. A Boston Globe story reports a lower number and comments that the company sought state aid recently to prevent layoffs.

What’s wrong with this industrial picture?

Local residents who haven’t taken environmental journalism classes may not know that the Environmental Protection Agency lists this as a high-priority hazardous waste site. The Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection database says there are 46 different contaminated locations at this address. Oil is the main culprit, but there are other hazardous materials too.

As an environmental communicator, I’m concerned that Lynn residents may not be aware of the websites above. Those jobs may benefit the community if the company hires locally, but their cost has been significant. Without transparency, problems like this may remain invisible.

Design and Engineering: Similar Skills with Different Reputations

Although there are real differences between art and engineering, the social gap between them may be due to misconceptions. The impersonal and equation-oriented image of engineering doesn’t reflect what engineers do at work.

As I commented on an article in The Atlantic:

Since I spent so much time in machine shops and garages during engineering school, I’m not sure that there really is a solid line one can draw between engineering and hands-on activities.

When I took art classes, students there were doing the same activities that I was already doing at the machine shop. Math classes use visualization and design skills frequently. And engineering is much more about problem-solving than memorization.

In other words – art and theater tech majors do many of the same things engineering and math students do…. but they end up with different jobs later.

The article encourages educators to value 3D design skills. I agree that 3D skills matter – but not just to designers and architects.

As a college freshman, I realized I would need shop skills that went beyond anything I learned before college. I’d been using art supplies and building small objects since grade school. As a high school student, I’d learned more about woodworking and auto repair.  But that wasn’t enough. To expand my experience, I began working in electronics and machine shops.

The day-to-day life of a mechanical engineer involves building and visualizing products continually. Having solid math and computer skills is only one part of that equation.

Design and construction are some of the building blocks of engineering. Intermediate art-related fields like architecture and product design require similar skills and experiences.

Occasionally, I hear people say engineering isn’t creative. But brainstorming is integral to industrial design. Engineers know that if they spend more time and energy in the design phase of a project, that will prevent costly retooling later on.

So, yes – engineers are creative. But the field’s impersonal image doesn’t match that reality. In college, I saw women taking theater tech and art classes and learning to solder, weld, and use shop equipment. My male friends took engineering classes, learned to use exactly the same equipment, and had relatively good job security after they graduated.

I’d encourage other women who are interested in design to consider engineering. My engineering degree gave me access to many resources. Those doors might never have opened if I had an art degree.

On the Trail of Our Garbage Trucks

Where in the world are our cell phones going? It shouldn’t be as difficult to answer this question as it is to find Carmen Sandiego.

MIT’s Senseable City Lab produced an award-winning Trash Track website which shows that it does take some sleuthing to find the final resting places of our waste. Here’s their video which excavates the fate of garbage from Seattle. While viewing this, remember that this video covers a limited time period; in 20 years, these batteries and cell phones may migrate elsewhere.

Because we live in a closed ecological system, what we have on this planet stays here (unless we send it out to orbit in space). And, one way or another, our garbage will be reused.

Like petroleum, which is made of compressed swamp residue – imagine the Everglades being buried for thousands of years – yesterday’s trash will become tomorrow’s treasure…. or, at least, tomorrow’s fast food packaging.

Our descendants will work with whatever we make – wherever we leave it for them. Think of it as a partly recyclable, sometimes toxic inheritance. This is one reason that I write about DIY.

Even sea animals may live inside bottles or reuse bits of glass. The video below shows that some of them already do.