CHILDREN FOUND ILLEGALLY EMPLOYED OR FOR WHOM PROOF OF AGE WAS NOTE. The above violations and demands for proof of age in the First Inspection District were found in 307 New York City factories. Those in the Second Inspection District were found in 149 factories, 14 of which were in Buffalo and 27 in Rochester. * In 74 cases the children secured the required certificates. -cases The total here represents the number of violations found; there were 39 duplications — ca in which children between 14 and 16 years of age without certificates were being employed illegal hours. tt In the First Inspection District the Department issues to children upon request certificates of age of more than 16 years upon production of sufficient proof of age. In 1915 the Division of Factory Inspection issued 2,862 such certificates, the evidence of age being school records in 1,419 cases, birth certificates in 805, baptismal certificates in 285, passports in 203, mothers' affidavits in 130, institution records in 15, and life insurance policies in 5. ** In 11 cases the children were found to be working more than eight hours a day or before 8. a. m. or after 5 p. m. In 18 cases the child had secured the require certificate, but it was not on file with the employer; in 7 cases the inspector reported that child secured the certificate. The total here represents the number of violations found; there were 50 duplications -cases in which children between 14 and 16 years of age without certificates were being employed illegal hours. WORK OF THE DIVISIONS OF ENGINEERING AND OF APPEALS OF THE BUREAU OF INSPECTION FOR YEAR ENDED SEPTEMBER 30, 1915 * *These divisions have jurisdiction in the First Inspection District only. Similar work in the Second Inspection District is reported in connection with the work of the factory inspectors (q. v.) (3) REPORT OF DIVISION OF HOMEWORK INSPECTION To the First Deputy Commissioner: The report of the activities of the Division of Homework Inspection for the year ending September 30th, 1915, is herewith respectfully submitted. At the close of the present report year there was a total of 14,372 licenses, as compared with 12,861 at the end of the previous year, distributed as follows: Of these, 255 represent shop or factory buildings situated on the same lot, but in the rear of tenement houses, and 14,117 represent separate tenement house buildings. The total number of living apartments in these tenement houses are 177,210, 75 per cent of which apartments were looked into by the field force in their annual inspection visit. There were 2,543 new licenses issued, 52 were revoked for sanitary reasons, 981 licenses were cancelled on account of all work having ceased in them, 249 licenses were refused on first visit of inspection and 4 on second visit, the applications for the latter being cancelled as the tenement houses to which they related were found to be habitually unfit and dirty. The total of inspections, visitations and other acts performed by the field force of fourteen inspectors assigned to this division for the year amounted to 32,101, divided as follows: Inspections of licensed buildings, tenements and shops, 14,512; inspections made of buildings seeking to be licensed, 2,789; reports of observation visits to houses not licensed, 2,250; complaints investigated, 206; visits made to secure or verify compliances, 2,836; visits of a miscellaneous character and not otherwise charged, 9,508. Much time was devoted to patrolling in congested localities where factory work is given out in greatest quantities and where children would most likely be found employed in the home in the early or late part of the day or on holidays, etc. The tenement tag was used 122 times in order to enforce the prompt removal of wrongful conditions found by the inspector. The tag still holds its place as an effective means of compelling tenants, and very often owners, who are negligent in keeping up the standard of cleanliness demanded by the department before issuing a license. Of 14,110 tenements inspected, 5,648 were found to contain no work of any kind at the time of inspection. In the remaining 8,452 licensed tenements, 18,055 persons were found at work on some article coming within the provisions of the law; of this number, 3,367 persons were found employed in 1,363 store shops, having no connection with any living rooms or apartments. The actual number of persons found at work in living roms was 14,688, and the apartments wherein they worked numbered 11,404. Of all the persons found working at home, 8,569 were engaged on articles intended for personal use or the trade commonly called custom, that is, articles prepared for personal customers and not for the retail trade. There were 9,486 home workers found at work on some article sent out from a factory or shop; of this number, 5,667 were employed on articles of wearing apparel; 1,388 on artificial flowers; 753 on embroidery of some kind; leaving only 1,678 persons employed on miscellaneous articles. Of the 2,250 observation reports submitted of unlicensed houses, in only 726 was there any work found coming under the law, and the work thus found was, in the main, of the custom or individual kind and not from a factory. The above clearly demonstrates the effect of the enforcement of the law in checking the indiscriminate giving out of work from factories to tenements. There were 738 persons found employed in living rooms who did not reside therein. Of these outside hands, 654 were employed legally by custom dressmakers who came within the exceptions contained in section 100, leaving but 84 persons employed in violation of law, nearly every one of whom was found at work with journeymen tailors on custom work sent out by merchant tailoring houses. There were 28 cases of disease |