Miners' Superstitions and Prejudices. Pit-Head Baths.
The general public must often have wondered why there is no provision made at collieries for miners to wash off the dirt after work, so that they might travel home through the streets looking clean and neat. This question was discussed at the meeting of the North Staffordshire Institute of Mining Engineers at the Central School of Science and Technology, Stoke-on-Trent, on Monday, and it arose out of a paper read by Mr. James B. Sproston, M.C., who is chief assistant to Mr. Arthur Hassam, the well-known consulting mining engineer.
Mr. Sproston advanced two reasons as to why objection would be raised to compulsory baths at pit-heads by miners. They were superstition and prejudice, and while he thought the former was existent to a greater extent in some districts than in others, he believed the latter was quite general. An old superstition in North Staffordshire and in other parts of the country was that if a man washed his back it became weak, while another belief was that if a man washed his back in the middle of the week an accident would ensure.
Mr Sproston advocated modern installations of baths, and declared that since demobilisation men were less inclined to object to washing, having been inculcated with habits of cleanliness in the Army. A miner coming from the pit to the surface, bathed in perspiration, rendered himself liable to illness, and baths would obviate this. Mining, however, was generally a healthy occupation.
Mr. J.R.L.Allott, the President, recalled the fact that in 1913 general regulations were made in regard to the establishment of pit-head baths in this country, but baths had not been installed with few exceptions. An interesting point Mr. Allott made wass that the installation of baths would produce a domestic revolution in the miners' homes of the country, and while the cost would be considerable, they must not altogether forget that the health of the workers was the primary duty. The proposal was that the employer and the workman should share the cost of the baths. He believed it would certainly be conducive to better work if baths were installed.
An important and interesting letter was read from Dr. J. S. Haldane, the famous mining physiologist, who stated that in his opinion the Miners' Federation had failed in not using its influence to bring pit-head baths into existence. He did not attach much importance to pit-head baths from the point of view of the health of the miners, because mining was a very healthy occupation. The important factor was the effect of cleanliness on home life. "Coal miners and their families lose also very seriously in social standing owing to their dirty appearance in public," added Dr. Haldane, "and the dirt is apt, unless great efforts are made by their wives, to invade thier homes. Those who go about the streets and in public conveyances with dirty faces and clothes suffer inevitably in public estimation, and tend to be regarded as of a lower class. Mining is a skilled occupation, requiring and actually evoking, not only greater intelligence, but also moral qualities of the highest order. Those who know what a good miner is can see the intelligence and moral qualities through the dirt on a miner's face and clothes; but to the world in general a dirty miner is apt to appear as no better than other dirty and untidy persons.
A colliery, as the source of so many dirty and untidy persons, suffers correspondingly in public estimation; whereas, by rights, coal-mining ought to be esteemed as an occupation, which, taking it all round, is second to none in this country." Dr. Haldane added that he felt convinced that the absence of pit washing and changing was at the root of the troubles of coal-mining in this country.
Staffordshire Advertiser. 26th March 1921.
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