Alzina Stevens
Alzina Parsons Stevens (May 27th, 1849 – June 3rd, 1900) was born on May 27th, 1849 in the small town of Parsonfield, Maine. An active trade unionist, Stevens was also instrumental in the establishment of the United States’ first juvenile court, served as its first probation officer, and was a prominent resident of Chicago’s Hull House where she worked closely with social reformer Florence Kelley.
Life
Born into a poor, working-class family, Stevens was sent to work at the young age of thirteen. First entering the textile trade, she would lose her right index finger in an industrial accident. In later years, Stevens would see her missing finger as a constant reminder of the need to improve working conditions within industrial factories and to regulate child labor in the workplace. Stevens later entered the printer’s trade working as a proofreader, typesetter and compositor. In 1872 Stevens relocated to Chicago where she joined the Typographical Union No. 16.
While in Chicago, Stevens became a resident of Jane Addams’ Hull House where she joined the likes of social reformers Jane Addams, Ellen Gates Starr, and Sophonisba Breckinridge. Stevens, one of the few women involved at Hull House who had first-hand experience of working-class life, quickly became an active trade unionist and developed an acute interest in social reform as a result of her prior work in trade unions. In 1877, Steven’s would found and later serve as president of the Working Woman’s Union No. 1, Chicago’s first trade union for female workers. Her working-class background and workforce experience proved to further fuel her desire for substantial improvements in urban working conditions, allowing her to become one of the most influential leaders of the 19th century labor movement.
Work
In 1882, Stevens left Chicago for Toledo, Ohio to work with the Knights of Labor, an American labor organization aimed at unionizing industrial workers nationwide. By 1890 Stevens had organized within the Knights of Labor a women’s sect known as the Joan of Arc assembly where she became its first master workman.
In 1892, Stevens returned to Chicago where she was named Assistant Factory Inspector to Florence Kelley, the State Inspector of Workshops and Factories for Illinois. Working closely with Kelley, also a Hull House resident, Stevens wrote numerous papers on the working conditions of industrial factories state wide. In 1895, she and Kelley co-authored ''Wage Earning Children'', a detailed study of child labor in which they analyzed labor statistics, Illinois legislation, health afflictions and the physical mutilations of children within the workplace. Kelley and Stevens argued against the reckless employment of children in injurious occupations and the altogether presence of children in the workforce. Together the two women helped Illinois Governor John Peter Altgeld to pass and enforce legislation that controlled child labor throughout Illinois. Their work would later lead to the passage of further improved child labor laws in 1916 and educational requirements for children throughout the state.
In 1899, Stevens and her Hull House colleagues would lobby for the passage of a state juvenile-court law that proved to ultimately establish the first juvenile court within the United States. Stevens was appointed the first probation officer of the court, and would serve on its committee, the Cook County Juvenile Court Committee.
Legacy
Considered one of the earliest female sociologists, Alzina Stevens worked as a progressive labor leader, journalist and social reformer. In 1899, she published a review of author Hariett Robinson's Loom and Spindle in which she criticized the author for her, "total misconception of the iron economic laws which regulate today's factory employment". Stevens frank nature and tireless pursuit to reform widespread labor injustice earned her a respected role within the male-dominated labor movement. During her work with the Knights of Labor, Stevens held the title of chief officer for more than twenty local Knights’ assemblies at one time. She would later represented the organization at the 1892 national convention of the Populist Party in Omaha, Nebraska. Stevens would also serve as a member of the women’s committee at the world’s fair labor congress. Her establishment of the first female labor union, improved factory and workplace regulations, and substantial protection of children in the workforce often defines her as one of the most progressive labor organizers in American history. She died at the age of fifty-one while still a resident at Chicago’s Hull House.
Publications
- Stevens, Alzina and Florence Kelley. Wage Earning Children. New York: Thomas Y. Crowell & Co., 1895.
- Stevens, Alzina. Review: Loom and Spindle, by Harriet H. Robinson. The Journal of Political Economy, volume 7, page 412. University of Chicago, 1899.
ReferencesISBN links support NWE through referral fees
- Schultz, Rima Lunin, and Adele Hast, eds. Women Building Chicago 1790-1990: A Biographical Dictionary. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2001. ISBN 0253338522.
- Grand Forks Herald, Iss. 186. Grand Forks, ND. Death Notice: Alzina Stevens. Published 05 June, 1900. Page 8.
- Encyclopædia Britannica. 2007. Stevens, Alzina Parsons Retrieved March 6 2007 from Encyclopædia Britannica Online.
- Gordon, Ann D. 1999. Stevens, Alzina Ann Parsons From American National Biography, published by Oxford University Press, Inc., copyright 1999 American Council of Learned Societies. For further information, see the American National Biography Web site
External Links
- Alzina Stevens. Spartacus School Net.
- The Jane Addams Hull House Museum.
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