Date
1-16-2025
Department
College of Arts and Sciences
Degree
Doctor of Philosophy in History (PhD)
Chair
Kevin E. Grimm
Keywords
Child Labor, Social history, Cultural history, Urban history, Saint Louis History
Disciplines
History
Recommended Citation
Morse, Deserea A., "A Written Dissertation of a History of the Ethnic Identity of the Irish Child Laborers in Saint Louis, Missouri: 1890-1930" (2025). Doctoral Dissertations and Projects. 6424.
https://digitalcommons.liberty.edu/doctoral/6424
Abstract
The study of child labor helps us better understand the connection between labor, ethnicity, and crime within America. Throughout this dissertation, there will be a closer look into the influence that child labor has had on the growth of this nation. It also grants a look into the design of society within Progressive America and gives a voice to the story of the child laborer and his experiences. Currently, there is an ever-changing debate on the role child labor played within American history, specifically between the years 1910-1930. This period of years is critical as it signals when reform programs took place, and what effect that these reforms had on child labor by 1930. Child labor is an easily overlooked subject within history, one which has not been given a thorough enough inspection.
Throughout this research study, the Irish children is discussed in greater detail because they were one of the main groups of child laborers in Saint Louis that had criminal cases against them, throughout the history of the juvenile courts. The children who worked on the streets, and this directly led them to a life of criminal behavior. This study aims to balance the three approaches of study on the ethnic, environmental, and social aspects of these children’s lives. The study on ethnicity is based in the children’s Irish culture and ethnicity. The focus here will be their identity as Irish people living in America during the Progressive era and up until the early 1930s. Environment, as a term, signifies the physical environment that the Irish children grew up in. This physical environment encompasses Saint Louis, and the Irish neighborhoods in Saint Louis, known as the Kerry Patch and Dogtown. Social aspects describe the concept of the child’s involvement with gangs, their educational resources, the reformers, and the institutions that stepped in for the child’s wellbeing. These three themes will be balanced throughout this dissertation, and each serves a critical part to better detailing the Irish child’s experience during the reform period in America.
