"Dirty Work" - George Getschow - Wall Street Journal

Description

Getschow lived and worked as an oil industry day laborer to expose conditions in the temporary "slave labor camps" throughout the Southwest.

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Effects and Outcomes

Getschow's 1983 two-part series was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in National Reporting in 1984.

Media History

The reporting was intended for these media types: Newspaper

I-"Dirty Work" - George Getschow - Wall Street Journal

"The Day Laborer's Toil Is Hard, Pay Minimal, Security Nonexistent; In Houston, the Jobless Fill Labor Pools That Retake Part of Each Day's Wage; The System at Krash Cabin"

1983-06-22

"Houston -- It's 5 a.m., and the 120 tenants of Krash Cabin, a filthy flophouse run by one of the many day-labor outfits on the fringes of downtown, are getting their instructions from the burly bunkhouse manager: 'Get your asses out of bed before I throw you out,' he shouts. "One man, exhausted after digging ditches for 10 hours in 85-degree heat the day before, begs to be allowed to recuperate in his bunk. 'I'm too sick to work today,' he tells Bob McClarity, the tattoed bunkhouse boss. 'I don't give a damn,' barks the boss, hauling him out of his bunk. 'This ain't a charity hospital.'"

II-"Dirty Work" - George Getschow - Wall Street Journal

"Louisiana Labor Camps Supply 'Warm Bodies' The Oil Business Needs; Laborers Often Earn Little Beyond Debt to a Camp; Life at a Halfway House; Some Citizens Defend System""

1983-06-23

"Morgan City, La. - In the early 1800s, when labor shortages threatened to stop the expansion of sugar-cane cultivation in this swampy part of southern Louisiana, some European settlers seized the opportunity to strike it rich by selling slaves to the landowners. Soon the slave trade flourished throughout St. Mary's Parish. Traders became wealthy plantation owners, and their descendants are still among the socially prominent here. . . . "