Margaret Eaton
Read by Eugene J. Buechler
Listen to: Hadley's Mill
Hadley's Mill is based on an experience I had working with some cotton mill workers in North Carolina who were fighting for better working conditions. All were sick with Brown Lung Disease, what used to be called Monday Fever. All were unable to work; each was slowly suffocating from the cotton dust caught in their airways. The small house where we met had belonged to the original owner of the mill, it was worn and tired, like the sick workers. Over lunch one day they started telling me stories of the old days, when kids worked in the mills and body-maiming bloody accidents were a regular occurrence. I will never forget those stories or those story tellers. Hadley's Mill is a bit macabre and the style is intentionally old-timey because that seemed to suit the mood of the place and the souls it held. A friend, a recently retried tug boat driver, reads the story. Another friend recorded it and I added some music.