ABSTRACT
Mashio described attempts by women in the Joban mines to deal with the heat. Surprisingly, the women interviewed by Morisaki Kazue and Idegawa Yasuko did not show great concern about the effects of dust in the lungs, but some of the illnesses they reported were obviously due to breathing dust-laden air. The dangers of using dynamite are generally associated with the women's experiences later in their working lives, at the same time that attempts at union organization were being made in the 1920s. Although relief systems such as those of the Kaijima Company were slowly improving, the numbers of accidents were increasing with the expansion of coal mining in the Chikuho region during the second decade of the twentieth century. There was an annual average of nearly three deaths and 18 serious injuries, as well as the almost incredible number of 560 lesser injuries, per 1,000 miners working in the last decad.
