The Ghost Wages of the Bellingham Mill
Workers built a dream of industry, only to find the rent-seekers were never serious about paying.
The men who were employed several weeks ago to put the big Bellingham mill in readiness for operation by Capt. Langdon and George E. Atkinson are still whistling for their pay. The lease was never signed because the owners of the mill insisted that it should not be run as a windmill, and the gentlemen who sought to lease it objected to what they were pleased to call 'dictation,' and declared that if they undertook to run the mill at all they would run it as they pleased. It was before this conclusion was concluded that some twenty-five men got in several days time for which they have not even received a vote of thanks. Some of the men have been flim-flammed before and they don't seem to mind much about it.
“The men who were employed several weeks ago... are still whistling for their pay.”
Wage theft remains a persistent issue in the region, echoing how speculative business ventures often leave the workforce holding the bag when disputes between owners and lessees occur. The nonchalant tone of the reporting suggests that such 'flim-flams' were a common, if frustrating, feature of the Gilded Age labor market.
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