Marie Moentmann

Marie Moentmann (September 6, 1900 – July 15, 1974) was a 15-year-old girl who lost her hands and full use of both arms in a factory accident in 1915 in St. Louis, Missouri.

She became a center of public attention in what the St. Louis Post-Dispatch called an "extraordinary case." Charity events were held on her behalf while she recovered, and gifts from the public flooded her hospital room. The company where she had been employed as an under-age worker quickly settled her suit for damages.

She was fitted with artificial hands, which she learned to use with proficiency. She had trouble finding employment but was eventually set up in business by a friend.

The accident

Marie Moentmann was severely injured on November 5, 1915, when she was working on a rotary stamp press or a printing press at the Fulton Bag and Cotton Mills, 610–612 South Seventh Street, St. Louis. She had begun working there at the age of 14. bags into a cylinder roll with a stick. One bag went into the roll crooked, and Marie tried to straighten it out with her right hand. Her fingers were caught; she grasped her wrist with her right hand, but her fingers were caught, the roll continued to turn, and both hands were "terribly mangled." The St. Louis Star reported:

Nettie McManus... who stood at the next machine, screamed when she saw her companion's plight. Edward Wright, foreman... turned off the power, and released the rolls and extricated the girl's hands. She retained consciousness, although every one of the thirty girls who were working in the second floor factory room with her became hysterical, [and] several fainted. No one visiting her was permitted to speak of the extent of her injuries. She made good progress until January 3, 1916, when she fell ill with pneumonia. It was a "long siege," but she was sent home later in the month.

On March 3 the next year, Dr. Robert Wilson cut a small section of bone from her right arm, at no charge, so she could be fitted with a prosthetic arm. Mrs. C.A. Lange contributed $50 for the device, with the balance to come from Marie's funds.

A "bridge and 500" party was given at the Planters Hotel for her benefit. More than a thousand tickets were sold at $1 each. From $1,200 to $1,400 was raised from more than eight hundred "society women" who attended. The money was to be paid to the girl at $10 a week, and a hundred women said they would each contribute fifty cents a week.

On Christmas Eve, 1915, she attended a benefit matinee given for her at the New Grand Central Theater. She received scores of Christmas gifts from well-wishers, many of which she gave away to fellow patients.

Criminal and civil law

At the insistence of State Factory Inspector A. Sidney Johnston, assistant City Prosecuting Attorney Wilson on December 16 issued four charges against E.W. Hummert, superintendent of the factory:

That he permitted a child under 16 to operate a cylinder machine. That he permitted a child to work more than eight hours continuously. That he employed a child under 16. That he failed to provide a guard for a dangerous machine or post a notice that it was dangerous.

The punishment could be a fine or a term in the workhouse (jail). Johnston warned Hummert to cease operation of all machines in the factory which were not protected by guards.

Marie Moentmann filed suit against Fulton Bag and Cotton Mills of Atlanta, Georgia, When the young woman became an 18-year-old adult in September 1918, during World War 1, she invested her settlement in U.S. Liberty Bonds.

Workers' compensation

Factory inspector Johnston blamed the State of Missouri for the incident because of "false economy" within the state factory department. He said there were only seven inspectors to check every establishment in the state, and only four in St. Louis. They were paid "only $100 a month" in the fees which they collected from the sites they visited, thus there was "no incentive ... to become proficient, particularly when the department is on a political basis and a fee basis."

Johnston said that "safety experts" should be paid at least $150 to $250 a month. He urged the passage of a workers' compensation law.

It has been a notorious fact that, in very many cases of injury to workmen, no one has been benefited by litigation except the lawyers. Meritorious cases have been appealed, time after time, until the resources and hopes of the injured workers were exhausted. Not even doctors' or hospital expenses have been paid.

The accident was used by Maurice J. Cassidy, secretary of L.U. 315, writing in The International Steam Engineer, to argue against the provisions of Missouri's workmen's compensation law, by which, he said, "Miss Moentmann would have had a hard road to travel under any compensation law now in existence. These laws, as now written, enrich the insurance companies and beggar the workers."

Marie Moentmann herself said three years later: In May 1916, she said she had considered studying for the law so she could "fight for people who became unfortunate like myself, but ... it would take such a long time, and I haven't had much school work."

In 1919 at age 18, Moentmann told a reporter:

She told reporter Marguerite Martyn that she had "cast about all these years in search of an occupation" and that she had once worked at the information desk at the Railway Exchange Building (St. Louis) and that she had taken courses at Washington University in St. Louis night school in English, literature, history and story telling. She gave up the latter, she said when she "came to realize that gestures with the hands are so much a part of story telling, especially to children, that I saw it was hopeless." She did keep on singing, with a church choir, but not as a professional.

News reports described the father as a street cleaner; She lived with her family during most of her life, her mother dying in 1933. She outlived her husband and died as Marie E. Wayt at age 73 on July 15, 1974. Interment was at Trinity Lutheran Cemetery.