Payroll Progress in Mississippi: 1939-1959

It’s one of those things. You’re thinking about getting a new pair of pants and the ones you are wearing rip or you really hate that planter that someone gave you and a kid breaks it. You think about something and serendipitously the universe helps you along. As I gear up for our Smithsonian exhibit in November I am keeping my mind aware of any materials that I come across dealing with “Work.” Last week I came across Payroll Progress in Mississippi: 1939-1959. This document “presents employment and hours and earnings data of the non-agricultural industry for the State of Mississippi coving the period 1939-1959. It also includes for the same period, such related data as population, personal income, per capita income, the Consumer Price Index and the Wholesale Price Index.” Most of the book contains, graphs and charts plotting the rising employment or shaded areas of various concentrations, but to me the most intriguing information is not the hours or earnings, but the actually vocations. The document notes outmoded or declining industries such as knitting and textile mills, stone, clay and glass products, or printing and publishing. Today these industries may exist but at such a small level that it shouldn’t appear in a state publication about Mississippi industry and employment. Living here in the Delta I’m fascinated with the inventiveness of the farmers and to see the evolving avenues of agricultural industry, so it was interesting seeing how the non-agricultural sector of Mississippi has changed.