2018.010.010 [Print, Photographic]

This photograph shows the employees who worked in the Finishing Department of the Hawkeye Pearl Button Company in Muscatine, Iowa. This company was one of the many pearl button companies that were located in Muscatine during the 20th Century. John Frederick Boepple, a German immigrant button maker, launched the pearl button industry in Muscatine in 1891, when he opened a small button shop. The button and clamming industries started small but quickly overwhelmed the town. Clamming became the Mississippi River's gold rush while large automated factories and shell-cutting shops employed nearly half the local workforce. By 1905, Muscatine made 37 percent of the world's buttons and earned the title of "Pearl Button Capital of the World." Entire families - men, women, and children - contributed to the industry, giving weight to the popular local saying "No Muscatine resident can enter Heaven without evidence of previous servitude in the button industry." Although the industry peaked in 1916, several decades passed before the American-made pearl button buckled under the pressure of foreign competition, changing fashions, limited availability of shell, and the development and refinement of plastic buttons. Content can be used with the following standards: 2nd grade SS 2.24 Natural Resources, SS-W.H. 9-12.26 Iowans Influence World History and 4th grade SS 4.25 Technological Changes in a lesson on how the natural resources of Iowa led to businesses and new industries. For any use other than instructional resources, please check with the organization that owns this item regarding copyright restrictions.