Guan Xiao'e, who was as pitiful as a stray cat when we first met, has grown a lot since she came to Jin Feng's house. She has nothing to worry about eating and drinking, and no need for her to work.
Tiantian put the bowl on the table and took a group of children either up the mountain to dig out bird's nests or down the river to catch fish.
He has become the child king of the village.
If it was just for fun, that day Jin Feng had just brought Wan Niang and Guan Xiaorou into the laboratory to discuss the issue of formulating flavors, and Tang Xiaobei came to find them.
Xiao'e took a group of children to catch a few fish. When she saw that a family at the entrance of the village had gone out to work, she sneaked into someone's house to grill fish and set the stove on fire.
Fortunately, the children escaped quickly and no one was injured, but the family's kitchen was burned down.
Jin Feng had no choice but to pay some money and take Xiao'e back with her face blackened.
That morning, Jin Feng asked Da Liu to send a veteran to the county town to buy two literate girls from Yahang.
At the same time, Guan Xiaorou was asked to clean up the old house that had not yet been demolished.
And he also asked the village chief to make a blackboard in the straw shed used for spinning before the old house.
A few days later, Jin Feng announced at the textile factory meeting that Xihewan Academy was officially established.
Not only Xiao'e and her group of naughty children, but anyone who has worked in Xihewan for more than three months can register their children and send them to Xihewan School to study.
As soon as the news came out, several surrounding villages were shaken.
You must know that in this era, reading and literacy are only reserved for rich people.
It costs a lot of money every year just to repair my husband's hair.
At that time, the old blacksmith's craftsmanship was unparalleled in the countryside, and the money he earned was several times more than that of ordinary farmers. However, in order to support Jin Feng's education, the old blacksmith spent almost all his money on him.
Now, the Xihewan Academy established by Jin Feng not only does not require money, but also provides lunch.
The next morning, whether they were female workers in the textile factory or male workers working on the construction site, as long as they met the requirements, they basically brought their children with them.
There were over a hundred children, big and small, in total, filling the thatched shed to the brim.
As for those workers who have not yet met the conditions, their eyes are turning red with envy.
The couple even had a fight over it.
The reason is that the mother-in-law of this family was one of the first female workers in the textile factory. She originally had the opportunity to send her children to school, but she was fired by Tang Dongdong last month for wasting food in the canteen and lost the opportunity.
On the same day, the veteran brought two girls back from the county town in response to the expectations of the workers.
These two girls are biological sisters. Their father is a minor official. Because he offended his superior for some things, not only was he exiled from the army, but the two sisters were also reduced to the job.
The fate of female domestic slaves is sometimes even more miserable than that of girls in brothels. When they were first brought back by the veterans, the two sisters were almost in despair.
Only after they arrived did they find out that Jin Feng bought them to teach children how to read.
And neither Jin Feng nor anyone else in the village looked down upon them because they were slaves. The villagers kept saying nice things to them, begging them to be stricter with their children and spank them when they needed to.
If you need to scold, scold.
This change made the sisters feel like they had gone from hell to heaven, and they cherished this job very much.
From that day on, the sisters moved into Jin Feng's old house and became the first teachers of Xihewan School, teaching children in the village how to read and write.
When Jin Feng is free, he will also come over to teach the children some basic mathematics knowledge.
There were already a lot of people in the surrounding villages who wanted to work in Xihewan Textile Factory, but now that the school has been added as a benefit, even more people are coming to seek jobs every day.
Xihewan, which used to be remote, has now become the center of ten miles and eight towns.
Some smart vendors began to carry their burdens to Xihewan to sell small things such as needles, threads and brains.
The school is booming, and other places are not idle either.
The old and new brick kilns are firing bricks day and night, but they are still not enough for a few construction sites.
Fortunately, new textile workshops are being completed one after another, and the demand for bricks is gradually decreasing.
Under Tang Dongdong's arrangement, Mancang and his female apprentices worked overtime to fill the new workshop with brand-new spinning wheels.
The workshop was built and the spinning wheel was in place. Next, Tang Dongdong started recruiting people.
Those female workers who came every day to wait for work soon got their wish and entered the textile workshop.
Even in the era of automation in later generations, the textile industry is still a labor-intensive industry, not to mention that Xihewan Textile Factory is still stuck in the era of pedal spinning wheels.
Each workshop works two shifts day and night and requires a large number of female workers.
As new workshops were put into use, women from several surrounding villages basically became female workers in textile factories.
After the last two workshops were built, Tang Dongdong suddenly found that he could not recruit anyone.
Women from several surrounding villages, ranging from grannies in their fifties and sixties to girls of thirteen or fourteen, basically all came here as long as they could spin.
If it is further away, the journey to and from get off work will be too far. The mountain road is difficult to travel, and the time spent traveling alone will take several hours.
If there is just a simple shortage of people, he can also transfer a group of girls from Tin Can Mountain. Anyway, the soap production does not require so many people for the time being.
Or you can just go to Yahang to buy a group of girls. The shortage of employees in Xihewan will definitely become larger and larger in the future. Female slaves are very cheap anyway, and buying them back can be regarded as a good deed.
But the problem now is that we have brought people here and there is no place to live.
"I didn't think carefully. It's too late to build dormitories now. If that doesn't work, just leave these two workshops empty for now. Or you can ask who is willing to work the Changbai shift and they can arrange for them to come over."
Jin Feng didn't have a good solution for this.
"That's all we can do now."
Tang Dongdong also nodded helplessly.
But what they didn't expect was that early the next morning, the third aunt actually brought five women to sign up.
The old one looks to be in his forties or fifties, and the younger one is not much taller than Xiao'e.
"Brother Feng, Director Tang, this is my cousin and her four children. They live in Yezhugou in the south of Jinchuan. My cousin's husband fell to his death while going up the mountain to cut firewood this year. Their family really can't survive. I
Seeing that we were short of people in the factory, we asked them to come."
The third aunt pointed at a few women and said, "Brother Feng, don't worry, Factory Manager Tang. They are all people who have endured hardship and will definitely not be lazy at work."
"That's right, we will never be lazy."
The third aunt's cousin and several children quickly promised.
Then they looked at Jin Feng with pleading eyes, fearing that Jin Feng would not accept them.
"You can come and work, but where do you live?" Jin Feng asked.
"I asked the owner to build a straw shed in my yard. Let's live in it for now," the third aunt said helplessly.
"Okay, I will build another batch of dormitories here soon. Once they are built, they can move in," Jin Feng said.
"Cousin, please thank Brother Feng quickly."
The third aunt left with the mother and daughter who expressed their gratitude.
And this is just the beginning. As time goes by, more and more people come to Xihewan to seek refuge with relatives.
There are also some people who have no relatives in Xihewan. In order to make a living, they simply set up a straw hut in places such as the threshing floor at the entrance of the village and live there.
Anyway, the textile factory takes care of food, as long as there is a place to sleep.
In less than half a month, the open spaces in Xihewan were filled with straw sheds.
At first, no one in the county government paid much attention to this situation, but as more and more people moved to Xihewan, they finally couldn't sit still.
After all, population is the basis of everything. If people run away, who will they exploit?
Who do the supported bandits turn to to collect their annual grain?