I have many ancestors and family who worked in the textile mills in the south. I'm familiar with the dangerous conditions people faced in these factories. Many, including children, were injured, maimed or even killed while working with the enormous and unforgiving machines. Mills relied heavily on unskilled cheap labor to keep their industry flowing. Since women and children could do much of the work as well as men, but were paid significantly less, it was common to see them employed in the mills. While it certainly did offer women a chance at employment and helped support them and their (often large) families, it was difficult work. It may have been the only viable employment opportunity for a 14 year old girl like Clara. It was aa job likely undertaken out of necessity.
To find out more about drawing in hand, I visited the Dictionary of Occupational Titles (DOT). This website, created in 1995 (just a couple years after the internet became available to the public) by Photius Coutsoukisas, has been updated and expanded for the last 30 years! From his bio, "his websites predated Wikipedia, Yahoo, and Google, making him an early pioneer in online information sharing." The DOT was just the resource I needed! (I've also added this site to my Genealogy Toolbox in the section for Glossaries, Dictionaries and Abbreviations.)
A quick search revealed Clara's days drawing in hand likely involved "drawing warp yarn through loom parts to arrange warp for weaving specified pattern, following pattern chart" on any one of a number of different types of looms. While the description was far more detailed, this is the essence of Clara's job. She created textiles. It makes me wonder, were they upholstery fabrics, fabrics designed for sewing, or something more durable to be used in industry? Did she look at the fruits of her labor and wish she could use the fabric to sew something for herself? I'll never know the specifics, but I can imagine her toiling away for extended periods of time, in the oppressive heat and incessant noise of a factory, generating the palette others would create from. It saddens me to think she spent her days in the factory, instead of being able to enjoy being a teenager.
By the time she was 18, Clara had married. A few short years later, at the age of 24, she was no longer working in the factory, but was raising 3 children under the age of 5. Her husband George was working as a carder in the cotton mill at this time. By 1930, her family had grown to 7 children, and George was still working for the textile mills as a farmer. Their lives were tied to the industry for more than 20 years. I've yet to find where they were in 1940, but by 1950 they had moved to Chattanooga, Tennessee and their family was blessed with several grandchildren. George died in 1965. I don't yet have information on Clara's later years, but it's likely she lived with one of her children until she passed away in 1983. Whether working in a factory or raising a large family, Clara worked hard all her life. I hope she found a measure of peace and enjoyment in her later years.
Thanks to the records on Clara, I now know what drawing in hand was. If you encounter an unfamiliar occupation, consider checking out the Dictionary of Occupational Titles to see if it might shed light on the jobs of your ancestors.