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Woman operating a welding machine (considered a "man's job"), Philadelphia, USA, WW1, 1918
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this post was submitted on 24 Feb 2026
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At what point did welders start to wear something that protected their whole face rather than just their eyes? And is there a reason not to wear gloves? (Looks like the men are similarly unprotected)
Oh this doesn't protect her eyes. These are just spark goggles with some cloth inside to dim the brightness a bit. They would keep sparks out, but that's pretty much it. This is 1918 and the first real welding helmet wouldn't be made till 1937, and even then UV protection was severely lacking.
They had better protection than this at the time, but it was basically a large leather hood, which was probably torture to wear, so as people do, they didn't wear it. And that also didn't prevent UV from burning their eyes.
Yes. It was 1918. Workplace safety as a concept was basically not a thing. Injury was a problem for the worker, and it was their fault too. If you don't want to burn your hands, don't touch hot metal, you idiot.
And it was 1918. A little sunburn never killed anyone! Hell, they might not even have known it was the UV light causing the sunburn on the hands and neck.
Source: I do Workplace safety for a living and history for fun. It hardly ever overlaps, so feel free to ask stuff.
She's torch welding. Not arc welding. No UV.
How do they avoid welders eyes?
By dying young.
They don't
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She's brazing using oxyacetylene torch. This does not produce harmful UV rays like arc welding or much hot metal splatter.
Note that this is gas welding, there is no UV or anything bad like with WIG, stick or MIG.
MIG , TIG weren't even a thing back then. She's likely brazing.
That's a whole lot of sparks for brazing, she is doing something wrong then.