In April 1901, a Bavarian immigrant baker named Joseph Lochner was arrested in Utica, New York. Unlike the larger bakeries, which worked two shifts, Lochner employed a single crew: his bakers arrived in the evening, prepared the dough, slept a few hours on the premises and baked before dawn.

One of them, Aman Schmitter, had worked more than 60 hours in a week. Under New York’s Bakeshop Act of 1895, no bakery employee could be “required or permitted” to work more than 10 hours in a day or 60 in a week. It was Lochner’s second offence. The fine was $50.

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