Singer Manufacturing Company ID Badge: Museum Object and Cultural History

The object in the museum catalogue

This Singer Manufacturing Company ID badge belonged to John Adrosko. According to the 1930 Federal Census, Adrosko worked at the Singer Manufacturing Company plant in Elizabeth, New Jersey, performing clerical duties.

The expansion of the scale of industry often meant that managers did not know every employee by sight, which created the need for employee identification in large plants such as the Singer plant.

Additionally management sometimes sought to regiment the workforce by restricting access to certain areas of the plant through ID badges and to help protect themselves against sabotage, espionage, and labor organization.

Materials, dates and provenance

• date made: 1918 - 1966
• Object Name: tag, identification
• Physical Description: metal (overall material)
• Physical Description: plastic (overall material)
• Measurements: overall: 2 5/8 in x 1 7/8 in x 3/8 in; 6.6675 cm x 4.7625 cm x .9525 cm
• place made: United States: New Jersey, Elizabeth
• ID Number: 1984.0289.01
• accession number: 1984.0289
• catalog number: 1984.0289.01
• Credit Line: Rita J. Adrosko
• Data Source: National Museum of American History

Sources and reuse

Catalogue descriptions and facts adapted from National Museum of American History through the Smithsonian's official Open Access dataset. This record explicitly marks its metadata CC0 1.0; formatting and selection have been changed.