Early Apprenticeship Training Programs

Early Apprenticeship Training Programs The origins of HRD can be traced to apprenticeship training programs in the eighteenth century. During this time, small shops operated by skilled artisans produced virtually all household goods, such as furniture, clothing, and shoes. To meet a growing demand for their products, craft-shop owners had to employ additional workers. Without vocational or technical schools, the shopkeepers had to educate and train their own workers. For little or no wages, these trainees, or apprentices, learned the craft of their master, usually working in the shop for several years until they became proficient in their trade. Not limited to the skilled trades, the apprenticeship model was also followed in the training of phy- sicians, educators, and attorneys. Even as late as the 1920s, a person apprenticing in a law office could practice law after passing a state-supervised examination.

Apprentices who mastered all the necessary skills were considered “yeomen,” and could leave their master and establish their own craft shops; however, most remained with their masters because they could not afford to buy the tools and equipment needed to start their own craft shops. To address a growing number of yeomen, master craftsmen formed a network of private “franchises” so they could regulate such things as product quality, wages, hours, and apprentice-testing procedures.9 These craft guilds grew to become powerful political and social forces within their communities, making it even more difficult for yeomen to establish independent craft shops. By forming separate guilds called “yeomanries,” the yeomen counterbalanced the powerful craft guilds and created a collective voice in negotiating higher wages and better working conditions. Yeomanries were the forerunners of modern labor unions.