Sewing circles

In the sewing room of the Rawlings factory where major-league baseballs are made, 300 people sat in high-backed chairs arranged in 12 rows of 25 chairs each. The scene would have looked like a cross between a classroom and a pre-Industrial Revolution factory, if not for the headphones on the ears of many of the workers and the motion of their arms.

By Philip Hersh

July 15, 2003