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Our ongoing research, focused on the future of work, recently took us to the Virginia Lee Burton archives at the Cape Ann Museum in Gloucester, Massachusetts. Burton is well known for her children’s stories, including The Little House, Life Story, Katy and the Big Snow, and Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel. Through archival research, we learned that the story of Mike Mulligan offers powerful historic lessons on labor disruption and job adaptation that may provide comfort and guidance for workers and leaders in today’s AI age.
The Story of Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel
One of Burton’s most enduring stories is Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel, published in 1939, about steam shovel operator Mike and his steam shovel, named Mary Anne. (Befitting a children’s book, Mary Anne is an anthropomorphized earth-moving machine.) The story is set against a future of work that unfolded a hundred years ago. After the Great Depression, the U.S. economy experienced wide-scale mechanization, standardization, and mass production designed to lift the economic situation. As a team, Mike and Mary Anne play a significant role in the boom; they lay the foundations for buildings, open waterways for ships, level the ground for highways, cut tunnels for railroads, and smooth the earth for airfields.
However, their success is somewhat short-lived, as technological advancement brings superior machinery into play. At its core, Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel is a story of disruption, change, and adaptation.
Scott F. Latham, Ph.D., is a professor in strategy at the Manning School of Business at the University of Massachusetts Lowell. Beth K. Humberd, Ph.D., is an associate professor of management at the Manning School of Business.
Here is an excerpt from an article written by Scott F. Latham and Beth K. Humberd for MIT Sloan Management Review. To read the complete article, check out others, sign up for email alerts, and obtain subscription information, please click here.