Imagine showing up for your first day at work and discovering that your desk is a steel beam hundreds of feet above the street. Or that you’re expected to operate heavy machinery before you’re old enough to drive. Old workplace photographs are full of situations that would send a modern HR department into an emergency meeting. Some jobs involved terrifying heights, others meant spending long hours around industrial equipment, and a few had working conditions that are hard to believe today. Photographers documented these scenes in remarkable detail, leaving behind a record of what earning a paycheck once involved. Here are 15 vintage workplace photos that would make today’s safety officers extremely nervous.Wikimedia CommonsOne Wrong StepA construction worker sits on the exposed steel framework of the Empire State Building in 1930, with New York City’s buildings far below.Wikimedia CommonsThe Night Shift Starts YoungYoung boys working at a glass factory in Alexandria, Virginia, were photographed during the night shift in 1911.Wikimedia Commons / Harry WalkerSmoking Next to an Oil WellOne worker smokes a pipe while another pours material into a large piece of equipment at an oil well in Brazoria County, Texas, in 1940.Wikimedia CommonsWindow Cleaning Was an Extreme SportWindow washers work outside a New York City building in 1958, standing on narrow exterior ledges with dozens of windows still waiting to be cleaned.Wikimedia CommonsThe Training Program Had No Ground FloorTelephone electrician trainees climb several tall wooden poles during a practical training session at the University of Michigan around 1918.Wikimedia Commons / Lewis HineThe Coal Mine Had a Kid on StaffA young boy shovels coal beside an adult operating drilling equipment at the Laura Mine in West Virginia in 1908.Wikimedia CommonsThe Shift Started at 3 A.M.Children and adults working at the Dunbar Cannery pose in front of a massive pile of oyster shells in 1911, during shifts that reportedly lasted from 3 a.m. to 5 p.m.Wikimedia CommonsYour Desk Is Somewhere Up ThereA lineman works among a dense web of telephone wires high above an intersection in Pratt, Kansas, in 1911.RedditThe Elevator Is Already FullCoal miners crowd onto a mine elevator after finishing their shifts in Belgium during the 1920s, packed closely together for the trip back up.RedditEven Job Hunting Came With CigarettesAn old photograph shared on Reddit shows a man smoking indoors at an employment office, back when job centers still permitted cigarettes inside.RedditThe Paint Comes With RadiationWomen working for the U.S. Radium Corporation paint watch dials with radioactive material in 1922, using small brushes for the delicate work.RedditLeaving Work Required an X-RayA diamond miner in South Africa undergoes an X-ray examination in 1954, part of a workplace practice intended to prevent employees from smuggling diamonds out of the mines.RedditAsbestos Was Literally the JobA woman poses with asbestos material inside a factory in 1944, handling a substance that would later become notorious for its serious health risks.RedditEven the Babies Needed Gas MasksNurses at an English hospital test protective gas-mask equipment designed for babies during a World War II air-raid drill in 1940.Wikimedia CommonsLunch Break, 800 Feet UpEleven construction workers eat lunch while sitting on a steel beam high above Manhattan during the construction of Rockefeller Center in 1932.The post 15 Vintage Workplace Photos That Would Give HR a Heart Attack Today appeared first on Den of Geek.