In 1824, a twelve-year-old Charles Dickens was in hell. His father, John Dickens, had been arrested for owing a baker £40. The whole family was sent to Marshalsea debtors’ prison—mother, siblings, everyone. Well, everyone except Charles. He was sent to Warren’s Blacking Factory at 30 Hungerford Stairs. His job? Pasting labels on pots of shoe polish. Ten hours a day, six days a week, for 6 shillings. The building was a “crazy, tumbledown old house,” he later wrote, “literally overrun with rats.”