My Sisters Telegraphic: Women in the Telegraph Office ... - Monoskop

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THE STRIKE OF 1883 159 went home to South Carolina after losing her employment, but she was soon lured back to Concord by a promise of a job with a competing telegraph company, the Southern Telegraph Company, which evidently had no problems with her union membership. According to the Raleigh, North Carolina, News and Observer, “Two weeks ago the Western Union company cut its own wires and removed the instruments from the office in that town [Concord], thus depriving the citizens of the benefits of the wires, and all because Miss Mary Ormand, the operator, was a member of the Brotherhood and had joined the strike. The Western Union moved out of a warm berth and the Southern Telegraph Company, seeing its opportunity, hopped into the place vacated by the Western Union.” Eventually Western Union reopened its office in Concord and brought in Alice F. Johnston, formerly the operator in Wadesboro, North Carolina, to run it. Johnston, a nonunion operator, had lost all of her belongings in a house fire shortly before in Wadesboro. The fire was apparently accidental and not related to the strike. The Concord Register noted the presence of the two competing companies: “Now we have two telegraph offices in town, and still we are— happy.” 22 Many railroad telegraphers joined in the strike and left the offices of the Baltimore and Ohio and Pennsylvania Railroads. When the B&O ordered the female operator at West Newton, Pennsylvania, to report to Pittsburgh and replace the striking operator there, she refused to do so and joined the strikers. In Chicago, all twenty-two operators at the B&O office joined the strike. A Tribune reporter stopped by the B&O office to see how Mr. Mc- Cullough was faring: When a Tribune reporter called about 12 o’clock he [McCullough] was found trying to manipulate one of the instruments, but failing to get an operator at the other end, his success was rather limited. He was not left altogether alone, however. An envelope addresser stuck nobly to her post in the outer office, as also did a check-girl and office-boy. . . . The check-girl arranged her bangs, and fastened a tulip on her bosom, and gazed out on the windows across the street. The
160 WOMEN TELEGRAPHERS AND THE LABOR MOVEMENT office-boy pleasantly squirted tobacco-juice in unexpected directions, and skirmished back and forth in the corridor in a state of gleeful excitement. The Tribune’s reporter also called on R. C. Clowry, superintendent of the Chicago Western Union office, and confidant of Eckert; Clowry would one day succeed Eckert as president. Asked to compare the strike of 1870 with the present action, Clowry said, “The strike is a weak one compared to that of 1870. Then all [managers] and men went out. In the present case, however, no officer, no office-manager, no chief-operator, nor subchief has left the office.” When asked, “Are not female operators worth as much as men?” Clowry answered, echoing Eckert’s statement: “Other things being equal the services of a man are preferable to those of a woman for many reasons. Women are not so reliable, they are more subject to indisposition, and they cannot be called upon in emergencies for night duty.” 23 Women were said to be more frequently absent than men; the opposition to women working nights, however, seemed to exist primarily in the minds of men, as there were numerous cases of women volunteering for night work when circumstances made it appropriate. More than in 1870, the women strikers were seen as representing an agenda that was distinct from that of the men in some respects. Although there were common interests, such as pay increases and improved working conditions, there was also the notion of equality, both in pay and in representation in the labor movement. Newspapers noted that in the Brotherhood of Telegraphers, women served on committees and had an equal voice in determining policies. Supporters of the women’s suffrage movement began to take notice of the union’s support of equal rights. Lillie Devereux- Blake, a prominent leader of the suffrage movement, praised the telegraphers’ union for its support of equal pay for equal work: “You simply demand what justice would at once concede, and if you succeed in securing the establishment of this rule that the labor accomplished and not the sex of the operator, shall regulate the amount of salary paid, you will have done much towards making this the usage in other branches of business.” 24 Some female spokespersons emerged in this strike, including Minnie Swan, a twenty-year-old first-class operator in New York who had worked for both Western Union and brokerage offices and who quickly became
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My Sisters Telegraphic Thomas C. Je
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My Sisters Telegraphic Women in the
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Contents List of Illustrations vii
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Illustrations 1. Emma Hunter, teleg
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Acknowledgments I would like to tha
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MY SISTERS TELEGRAPHIC
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2 WOMEN IN THE TELEGRAPH INDUSTRY t
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4 WOMEN IN THE TELEGRAPH INDUSTRY i
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6 Figure 1. Emma Hunter, telegraphe
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8 WOMEN IN THE TELEGRAPH INDUSTRY f
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10 WOMEN IN THE TELEGRAPH INDUSTRY
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c h a p t e r t w o Daily Life in t
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14 DAILY LIFE IN THE TELEGRAPH OFFI
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c h a p t e r t h r e e Society and
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40 SOCIETY AND THE TELEGRAPH OPERAT
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Figure 18. Emily Warburton and Barb
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80 WOMEN’S ISSUES IN THE TELEGRAP
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100 WOMEN’S ISSUES IN THE TELEGRA
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Page 131 and 132: c h a p t e r f i v e Women Telegra
Page 133 and 134: Figure 20. “Romance on the Wires,
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Page 203 and 204: 190 CONCLUSIONS Women telegraphers
Page 205 and 206: 192 CONCLUSIONS radio instead. Whil
Page 207 and 208: 194 CONCLUSIONS Although Wired Love
Page 209 and 210: 196 CONCLUSIONS the same gender iss
Page 211 and 212: 198 CONCLUSIONS of Railroad Telegra
Page 213 and 214: 200 CONCLUSIONS female railroad tel
Page 216 and 217: Notes Chapter 1—Women in the Tele
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Page 220 and 221: NOTES TO PAGES 42-52 207 10. Gabler
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NOTES TO PAGES 63-72 209 lection, N
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NOTES TO PAGES 86-108 211 tlemen of
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NOTES TO PAGES 129-159 213 is ident
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NOTES TO PAGES 181-200 215 64. Fone
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218 BIBLIOGRAPHY Burman, Shirley, c
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220 BIBLIOGRAPHY Long Beach (Calif.
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222 BIBLIOGRAPHY Withuhn, William L
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224 Boston and Providence Railroad,
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226 “glass arm” (telegraphers
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228 Northbridge, Mass., telegraph o
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230 telegraphers, demographics: age
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My Sisters Telegraphic: Women in the Telegraph Office ... - Monoskop

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