Inside History: Protest. Revolt & Reform

20th Century
In 1909, Clara Lemlich raised her voice about safety concerns at the Triangle
Factory in New York City. She was not alone as many textile workers would
strike with the same concerns. Whilst some factories would change their
practices, others held strong against the workers demands. Tragically, the
workers would be proven right as Alycia Asai explains more about The New
York Garment Strike of 1909.
She sat in the back of the union hall,
listening to one speaker after another
voice support for their cause, but remain
silent on a solution. She hoped the next
order of business would be to vote on a
call to strike. But the speeches kept
coming; frustrated, she quickly raised her
hand and requested to speak to the large
crowd. Making her way up the aisle, the
Ukrainian immigrant, who had a
reputation for being a troublemaker
and who was still nursing some broken
ribs thanks to strikebreakers stepped to
the microphone. In her native Yiddish,
she told the crowd, “I have no further
patience for talk as I am one of those
who feels and suffers from the things
pictured. I move that we go on a general
strike...now!” Her name was Clara Lemlich
and she is known as the voice to the
uprising of the twenty thousand, the first
general strike of the New York garment
district, and one of the largest strikes by
women in history. The strike of 1909 was
successful in many of its efforts, however
it failed to garner one key concession
from shop owners, ultimately leading to
one of the most devastating workplace
disasters in history.
At the turn of the century, New York was
a hot spot for the newly popular
shirtwaists. Memorialised by the Gibson
Girl, the shirtwaist - or blouse - was a hot
commodity rapidly spreading in
popularity across the country’s women.
Over six hundred shops employing nearly
thirty-two thousand workers were sewing
and piecing together upwards of fifty
million dollars-worth of merchandise
annually. To meet this high demand,
shop owners mandated workers show up
six days a week and toil long hours -
often requiring overtime during the busy
months, without increased pay incentive.
The workforce, made up largely of
immigrant women, labored up to sixty
hours a week and were paid $6 per
week, about $174 when adjusted for
inflation.
The women of the Triangle Shirtwaist
Factory had been advocating for
increased pay, safer conditions, and
wanted the ability to form a union.
Frustrated with the deafening silence by
owners Max Blanck and Isaac Harris,
the women walked off the job on
October 4, 1909. Tired of the deplorable
working conditions, fourteen-hour
workdays, and meager pay, the women
refused to return to work until Blanck
and Harris were ready to hear their
demands. The owners, however, would
hear nothing. Instead, they worked to
break the women; they hired prostitutes
to start fights and paid off thugs to
intimidate and physically assault the
striking workers. The women held firm,
picketing daily for six weeks.
Inspired by those fighting the Triangle
Factory, the International Ladies
Garment Workers called a meeting on
November 22 to determine the best
course of action. Would they continue
to labor in decrepit and unsafe working
conditions, or would they band together
and collectively demand better
treatment? Held at Cooper Union,
thousands of workers showed up to
debate their fate and vote for action.
Inspired by Lemlich’s speech, the
members present at the hall voted in
favor of a general strike, and the
following day, fifteen thousand workers
walked off the job in New York’s
Garment District. Their demands were
simple: better pay, lower hours, the
ability to organize, and safe working
conditions. The union organized picket
lines for the factories, culminating in
nearly twenty thousand workers from
five hundred shops refusing to work in
the largest industry-wide strike to date.
The Garment District was suddenly at a
standstill.
While nearly one hundred smaller
factories caved to many of the strikers'
demands within forty-eight hours, the
larger firms - led by the owners of
Triangle - were determined to break the
strike by any means necessary.
Employing tactics that would make
headlines today, the factory magnates
hired replacement workers, violent
strikebreakers, and paid off police to
make arrests for anyone who picketed
their shops. The physical mistreatment
of the picketers gained the attention of
the affluent women pushing for suffrage
who saw an opportunity to galvanize
the push for the rights to vote with the
plight of the immigrants demanding
better working conditions.
As women were arrested and given
exorbitant bails, Alva Belmont, wife of
Willliam Vanderbilt, started showing up
to court to pay their fines. Having the
backing of the wealthy and connected,
the press started to write pieces in
support of the strike and the factory
owners began losing the war of public
opinion. By December, word of the
strike reached Philadelphia, prompting
the city’s garment workers to also walk
off the job to demand better conditions.
A month into the strike, many of the
larger factories were tired of seeing
their profits diminish and prepared
themselves for negotiations, offering
tentative agreements to their
employees. The strikers were also
growing weary; fighting the battle alone
without government support and
lacking secure financial backing, they
had a choice to make; they could go
back with the guaranteed concessions,
INSIDE HISTORY 23