On This Day in Working Class History

On this day, 27 May 1935 in Canada, employers at Ballantyne Pier locked out members of the Vancouver and District Waterfront Workers' Association in an attempt to break workers' organisation on the docks. After breaking a previous union, employers had set up the VDWWA as a tame company union, but the attempt to pacify the workers was unsuccessful. Workers responded by going on strike for months, but by December they were defeated. However it did not take long for workers to organise themselves once again and form a new union. 
More information, sources and map: https://stories.workingclasshistory.com/article/9941/ballantyne-lockout-begins

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On this day, 26 May 1824, the first recorded factory strike in US history took place when 102 women and girls working at the Slater Mill in Pawtucket picketed their factory. 
Two days prior, the mill owners in the town had decided to increase working hours by one hour a day for everyone with no additional pay, and cut the pay of power-loom weavers by 25%. The weavers affected were all women and girls aged 15 to 30, whom were previously being paid "extravagant wages for young women," according to the employers. 
What the owners did not expect, something which had not happened before in the infant textile industry, or indeed any factory in the country: the women organised themselves and went on strike. They were joined by other workers and members of the local community, who blockaded the mills, protested and hurled rocks at the mansions of the owners. One prominent local politician, George F. Jenkes wrote in his journal during the dispute: “I have just returned from one of the moste gloomy assemblage of people I have ever witnessed, from the street from the Pawtucket Bank across the bridge to Josiah Mill’s shop is literally filled with Men Women and Children — making a mob of very daring aspect, insulting the managers of cotton mills in every shape — pulling and hauling — screaming and shouting thro the streets.” 
On the final day of the week-long strike, one of the mills was set ablaze. The day after the fire, the mill owners moved to negotiate with the workers, and they reached a compromise. 
In the wake of the dispute, other groups of workers began organising themselves, and other strikes would break out across the New England textile industry in the coming years. 
Learn more about this dispute in our podcast episode 32: https://workingclasshistory.com/2019/08/12/e28-the-pawtucket-mill-strike/

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On this day, 25 May 1901, 27 unions around Argentina gathered and together formed the the revolutionary anarchist union the Federacion Obrera Argentina (later renamed the FORA).
It was committed to the methods of workers’ organisation and direct action as principal weapons in the struggle against the state.
In October, the FOA organised its first general strike, a 24-hour strike in solidarity with striking sugar refinery workers in Rosario, one of whom was killed by police.
In 1902, the union organised a general strike of bakery workers to demand the release of two bakery union members who had been arrested by police. The police raided the FOA headquarters, and large numbers of union members were arrested and tortured, eventually breaking the strike. FOA stevedores walked out on strike shortly thereafter.
In an attempt to halt a wave of strikes, the government passed the Anti-Alien Act, enabling them to quickly deport “undesirable” migrants - namely, anarchists and union activists. A state of siege was then declared, and most union offices and radical publications were shut down.
In spite of the repression, the union continued to grow, and in 1904 it was renamed Federación Obrera Regional Argentina (FORA). The FORA organised multiple other general strikes, and survived repeated raids and attacks by police and right-wing mobs.
In the 1920s, faced with mass unemployment, the union launched a campaign for a maximum six-hour working day.
A wave of strikes broke out once more in 1929. But shortly thereafter, in 1930, a right wing coup by a general José Félix Uriburu took place. Uriburu's regime declared martial law, and initiated a wave of terror against the anarchist and working-class movements, including the systematic use of torture, and secret executions. This broke both the FORA and the anarchist movement more generally.
More information, sources and map: https://stories.workingclasshistory.com/article/9770/fora-anarchist-union-founded

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On this day, 24 May, 1919, thousands of coalminers in Alberta, Canada walked off the job in a dispute over pay, the cost of living, and conditions. They were organised in the One Big Union: a revolutionary union which planned to organise all workers together and take control of society. 13 mine companies in Drumheller refused to negotiate and hired returning war veterans, arming them with clubs and iron bars and giving them free alcohol to terrorise the workers and beat and torture organisers, while the police turned a blind eye. By August the strike was broken.
Learn more about the One Big Union and the Industrial Workers of the World in Canada in episode 52 of our podcast: https://workingclasshistory.com/podcast/e52-the-iww-in-canada/

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On 23 May 2020, thousands of miners at the Tenke Fungurume mine in the Democratic Republic of Congo went on strike.
The workers at the majority-Chinese owned firm were demanding the payment of a special allowance of $600 to each of 6000 workers who had been quarantined for two months during the Covid-19 pandemic. Despite being quarantined, the workers had to continue to go to work.
After a one-day strike, employers agreed to pay the allowance.
More information, sources and map: https://stories.workingclasshistory.com/article/12754/tenke-fungurume-miners-strike

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See all of our anniversaries each day, alongside sources and maps on the On This Day section of our Stories app: stories.workingclasshistory.com/date/today
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