On This Day in Working Class History

On this day, 24 August 1922, radical historian, author, World War II bombardier and activist, Howard Zinn, was born to a Jewish immigrant family in Brooklyn, New York City.  Author of the book A People’s History of the United States and many other works, Zinn did perhaps more than anyone else in recent years to popularise the history of ordinary people, our history and our struggles.  For Zinn, fi...

On this day, 23 August 1966, 200 Gurindji Aboriginal workers at the Wave Hill pastoral station in Australia walked out on strike for equal pay with white workers. At the time, it was against the law for Aboriginal workers to be paid more than a specific amount. After walking out, the workers set up a camp, and kept up their strike for nine years. They received support from other workers, who donat...

On 22 August 2005 at 4:30 AM over 100 workers at Air Vanuatu walked out on strike in a dispute over a collective bargaining agreement, job security and severance pay. The stoppage, by members of the National Workers' Union, forced the cancellation of all international and domestic flights that day. In order to return to work, workers demanded arbitration of their complaints. Management agreed to t...

On this day, 21 August 1971, number 359 Amhurst Road, London, was raided by police investigating the Angry Brigade urban guerrilla group. Jim Greenfield, Anna Mendelson, John Barker and Hilary Creek were arrested. The four were taken to the 'Bomb Squad' HQ in Albany Street, London, where the two men were subjected to a brutal beating to extract a confession from them.  Learn more about the group i...

On this day, 20 August 1976, the Grunwick strike began in London when Devshi Bhudia was dismissed from a photo processing plant for working too slowly and three colleagues walked out in his support.  Three days later they began picketing in what became an iconic dispute and one of the key struggles of the working class, particularly the Asian and female working class in the UK in the late 20th cen...

On this day, 19 August 1909, the first edition of the revolutionary Industrial Workers of the World union’s Little Red Songbook was published in the US. Spreading faster than many radical texts, these songs were sung by thousands on picket lines across the country in the coming years, including perhaps the most famous, 'Solidarity Forever', written by Ralph Chaplin during a miners' strike in West...

On this day, 18 August 1812, food riots broke out in Leeds and Sheffield, England, primarily led by women. In Leeds the local paper described the group of women and boys who were seizing corn and wheat, and assaulting sellers, as being "dignified with the title of Lady Ludd". In Sheffield flour dealers were forced to reduce their prices to 3 shillings per stone.  More information, sources and map:...

On this day, 17 August 1987, workers in South Korea occupied factories and the shipyard of the Hyundai corporation in the city of Ulsan.  Meanwhile, upwards of 30,000 workers took to the streets and battled riot police in the city, in one of the biggest confrontations to date between workers and the US-backed dictatorship.  The strikes spread, and the "Great Workers' Struggle," as the movement wou...

On this day, 15 August 1911, prison vans containing 90 of those convicted for involvement in the Liverpool transport general strike were attacked as they made their way down Vauxhall Road to Walton Jail. The convoy was being escorted by 32 men from the cavalry unit the 18th Hussars, yet bottles and bricks were thrown at the soldiers and rioters grabbed the reins of the horses. The Hussars opened f...

On this day, 14 August 1886 50 women and girls working in the L Candee Rubber Boot Company factory in New Haven, Connecticut, walked out on strike over excessive working temperatures. The New York Times reported that the women: "complained that the heat of the room was unendurable, and insisted that the windows must be opened. The Superintendent refused to open the windows for fear of damage to th...

On this day, 13 August 1937, striking workers were massacred at the Union Flacq Sugar Estate in Mauritius. Primarily Indian labourers on sugar plantations on the island, then a British colony, had been organising for better pay, and police were being used to intimidate workers and break strikes. Workers on the Union Flacq estate were unhappy about low pay, poor quality food rations and inadequate...

On this day, 12 August 1887, pioneering Colombian socialist and women's rights advocate María Cano, known as the "Flor del trabajo" ("Labour flower"), was born in Antioquia. At the time, women in Colombia could not hold most jobs, participate in elections, or even spend their own money. Cano was from a middle-class family, but came into contact with lots of people regularly at her local library, a...

On this day, 11 August 1958, civil rights activists in Wichita, Kansas won a key early successful sit-in protest against segregated lunch counters. Black students and young people sat at the counter in the Dockum's Drug Store in rotating shifts of 30 minutes to 2 hours, blocking sales and facing down police and racist harassment for 23 days until they won. After this victory, sit-ins spread rapidl...

On this day, 10 August 2005, the Gate Gourmet dispute began in London. British Airways (BA) had outsourced its airline meal production, primarily by Asian women workers, to Gate Gourmet, who cut wages and conditions. Planning on worsening conditions further, they brought in hundreds of agency workers to do the work of the permanent employees. Seeing agency workers in their usual posts, the workers...

On this day, 9 August 1979, the women workers of the YH wig making company in Seoul, South Korea, occupied the headquarters of the opposition New Democratic Party in protest at the closure of their employer.  The workers had gone on strike against the proposed closure, but to no avail, so they attempted to escalate their protest.  However, the US-backed military dictatorship instead sent 2,000 rio...

On this day, 8 August 1883, over 3,000 people attended a benefit ball and concert for striking telegraphers in New York's Madison Square Garden. A procession of 800 striking workers, mostly employees of Western Union fighting for equal pay for men and women and an eight-hour day, were led into the ballroom by John Mitchell and Minnie Swan, who had emerged as key organisers of the strike in the cit...

On this day, 7 August 1842, a mass meeting of 18,000 workers took place in the UK, organised by the Chartist movement.  They decided to call a general strike beginning the following day, demanding universal male suffrage, and opposing pay cuts.  The strikes began and spread rapidly around the country, to towns including Manchester, Burnley, Preston, Macclesfield, Oldham, Wigan, and many more. Work...

On this day, 6 August 1970, up to 300 Yippies — countercultural radical youth — invaded Disneyland, protesting against the Vietnam war and calling for the liberation of Minnie Mouse from patriarchal captivity. Disney brought in extra security, and 150 armed riot police in preparation for the event: a theatrical "convention" called by the Youth International Party, whose members were nicknamed Yipp...

On this day, 5 August 1981, after just two days on strike, 11,345 federal air traffic controllers were sacked by US president Ronald Reagan for refusing his order to return to work (content note: suicide).  The workers in the extremely stressful industry had gone on strike demanding a pay increase and a reduction in working hours from 40 per week over five days to 32 per week over four days. Despi...

On 4 August 1941, shovel operators in the Moengo bauxite mine in the then-Dutch colony of Suriname went on strike. The walkout of mostly Javanese and Creole workers was swiftly followed by mill, shipping and tow boat crews. They were soon all offered substantial pay increases, and the strikes ended. Mill workers also had their working days reduced from 12 to eight hours per day. Powerhouse workers...

On this day, 3 August 1945, a group in Melbourne called the Australian Soldiers' Legion (ASL) met up with a family called the Wagglens, which included a homeless, wounded World War II veteran, his wife and children, and squatted a house in Bell Street, Hawthorn.  As members of the media watched on, ASL members entered the empty home and carried furniture in through the window. The group claimed to...

On this day, 2 August 1917, the general strike in Rio de Janeiro ended as employers agreed to a 10% pay increase and a maximum 56-hour work week. The stoppage began with just one furniture worker the previous month, and the strike spread organically, despite the government declaring martial law and calling in police, the army and navy.  More information, sources and map: https://stories.workingcla...

On this day, 1 August 1938, the Hilo massacre took place in Hawaii, when police opened fire at an unarmed group of striking dock workers, injuring 50. Longshoremen in different unions and of many different ethnicities united and staged a series of walkouts for equal pay with dock workers on the West Coast of the US. 200 workers gathered 1 August to protest against the arrival of a steamship, when...

On this day, 31 July 1945, the newly elected Labour government sent 600 conscript troops into the Surrey docks in London to try to break a go-slow of dockworkers fighting for better pay.  A Telegraph journalist described the go-slow: "In everything they did the men were unhurried in a way that looked deliberate. There was evidence that their actions were planned. True, the cranes were working and...

On this day, 30 July 1766, silver miners in Real Del Monte, Mexico, went on strike against a 25% pay cut in the first recorded strike against an employer in North American history. They faced down repression from the Spanish colonial bosses' private army and held out until September, when the employers caved in.  More information, sources and map: https://stories.workingclasshistory.com/article/10...