The Sauk Centre herald. (Sauk Centre, Stearns County, Minn.) 1886-current, 1901-07-04
BIG FIGHT IS ON
GREAT STEEL TRUST AND THE
AMALGAMATED AssocIA.
TIoN LOCK HORNS.
SKILLED MEN QUIT WORK

Thirty--five Thousand Employees at Va
rious Plants Of the Combine Al
ready Out and It May Develop Into
One Of the Greatest Strikes the
Country Has Ever seen--contest
Is Mainly for Right to Organize.
Pittsburg, July 2.-As a result of the
refusal of the representatives Of the
American Sheet Steel company and
the American Steel Hoop company,
subsidiary companies of the great
United States Steel corporation, to
sign the workers new scale at Satur-
days conference, circulars were sent
out from the national headquarters of
the Amalgamated Association of Iron,
Steel and Tin Workers declaring a
strike at all the plants of the two COM
bines. The great strike is now on,
but it will be several days before it's
actual extent is known. At the out
set, however, over $4,000 men will be
| involved as follows:
Union sheet mills: Aetna-Standard
steel mills, Bridgeport, o., $500; Mid
land steel mills, Muncie, Ind, 1000;
Old Meadow rolling mill, Scottdale,
400; Saltburg rolling mill, Saltburg,
300; w. Device Wood mills, McKees-
port, 1000; Cambridge iron and steel
mills, Cambridge, O., 400; Canton roll
ing mills, Canton, O., $50; CHARTERS
iron and steel mills, Carnegie, 800;
Dennison rolling mills, Dennison, o.,
! $50; Dresden iron and steel mills,
Dresden, O., 800; Falcon iron and nail
mills, Niles, o., $50; New Philadelphia
mills, New Philadelphia, o.. 700;
Piqua rolling mills, Piqua, o., 600;
Reeves iron mills, Canal Dover, O.,
$50; Struthers iron mills, Struthers,
O., 400; Corning steel mills, Ham
mond, Ind, 300; Lauffman steel mills,
Paulton, 200; Hyde Park iron and
steel mills, Hyde Park, $50; total,
26,250.
Non-union sheet mills: Apollo iron
and steel mills, Vandergrift, $500;
kirkpatrick mills, Leechburg, $50;
Wellsville plate and sheet iron mills,
Wellsville, O., 400; Scottdale iron and
steel mills, Scottdale, $50; total, 500.
American Steel Hoop company,
1,40O; Independent plants, 81 in num-
Der, 5000.
Total number of men involved in
strike $3.50.
The fight is not for wages, but for
| organization. Either the Amalgamat-
| I'D association must bow to the will
If the greater combine, or else the
greater combine will have to give up
it's non-union mills.
May Involve 100000 Men.
What the strike just inaugurated
may eventually lead to is problemati-
cal. Three months ago when strike
occurred in the Wood plant of the
American Sheet Steel company at Nc
Keesport, because the company refus-
ed to allow it's men to become mem
| bers of the Amalgamated association,
President Shaffer threatened if the
Mckeesport strikers could not win
with their own strength he would or
der strike in every plant of the COM
pany. If the latter would not yield he
would then call out the union men in
every plant of the United States
Steel corporation. Such course
would result in the biggest strike the
country has ever seen, involving sew
eral hundred thousand men. For the
first few weeks the situation will not
show the strength of the association.
Almost all the plants of the company,
union and non-union, will be COMPEL
ed to shut down during the early part
of July to give the men rest. They
have been working steadily since the
first Of the year, many of them with
out a weeks cessation. Union and
non-union alike, they are demanding
short vacation, and the prediction is
made that the companies will be una
BILE to keep any one at work for two
or three weeks. The heat is intense
and the men, one vice president said,
are almost in state of revolt.
It will be after, perhaps, the first Of
August, when the combine makes Sc
rious attempt to start up in full, that
the real battle will begin if no settle
ment has been reached at that time.
The company cannot we'll delay oper-
ating longer than that, on account Of
the present flood of orders. In fact,
the urgent orders now on the books
can scarcely wait through July. Thus
the association has almost a month
more to prepare for the coming strug-
gle. It is the boast of the Amalga-
mated association officials that by
that time they will control 80 per cent
of the capacity of the combinations
plants. ~ H.,