Evening star., 1936-03-10
STRIKE EXTENDED
TO 800 BUILDINGS
IN RENEWED WAR
"Big Push" Carried Into
Grand Central Area of
New York.
MOVE LAUNCHED AFTER
TERMS ARE REJECTED
Banks and Department Stores Are
Included in Latest Walk
out Orders.
BACKGROUND

alike are feeling effects OF bitter
dispute bettreen management and
labor in building service activities
in NetD York City.
Starting peek ago Monday in
comparatively small area, strike OF
elevator operators. janitors and
other building employees has spread
over large portion of ,Oorld's great
est city. Although ,UageS and hours
OF employment are at issue, greatest
controversy has centered ouer
cloSed-Sllop demand OF union
Seeking solution are Mayor La
Gudrdid and Assistant Secretary of
Labor McGrddy.
BY the Associated Press.
NEW YORK, March 10-Under the
opening salvo of the building workers
"big push" William D. Rawlins, ex-
ecutive secretary of the Realty Ad-
viSory Board on Labor Relations, said
today his group lis ready to accept
any reasonable agreement which will
work to eliminate abuses and sub
standard conditions in the industry"
Rawlins declared that "the union
Is no longer fighting for the men, but
for power to crush the city,"
Two hours after the lid was declared
OF, following 10 days of fruitless ar
bitration, the union announced that
its strike had affected about 900 addi-
tional buildings in the vital Grand
Central area of the city.
1900 Men Declared Out.
Seven thousand men, Union Leader
James J. Bambrick estimated, walked
out during the two hours.
Bambrick set the figure of total
buildings affected at 4,200, which was
far in excess Of police estimates. He
estimated that 1900 buildings had
settled with the union, about half con-
ceding the closed-shop clause of the
agreement and the rest granting a
preferential shop" the rehiring,
eventually, Of only union men.
At the same time Bambrick issued
an ultimatum announcing that the old
demands of closed shop, So a week
raise and 48-hour week would become
effective again.
In many buildings at least tenn
porary failure to pull workers was
experienced by the flying squadrons. J"
Employees in the 38-story building at
b5l Fifth avenue, who were said by
the union to be 100 per cent Or
ganized," refused to leave despite
half hours argument with strikers.
Men Declared Desperate.
On the subject of seeking a gen
eral' city-wide strike, which Bambrick
has been considering, the leader as
serted: THE men are exasperated. If
something isn't done soon, don't
know what will happen"
He said he was still holding under
advisement" the possibility of asking
Nationwide building employees strike.
The Tenants League in Defense of
the Strikers" new organization of
tenants sympathetic to the strikers,
called a mass meeting for tomorrow
night at Mecca Temple.
A representative of broadcaSting
station complained to Bambrick that
radio artists were unable to appear be-
cause all elevator service had been
suspended. 3ambrick sent, he said,
one operator to serve the station.
The tall cluster of buildings COM
posing Rockefeller Center was unaf-
fected. The union was not organized
there.
Pickets patrolled streets before
many banks and insurance Offices.
Several large Office buildings on
Broadway, Fifth avenue and Madison
avenue were tied up by initial sorties
Of the strikers. Office employees,
grouped in lobbies and on the curbs,
awaited replacements to man aban-
doned elevators.
The long-delayed thrust at the
Grand Central area resulted, the
union said, in immediate abandon
ment of vertical transportation in the
Paramount Building, an aerial land
mark at Times Square, the lofty Per-
shing Square and Fred F, French
Buildings.
Rolled by the refusal of operators
OF New York's skyscrapers to accept
Mayor F. H. La Guardia's proposals
to end the nine-day-old walkout, the
union named department stores, ho-
tels, banks and insurance companies
as their immediate points Of new at
tack.
Bambrick addressed much of his at
tack at the "moneyed interests" he
said were trying to break union labor.
He appealed to all union workers and
sympathizers to withdraw their de-
posits from banks they may suspect
Of opposing the strike.
The Realty Advisory Board, an Or
ganization of building operators, told
the mayor yesterday that "modifica-
tions" would be necessary before they
could agree to his plan.