Evening star., 1937-05-28
Picket Lines Strengthened
About Two Republic
Plants.
WIDESPREAD REDUCTION
IN OPERATIONS FORCED
Auto and Other Unionists to Aid
Drive-U. S. Intervention
Envisaged.
BACKGROUND

oott IL LCUtS SOWW[tleS JUT
Industrial Organization has car
ried driue into mass production
industries, striking first at auto
mobile manufacturers and, after
,cinning contracts with General
Motors and Chrysler, haze inau-
gurated campaign against steel
industry.
Large number OF steel companies,
including subsidiaries OF United
States Steel, Uhich haze per-
sistently in past refused to bargain
collectively, hare entered agree
ments. Three major Independent
producers have held out, houeuer.
Widespread strike has resulted.
Ey the Associated Press.
YOUNGSTOWN Ohio, May 2s.-
John L. Lewis militant steel unit grid
ed on several fronts Of broad Great
Lakes sector today to tighten strike
lines around three major producers
who have constantly refused to sign
union contracts.
Seventy thousand were idle-47 900
in Ohio and $4,000 more in Chicago's
Calumet area, key producing centers
Of the ar-flung major industry which
employs upward Of 550,000 workers at
its flery-hot open hearths and blast
furnaces.
Great lofty smokestacks poked emp
tily skyWard from closed mills of the
Youngstown Sheet q Tube Co. and
the Inland Steel Corp. Many Re-
public Steel Corp plants also were
shut by husky pickets.
But two big plants Of Republic
largest Of the three independent pro-
ducers locked with the Steel Workers
Organizing Committee in its greatest
test Of year-old organization drive
continued curtailed operations in South
Buffalo, N. Y, and South Chicago
units.
Picket Forces Expanded.
1t was against these that Lewis
steel chieftains mobilized expanded
picket resources.
Hugh Thompson, organizer for Lewis
Committee for Industrial Organization,
embracing automobile. garment, mine,
rubber and other union workers, de-
clared that 5000 c. I. O. auto and
other unionists would swell picket lines
around the South Buffalo mills.
They will form one of the biggest
picket lines this part OF the country
has ever SEEN" he said.
Pickets mobilized for fresh drive
to close Republics main Chicago area
plant after police broke up two at
tempts to mass around company gates.
Strike leaders expected reinforce
ments from other plants.
John Mayo, sub-regional director
for the S. w. O. c. in Youngstown S
Mahoning Valley area. told a group Of
strikers near Republics mills:
Ninety per cent Of the battle is
over and your work will serve the
working man in generations to come.
If you all get out on the picket lines
there will not be drop of blood she'd"
Republic Units Operating.
Smoke that normally clung black
and heavy, dwindled to thin scattered
wisps in Northeastern Ohio's steel
centers as Republic claimed it also
had units operating at Warren and
Canton.
Previous to the strike Republic
had been operating so Of its open
hearth furnaces in plants where
strikes were called" the concern said
In statement issued from its gen.
eral Offices at Cleveland, where its
four plants employing 1000 were
closed.
With the steel plants at Warren,
Canton, Chicago and Buffalo working,
there are total Of % open hearths
in production" it stated. S. w. o. c.
sources asserted the number operating
was less than one third Of Republics
claim.
U. S. Intervention EnvisaYed.
The scene was comparatively peace
full as Federal intervention from
Washington was envisaged by an au-
thoritative source as the only chance
for quick break in the flve-State
steel strike deadlock.
Declining to be quoted by name,
the source in contact with both sides
pointed out that the youthful S. w.
o. c. and independent producers
were locked in a conflict over how
to proceed to negotiation OF strike
settlement.
As the biggest steel strike since
1919 moved into its second day around
the sprawling plants from Chicago to
Buffalo, there was no immediate in
dtcation from the official that Wash
ington would seek quick settlement.