The potters herald. [volume] (East Liverpool, Ohio) 1899-1982, 1950-11-30
News History Of Garment Workers Goes
From Sweat Shop To Radio In SO Years

New York kEfA IA uilloi uoon
prepared for its own membership
is threatening to make the best
lseller lists.
i 1t is ILGWU NEWS HISTORY
ia history of the international
Ladies' Garment Workers Union
lAFL, compiled earlier this year as
a souvenir for the 50th anniversary
of the union. 1t tells it's story in
IL numbers of 10-page tabloid
size newspaper and was edited by
| Max D. Danish and other staff
members of Justice, the unions
newspaper.
i All the stories in the book are
taken verbatim from newspapers
and magazines published at the
i time of the events described. Sc
successful has been this method OF
presentation, and SO great has been
Its reception by other union mem
businessmen, ibrari e S
schools, and the general public
that it has been reprinted for sale
in bookstores. Macy's and Double
day book stores in New York
handle it, or it may be obtained for
Isl by mail from ILGWU NEWS
HISTORY, ITO Broadway, New
York 10, N. Y.
The first chapter covers the era
of the sweatshop. Stories from the
New York Times and the Daily
Forward tell Of efforts in the 52nd
| Congress in 1893 to have sweat
shop products barred from inter
state commerce, of a strike of $500
coatmakers in Boston against a
50R wage cut, and of another
strike of 5000 garmentmakers in
Philadelphia against sub-contract-
ling and for higher wages.
The progress of labor unions is
pointed up by two stories. One noti-
fies cloakmakers that hours of
work in inside shops will be "from
6 a. m. to 8 p. m. only" the other,
written by Jacob A. Riis, who cru
saded against the evils of New
York slums, tells of two cloakmak-
ers who worked all day in shop
and then took work home at night.
Tt shows says Riis, 'that he
and his partner, working on first
class garments for a Broadway
house in the four busiest weeks of
the season, made together from
I$15.15 to $19.20 a week by striving
from a. m. to IL p. m. that is to
say, from $758 to $500 a week"
Many of the 236 illustrations in
the book show children laboring in
sweatshops. Others range from
pickets in corsets and underwear to
early strike photos of girls in
ankle-length dresses.
| The second chapter depicts a
group of such girls in their large
hats and pinched waists waiting
for the patrol wagon after being
arrested for picketing at the Tri-
angle Waist Co. in 1909. This per-
iod from 1900-to-1909 is entitled
Eight for Survival. Lockouts,
gangsters, and "lock-ins" were the
order of the day. In 1911 Triangle
workers were victims of being lock-
ed in by their boss. Scores perished
in fire when unable to get out of
the building because the doors were
barred to keep girls from walking
off their jobs to protest working
conditions.
A photograph of Samuel Comp
ers, AFL president, addressing a
meeting in Cooper Hall during the
historic strike of 10000 waistmak-
ers highlights the third chapter.
Ida M. Tarbell, noted author, wrote
of this walkout that it showed wo-
men could be good strikers and
good unionists even though they
had had no previous experience.
The fourth chapter is devoted in
large part to the Triangle Waist
Co. fire. Many side stories on the
fire describe it from personal view
points and there are photographs
of every phase of the holocaust
from the actual fighting of the fire
to the search for bodies by rela-
tives.
Teddy Roosevelt's visit to strik-
ing girls in the kimono and wrap
per industry as reported by the
New York Times is one of the fea-
lures in Chapter five, After listen
ing to their stories, TR told report
ers, "This is crushing the future
motherhood of the country. 1t must
be stopped. This is too horrible for