Brief History of Local 1064 – The United Steel Workers Association
By Frank Smith July 4, 1985
When the Sydney Steel Plant commenced operations as the Dominion Iron and Steel Corporation early in the winter of 1901, the new plant, according to the very promotional literature handed out at the time, was thought certain, because of its unique tidewater location and proximity to seemingly limitless deposits of iron ore, coking coal and limestone to be on the threshold of becoming a steel center of world significance with glowing prospects of unparalleled future prosperity, not only for its investors but for the community in which it was situated as well.
Its promise as a supplier of world markets was, to a considerable extent, realized, but came rather short of the early heady predictions. As to the matters of financial returns, the one thing certain here was that the workers’ share was such that they were forced to strike the plant on June 1, 1904.
The workers, organized at the time in the Provincial Workers Association, battled for a better deal as best they could but to no avail. What with the intervention from all sides on the company’s behalf the Military, the Police, the Federal and Provincial Authorities along with the recruitment of local strike-breakers – the steelworkers, overwhelmed, were compelled to give up the fight and return to the job on the company’s terms. The strike had lasted about seven weeks.
Despite bland assurances that none would be discriminated against, a number of the leaders were nevertheless fired and blacklisted. Nothing appears to have come down concerning these men, due, no doubt, to the sad fact that retreating into anonymity was one of the few recourses left to those so circumstanced in those days.
In any case, this particular strike would seem to have terminated almost as a closed incident having no discernible links with anything that followed after. Likely, the lapse of thirteen years before organization was again attempted along with the advent of the first world war accounts for this.
No matter. The long wait notwithstanding the desire for a real union remained strong, though understandably kept under wraps. All that was required was a favorable opportunity for a new start. In 1917, the amalgamated iron, steel and tin workers appeared on the scene and the workers prepared for renewed struggle against Disco.
The company attempted to forestall this latest effort by trotting out what was euphemistically referred to as industrial committees but the workers decisively rejected what was transparently a company ploy. This was the first of two attempts to foist on the Steelworkers a plan of “Representation” that could only mean for them {to use an analogy suggested by the claim made for a certain other variety of soap} 99 44/100% Pure Company Domination.
The work of building the Union, Punctuated by a number of work stoppages and marked by increasing militancy generally, proceeded steadily until the summer of 1923 when matters finally came to a head.
Other than setting down a few recollections I have, myself of the 1923 strike, I do not propose to deal with it here except to emphasize one or two essential points – First its lasting impression on the community and second, the re-introduction by the company after the strike was broken of the same old shoddy bill of goods, known variously now as the Bischoff Plan, the Plant Council and by other names not mentioned in polite society. However, it was to serve a very useful purpose later on after a number of militants had managed to get themselves elected to it.
This plan, as above noted, was the brain-child of one Carl Bischoff, a company official at the time and as previously noted, a similar one had been rejected by the men.
This latest drive to push it through came in the aftermath of the strike when terror, blacklists and general demoralization were the order of the day. In such conditions, its temporary imposition was inevitable.
As is well known, under this scheme “Action” on Grievances was pretty much limited to the replacement of burned out light bulbs and the filling of pot holes on the company roads. The bringing up of matters such as wages, hours of work and conditions on the job and meaning it, was decidedly thought of as “Not Cricket” and given short shift, the excuse being invariably, that the company was losing money due to adverse market conditions. Such assertions were neither believed nor accepted by the workers and served merely to fuel their growing resentment and impatience for militant meaningful response to their grievances.
And now for those few but still vivid reminiscences I have myself of the 1923 Strike. By this time Disco had become Besco, the British Empire Steel Corporation, a development that boded anything but good for the workers.
I was not more than six or seven at the time but like most youngsters at that age – running all over the place and poking into everything – it was, I suppose, natural enough, what with the prevailing excitement, that I should occasionally stray where, like O’Casey’s Captain Boyle, I “Had No Business To Be”.
I remember very clearly the charge of the Halifax Light Brigade up Victoria Road on that memorable Sunday evening.
I recall lingering about the old No. 4 gate in the early part of the evening watching with intense interest a number of men in Blue forming up against the side of the Wire and Nail Mill {for years I was under the impression that these were the lads who made the sally up the Pier’s main artery, but on checking, just recently, I found that these were City and Company Police standing by}.
Anyhow, the Gateman who seemed to be a decent sort, spotted me and told me that I had better run along home. The advice was given none too soon because I had gone no farther than the corner of Mt. Pleasant St. and Victoria Rd. when I turned to look back toward the old subway. What I saw, in the roadway before Nathanson’s Store, no more than a hundred yards down the road from where I stood, was a crazy blur of horses and riders coming on a crowd of screaming people running off in all directions.
I don’t know to this day, whether they came on any farther or not, I was only aware that everyone else was running or trying to and that I had a clear road down Mt. Pleasant St. and I lost no time about it. If there was a track class for six year olds at the time, I likely broke all records. I found my mother and some of the other neighbourhood women – all of them frightened stiff – on the veranda of a nearby friends house. I likely got hell for wandering about at such a time but if I did it’s been long forgotten.
A prominent casualty of that evening’s work was Jack Murphy, the father of a well known and respected Whitney Pier family. I remember Mr. Murphy who was in the Insurance Business at the time, when making his rounds in the Henry St. area a few weeks after the strike was over, removing his hat and revealing to our fascinated gaze, a long, ugly scar – a memento that he likely retained to the end of his days.
But what we kids delighted in was following the parade when the strikers, taking all sides of the street, would be marching a batch of Scabs they had forcibly removed from the plant back to their homes and spouses – all of this to the accompaniment of cries of “Scabs”!”Scabs”!
I remember particularly, one fellow after being escorted thus, standing sheepishly by on a veranda while his better half loosed a flood of invective that would surely have raised the art to new heights had she not been drowned out by the jeers of the strikers.
Some of the stories that have come down from that wild and stormy period though strictly in the oral tradition, nevertheless accord well with the temper and conditions obtaining at the time. There was hate – in many cases, hate that was unrelenting and permanent. Even in those cases where, in time, there was tolerance, nothing was really forgotten – A trifling difference over some unrelated matter would very often re-open old sores, not only between striker and scab, but between their children as well.
However, humor of a sort did occasionally come into the picture. A story that I heard long ago and believe to have some basis in fact, tells of what happened to one scab when he experienced a bout of home sickness during his enforced stay on company premises. He decided that he would try, under cover of darkness, to make it past the pickets and see how things were doing with the family, but unfortunately for him, was spotted and chased to his residence where he took refuge in the cellar. While cowering in one of its darkest corners, he hears a sound as of someone stirring about. On the likelihood of it being a member of the family, he ventured making known his presence. But it wasn’t a member of the family – It was Hamm’s Ram.
Many of the older Sydney residents, particularly those living in or brought up in the Whitney Pier District, will recall that the City’s Streets were enlivened at that time by presence of a colorful variety of livestock – Horses, Cows, Goats, Sheep etc. Most wandering about in blithe disregard of their chances with the local poundkeeper.
Prominent among these roamers was Hamm’s ram! As to any attempt that might be made to collar him, it would be very much a moot question as to who would be taking the chance. The most profound instinct of the beast was to charge instantly and knock to the ground any member of the human species upon whom he fixed his peculiarly sullen gaze and who was bold or stupid enough to be within range of the coming onset – The Hamm family being to only possible exception.
On this particular occasion, even though the somewhat cramped quarters that he had strayed into afforded less than the usual scope for this talent, the Ram is said to have lived up to his reputation.
When it dawned upon the luckless scab that it was that he was up against, he made a dash for the basement entry which opened out, at ground level, but the Ram was on him before he could make it. Knocked flat, the fellow emerged in the manner to which he had become accustomed, on hi hands and knees but this time dragging a very sore butt after him.
But the strikers, too, had their bad days. One “Loyal Employee” nabbed and restored to the family circle, had a wife considerably more formidable and resourceful than himself. Burning with resentment and the desire for revenge, this lady while compliments were being exchanged below, between scab and strikers, had gathered up the nights receipts from the family’s kidneys and without as much as a warning “ Gad Ha Mercy” flung from an upper window the contents of all pots upon the heads of the hapless strikers milling about below. As I say, I won’t vouch for the accuracy of these stories but these and many more were the stuff of conversation on Henry Street corner for years after the strike was over.
But the strike of 1923 and its aftermath were serious business. It ended in complete defeat of the workers early in August of that year – The men having been on the street just over a month. Some were jailed, many blacklisted and the rest intimidated. Many left Cape Breton never to return.
Though the strike was of brief duration compared with some of those in recent years, it had resulted in terrible privation for the mass of the workers and their families. Unions in those days had nowhere near the resources that they were later to have and the average worker was often hard put to it to provide for his family, even when working.
Understandably, it was long before union organization was to be thought of again, but it’s a long road that has no turning, as they say, and eventually, turn it did but not significantly until the middle thirties when the country was emerging from the blight of the Great Depression.
The Steelworkers, in the meantime, had become heartily sick of the plant council but the militants on it determined to use it as a springboard in the furtherance of their plans for the genuine union so long awaited and so vainly, up to now.
Without doubt, the outstanding factor in the organization of local 1064, was the fact that the day of industrial unionism had dawned and was not to be denied. Workers unity was given a new dimension. But the road forward was a rocky on for not only was there the company to contend with but there was also the matter of savage infighting between left and right as to what policies would be followed. Matters had also to be settled with a faction opposed to international unions.
Just the same through it all, the over-all objective was step by step, becoming a reality. Militants were meeting in the kitchens of their homes, in the woods, making contacts on the job, meeting their brothers in the mines, getting in touch with their fellow workers in the rest of Canada and in the U.S., building up gradually to the point where they were able to “Go public”.
In these new conditions, the first definite move in the direction of an honest and effective trade union for the Sydney Steelworkers came by George MacEachern and Harry Davis. This effort, while accorded fair support, was unable to generate sufficient momentum for further advance.
In the meantime, George was busy discussing things with his fellow workers in the Plant Machine Shop. His boss, the late Jimmie Banks, a great fellow, used to tell me, first glancing circumspectly about, that he was sure that the sop tool room was where local 1064 had its beginnings. As the idea of union strengthened and developed and broadened out from a craft basis to include all steelworkers, a powerful ally, the United Mineworkers of America appeared on the scene and this development was decisive in the Sydney Steelworkers becoming part of the mainstream of the labor movement of the day. Whether anybody liked it or not, and there were tbose who didn’t, John L. Lewis and the Congress of Industrial Organizations were the power behind the great movement of industrial unionism in the latter thirties. It was through this connection that the resources of District 26 of the U.M.W. were placed at the service of the Sydney Steelworkers, though the latter were something less than enchanted at the pace set by Leis’s local lieutenant, Silby Barrett.
Local 1064, came into existence on December 13, 1936 at a meeting held in the old Temperance Hall still standing on Falmouth St.
Carl Neville was chosen as Charter President with the following selected for the remaining offices: C. MacDonald, Vice-President; J.C. Nicholson, Recording Secretary; George MacEachern, Financial Secretary; C. Burke, Treasurer; W. Pike, Guide; E. Gillis Inside Guard, E. MacDonald, Outside Guard.
The union functioned under the aegis of the Steelworkers Organizing Committee (SWOC) until 1942, when it became what it still is – local 1064, United Steelworkers of America.
The union was officially set up, first, in quarters situated above Moraff’s Pool Room on Charlotte St. and was there until moving to the Ashby Hall where the first meeting was held on June 1, 1938.
The most urgent task confronting the new union was securing of the check-off – The haphazard collection of dues on a voluntary basis proving to be just about as impossible as it was impractical.
After a campaign that can only be described as epic in scope and intensity with support from all sides except the local board of trade, legislation providing for the check-off was passed by the MacDonald Government on April 17, 1937.
This legislation known as Bill 92, was recognized as a trailblazer for many other unions trying to become established at the time – Not only in Canada but the U.S. as well. An interesting sidelight of the winning of the Check-off was that it was instrumental in getting the international office through some difficult times during that trying formative period. The cheque coming through from Sydney, for a while, our people were later told, was a considerable factor in the ability of the American Brother to carry on.
The signing of a contract, an objective no less urgent, came three years later – The company dragging its feet and screaming all the way to the table. This particular contract, hardly a world shaker, was nevertheless a first and, as such, opened up the way to better things as indeed, proved to be the case.
No sermon intended, but it might be a very instructive experience if some of the present generation of steelworkers were to take the time to compare conditions under that contract with those that have followed since – The more so because of the danger unions are in these days of losing it all.
Nothing came easy – All had to be fought for and unity, more unity and again unity was ever the key to victory.
Finally, a word concerning the contribution of local 1064 to the community in which it has played so considerable a part for just under a half century. I think it can be confidently stated that its record of service is second to none, not only to its immediate membership but also to the labor movement and the community in general.
What it has meant to the Steelworkers and their families is convincingly attested to by the steady and ongoing progress registered in the various contracts negotiated over the years. Though the eight hour day was introduced by the company on its own initiative, no one doubts the move was the result of company awareness that the union train was just around the corner and rounding it uncomfortable fast. All significant later developments, the 40 hour week; reasonable was scales; seniority clauses; grievance procedure; decent and safe working conditions; pensions; vacations; holidays; – These evolved through the union. One of the great results of all this was that relations between men and management to say nothing of relations among the men themselves, became more human.
Local 1064 can be proud too, of the contribution of its delegates to the effectiveness of the various labor bodies with which it has been traditionally affiliated – The Cape Breton District and Labor Council, The Nova Scotia Federation of Labor and the Canadian Labor of Congress.
Especially noteworthy is the moral and financial support it has unfailingly rendered to the smaller unions in the area when these were in trouble.
On the community level it has supported local education through a number of scholarships, donated its hall to the Red Cross on a regular basis for its blood donor clinics, supported many local sports activities and cultural events along with support of a number of charitable organizations.
And now, new times, new issues, not the least of which are growing unemployment and threats of universal nuclear destruction. Given a return to the spirit of the founding days, local 1064 can still be in the forefront of the fight that the new times call for.
