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Cause & Effect: The Newsboy Strike of 1899
“Extra, extra, read all about it!” Almost everyone has seen the classic image of a newsboy hawking headlines in film and television but few know any history of these kids. Newsboys were young boys and, occasionally, girls who ranged from children to young teens, most of whom were runaways or orphans. These kids would buy papers from the publishers then walk the streets hawking headlines and selling papers. In July of 1899, a group of New York newsboys, dubbed newsies at the time, protested two of the most popular New York papers, the World and the Journal. This strike, caused by a high price for papers, affected the newsies, the papers, and the citizens of New York.
The owners of these papers, Joseph
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A group of newsies led by an eye patch clad George J. Fabian, more commonly known as Kid Blink, joined together to convince newsies all over New York to boycott the papers. Due to the strike, these newsies were not making any income to pay for food or board. They were spending their time creating a union, leading demonstrations, and protesting the papers. They held rallies and were recognized in various newspaper articles. These articles captured the intentions and hearts of the newsies well, including quotes like this one from Brooklyn native Kid Blink, “Friens and feller workers. Dis is a time which tries de hearts of men. Dis is de time when we’se got to stick together like glue. We know wot we wants and we’ll git it, even if we is blind.” These articles made the newsies seem favorable in the eyes of the public. They were beginning to learn how unfairly working children were being treated. Unfortunately, some of the newsies were arrested or fined during the strike for violence, destruction of property, or disorderly conduct. Newsies would even beat on each other if one attempted to sell papers during the strike. They made examples of them saying “Ye don’t sell no more Woild ‘r Joinal, ‘r ye git yer face punched in-see?”
The owners and employees of the papers were also affected. They were losing profits and popularity. Newsies would destroy any newspapers that the World or Journal attempted to distribute. Carts of newspapers were dumped into the streets and papers were torn to shreds as newsboys said things like, “No true friend of organized labor will read dem papers. We’s got other union papers. Pay a penny and read dem.” They would sometimes become violent with the employees as well, bringing things like sticks to
The 1919 steel strike was an attempt to organize the United States steel industry after World War One. The strike lasted about five months, and was unsuccessful. It began on September 21, 1919, and collapsed on January 8, 1920. It was started by the Amalgamated Association of Iron, Steel and Tin Workers, or the AA. The AA had formed in 1876. It was a union of iron and steel workers which was very committed to creating unionism, but advancements in technology had decreased the amount of skilled workers in the industries.
During the Railroad Strike of 1877, when large crowds in Baltimore attempted to attack militia breaking up the strike, President Hayes got word of the uprising and personally sent his troops to quell it (DOC B). Many witnesses of the strike used Yellow Journalism to make it seem as if Communists were causing the strike through the use of political cartoons in newspapers, such as “Always killing the goose that lays the golden egg” (DOC C), where the strike was purposefully invalidated to break up the labor movement. Nevertheless, the largeness of the uprising made strikes become more widely-known, causing employers to be slower to slash wages in fear of a bigger
in the New York Post, a local tabloid, as a symbolic representation of the main
The unions resorted to many forms of tactics such as boycotts, picketing, and the less prominent “closed shop”. The most prevalent of these methods, however, was the formation of riots. During the late 19th century riots included: the Haymarket Square Riots (1886), the Homestead Lockout, and the Pullman Car Company strike. The Haymarket Square Riots of 1886 took place at the McCormick plant in Chicago, Illinois in response to the worker’s need for an eight hour workday. The first two days were innate, but the third day was where the the situation actually instigated the cause. The owner of the plant, McCormick, attempted to bring strikebreakers (scabs), and a battle had begun between the scabs and the strikers. The riot, wistfully, ended the lives of four men when the police began to attempt to impede and halter the situation. These four deaths initiated a chain reaction resulting in the calling for the revenge of the four men by German radical Johann Most. Despite Johann’s reaction, 200 more Chicago policemen ordered the remaining strikers to leave the area. In the crowd, in the moment, a homemade bomb was hurled leading in the death of one policeman; acting as a predecessor of events, this event lead to a shooting between the policemen and the strikers concluding with the death of four workers and seven more policemen; entirely approximately one hundred people were injured. The Haymarket Riots caused public opinion to turn against labor. The Homestead Lockout took place in Homestead, Pennsylvania at Andrew Carnegie’s steel plant and was instigated by Henry Clay Frick’s wage cut. In this riot workers walked out of the company and then Frick ordered company doors to be locked and trapped the workers inside. Employees rebelled and caused about 200 Pinkerton detectives to come up the river to protect company property and created a battle.
strikes turned very bad with deaths and injuries. Having unions were good in some views
Forced labor system in Amazonia, isolated their workers—often being seParáted from others, working long trails and seParáted from their family. Based on primary accounts of explorers of the Amazon during the Rubber Boom, there are documented accounts of forced laborers being sick from European diseases, their native wives were sexually assaulted and their children were sold as servants. Survivors experienced a loss of their ethnic identity and forced from their lands. Because conditions were unfavorable to the rubber tappers, Rubber Barons had a constant fear of employees leaving without paying their debts. To insure tappers would not return to their previous homes Rubber Barons “exerted greater control over their labor forces by building portage roads around the rapids and patrolling the only safe passages downstream.” Many of the patrols would be armed, forcing laborers to produce rubber at higher rates and making sure they would not leave without paying off their debts.
The Coal Strike of 1902 occurred as a result of many problems that were faced by miners. At the time of the coal strike there were 150,000 miners working in the mines (Grossman) Due to the depression of 1893, miners had their wages cut and were living in poverty (Grossman). Many miners were dissatisfied and looked to the United Mine Workers for support in raising their standard of living. This proved difficult since employers refused to recognize labor unions for fear of giving them significant control over the industry. In most instances of employee demands before 1902, employers would use government troops or hire immigrants to take the jobs of the strikers (David Kennedy).
The early 1900s was a time of many movements, from the cities to the rural farms; people were uniting for various causes. One of the most widespread was the labor movement, which affected people far and wide. Conditions in the nation’s workplaces were notoriously poor, but New York City fostered the worst. Factories had started out in the city’s tenements, which were extremely cramped, poorly ventilated, and thoroughly unsanitary. With the advent of skyscrapers, factories were moved out of the tenements and into slightly larger buildings, which still had terrible conditions. Workers were forced to work long hours (around 12 hours long) six hours a day, often for extremely low pay. The pay was also extremely lower for women, who made up a large portion of the shirtwaist industry. If a worker were to openly contest an employer’s rule, they would be promptly fired and replaced immediately. Also, strength in numbers did not always work. Managers often hired brutal strikebreakers to shut movements down. The local police and justice were often of no help to the workers, even when women were being beaten. At the time, the workers needs were not taken seriously and profit was placed ahead of human life. This was not just a struggle for workers’ rights; it was also a movement for the working class’ freedom.
A common trend was always that wages were not keeping up with the cost of living. Many could not make ends meet and were struggling to simply survive. They started to question the effectiveness of the National Recovery Administration (N.R.A.). It was unfair to them that businesses were still making enormous profits while its employees were forced into poverty. Pushing for a unionization was disowned by factories where they threatened to close their doors if a worker’s union formed. Some thought businesses were crooked and angled themselves to take advantage of the economy to increase their
The term “muckraking” was coined by Theodore Roosevelt because according to Roosevelt the journalist “raked up “filth” at his feet”. Before the 1880s, quality magazines were expensive and had poor circulation around the nation. Newspaper on the other hand were more popular with the public and of course they were cheaper. Entering the 1880s, technological developments made the circulations of magazines popular and affordable for
The Strike of 1934 On May 9th 1934 a organized labor strike started in San Francisco that would snowball into a city crippling strike. The International Longshoremen’s Association (ILA) declared a strike for all longshoremen on the west coast, until they received better wages, a union-administered hiring hall, and union membership as a prerequisite for employed longshoremen. The Strike of 1934 lasted for three months, stopping maritime trade in the ports of the Western United States, from San Diego to Seattle. The clash was between the Industrial Association (IA), composed of big business and employers wanting to break the strike, and the ILA, along with other unions that dealt with maritime trades.
...s became even more desperate at the time of the great depression that ultimately led to the great railway strike, in which many workers lost their lives at the hand of the Pennsylvania militia. This act proved to be a major turning point in the evolution of the labor movement in the United States.
George Pullman was not always believed to be a cruel boss. George Pullman started off believing that anyone could be successful if they worked hard enough. But as his business grew, he took this belief too far, furthering his own company by working his employees hard, treating his employees like slaves. There were many factors included in how the Pullman strike started. George Pullman and the company’s treatment of employees, how the town of Pullman, Illinois reacted to their treatment, other strikes that led up to the Pullman employee unhappiness and their reaction, the Pullman Strike.
The Winnipeg General Strike The year of 1919 has been one of the most influential years of strikes
The public was further angered by something called “yellow journalism”. Yellow journalism refers to writers such as Joseph Pullitzer and William Hearst trying to outdo each other with screeching headlines and hair raising “scoops”. Where there were no headlines, the yellow press would exaggerate and fabricate stories to get readers interested in their newspaper. For example, Hearst once wrote about Spanish Customs Offic...