The Streetcar Strike at Rainier Avenue
Electric rail workers refuse to accept a 10 percent wage cut after a winter of working for starvation wages.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
Receiver W. J. Grambs, of the Rainier Avenue electric line, yesterday announced a cut of 10 percent in the wages of all employes on the line, which the latter refused to accept, and this morning the cars of that line will not be running until new men can be secured. A committee of the strikers told a Post-Intelligencer reporter late last night the story of their connection with the road: 'Before the failure of the Securities Bank our wages were paid promptly, even though the road was not earning them. After that time we had to take what we could get, and we have worked all winter keeping the road running on barely enough to keep our families from starving, getting sometimes $10 and hardly ever more than $20 or $30 a month. At times the families of some of the men were actually suffering from want.' Now that their road has begun to earn money the receiver cuts wages. The motormen and conductors last month got $40 each, or 20 cents an hour.
“At times the families of some of the men were actually suffering from want.”
This strike highlights the volatile relationship between Seattle's early transit infrastructure and its workforce. Much like modern transit labor battles over cost-of-living adjustments and wage stagnation, these workers were expected to shoulder the financial instability of their employer during lean times, only to face cuts just as the company regained its footing.
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