The Laundry Strike of 1910
Striking laundry workers in Everett launch a campaign for higher wages and against the 'laundry trust,' enlisting public support to run their own mobile collection service.
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.
One of the most complete tie-ups that ever occurred in any industry in Everett was inaugurated last Monday morning when the employees of every laundry plant in the city walked out in support of their wage scale, which the Laundrymen's association refused to sign. The previous wage scale had been in effect for two years, during which time proprietors raised prices to the public by 25 to 35 percent, while refusing to increase the meager pay of their women workers. Striking girls reported making as little as five dollars a week. To combat the employers, the strikers organized their own collection service, driving wagons throughout the city to gather laundry and shipping it to an independent union plant in Seattle. The strikers urge the public to support their fight for a living wage by sending their laundry to the Labor Temple.
“Twenty cents for a fine shirt and five dollars a week for the girl worker.”
The laundry strike of 1910 highlights the perennial Everett struggle between organized labor and industry. Just as these workers fought for a living wage in 1910, modern service-sector workers in the Pacific Northwest continue to negotiate for fair compensation amidst the rising cost of living.
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