Hoquiam Mill Workers Strike for Living Wage
Employees walk out at the Northwestern lumber mill after management refuses a raise from $1.75 to $2.00 per day.
Ninety employees of the Northwestern lumber mill who were getting $1.75 a day demanded $2 Saturday and, on the refusal of the company to grant the increase, they struck. The loss of the men caused the mill to shut down, throwing 245 men out of work. An effort will be made to start up today with new men.
“Ninety employees of the Northwestern lumber mill who were getting $1.75 a day demanded $2 Saturday and, on the refusal of the company to grant the increase, they struck.”
The struggle over a 25-cent wage increase in 1909 is a quintessential example of the early 20th-century labor battles in the Pacific Northwest timber industry. These small-scale strikes paved the way for the larger industrial unions that would eventually define the region's labor landscape.
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