On this day, 15 April 1916, the newspaper of the revolutionary Industrial Workers of the World union announced the formation of its Domestic Workers Union in Denver, Colorado.
Much of the history of the group was lost, but a fascinating letter by Jane Street, its secretary, was illegally seized by the Justice Department in 1917 and only discovered nearly 60 years later.
She was writing to another domestic worker organiser in Tulsa, Oklahoma in which she described how they organised and took action to improve pay and conditions:
“if you want to raise a job from $20 to $30… you can have a dozen girls answer an ad and demand $30—even if they do not want work at all. Or call up the woman and tell her you will accept the position at $20. Then she will not run her ad the next day. Don’t go. Call up the next day and ask for $25 and promise to go (and don’t go). On the third day she will say, ‘Come on out and we will talk the matter over.’ You can get not only the wages, but shortened hours and lightened labor as well.”
More information in our podcast episode 16 about women in the early IWW: https://workingclasshistory.com/2018/12/02/e16-women-in-the-early-iww/
Pictured: women IWW members, 1913 https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=609480367891849&set=a.602588028581083&type=3
