01/01/2025
On this day, 31 December 1912, a strike of New York City hotel workers and waiting staff broke out, organised by the Industrial Workers of the World union.
Just after 11 PM, fighting broke out outside the Hotel Astor when 25 private detectives and armed police confronted 30 striking waiters, who fought back with bricks.
Initially, the strike affected a few hotels where working conditions were particularly bad. The stoppage escalated to become a general strike in January 1913.
At a mass meeting in four languages – English, French, Italian and Greek – led by IWW organiser, Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, strikers voted unanimously to call for the abolition of tips and their replacement with a living wage from hotel employers. Flynn was described as “the real power behind the men” on strike by the Times.
Towards the end of the month, running low on funds, workers were eventually forced to call off the strike. Flynn told strikers not to feel discouraged at having to go back to work, and she said to the press, “when their union is fully organised and strengthened they will again strike and will not return until their requests now made are granted. The real purpose of the present strike was to bring all the different classes of hotel workers together to form a solid organisation. We have won the strike in many ways, especially in doing away with the jealousy that formerly existed between the waiters and the other grades of hotel employees.”
Several later strikes did indeed occur, which eventually succeeded in winning much better pay and conditions, which to some extent persist today.
Learn more about the IWW in these books: https://shop.workingclasshistory.com/collections/all/iww
