On this day in labor history, the year was 1937.
That was the day five governmental agencies began independent investigations into the Little Steel strike, then in its third day.
The Labor and Justice Departments as well as the NLRB and Senator Robert LaFollette’s Civil Liberties Committee all inquired about Wagner Act violations.
Production at Republic, Inland and Youngstown Sheet and Tube steel mills was grinding to a halt.
Across five states, strike forces proved stronger than steel bosses had anticipated.
Subsidiaries across the Great Lakes region continued to shut down.
Weekend wrap-up reports of violent clashes on picket lines appeared in newspapers across the country.
Strikers had adopted a “Quit Work or Starve” policy against those who remained behind the gates.
They successfully turned away mail trucks and tore up railroad tracks in yards at Warren and Youngstown, Ohio facilities to stop food deliveries.
The strike was referred to as a grim siege as Republic was forced to drop food by airplane to hemmed-in scabs behind the lines.
At Inland Steel in East Chicago, Indiana, company police clubbed picketers as they stopped railroad cars headed into the plant.
In Buffalo, strikers stoned scab cars as they passed through the gates.
In Monroe, Michigan, strikers successfully prevented the night shift from crossing.
In South Chicago, three strikers were being held on conspiracy charges, following a pitched battle with police the day before that injured more than 20.
1000 strikers there had attempted to establish a picket line at Republic Steel gates. SWOC president Philip Murray demanded additional investigation against Republic, charging the company had been stockpiling ammunition and hired private gunmen.
His worries would be confirmed in the decisive battles that lay ahead.
November 12 - Striking Against Privatization
November 11 - Haymarket Martyrs are Executed
November 10 - Suicide or Murder?
November 9 - Remembering Philip Murray
November 8 - Dorothy Day is Born
November 7 - Eisenhower Wields Taft-Hartley
November 6 - The Fight for Equality
November 5 - The Everett Massacre
November 4 - Will Rogers is Born
November 3 - The Greensboro Massacre
November 2 - Sixteen Tons
November 1 - The Deadly Consequences of Scabbing
October 31 - Happy Union Made Halloween
October 30 - Wall St. Lays an Egg
October 29 - Alice Doesn’t Day
October 28 - The Pony Express
October 27 - The 1948 Donora Smog
October 26 - America’s Florence Nightingale
October 25 - NY Daily News On Strike!
October 24 - Eight Hours for Work, Eight Hours for Rest, Eight Hours for What We Will!
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