Solidarity Forever
For the Union makes us strong.
-Ralph Chaplin
Hellraisers Journal, Thursday March 28, 1918
Kansas City, Missouri – General Strike Is Spreading
Workers of Kansas City, both union and non-union, are rallying to the aid of laundry drivers and laundry workers who have been on strike now for about five weeks.The employers have repeatedly refused to bargain with their employees, and have even refused to meet with the federal conciliators sent by the U. S. Department of Labor.
From The Leavenworth Post of March 27, 1918:
GREAT STRIKE AT KANSAS CITY
NOW WELL UNDER WAY
—–
Walkout Began at Eight o’Clock This Morning
With Barbers, Bartenders and Brewers
in the Forefront of the Fray.
—–TROUBLE REPORTED THIS AFTERNOON
—–
Sympathetic Strike, Called to Aid Laundry Drivers,
Brought Out 700 Card Men
From Other Unions in First Call.
—–
Kansas City, March 27.-Kansas City today was in the midst of a general strike, the exact extent of which was unknown this afternoon. The strike began at 8 o’clock this morning and although labor leaders declared it would result in a virtual tie-up of all industry by tomorrow night, best reports indicated that so far only 700 union men, including brewers, bartenders, barbers and members of certain building trades unions had quit work. Men from other crafts were walking out this afternoon, however, it was said. No disorders had been reported to the police. The strike was called to support the walkout of laundry workers and drivers.
Street cars were still operating this afternoon and reports were current that members of the Street Railway Employes’ union had voted not to strike.
Late News Tells of Violence.
The first violence in connection with the strike occurred at 2 o’clock this afternoon when a crowd estimated at one thousand persons rushed a crowd of police reserves who had arrested three men in connection with the overturning of a laundry wagon. The officers used their clubs freely and the crowd responded with stones and fists. A number of persons were injured, none severely it was reported. The prisoners escaped during the tussle and only one of them was recaptured it was said.
Reports late this afternoon indicated that the strike was spreading slowly.
———-
[Inset is from Chicago Daily Tribune of March 27th.]
SOURCES
Labor and World War I 1914-1918
-by Philip S Foner
International Pub, 1987
-see pages 171-172
https://books.google.com/books?id=UMBWNCXcR8wC
The Leavenworth Post
(Leavenworth, Kansas)
-Mar 27, 1918
https://www.newspapers.com/image/109942864/
IMAGE
The Chicago Daily Tribune
(Chicago, Illinois)
-Mar 27, 1918
https://www.newspapers.com/image/355019126/
See also:
Hundreds of cooks, waiters, and waitresses are milling about outside the Labor Temple #KCGS1918 https://t.co/PpMUIAy69T
— Kansas City 1918 (@Jeff_Stilley) March 28, 2018
For a good summary of the Kansas City General Strike of 1918:
The Streetcar Strikes of 1917-18
by Bill Onasch
Coverage of KC General Strike begins:
“The second strike in March 1918…”
http://www.kclabor.org/streetcar_strikes_of_1917.htm
Women, War, and Work:
The Impact of World War I on Women Workers in the United States
-by Maurine Weiner Greenwald
Cornell University Press, 1990
-see pages 174-175
https://books.google.com/books?id=-zidwNs535gC
For more on Kansas City labor struggles Sept 1917-April 1918:
A City Divided:
The Racial Landscape of Kansas City, 1900-1960
-by Sherry Lamb Schirmer
University of Missouri Press, 2002
(search: “although local packers reported”
-coverage of GS: pages 62-64)
https://books.google.com/books?id=cFTxodD44OwC
War-time Strikes and Their Adjustment
by Alexander M. Bing
Dutton, 1921
https://books.google.com/books?id=w2kOAAAAYAAJ
Note re KC General Strike:
https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=w2kOAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover&output=reader&hl=en&pg=GBS.PA30
. . . But the most important general strike which occurred during the war itself (the Seattle Strike took place after the armistice) was that of March, 1918, at Kansas City. Here also the strike was sympathetic; this time with the laundry workers and drivers who had sought recognition of their union (a demand not sanctioned by the Government’s war labor policy). There seems to have been little disorder during the seven days that the strike lasted, until an attempt was made to run the street cars. Rioting then occurred and the National Guard had to be called in. The feelings stirred up by this general strike may have been in part responsible for the creation of the Kansas Industrial Court, which will be dealt with in subsequent chapters.
Search of Chronicling America: “kansas city” “general strike”-
https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/search/pages/results/?state=&date1=1918&date2=1918&proxtext=%22kansas+city%22+%22general+strike%22&x=11&y=16&dateFilterType=yearRange&rows=50&searchType=basic&sort=date