Homestead+Strike+of+1892

= __**Homestead Strike of 1892**__ =

COMPANY
Andrew Carnegie was the owner of the United States Steel which used to be the world’s largest producer of steel. Under his company, he also owned the Homestead Steel Plant in the state of Pennsylvania. He was known as a “captain of industry” as well as a “robber baron” because he used vertical consolidation to stop competition. Henry Frick was a millionaire who was the President of the company. As the years went on, Carnegie and Frick decided to cut wages and eliminate the labor union to help the profit due to the drop in steel price. This angered workers and caused them to be furious with both men. To settle this dispute, they went on strike.



WORKERS
The jobs of many were threatened by Carnegie and his wealth. He had come up with more efficient ways of making steel which made it unnecessary to have highly skilled and trained professionals working. Carnegie decided to cut wages as he saw that unskilled laborers could be employed in his mills. When he broke the news to the workers, the workers were furious. In addition to wage cuts, both Frick and Carnegie abolished the AAISW steel worker’s union. This caused all of the employees on the Homestead to try and seize the plant to prevent “scabs” who were replacement workers while others went on strike. They wanted this strike to have a devastating blow on the steel industries profits.



STRIKE
The Homestead Plant strike began on the morning of July 6th, 1892. Henry Frick had shut down the mill and installed three-miles of wooden fence topped with barbed wire around the perimeter. The workers were prepared to seize the plant when Pinkerton guards were hired by Frick to control the mill. Workers used anything they had for weapons; anything they could find would help in the fight that was brewing. The arrival of the guards began one of the nation’s bloodiest labor battles. Thousands of workers seized the guards in a battle that lasted 14 hours and resulted in the death of seven union workers and three Pinkerton guards. Although the guards surrendered, this victory was short lived as 8,500 members of National Guard took control of the plant. The union was relinquished 4 months after the bloody strike.



BACK TO WORK
After the National Guard took control of the strike, production started up again as Frick hired new non-union workers. After months of unemployment, the strikers were faced with returning to work. As the mill was making steel, the union had been broken and the mill was using African American and eastern European workers instead. It would be nearly 45 years before the steel industry would again be unionized by Franklin D. Roosevelt with the New Deal Policy.



IMMEDIATE EFFECTS
One of the strike's consequences was that the steel mills working hours were increased. They shifted from an eight hour to a 12-hour day, six-day work week, with a 24-hour shift followed by a day off, every two weeks. The workers were punished for the striking and they were receiving the same low wages as before. Labor was longer making things more difficult for workers to keep up. Along with increased work hours, the public opinion turned against the steel workers' union after an assassination attempt on Frick. People began to go against the union as some were arrested and tried with treason because of the revolts. Labor would not be changed until 1933, when Roosevelt was President.



= Resources =

__Primary Sources:__ - "Another Strike Threatened." //New York Times// 12 Dec. 1891: 1. //Historic New York Times//. Web. 11 May 2011.

- "The Homestead Strike." //New York Times// 16 July 1889: n. pag. //Historic New York Times//. Web. 11 May 2011.

__Secondary Sources:__ - "Digital History." //Digital History//. N.p., n.d. Web. 11 May 2011. .

- "American Experience . The Richest Man in the World: Andrew Carnegie . People & Events | The Homestead Strike | PBS." //PBS: Public Broadcasting Service//. N.p., n.d. Web. 11 May 2011. <http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex

- "Homestead strike." //American History//. ABC-CLIO, 2011. Web. 11 May 2011.

- Lens, Sidney. //The labor wars: from the Molly Maguires to the sitdowns//. [1st ed. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1973. Print.

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Rob Devaney