“A Duty to Organized Labour and Workers Throughout the Whole Dominion” When the Winnipeg General Strike began on May 15, 1919 sympathy strikes in communities across Canada soon broke out. In British Columbia, the heroic Vancouver sympathy strike and Victoria’s four day stoppage are often cited as examples. (see bibliography). Read more…
Did you know that October is Women’s History Month in Canada? This year’s theme is #MakeAnImpact – we would like to highlight a woman in BC’s labour history who certainly did just that. Helena Gutteridge, ca. 1911 – City of Vancouver Archives [371-2693] The 1912 recession was difficult for all Read more…
With high unemployment and a recession in full swing, the Asiatic Exclusion League (AEL) was formed by the Vancouver Trades and Labour Council in August 1907, with the aim of “keeping Oriental immigrants out of British Columbia”. It is a sad and troubling part of BC’s labour history. Unfortunately, this Read more…
(Excerpt from On the Line: A History of the British Columbia Labour Movement, by Rod Mickleburgh [2018]) The thousands of Chinese immigrants who endured so much helping to unite Canada by rail left little record of their ordeal. But we do have one personal account written by former railway Read more…
(Photo credit: Past Tense Vancouver) Late in the night on April 13, 1903, labour organizer and longshore worker Frank Rogers was walking home from dinner and stopped by the Canadian Pacific Railway tracks at the foot of Abbott Street in Vancouver, BC, to check on the picketers from the United Read more…