Clara Lemlich: Labor Activist by Linda Harris Sittig

In November of 1909, she appeared as a will-of-the wisp young woman pushing her way to the front of the Union stage. Perhaps, she even stood a bit crooked, due to the uneven mending of bones previously broken by hired thugs.

At twenty-three, Clara Lemlich hardly looked the part of a labor activist, although she had already been arrested seventeen times for unlawful picketing.

Clara’s passion was to organize the other garment workers in New York City in a strike for more reasonable working conditions. At this point in time, female garment workers earned $6.00 a week. For that, they worked 11-hour workdays, six days a week.

Ms. Lemlich’s rebellious attitude stemmed from an early distrust of officials. While living with her family in a Jewish community in the Ukraine, peace ended abruptly in 1903. A violent pogrom (campaign of violence) launched by local officials swept through the community. After watching loved ones and neighbors beaten and killed, Clara’s family emigrated to New York City and settled in a Jewish neighborhood on the Lower East Side.

Clara, like many immigrant girls her age, got a job in the garment industry, working sweltering hours in a shirtwaist (blouse) factory. Disgusted with the humiliating way the female workers were treated, she repeatedly urged the Union to organize the women to strike.

The male leaders of the Union were not in favor. They wanted to concentrate their efforts in raising the men’s pay.

On November 22^nd Clara stood with the massive crowd outside the Cooper Union building in Greenwich Village, Manhattan. While the Union organizers argued for control, Clara had herself hoisted to the stage and commanded the attention of the crowd as she spoke fervently that unless the women garment workers went on strike, their working lives would never improve.

The women in the audience burst into spontaneous applause.

The next day, 20,000 out of the 32,000 workers in the New York garment industry went out on strike. And they stayed on strike until Feb. 10, 1910, practically crippling the industry. It became known as The Uprising of the 20,000. As a result, almost every factory agreed to a Union contract.

One factory did not.

That was the infamous Triangle Shirtwaist Factory that exactly thirteen months later experienced the worst disaster in garment workers’ history – the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire. One hundred forty-six workers, mostly female, perished in the fire or jumped to their deaths on the pavement below.

The tragedy left Clara heartbroken, but stronger in her resolve to help working-class women.

As a result of all her activist activities, Clara became blacklisted in the New York City garment trade. That galvanized her to turn her energies to work as a suffragist, arguing that American women could only improve their lives if they had the chance to vote.

In 1913 Clara married Joseph Shavelson, and together they had three children. The family moved first to East New York and then to Brighton Beach in Brooklyn. For several years, she kept a lower profile while raising her children.

Then in 1929 Clara helped to launch the United Council of Working-Class Women, which eventually had affiliates all across America, addressing working women’s issues of housing, education, and fair consumer pricing.

For the next several decades she worked tirelessly to promote the idea of improved labor conditions in American factories. With a charismatic presence, Clara roused working-class women to fight for their rights, battle unfair housing practices, and establish a control to rising rent and food prices.

The last recorded activity for Clara was in the 1960s when, in her eighties, she became a resident of the Jewish Home for the Aged in Los Angeles, California. While living there, she persuaded the management to join the boycott of grapes and lettuce, in support of the United Farm Workers led by César Chávez and Dolores Huerta.

Clara’s last activist effort was to encourage the staff of the Aged Home to organize together for better working conditions. She passed a few months late at the age of 96 years.

Thank you to Ed Jahn for sending me Clara’s name to research.

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~ Linda ~