The Winnipeg General Strike overview

1. Predict: How might these images relate? How might they
differ? What is going on in each?
Think, Pair, Share

2. Terms To Know:
•Communism
•O.B.U
•Collective Bargaining
•General Strike
•Sedition
•Citizen’s Committee of 1,000
•Bloody Saturday

3. Winnipeg General
Strike
North Main Street, 21 June 1919, resulting in 30
casualties and one death

4. The Lead Up
Winnipeg
-Largest Western City

5. The Lead Up
1. Soldiers
-Lack of gov’t aid
(pension, medical)
-Few jobs
-Resented rich employers
(factory owners)

6. Returning
WWI soldiers
at Union
Station,
Winnipeg,
1919
Canadian Soldiers,
WW1
Returning
home, 1919

7. The Lead Up
2. Workers
-Poor pay
-Poor conditions

8. Rules of the Workplace
(Cigar Factory)
•10 hrs make up a day's work
•No one is allowed to stop
work during working hours
•All employees to be search
before leaving the factory
•Loud or profane talking
strictly prohibited.
•All employees wasting or
dropping tobacco on the
floor will be fined for each
offence.
•Hair combing not allowed in
the factory

9. The Lead Up
3. Influenza (Flu) Epidemic
-Passed along CPR lines
-Hit Winnipeg hard (1918/19)

10. The Lead Up
4. Communist Influences
-Russian Revolution (1919)
-”Worker’s Unite!”
-No private ownership
-High Russian Population

11. Power In Numbers
Unions
-organization of workers who
have banded together to
achieve common goals

12. Power In Numbers
O.B.U. “One Big Union” (1919)
-Represents all Canadian workers
-Main Weapon: GENERAL STRIKE!!
Strike Committee 1919

13. Power In Numbers
Collective Bargaining
-1 bargains on behalf of
the whole
e.g. Union leaders negotiate with
a company for better wages/
conditions for workers(union
members.

14. How It All Went Down
1. Metal Workers Walk Out (May 1919)
Demands:
-higher wages (85 cents/hour)
-shorter work week (60 hrs/wk -> 44)
-Right to collective bargaining

15. How It All Went Down
2. GENERAL STRIKE!
-30,000 Support Strike
-Strike Committee
-Winnipeg ground to a halt!

16. How It All Went Down
3. Citizen’s Committee of 1,000
-Business leaders,
politicians,factory owners
-Create Special Police Force
-Arrest strike leaders
-Fire civic workers
-“Sedition”
-threatening the state

17. Citizen’s Committee of
1000

18. How It All Went Down
4. Bloody Saturday (June 21, 1919)
-Parade: workers protest
-N.W.M.P. charge the crowd
-1 dead, 30 injured
-Many arrested

20. How It All Went Down
5. Workers Defeated
-Back to Work (Monday June 22, 1919)
-43 day protest ends

21. Results
1. Many strikers were not rehired

22. Results
2. Some strikers were rehired, but
forced to sign a contract:
Forbidding union involvement

23. Results
3. 7 arrested leaders served
prison time
J.S. Woodsworth:
-formed the Cooperative Commonwealth
Federation (CCF)  NDP

24. Summary
1. Winnipeg in a fragile state,
unhappy masses
2. Workers STRIKE to protest unrest
3. City grinds to a halt
4. Citizen’s Committee of 1000
opposes
5. Bloody Saturday – violence
erupts
6. Workers return back to work

25. Forum Question:
Were the workers justified in
their decision to strike?