Trades Hall Press January 2022
Newsletter from Sydney Trades Hall, home of the largest trade union historical collection in Australia
THIS MONTH: Have a laugh with the Wharfies; Sarah Peninton and the Timber Workers 1929; Broken Hill Lockout January 1909: a summary, some stories and cartoons; PLUS Parks for the People at Mascot Library
WHARFIES HAVE A LAUGH
Brecht may have written that the man who laughs has not yet been told the terrible news but wharf labourers and seafarers have been fighting to alter the terrible news for centuries. They can still manage a laugh about the work, the victories and the defeats (well maybe not so much the latter)
This year the MUA celebrate 150 years of unionism, with the Seamen’s Union having begun in 1872. It has been a hard battle over the years at sea and on the waterfront, but humour has also been central to MUA member culture. Legendary journalist Rupert Lockwood compiled a great little book in 1985. The title – Humour is their Weapon – sums up the laughs and the combat.
Some great yarns in the book. Chapter 2 is Lots in a Name. Here is a taste of the way they could dish it out, quick as a flash to fellow workers, union officials and bosses. No real names are disclosed!
The Mirror: union official who, when hearing a complaint from a wharfie, always said: “I’ll look into it”
The Vomiting VO: Another union official (Vigilance Officer) who promised complaining members “’ll bring it up on the executive.
The Lawyer: often had a hand in a case
Captain Sardines: He came from Norway
Photo Finish: Two brothers who, wharfies said, didn’t have a half a head between them
Tea Bags: Forever getting into hot water
Singlets; Foreman who was never off the workers backs
The Taipan: Supervisor who was very against the wharfies. When asked what caused his death, one wharfie said: “He ran out of venom”.
Preserved Peaches: always in the can
Daylight Savings: He put the clock back (a Melbourne wharfie who took the clock out of an imported Japanese car, became conscience stricken and put it back)
George Negus: Didn’t like working more than 60 minutes
Leaky Canoe: often had to be bailed out
If you can find it, lots of good laughs in Humour is Their Weapon: laugh with the Australian Wharfies by Rupert Lockwood. Illustrations by Mark Knight. Sydney: Ellsyd Press, 1985
Sarah Peninton Reserve
Walking through Glebe near Blackwattle Bay recently and found this park near what was the Hudson Timber. There is a good summary of the events that lead to Sarah Peninton and Doris Flanagan being arrested here and its connection to the second big International Women’s Day event in Sydney 1929 and the timberworkers strike (ultimately lost).
"On 8 March 1929, the Militant’s Women’s Group organised a second International Women’s Day rally at Belmore Park to support the wives and children of the striking timber workers. They also stormed the offices of the Timber Merchants Association, leaving its Secretary, Mr F H Corke ‘pale and trembling’.
Throughout the timber workers strike, Hudson’s timber yards was the scene for violent clashes between police, scabs, strikers and picketers. In July, hundreds of police arrived with their ‘basher gang’ to disperse up to 400 picketers. The following day, there were thousands of picketers outside the mill, and clashes ensued.
Women played an important role in the strike. Just weeks after the lock out, the Militant’s Women’s Group organised relief depots throughout inner Sydney to supply timber workers and their families with food. According to Mary Wright, one of the members of this group, they went house to house with the timber workers wives to collect food and to explain the position of timber workers to the mostly female householders. Donations were collected for over a year.
The involvement and support of local women and the timber workers’ wives ensured that the strike ran for over eight months. Apart from the work of the Militant Women’s Group in organising relief depots and public rallies to support the timber workers and their families, women fund-raised with dances, euchre parties and fancy dress balls."
The Wikipedia page is good too, with excellent references, including Issy Wyner’s story in the online book My Union Right or Wrong
(From The Sun 3rd September 1929; Other famous name in Australian left history such as Eddie Ward, Joyce Barrington and Esmonde Higgins also arrested)
The Glebe Society has a good walking tour on the web, and the reserve is a part of the tour
Several union leaders were charged with conspiracy when the strike ended, including Jack Kavanagh, Jock Garden (Labor Council secretary) and John Colbert, secretary of the Timberworkers.
My first thought was that Doris Flanagan must be related to Merv, the man murdered by strikebreakers in the 1917 General Strike on Pyrmont Bridge Rd not far up the hill from this action but this does not seem to be the case.
The Broken Hill – B.H.P. 1909 Lockout
January 1909 saw Broken Hill mass action against BHP
The mine owners locked out the combined Broken Hill unions for over 6 months in 1909, from 4th January. This was a very bitter dispute that was ultimately unsuccessful because of the forces of the government and lack of solidarity from other unions in Australia. For Tom Mann, sent to Broken Hill to organise the dispute, it signalled the failure of the Australasian system of conciliation and arbitration as employers were able to ignore the court ruling. The syndicalist and industrial unionist ideas that were developed in 1909 led to the successful Broken Hill disputes of 1916 for a 44-hour week, and the 1919-20 35-hour week campaign. These were won outside the arbitration system. The mine owners refused to honour agreements with the miners on no wage cuts, and ignored the Arbitration Court. The NSW Government sent armed police and helped organise strikebreakers. The workers set an example of action and the community set a great example of solidarity and support, via picketing, food supplies and coupons, and blacklisting shops and workers who opposed the locked out workers.
In Solidarity Forever Bertha Walker captured scenes from the dispute:
It was reported that there were 350 police there on January 9th. They were armed with carbines and revolvers.
At a meeting of 4,000 to 5,000 at the Trades Hall, Tom Mann said that several police were ashamed of their job. Some had told him themselves in the Post Office that afternoon.
He said, "Today we have witnessed some amusing sights along the line of lode. We have seen blue tunics and white helmets jumping about like kangaroos and wallabies, jumping and bumping along the lines of lodes and over the dumps."
The Arrests
On Saturday, January the 9th there was a huge number of people marching behind the band, union officials and pickets going on duty. On reaching Sulphide Street, it was found there was a line of police across the road and one of them shouted, "You cannot pass here. Go right or left." This was taken to mean that the police wanted them to go down Crystal Lane instead of crossing it. As they turned right the police blocked them and laid into them. Tom Mann was seized by a large number of policemen (some reports say six on each arm). The police grabbed the union banner, tore it off the poles and used the latter on the heads of the men, including the bandsmen. Mann and twenty-eight other men were arrested.
Female activists have been shown to to be the fiercest of the Broken Hill protestors. Dale records that “". . . The womenfolk that evening at least got some of their own back, for wherever a 'cop' was observed during the march he either received a 'back-hander' from a woman on passing or was spat upon. This happened not once but hundreds of times during that memorable tramp through the city's streets."
Mrs. Gibson, wife of the City Librarian, was subsequently charged with insulting the police. Her alleged remark is a classic: "Wade's never sweat bludgers from the slums of Sydney go back and live on your prostitutes!"
She was bound over in a sum of £20 to be of good behaviour for a year, in default one month's imprisonment.
She chose gaol.
Sandra Bloodworth’s Militant Spirits is very good
Mock Graves in 1909
Famously Tom Mann was one of those arrested in Broken Hill. He was then banned from speaking in NSW. So the people came to him and special trains ran from Broken Hill to Cockburn on the South Australian border. They were packed.
Mann’s experience of the Australian conciliation and arbitration system hardened his attitudes to capitalism and industrial unionism. "This experience of the admittedly most perfect Arbitration Court in existence, with a Labor Government in power, damped any enthusiasm I might have felt for such an institution."
He left Australia, rethought his industrial union approach, winning with fellow workers the great transport strikes in the UK in 1911. As he said of himself: "I am a dangerous agitator and a dangerous man. I am an enemy to capitalism. Knowing what I know I hope to be increasingly dangerous as the years roll by."
PARKS FOR THE PEOPLE
In November 1971, part of the former Rosebery Racecourse (now known as Eastlakes) was the subject of only the second ‘green ban’ in history.
This exhibition tells the story of how residents, with the support of Jack Mundey and the NSW Builders Labourers’ Federation, stood up to the powerful, wealthy developers and the politicians who supported them.
Parks for the People!
Eastlakes, Jack Mundey, and the Green Bans
Mascot Library, 4 Hatfield Street, Mascot
Monday 29 November to Monday 28 February 2022
Monday to Friday 10am to 6pm
TRADES HALL TOURS ALWAYS AVAILABLE virtually or for real life contact Neale ntowart@unionsnsw.org.au
