Gender, labor, and place: reconstructing women's spaces in industrial communities of western Canada and the United States

Abstract

Focusing on western Canada and US Pacific Northwest industrial communities during the mid-twentieth century, Laurie Mercier explores how myths about place and work have intertwined to reinforce gender inequalities in logging, mining, and longshoring. Through examining the activities of women's auxiliaries of the International Union of Mine, Mill and Smelter Workers, the International Woodworkers of America, and the International Longshore and Warehouse Union, the author traces how women actively reshaped the class politics, cultures, and spatial arrangements of their communities.

Notes

1. Gunther Peck describes how environmental and labor histories have long intertwined in the North American West in his very useful essay, ‘Nature of Labor’.

2. Quoted in Mercier, Anaconda, 204–5.

3. Women and Geography Study Group, Geography and Gender, 37.

4. As ‘international’ labor unions, the IUMMSW, ILWU and IWA had locals in both Canada and the United States. For a discussion of borders and the differences between the Canadian and US Wests, see Jameson and McManus, One Step Over the Line, xvi–xxiii; Coates, ‘Border Crossings’, 4; McManus, Line Which Separates, xx.

5. Hayden, Power of Place, 22.

6. In her detailed study of Flin Flon mining households in the 1970s, Meg Luxton finds that in over half of families men voluntarily turned over all or most of their wages to wives. More Than a Labour of Love, 165.

7. Diamond, ‘Union Man's Wife’, 289.

8. Although women's and labor historians have been somewhat discomforted by their roles as ‘auxiliary’ or secondary to men's unions, union auxiliaries have received persistent even if little attention. In addition to works cited here, see Merithew, ‘We Were Not Ladies’; Chateauvert, Marching Together; Pfeffer, ‘Women Behind the Union’; Levine, ‘Workers’ Wives’; Lasky, ‘Where I Was a Person’; Diehl-Taylor, ‘Partners in the Struggle’; Aulette and Mills, ‘Something Old, Something New’; and Rosenfelt, Salt of the Earth.

9. Diamond, ‘Union Man's Wife’, 288.

10. Murphy to Donaldson, November 13, 1962, Box 62, folder 16, Western District Union Files 1955–67, Ladies Auxiliaries, 1962–64, IUMMSW, UBC.

11. Quoted in Luxton, More Than a Labour of Love, 78.

12. Quoted in Mercier, Anaconda, 123.

13. Quoted in Mercier, Anaconda, 124. I explore this theme of domestic violence in the home more fully in Anaconda, 123–7.

14. Baker, On Strike and On Film, 174, 245.

15. Mercier and Gier, Mining Women, 6–7, 171–2, 177–9.

16. Bridges in Fox, History of Federated Auxiliaries, 11.

17. Beda, ‘“More Than a Tea Party”’, 134.

18. Sokalski, ‘Sherritt-Gordon Mine Strike’.

19. Baker, On Strike and On Film, 172.

20. Proceedings of 7th Annual Convention of Mine Mill Ladies Auxiliaries in Canada, Rossland, July 18, 1955 (17), IUMMSW, UBC.

21. 2nd Annual Convention of the Ladies’ Auxiliaries of IUMMSW, San Francisco, September 13–17, 1948, p. 2, Folder 2 ‘Natl Office Ladies Auxiliaries bulletins’, UBC.

22. Steedman, ‘Red Petticoat Brigade’.

23. Minutes 3rd Annual Convention of Ladies Auxiliaries of IUMMSW, Chicago, 1949, UBC; Steedman, ‘Red Petticoat Brigade’, 61.

24. MacDowell, ‘Paul Robeson in Canada’.

25. Proceedings of 7th Annual Convention of Mine Mill Ladies Auxiliaries in Canada, Rossland, July 18, 1955 (17), IUMMSW, UBC.

26. Polishuk, Sticking to the Union, 60.

27. Western Auxiliary Newsletter, Oasis, March 1961, Folder 7B, Western District Union Files Ladies Auxiliaries, 1955–67, IUMMSW, UBC.

28. Ibid.

29. Proceedings of 7th Annual Convention of Mine Mill Ladies Auxiliaries in Canada, Rossland, July 18, 1955 (17), IUMMSW, UBC. Many scholars have attributed more traditional meanings to the kitchen. Sian Supski, for example, notes that ‘kitchens are the repositories of feelings of intimacy and warmth, of security, comfort and belonging. Hence, the kitchen is a central site of creating a feeling of being at home’. ‘“It Was Another Skin”’, 139. I argue here that perhaps there is another way to think about kitchens, in home and in public spaces, which is more empowering.

30. Mine-Mill Union, April 1956; IUMMSW Auxiliary president Eva Pence, reports, ca. 1955 and 1956; Pence to IUMMSW and Ladies Auxiliary, n.d., Box 159, folder ‘Auxiliary’, IUMMSW, UC.

31. Minutes, June 11, 24, July 9, 1950, IWA Local 23-101, Box 1, UW.

32. Proceedings 7th Annual Convention Ladies’ Auxiliaries IUMMSW St Louis, September 14, 1953 (3–5).

33. Reid and Jencks quoted in Steedman, Suschnigg, and Buse, Hard Lessons, 8, 153, 171; Mine Mill Auxiliary Newsletter, July 21, 1955, and, Eva Pence, to members of the IUMMSW and Ladies Auxiliary, ca. 1957, Box 159, folder ‘Auxiliary Newsletter’, IUMMSW, UC. That the border and auxiliary separation remained fluid is represented by continued British Columbian attendance at Auxiliary meetings and conventions in Spokane, Salt Lake, and other US western cities.

34. Proceedings of 7th Annual Convention, Rossland, July 18, 1955 (17–18), UBC.

35. Murphy to Donaldson, November 13, 1962, Box 62, folder 16, IUMMSW Western District Union Files 1955–67, Ladies Auxiliaries, 1962–64, UBC.

36. Beda, ‘“More Than a Tea Party”’, 143.

37. Auxiliary member quoted in Steedman, ‘Red Petticoat Brigade’, 61.

38. Polishuk, Sticking to the Union.

39. Taylor, Foreword, in Fox, History of Federated Auxiliaries, 2.

40. Mercier, ‘Reworking Race’, 63; Stainsby, ‘“It's the Smell of Money”’.

41. Quoted in Mercier, Anaconda, 184.

42. Mercier, Anaconda, 188

43. Mercier, ‘Reworking Race’, 65–6.

44. Mercier, ‘Reworking Race’, 67; Klausen, ‘Plywood Girls’, 199–200, 223, 227.

45. A class-action lawsuit settled in 1978 forced Appalachian coal companies to open their tunnels to women. In 1977 women made up just 1% of the US mining workforce; by 1979, they had increased to over 10%, changing the mining landscape. Savage, ‘Re-gendering Coal’, 232.

46. Luxton, More Than a Labour of Love, 214.

47. Grimsley, ‘Hostile Workplace’; Quoted in Winter and Hemphill, ‘No Place for a Woman’.

48. Quoted in Mercier, Anaconda, 204. The gender shift in the workforce after shutdowns, when women often became breadwinners, is reflected more globally. See, for example, Marchak, Green Gold; Jung, ‘Just a Housewife?’; and Olson, Wives of Steel.

49. Rotman, Shared Spaces, 14.

50. McDowell, ‘Thinking Through Class and Gender’, 24.