Women Workers and Industrial Action

I haven't looked at this section of the forum in ages. I think I might have something on this. Will get back to you.

Edited to add: Well I've had a look and I don't have anything. Sorry bout that.

A couple you might get in the library:

Obstreperous Lassies: a history of the IWWU
by Mary Jones
Gill and Macmillan (1988)

The only history of the Irish Women Workers Union from its formation in 1911 until its amalgamation with the Federated Workers Union of Ireland (which went on to co-found SIPTU).

Some useful stuff on struggles like the 1945 strike of 1,500 laundry workers, which after eight months won the right to a fortnight's paid holiday.

And the one in 1928 when the Dublin Box Company tried to cut pay by five shillings. Not only did the union stop the pay cut but it won a rise. This was exceptional at a time when the economy was in particularly bad shape and the bosses were on the offensive.

But this book relies too much on documents and minute books, and not enough on the veterans' own memories. There are still a fair few of them around - maybe some history student might look at doing a new history based on the women's own recollections?

Did your granny have a hammer? - a history of the Irish Suffrage Movement
by Rosemary Cullen Owens
Attic Press 1985)