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General Textile Strike Thesis

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During the mid to late 1920s, North Carolina was ranked as the largest producer of textiles in the United States. They produced things such as yarn, woven fabric, and spun cotton. Many of the mills were located in the Piedmont region. To keep up with the high demand and the competitive market, owners would “stretch out” the workers. Workers in these textile mills were as young as five years old worked in the mills. Much tension was built up during this time, and surfaced when the US entered into WWI. Many workers lost their jobs and many were killed due to the poor conditions in the mills. Many smaller battles between owners and workers began in 1929, but weren’t successful. Even though the nationwide effort in the General Textile Strike overall was not a success, it did set a precedent for laws to be passed to forever change the workforce that are still enforced in today’s society. In 1929, when the United States entered the war, there was a significant decrease of …show more content…

The famous Ella Mae Wiggins, a popular speaker known for her ballads in support working women, was set to perform one of her famous ballads and speak at the at the strike. Early that morning, the owner of the mill, Manville-Jenckes, mobilized hundreds of men to attend the rally. They set up many roadblocks to trump the rally. Right before the rally began, a group of 22 unarmed union members, strikers, and sympathizers, including Ella Mae Wiggins, road in a truck from Bessemer City to the rally site south of Gastonia. Ella Mae Wiggins insisted that carrying weapons would further aggravate the situation, if they encountered people who did not support them. The truck hit the roadblock and was order to return to Bessemer City on “pain of death.” The strikers turned back and headed for Bessemer City. A short time on the road back home, they were ambushed by truck loads of armed

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