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March 8 is International Women's Day, a global day of recognition celebrating the social, economic, cultural and political achievements of women and girls, and raising awareness of the work left to be done. In the United States the entire month of March is dedicated to Women's History, while in Canada women's history is recognized in October.
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A group portrait of 13 female employees of Burrard Dry Dock in North Vancouver during the second World War (1940s). Ruth Franzen at extreme left, Lydia Jeal second from right in middle row. North Vancouver Museum & Archives 15315.
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Do you recognize any of the other faces in this photo? We'd love to know their names info@labourheritagecentre.ca
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Produced in co-operation with BC's Knowledge Network, Home Front, Work Front is a 2.5 minute video that explores the role of women in wartime industry and the effect of wartime production on working women’s lives. A lesson plan produced by the BC Labour Heritage Centre's Labour History Project gives teachers resources for discussing the video and goes further to make connections to images of women in wartime propaganda.
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An interpretive panel at the Vancouver Convention Centre is part of its Art Program sharing the history of labour in British Columbia.
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Full maternity benefits
Association of University and College Employees (AUCE)
Local 1 at UBC achieve breakthrough in 1974.
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Join guest host Bailey Garden for Episode 6 of our podcast On the Line: Stories of BC Workers. In its first collective agreement in 1974, UBC clerical and library workers achieved contract language that provided fully funded maternity leave for its members. It was a breakthrough not just for workers at UBC, but for families across the country.
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"Mr Boss, I'm As Good As You"
In the not-too-distant past typists and stenographers added upper and lower case initials to the bottom left hand corner of correspondence to indicate those of the author (in UPPER CASE) followed by those of the typist (in lower case) implying a subservient position. Typically the notation would look like this:
MLK/eep
This poem published in the August 1990 edition of the BCGEU Component 12 Administrative Services newsletter was a call to typists to change lower case letters to upper case. "'Cause though I'm a secretary, I'm an upper case person too."
MLK/EEP |
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Source: Twelve, BCGEU Administrative Services Component, Vol. 1 No. 1, August 1990, p.4. Courtesy BCGEU.
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Left: A poster celebrating 25 years since the establishment of the BC Federation of Labour's Women's Rights Committee.
Right: One of a series of posters produced by the BC Government and Service Employees Union in the 1970s encouraging women to join unions.
From the BC Labour Heritage Centre Archives.
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NEW FROM OUR BLOG: Rebecca Gibbs, a black woman working as a laundress in the mining town of Barkerville during the gold rush brings a rare woman’s perspective to the miserable working conditions early labourers endured in her 1896 poem "The Old Red Shirt". Read more.
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Ken's Book Picks for March
We continue our feature of titles "recommended for lefties"
by BC Labour Heritage Centre's Ken Novakowski.
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This collection of Jean Barman essays deals with the impact of colonization on Indigenous peoples and specifically addresses the experiences of Indigenous women during this time period. The essays cover specific situations that faced Indigenous women, including the impact of urbanization on their lives as well as life in rural British Columbia. It is one of the rare publications that actually identifies the role that Indigenous women have played in the building of this province.
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For anyone who remembers the murder of Patrice Lumumba, the democratically elected President of the newly independent Congo and the subsequent death of United Nations Secretary-General Da Hammarskjold in a plane crash in the Congo months later, this is a must read. If you had any suspicions about what forces were behind either of these deaths, the prodigious research done by numerous people over the intervening 60 years make it clear that the United States and the CIA were responsible for Lumumba’s death and probably for Hammarskjold’s as well. It is a fascinating, well-written read.
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This month in BC Labour History:
March 6, 1911 - The Battle of Kelly's Cut, Prince Rupert
March 6, 1945 - SS Greenhill Park explodes on Vancouver waterfront, killing eight
March 24, 1937 - Labour organizer Helena Gutteridge is the first woman elected to Vancouver City Council
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