Dreaming on Labor Day
According to the U.S. Department of Labor, Labor Day is “an annual celebration of the social and economic achievements of American workers.” But between cookouts, retail sales, and summer scaries, it’s easy to forget what Labor Day is actually about. In this post, I’m going to talk about Labor Day and dreams—which means I’m also going to talk about women and Lynn, Massachusetts.
Lynn, MA is a midsized city located just north of Boston and it’s widely regarded as a cradle of the Industrial Revolution in the United States. The remnants of Lynn’s industrial-era success are still visible. Attractive Romanesque Revival redbrick buildings line both sides of the city’s downtown streets. Lynn, MA was once the so-called shoemaking capital of the world, and the buildings were a prominent symbol of the city’s prosperity—and progressiveness.
The trend towards mass production meant that there was an abundance of jobs. And in Lynn, this also meant that there was an abundance of jobs for women. Throughout the nineteenth century, Lynn became a destination of sorts for single women—mostly immigrant women—who migrated to the city in search of jobs and the promise of economic independence. But the working conditions the women experienced were abhorrent. The poorly ventilated, cramped spaces they worked in were breeding grounds for tuberculosis, and they often worked twelve-hour days without weekends—all for very little pay.
In light of the shoe industry’s rapidly expanding profits, the women viewed their poor working conditions as a moral outrage. They agreed to march in the New England Shoemakers Strike of 1860—a pivotal uprising that fueled the US labor movement. Later, as women in Lynn continued to mobilize for fair working conditions, they set their sights on securing the right to vote, and their efforts gave rise to the suffrage movement. So by the turn of the 20th century, Lynn was an industrial hub and social movement incubator—a place where human rights in the context of capitalism were consistently contested and negotiated.
Historians of labor (like Mary Blewett and Thomas Dublin) often depict women at the forefront of these movements fighting for change. And of course, that is true. But that isn’t the full story. Women were at the forefront dreaming. They were dreaming about a world where they could work outside of the home and live independently. A world that recognized their efforts and compensated them fairly. A world where they could participate as equals. A world that didn’t exploit them.
Women in Lynn, MA dreamed of a world that was different—and their dreams were a crucial first step in building the forms of social movement power that could help make it happen.
