1901

• 15% of women aged 14-years and up were part of the labour force.
• Women worked mainly as domestics, labourers, seamstresses and teachers.

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1907

Striking Women

Bell Operators go on strike to protest excessive hours.

Bell operators

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Valleyfield Textile Strike, Quebec

• Workers demand shorter hours of work, a living wage, and an end to abusive treatment by shop foremen.
• Women workers shut down the mills for 10 days.
• Workers lost this strike but their militancy leads to improvements in the industry.

1907 TextileMill

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1909

• The Criminal Code amended to criminalize the abduction of women.
• Until amendment, kidnapping of any woman over 16 was legal, except if she was a heiress.
• Fact: maximum penalty for stealing a cow was higher than for kidnapping an heiress.

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1910

• At the 2nd International Women’s conference, German socialist Clara Zetkin calls for creation of an International Women’s day. Later declared as March 8.
• Quebec legislation cuts work hours for women textile workers from 60 to 58 hours per week. Other legislation follows to limit work week.

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1912

• Women textile workers in Lawrence, Massachusetts go on strike, calling for “Bread and Roses”.
• “Bread and Roses” comes to symbolize women’s demand for equality and dignity.
• “Bread and Roses” song becomes anthem for Canadian women in the labour movement.

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1914 – 1918

World War I

• During WWI women worked in munitions factories while men went off to war.
• Increase in women working in all sectors– factories, offices, stores.
• Not all women had equal access to work – employers prefered single women “Mothers and wives need not apply”.

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1915

Helena Gutteridge

• Ensured that equal pay was written into the Vancouver Trades and Labour Council constitution.
• Forging of women’s groups and labour activism in 1918 results in BC’s first minimum wage law.

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