“Present indications are that the citizens of Hamilton will have the privilege of walking, without the alternative of riding, on the trolley cars, after Thursday night of this week. Unless one side or the other recedes from the stand taken there will be a tie up of electric car traffic on the Hamilton Street Railway, the Hamilton Radial Railway and the Hamilton & Dundas Railway on Friday morning.”
“We May All Have to Walk After Thursday Night Next : Street Railway Employees Meet and Decide to Stand Fast to Terms They Have Asked : Company Refuses to Treat With Any But Hamilton Street Railway Employees : Representative M. Sinclair of Amalgamated Association Trying to Settle.”
Hamilton Times. August 30 1906.
It was a dispute that was long-brewing but was intensified by recent changes in the relationship between the two parties.
The management of the Hamilton Street Railway had little regard for the union representing the conductors and other employees of the company
The union leadership and the rank and file had constant issues with the company, notably concerning pay and scheduling.
In the summer of 1906, the dispute widened.
The Hamilton Cataract Power, Light & Traction Company owned the Hamilton Street Railway, the Hamilton and Dundas Electric Railway and the Hamilton Radial Railway.
The employees of the Hamilton and Dundas Electric Railway had recently joined the Hamilton Street Railway union.
The relatively new Hamilton Radial Electric Railway which ran from the Hamilton downtown core across the Beach Strip had only recently been put into operation Its drivers and conductors were part of the union.
The company treated the employees of each system differently although ostensibly the work being done was exactly the same. This was shown by the fact that a driver would be on one system one day, and then the very next day be scheduled on a different system.
However, the company insisted on there being three different contracts with each line, each having different pay scales and rules re scheduling.
“One of the local officers put it this way this morning : ‘We are all employed by one company. The same man makes up our time and the same man pays us all. We work on the Hamilton Street Railway today; tomorrow we are shifted over to the Radial; next day we may be on the H. & D. We go where we are sent and ask no questions. Only last week, even as late as yesterday, Hamilton Street Railway crews have been working on the Radial”
Management admitted that indeed drivers were moved around, but argued that it was done out of necessity in order to meet demands for service.
The company took a very hard line that each of the three lines was separate, and employees when working for one of the lines would have to be paid according to terms of that contract. A pay scale being exactly the same for all three lines would not be allowed.
The union strongly disagreed with the following statement regarding the Hamilton Radial Railway and the Hamilton and Dundas Railway made by the traction manager, Mr. C. K, Green:
‘We do and we will pay them the same as we pay the street railway men,’ said Mr. Green, ‘but we will deal with them independently. We are prepared to deal with our Street Railway employees at any time, as we have done in the past. We are also prepared at any time to deal with our H. & D men and our Radial men, and to use them fairly in the matter of wages and hours.”
Traction Manager Green also said that the union had only recently sought to bring drivers from the Hamilton and Dundas line into the union for the purpose of ‘making trouble.
The relationship between management and the union was already bitter and subsequent events would only make that relationship even more toxic.
An immediate issue which brought the problems being management and union to the boiling point related to the need for service for the huge number of employees working for the recently opened Hamilton branch of the International Harvester Company.
Street cars heading to the plant at the start of working day would be completely full. Indeed extra cars would have to be put in service. Later in the afternoon the situation was reversed. The company made money when the cars were full, but when they returned to the sheds empty in the morning, or were brought to the plant in the afternoon, the company made no money. Paying overtime to drivers to accommodate such a situation was not an option the company relished, preferring to just pull drivers from the other lines.
Relationship between the union and the Street Railway management got so bad that in person meetings were no longer being scheduled.
As shown in the Times of August 22 1906, a different way of communicating was instituted :
“No progress has been made yet towards a settlement between the Cataract Power Company and its employees on the Hamilton Street Railway, the Hamilton Radial Railway and the Hamilton & Dundas Railway, which promise to result in a tie-up by the end of the week. However, the employees’ committee has not given up hope, and having failed to get a conference with the company’s representatives, has decided to try what can be done by letter. This afternoon a communication will be drawn up and sent to Mr. C. K. Green, traction manager, setting forth the employees’ position upon the points in dispute.”
So began, on August 22, 1906, a series of letters between the parties in the dispute, letters which were shared for publication with all of the three Hamilton daily newspapers.
For example, the following from Traction Manager Green:
“John Theaker, President Division 107, Amalgamated Street Railway Employees’ Association:
“Dear Sir, Having reference to the disagreement between the Hamilton Street Railway Company and the employees of the company, I desire to say, and you must be aware, that there has been no want of inclination on the part of the company to meet your committee and to enter on negotiations for a renewal of the agreement. In fact, there have been several meetings already and it seems that the chief obstacle to getting down to real business is the employees of the Street Railway want to insist on regulating the terms of employment of the employees of the Radial and Dundas Railway Companies as well as their own. This cannot be agreed to, for various reasons which I need not now explain and it may as well be so understood now as later on.”
In the issue of the Times for August 22 1906, an editorial on the matter and advice for Hamiltonians was given:
“The deadlock between the Cataract Power Company and its employees of the Street Railway, the Radial and the Dundas line continues, and unless there is an early giving way, so as to render agreement possible, it is possible that citizens will be put to more or less inconvenience by the interruption of service. In anticipation of such a contingency, it would be well for those interested to so arrange their affairs as to provide against serious disappointment and loss. We are still hopeful that good sense will prevail and that an amicable settlement will be made, but it is the part of prudence to be prepared. Delay has reached the danger point, and a day or two will decide.”
(To be continued)
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