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In San Francisco, waitresses enjoyed not only a long tradition of separate-sex organizing among workers and city residents, but also a solid union-consciousness that resurfaced with a vengeance in the 1930s.13 Waitresses’ Local 48 organized first in restaurants patronized by union clientele, spread…

The NRA codes sparked organization in the culinary industry because they raised hopes of improved wages and working conditions, yet failed miserably in delivering on these promises. The problem was twofold: the codes themselves, largely determined by employers, were substandard; and employers viola…

Described in 1930 as little more than “an association of coffin societies,” the labor movement confounded critics by its unprecedented expansion over the next two decades, adding fifteen million members by the early 1950s.2 Culinary workers were not immune to the union fever: HERE nearly doubled it…

Waitresses turned to unionization as early as the 1880s, forming separate all-female unions as well as locals that included male waiters and other food service crafts. With the help of the Federated Trades Council of San Francisco and the International Workingmen's Association, San Francisco waitre…

Before the 1930s, few American workers were organized: in 1920, at the peak of pre-New Deal organizational strength only a fifth of the nonagricultural work force belonged to unions. The situation changed dramatically during the 1930s and 1940s as workers flocked to the labor movement and for the f…