The 1933 cotton strike was the largest single strike in the history of agricultural labor up to that time. By then CAWIU organizers had gained practical experience, and they prepared carefully, holding meetings with farmworkers throughout Kern and Kings counties. They asked for one dollar per hundred pounds of cotton. The growers offered 60 cents. The strike began on October 4. Growers responded with attacks on the organizers and strikers. Local authorities looked the other way or joined in. The Kings County district attorney later admitted, “The sheriff and I told the growers not to worry much about the pickers’ rights.” Evicted from grower-owned housing, strikers camped wherever they could. State authorities eventually used federal relief funds to provide them with necessities. One camp near Corcoran housed some three thousand people.28