Local 12103 on Strike in Hopewell, Photograph, 1956

Hopewell, Virginia, was like many small towns in the south that benefited financially from outside industrial development early in the 20th century. At the outbreak of World War I in 1914, the E.I. DuPont de Nemours Company began producing guncotton at its new factory at City Point, located at the confluence of the James and Appomattox Rivers. Incorporated as the city of Hopewell in 1916, the area became known for chemical production. Other corporations followed DuPont, and industrial plants in Hopewell engaged in the production of numerous products including pesticides, textiles, and paper pulp.

The corporations built company towns under their control with housing, schools, churches, and other facilities for their employees. However, employees who sought better wages and working conditions faced the threats of being fired, blackballed (barred from being hired in other local factories), and possibly even losing their housing. Collective bargaining—joining together to secure better wages, conditions, and benefits—sometimes worked, but in Virginia and other southern states, many politicians were hostile to unions and often stoked racial prejudice to undermine their effectiveness.

When Congress passed the National Labor Relations Act (also known as the Wagner Act) in 1935, it asserted the right of unions to bargain collectively and created a National Labor Relations Board to ensure that unions would have protection and recognition. At this time, many factory workers across the country joined unions, and during the 1950s approximately one-third of the U.S. workforce belonged to unions. In Virginia, union membership remained at less than twenty percent of the state's non-agricultural workforce. Many workers in Hopewell joined unions, which also organized social events and recreational activities in addition to supporting workers on strike. By 1952, Hopewell had five local chapters of District 50 of the United Mine Workers of America (representing chemical, coke, and gas production workers), whose members had raised enough money to build a union hall in a town largely controlled by industry.

This photograph shows some of the members of Local 12103 of the United Mine Workers in January 1956. Workers at the Solvay Process Division of the Allied Chemical and Dye Corporation, the country’s leading producer of nitrates and nitric acid used in fertilizer, went on strike that month to protest the inadequate pay raises and benefits proposed by the company during a contract negotiation. The strike ended after three days, when the UMW representatives agreed to terms and signed the contract. While they had wanted a fifteen percent wage increase, they managed to secure a six percent increase, an additional paid holiday, a three-year agreement on the pension plan, and an adjustment for Black workers who received unequal pay.

Virginia was one of eighteen states that adopted a Right to Work law during the 1940s and 1950s. After the governor broke a strike in 1946 by unionized employees of the Virginia Electric and Power Comany, the General Assembly in 1947 adopted a Right to Work Law that outlawed labor contracts requiring a company's employees to be union members. The law remains in effect today.
 
Citation: Local 12103 on Strike, Jan. 26, 1956, Hopewell Virginia Locals of United Mine Workers of America Photograph Collection, Visual Studies Collection, Library of Virginia.

Find more photographs in the Library of Virginia's Hopewell Virginia Locals of United Mine Workers of America Photograph Collection online. 

Read a news report about the strike in Southwest Times, Jan. 16, 1956 online at Virginia Chronicle.

USII.3, USII.5, USII.7, USII.9, VUS.13, VUS.17, CE.6

Preview Activity

Look At It: Look at the photograph. What appears to be happening in the image? What makes you think that?

Post Activities

Current Connection: Virginia is an at will employment state in which the terms of employment may be terminated by either party for any reason, or no reason at all, upon reasonable notice. Although some unions exist in Virginia, they may not have the same power to influence business practices and policies as they do in other states. How might this arrangement impact the choices employees make in being willing to strike? Are there risks in striking? Explain.

Form An Opinion: If you were a worker at the time, would you have decided to strike for better conditions at the risk of losing a paycheck? How bad would conditions have to be for you to strike?

Artistic Exploration: Look carefully at the photo of the men on strike and the objects around them. What can you conclude about the six men featured? What do you notice about the barrel and wood in the photo and what might they have been used for and why