Homestead strike

Homestead strike in U.S. history, a bitterly fought labor dispute. On June 29, 1892, workers belonging to the Amalgamated Association of Iron and Steel Workers struck the Carnegie Steel Company at Homestead, Pa. to protest a proposed wage cut. Henry C. Frick , the company's general manager, determined to break the union. He hired 300 Pinkerton detectives to protect the plant and strikebreakers. After an armed battle between the workers and the detectives on July 6, in which several men were killed or wounded, the governor called out the state militia. The plant opened, nonunion workers stayed on the job, and the strike, which was officially called off on Nov. 20, was broken. The Homestead strike led to a serious weakening of unionism in the steel industry until the 1930s.

Homestead strike (1892) A US labour dispute. It was the bitter climax of deteriorating relations between the Carnegie Steel Company at Homestead, outside Pittsburgh, run by Henry Clay Frick, and the Amalgamated Association of Iron and Steel Workers, who had refused to accept a disadvantageous new contract and ordered a strike. When Frick imported 300 PINKERTON detectives to protect the plant and the non-union workers, they were repulsed in an armed battle in which several people were killed. The state governor introduced state militia to restore order, and the strike failed. The union collapsed after the anarchist Alexander Berkman tried to kill Frick, and unionism in the industry was seriously weakened until the 1930s.