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Union Booms and Busts
Union Booms and Busts
The Ongoing Fight Over
the U.S. Labor Movement

J U D I T H S T E PA N -​N O R R I S
Professor Emerita
Department of Sociology
University of California, Irvine

JA SM I N E K E R R I S SEY
Associate Professor
Department of Sociology and Labor Center Director
University of Massachusetts, Amherst
 Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers
the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education
by publishing worldwide. Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University
Press in the UK and certain other countries.

Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press

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© Oxford University Press 2023

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You must not circulate this work in any other form

and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Stepan-Norris, Judith, 1957– author. | Kerrissey, Jasmine, 1977– author.
Title: Union booms and busts : the ongoing fight over the U.S. labor movement /
Judith Stepan-Norris and Jasmine Kerrissey.
Description: New York, NY : Oxford University Press, [2023] |
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2022054565 (print) | LCCN 2022054566 (ebook) |
ISBN 9780197539859 (hardback) | ISBN 9780197539873 (epub)
Subjects: LCSH: Labor movement—United States. | Labor unions—United States.
Classification: LCC HD8066 .S737 2023 (print) | LCC HD8066 (ebook) |
DDC 331.0973—dc23/eng/20230207
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022054565
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022054566

DOI: 10.1093/​oso/​9780197539859.001.0001

Printed by Integrated Books International, United States of America

For Rick and Kurt
 Contents

List of Illustrations  ix
Preface and Acknowledgments  xiii
Abbreviations and Acronyms  xvii

1. Introduction  1
2. Union Density in the Unregulated Period (1900–​1934)  44
3. Union Density in the Regulated Period (1935–​1979)  92
4. Union Density in the Dis-​Regulated Period (1980–​2015)  155
5. Conclusion  210

Appendix A: A Brief History of Major Modern Union Federations  239

Appendix B: Methodological Appendix  249
References  263
Index  277
 List of Illustrations

Figures

1.1. Aggregate union density, average by decade. 7

1.2. Union density by industry, average by decade. 8
1.3. Number of union members by industry, average by decade. 9
1.4. Employment by industry, average by decade. 10
1.5. Unfair labor practice cases, total and union-​filed by year 23
1.6. Number of workers involved in strikes, by year. 26
1.7. Strike rate (percent of workers involved in strikes), average by decade. 26
1.8. Strike rate by industry (percent of workers involved in strikes),
average by decade 28
1.9. Workers eligible to vote in NLRB elections, by year. 29
1.10. Number of total NLRB elections and union-​won elections, by year. 30
2.1. Unregulated period: Union density by industry, average by decade. 52
2.2. Unregulated period: Employment by industry, average by decade. 61
2.3. Unregulated period: Percent of the workforce characterized as craft or
technical/​professional occupations by industry, average for 1910–​1930. 62
2.4. Unregulated period: Percent of the workforce characterized as white or
male by industry, average for 1910–​1930. 63
2.5. Unregulated period: Number of workers involved in strikes, by year. 79
2.6. Bivariate relationship between number of strikes ended and strike
outcome, 1916–​1936. 80
2.7. Unregulated period: Strike rate by industry (percent of workers
involved in strikes), average by subperiods. 81
2.8. Unregulated period: Strike win rates for AFL affiliated unions in
high-​strike industries, average for 1900–​1921. 82
3.1. Regulated period: Union density by industry, average by decade. 94
3.2. Regulated period: Employment by industry, average by decade. 109
3.3. Regulated period: Percent of the workforce characterized as craft or
technical/​professional occupations by industry, average for period. 111
x List of Illustrations

3.4. Regulated period: Percent of the workforce characterized as white or

male by industry, average for period. 112
3.5. Regulated period: Number of workers eligible to vote in NLRB elections by
industry, average by subperiods. 124
3.6. Regulated period: Number of NLRB elections and union wins
by industry, average by subperiods. 126
3.7. Regulated period: Number of unfair labor practices filed
by unions and employers by industry, average by subperiods. 128
3.8. Regulated period: Number of workers involved in strikes, average
by subperiods. 133
3.9. Regulated period: Strike rate by industry (percent of workers
involved in strikes), average by subperiods. 134
3.10. Regulated period: Number of manufacturing workers involved
in strikes, 1927–​1950. 136
3.11. Regulated period: Number of public administration and
education workers involved in strikes, 1950–​1975. 137
4.1. Dis-​regulated period: Union density by industry, average by subperiod. 157
4.2. Dis-​regulated period: Employment by industry, average by subperiod. 166
4.3. Dis-​regulated period: Percent of the workforce characterized as
craft or technical/​professional occupations, average for period. 167
4.4. Dis-​regulated period: Percent of the workforce characterized as
white or male, average for period. 168
4.5. Dis-​regulated period: Number of NLRB elections and win/​loss
outcome, average by decade. 191
4.6. Dis-​regulated period: Number of unfair labor practice cases filed
by unions and employers by industry, average by decade. 194
4.7. Dis-​regulated period: Number of workers involved in strikes
by industry, average by subperiod. 196
4.8. Dis-​regulated period: Strike rate by industry (percent of
workers involved in strikes), average by subperiod. 197
 List of Illustrations xi

Tables

1.1. Percent of Employment by Occupation: 1910, 1960, and 2015. 17

1.2. Percent of Employment by Race and Gender: 1910, 1960, and 2015. 34
2.1. Unregulated Period: Characteristics of Industries with High,
Medium, and Low Union Densities. 87
3.1. Regulated Period: Characteristics of Industries With High, Medium, and
Low Union Densities—​Indicators From the Unregulated Period. 146
3.2. Regulated Period: Characteristics of Industries With High,
Medium, and Low Union Densities—​Emergent Indicators
Important for the Regulated Period. 147
4.1. Dis-​regulated Period: Characteristics of Industries With High,
Medium, and Low Union Densities. 201
5.1. Summary of Mechanisms by Period. 212
 Preface and Acknowledgments

The history of the U.S. labor movement presents several puzzles for interested
participants, labor scholars, and the public. Why were workers relatively suc-
cessful in forming unions in some industries and some time periods, but
not in others? How much do the economic, political, and legal contexts of
the time matter for union density? How have race and gender dynamics im-
pacted unionization prospects? What have unions and employers done to
enhance their power vis-​à-​vis their opponents and to change the terrain on
which their subsequent struggles occur?
Scholars have addressed these and many more questions, usually within
relatively short timeframes and focusing on certain industries, labor
federations, or individual unions. Some have a more long-​term historical
focus, while others tend to be more data driven. Our study builds upon this
body of earlier analyses. But this book is different—​very different. Our dis-
tinctive contribution lies in an analysis based on our unique and extensive
longitudinal data set covering 115 years of U.S. labor union and employer ac-
tivity in eleven industries. Using this broad and long-​term approach, we seek
to explain what accounts for the cyclical fluctuations of union successes and
failures as represented by union density.
Originally, we sought to collect and analyze data by union. Indeed, some
of our data is coded by national/​international union. But many of the factors
we consider are not systematically available at the individual union level.
So, instead, we opted to identify broad industry-​level patterns of union
strength within three major time periods using comparative and historical
analysis. We supplement these analyses with illustrations of events within in-
dividual unions and industries that typify these patterns. Since our focus is
broad, we necessarily omit many interesting and even important events and
developments.
Answers to the historical questions of this book, we believe, remain key
for understanding potential paths forward for today’s labor movement. This
analysis seeks to pinpoint the conditions under which unions were more
likely to successfully organize and maintain workers as union members and
when they were more likely to fail. Juxtaposing patterns that emerged during
xiv Preface and Acknowledgments

certain times and in particular industries with actions (or inactions) on the
part of unions and employers has the potential to provide compelling lessons
for moving forward.
Our research for this project began with visits to several archives, including
the U.S. National Archives (College Park, DC), George Meany Archives
(Silver Springs, MD, most of the data we found here pertain only to the AFL
or AFL-​CIO), Department of Labor (Wirtz) Library (Washington, DC),
American Catholic History Center and University Archives (Washington,
DC), NYU Tamiment Library (New York, NY), Cornell Catherwood Library/​
Kheel Center (Ithaca, NY), and Wisconsin Historical Society (Madison, WI).
We are grateful to these archives and libraries for allowing us to use their
collections. We also use data that have been available online. Some data that
we assessed online are no longer available at those sites.
The data that we have accumulated from all of these organizations and
sources are extensive. There are many types of analysis that would benefit by
their use. Therefore, we make this data trove available to everyone at no cost.
The data are accessible through the authors’ faculty profiles at the University
of California, Irvine and the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. We hope
that others will take advantage of this data to further our collective under-
standing of the U.S. labor movement.
Our project began in collaboration with Caleb Southworth. He spent many
hours visiting archives, researching, and establishing and working on the
complex data set we assembled. He has remained connected with the project
by providing valuable feedback. We greatly appreciate his contributions and
emphasize that we are solely responsible for the arguments and data that are
represented in this book.
Early funding for this project was generously provided by the National
Science Foundation (grant to Caleb Southworth and Stepan-​Norris, and dis-
sertation grant to Kerrissey), the University of California, Irvine Academic
Senate and administration, and UCI’s Center for the Study of Democracy.
We relied on scholars for crucial feedback. Early on, we assembled an advi-
sory board to inform our data collection decisions. We are appreciative of this
board, which consisted of the following individuals: Art Shostack (Drexel
University), Randy Hodson (Ohio State University), Kim Voss (University
of California, Berkeley), Dan Cornfield (Vanderbilt), Leo Troy (Economics),
Neil Shefflin (Economics, Rutgers), Barry Hirsch (Policy Studies, Georgia
State), Maurice Zeitlin (UCLA), Andrew Martin (Ohio State University),
Howard Kimeldorf (University of Michigan), Kate Bronfenbrenner
 Preface and Acknowledgments xv

(Cornell ILR), Dan Clawson (University of Massachusetts, Amherst), and

Margaret Levy (University of Washington). We are also grateful for the
well-​argued and insightful comments and suggestions we received on var-
ious chapters (or the entire manuscript) from the following scholars: Dan
Clawson, Mary Ann Clawson, Marc Dixon, G. William Domhoff, Michael
Goldfield, Howard Kimeldorf, Tyson Patros, Caleb Southworth, and anon-
ymous Oxford reviewers. The members of the UMass Five College Social
Movement Group gave us early stage, helpful feedback. We also thank the
faculty, staff, and graduate students of the UMass Labor Center, whose many
conversations helped to sharpen our thinking.
Several then UCI graduate students (all now PhDs) helped us with re-
search, data collection, coding, and analysis. We are grateful to Ben Lind,
Daniel Schneider, Tyson Patros, Christopher Zoeller, and Langou Lian. We
also owe thanks to current UCI graduate students Spencer Potiker, Sabrina
Nasir, and Darnell Calderon for helpful research, coding, and analyses, as
well as UMass graduate student Nathan Meyers. Early on, UCI undergrad-
uate students Christina Nizar and Daniel Rojas helped with coding and later,
Kai Soto-​Dessen helped with coding large strike information. Then high
school student Jadyn Tiong was also very helpful in the large strikes coding
project.
We are both indebted to our families and friends who have provided sup-
port and encouragement during this long-​term project. Stepan-​Norris is es-
pecially grateful to her husband, Rick, who read many drafts and provided
valuable feedback and for the regular interesting and stimulating dinner
conversations with her grown children and their partners. Kerrissey is
thankful for the support of her (growing) family during the many stages of
this book, especially the care from her partner-​in-​all Kurt, the laughter from
Ansel and Brio, and the encouragement from her parents, Paul and Carol.
And we acknowledge the working people who struggled and sacrificed
throughout the last 115 years by organizing unions to better workers’ lives,
reduce inequalities, and to increase overall democracy.
Union Booms and Busts represents our long-​term academic partnership; it
is a fully joint work.
 Abbreviations and Acronyms

ACORN Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now

AFL American Federation of Labor
AFL-​CIO American Federation of Labor-​Congress of Industrial
Organizations
AFT American Federation of Teachers
ANA American Nurses Association
BEA U.S. Bureau of Economic Analyses
BLS U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics
CBTU Coalition of Black Trade Unionists
CEO Chief Executive Officer
CES U.S. Current Employment Statistics
CETA Comprehensive Employment and Training Act
CIO Congress of Industrial Organizations
CLUW Coalition of Labor Union Women
CPI Consumer Price Index
CPS U.S. Census Current Population Survey
CtW Change to Win
CUAIR Construction Users Anti-​Inflation Roundtable
DOL Department of Labor
EEOC Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
EFCA Employee Free Choice Act
FIRE Finance, Insurance, and Real Estate industry
FLU AFL Federal Labor Union
FMCS U.S. Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service
HERE Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees Union
ITU International Typographical Union
IWW Industrial Workers of the World
NAFTA North American Free Trade Agreement
NAM National Association of Manufacturers
NCF National Civic Federation
NEA National Educational Association
NLRA National Labor Relations Act
NLRB National Labor Relations Board
NRA U.S. National Recovery Administration
OSHA U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration
xviii Abbreviations and Acronyms

PATCO Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization

RWDSU Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union
SEIU Service Employees International Union
TCU Transportation, Communications, and Utilities industry
Trade Retail and Wholesale Trade industry
TUEL Trade Union Education League
TUUL Trade Union Unity League
UAW United Automobile Workers Union
UFCW United Food and Commercial Workers Union
ULP Unfair Labor Practice
ULU United Labor Unions
UMW United Mine Workers Union
UNITE-​HERE United Needletrades, Industrial, and Textile Employees—​Hotel
Employees and Restaurant Employees Union
USCIR U.S. Commission on Industrial Relations
WLB War Labor Board
WTO World Trade Organization
WTUL Women’s Trade Union League
 1
Introduction

Forming and defending unions in the United States has always been a hercu-
lean task. Employers have a long history of fighting vigorously to bust strikes
and prevent workers from organizing—​ and, ultimately to dis-​
organize
unions. The government, including politicians, local officials, and the courts,
has provided unions only sporadic support—​and sometimes it directly op-
posed them. This challenging terrain for unions characterizes labor relations
in the 2000s, just as it did in the early 1900s.
And yet, throughout the last century, large numbers of workers success-
fully formed unions, with national trends in union strength developing a
wave-​like pattern. In the early 1900s, about one in ten workers were union-
ized; by mid-​century, that number had risen to one in three. But by 2015,
union density resembled the circumstances from a century earlier, with ap-
proximately one in ten workers unionized.
Scholars, union activists, and anti-​union agents alike hope to better un-
derstand what makes unions strong and what drives these patterns of union
booms and busts (Ashenfelter and Pencavel 1969; Clawson 2003; Goldfield
1987; Southworth and Stepan-​Norris 2009; Western 1999). Researchers
have analyzed a range of issues, including laws, economic factors, industry
structures, and the actions taken by employers and unions. Getting it right
matters: the fate of unions constitutes the single most important force for
elevating or sidelining workers’ collective voice, growing or checking in-
come inequality, deteriorating or improving working conditions, and per-
haps augmenting democracy itself (Fletcher and La Luz 2020; Lafer 2017;
MacLean 2017).
This book tackles these long-​standing debates from a unique angle. We
ask: Why have some industries become highly unionized in certain historical
contexts while others have not? Most scholarship focuses on aggregate na-
tional union density. We show that an industry-​level approach over a long pe-
riod of time reveals important patterns. For example, an entertainer—​say, a
musician—​was very likely to be unionized in the early 1900s, while a factory
worker was not. However, by mid-​century, factory workers were among the

Union Booms and Busts. Judith Stepan-​Norris and Jasmine Kerrissey, Oxford University Press.
© Oxford University Press 2023. DOI: 10.1093/​oso/​9780197539859.003.0001
2 Union Booms and Busts

most unionized. Only a few decades later, success in manufacturing unions

was surpassed by public sector workers, who had previously been largely un-
organized. What drives these industry-​level differences in unionization over
time, and what can we learn from them?
These debates have never been more important: by the twenty-​first cen-
tury, union density had slid to an almost unimaginable low. The economic
and social consequences of mass de-​unionization are staggering, including
increasing poverty, health disparities, and racial and gender inequities. The
largest contemporary employers, Walmart and Amazon, are largely union-​
free in the United States. While their workers face considerable challenges,
the owners of these mega-​corporations are among the richest in the world.
Even union strongholds—​from manufacturing to the public sector—​face se-
rious obstacles. The intense union organizing efforts of the 1990s and 2000s
did little to move the needle on union strength. Among labor circles, many are
asking: What is to be done? Historical analysis can help give us insight about
the contemporary issues that workers and unions face in America today.
Our expansive and detailed data set covering labor issues from 1900 to
2015 includes estimates of yearly memberships by union and industry level,
and data on union density, strikes, elections for union representation, filings
of unfair labor practices (ULPs), and workers’ occupations, gender, and race.
These data afford analytical traction to address ongoing debates about union
power and resulting union fates in the cycles of booms and busts.

Key Questions for Unions and Employers

Several key debates among the major players have resurfaced repeatedly over
the 115 years we study. For unions, the key question has been how to build
power, especially when the conditions appear to be unfavorable. Part of this
debate has focused on the proper strategy for organizing. Who should be in-
cluded, and who should be excluded? One strategy has been to build power
based on exclusive skills, with the idea that workers’ power is maximized
when they are able to reduce employers’ capacity to find replacements for
striking workers. This was the general approach of American Federation
of Labor (AFL) craft unions in the early 1900s, which consisted of mostly
skilled workers (and mostly white men), and aimed to control the pool of
available skilled labor. Inclusionary power, in contrast, builds power by
broad organization. We could think of race and gender here as well as skilled
 Introduction 3

and unskilled, supervisors and supervised, allies and community members.

Through expansive solidarity—​extending the terrain of struggle beyond in-
dividual workplaces or specific groups of workers—​unions have aimed to
shift power relations through inclusion. The goal here is to use solidarity to
get all workers onboard with unions’ main objectives, so that none are willing
to serve as replacements during strikes. Historically, the inclusionary vision
has garnered workers’ support, from the massive Industrial Workers of the
World (IWW) strikes in the early 1900s, to the formation of the more in-
clusionary Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) unions in the 1930s.
However, this orientation has also received intense pushback, from the state
(especially against radicals), employers, more conservative unions, and some
workers intent on upholding race and gender hierarchies.
Strikes and union militancy are another major touch point in labor his-
tory. What strategies and how much militancy should the collective use (e.g.,
single workplace strikes vs. general strikes; boycotts vs. using the union label;
NLRB elections vs. other actions to win power)? Under which conditions do
strikes compel employers to concede or state governments to create more
favorable laws? If workers are not well-​positioned to win strikes, what other
actions might work? How could unions maneuver themselves into being
better positioned to win strikes?
Unions have also debated how to improve laws and conditions that are
hostile, with an eye toward weakening strong employers and strengthening
workers’ rights. What is the balance among political efforts, community
alliances, and direct action? Other debates have centered on questions of
how unions should operate. Should they primarily “service” members or
should they have more of a participatory social movement orientation? How
should resources be deployed?
Employers have also debated how to organize themselves, and what sort
of strategies to use to dis-​organize unions, to gain state and public sup-
port, and to minimize the impact of strikes. A main question has been how
best to influence laws and the geographic scope of laws. At various points
over the twentieth century, employers also had to consider just how much
worker militancy they were willing to endure. During the massive strikes and
government actions of the 1940s, many employers were forced to bargain.
Decades later, more favorable options were readily available to them. Many
employers chose to relocate to union-​free areas, hire contingent workers who
would be less likely to unionize, use anti-​union consultants to beat election
attempts, or break laws to minimize unionization.
4 Union Booms and Busts

As we show, the contexts that unions and employers faced differed by in-
dustry. Throughout the book, we examine industry-​level union dynamics to
identify the factors that contribute to building or breaking unions. In doing
so, we shed new light on these long-​standing debates about what empowers
or weakens both unions and employers.

The Theoretical Argument in Brief

Structural explanations dominate existing union density scholarship,

emphasizing the importance of favorable structures for unionization, such
as laws, institutional arrangements, tight labor markets, and the location of
workers within the economic system (e.g., Ashenfelter and Pencavel 1969;
Kimeldorf 2013; Wallace, Griffin, and Rubin 1989; Wright 2000). Research
that compares country-​level unionization rates shows that institutions and
political alignments strongly shape union trajectories (Eidlin 2018; Western
1999). These studies suggest that how the state manages labor relations and
the institutional climate is key to understanding union density.
What employers do, and what the state allows them to do, also shapes the
prospects for unionization. Extensive research identifies the “employer of-
fensive” as key to undermining union strength (Domhoff 2015; Goldfield
1989b; Lafer 2017; Windham 2017). Many employers, with their vast re-
sources, have the advantage of being able to withstand long strikes, engage in
lengthy and costly court cases, hire expensive union-​avoidance consultants,
make large political donations to employer-​friendly candidates, and engage
in long-​term planning. Their offensive plays out in multiple arenas, including
workplaces, courts, and the halls of Congress.
Workers, for their part, have aimed to organize themselves and their
communities, weaken employers, and gain greater protection from the
state. Scholarship considering unions’ and workers’ options focuses on the
actions that unions themselves have taken to overcome unfavorable polit-
ical climates and hostile employers. Much of this scholarship elucidates how
unions have captured workers’ hearts and minds and developed social move-
ment orientations (Clawson 2003; Ganz 2000; Stepan-​Norris and Zeitlin
2003; Voss and Sherman 2000).
We draw on both structural and agentic perspectives to build a dynamic
understanding of industry-​ level unionization in America. Structures
matter, but real people—​along with their collectives—​must act to realize
 Introduction 5

structural potential and to change unfavorable structures over the long term.
Employers’ and workers’ organizations, sometimes with internal competi-
tion and differing strategies, have struggled to further their class interests.
We consider the major organizations on each side but mostly tend to how
these actors have aimed to shift the terrain of struggle to their advantage by
influencing political and legal climates and by building (or undermining) the
abilities of workers to effectively strike and organize.
Several related mechanisms have shaped industry-​ level union den-
sity since 1900. First, the state and macro context set the stage for labor re-
lations, including laws, institutions, and major events such as wars. Both
employers and unions have tried to influence this stage over the 115 years
that we study. Second, replacement costs of workers influence unionization
patterns. Workers are better positioned to form and maintain unions when
they are difficult to replace. If employers can easily replace strikers or union
leaders with “docile” workers, unions flounder. Third, organizing strategies
of unions and employers—​or how they make or break solidarity—​also shape
unionization. We pay particular attention to how unions aim to build strikes
and solidarity—​and how employers try to break them. Finally, although
less of a mechanism and more of a correlate, race and gender dynamics per-
meate U.S. labor relations. Women and workers of color have been dispro-
portionately employed in industries with lower unionization levels, due to
employers’ hiring patterns, opportunities for skill acquisition, and laws, and
they have faced unique challenges to organizing.
These factors evolved over the century, as both employers and unions
experimented with new strategies to build power. We distinguish between
three broad periods of labor relations, each the subject of a chapter: unregu-
lated (1900–​1934), regulated (1935–​1979), and dis-​regulated (1980–​2015).
For each period, we examine how these major mechanisms relate to union
density. We then summarize the main actions and strategies that employers
and unions used to fortify their positions during these periods.
What the state did (or didn’t) do is crucial to understanding unionization—​
and both unions and employers have sought to influence the basic terrain of
struggle. Sometimes conditions provide openings for unions to secure state
support. These occur most often when replacement costs are high, disrup-
tive capacity is high (through strikes or other actions), and workers pro-
vide strong support for progressive politicians who are willing to push for
workers’ rights. Likewise, maintaining state support is dependent on union
power and workers’ disruptive capacities: as union power declines, pro-​labor
6 Union Booms and Busts

legislation erodes. Still, even in unfavorable political climates, some workers

have had success unionizing. We mainly see this success when workers’ re-
placement costs are high, strikes are high, workers have a union (rather than
a professional association) orientation, and where employers are relatively
less aggressive against union efforts (such as in the public sector during our
later periods). We find that race, gender, and skill divisions (or solidarities)
intertwine with union prospects in each period.

A Bird’s-​Eye View of Union Power

We take a bird’s-​eye view of union power, stepping back to see broad trends
in industry-​level unionization over time. We capture union power by meas-
uring union density, which is the ratio of unionized workers to all workers.
Higher union density not only means that more workers are unionized but
also helps unions to be more powerful. With less non-​union competition,
unions have a more credible “threat” effect vis-​à-​vis non-​union employers
(Western and Rosenfeld 2011), which helps them to secure better working
conditions and attract new members. Higher overall union density also
means that unions have a larger base with which to influence the political
arena (Kerrissey and Schofer 2013). Union density doesn’t capture all of
the complex ways that organized workers may be powerful. It does not ac-
count for workers involved in worker centers or political organizations. It
also doesn’t account for instances of low density but the presence of a highly
mobilized membership (or vice versa, high density, but a membership that
is not mobilized). However, union density does provide a useful measure
that can be compared across time and industry, and we think it is the best
measure available.
Figure 1.1 presents the aggregate union density over the last century
through 2015. Aggregate unionization was relatively low but rising in the
early 1900s, peaked mid-​century, and steadily declined for the next fifty-​plus
years.1

1 The 1950s peak is similar to union density estimates by the Congressional Research Service

(2004), which estimates the peak in 1954 to be 28.3 percent of total employment (and 34.8 per-
cent of all wage and salary employment). To remain consistent over the 115 that we study, we use
census employment estimates (the employment base includes agricultural workers and independent
contractors). See “Methods” section for details.
 Introduction 7

30
1950s
1960s
1970s

1940s
1980s
Percent Union Density
20

1990s
2000–’15

1930s
1920s
10

1910s
0

Figure 1.1 Aggregate union density, average by decade.

But industry-​level analyses reveal a far more interesting story, due to

substantial variation by industry (see Figure 1.2). We analyze eleven major
industries since 1900 (see “The Census and Industry Categories” section
of this chapter for details): agriculture, forestry, and fisheries; mining; con-
struction; manufacturing; transportation, communication, and utilities
(TCU); wholesale and retail trade; finance, insurance, and real estate (FIRE);
personal services; entertainment; health services; and public administration
and education.
A handful of industries maintained moderate to high levels of unioniza-
tion for most of the twentieth and early twenty-​first centuries: construction,
mining, TCU and entertainment. Two industries moved from relatively low
unionization to much higher: manufacturing and public administration/​ed-
ucation. Personal services and health services established some union pres-
ence over the century. A handful of industries had minimal unionization
throughout the period, including retail and wholesale trade; FIRE; and agri-
culture, fisheries, and forestry.
All industries grew in unionization during the regulated period (1935–​
1979) and several secured major gains. In fact, all of the industries that had
higher density in the early 1900s (construction, mining, TCU, and entertain-
ment) as well as manufacturing gained over 50 percent density during the
8 Union Booms and Busts

80
60
Percent Union Density
40
20
0

ft

al

lth

Ag
uc
en

ad
in
tio

R
M

on
TC

ea
Ed

FI
m
in

Tr
uc

rs

H
in
M

ic/

Pe
tr

rta
ns

bl
te

Pu
Co

En

10s 20s 30s 40s 50s

60s 70s 80s 90s 00–15

Figure 1.2 Union density by industry, average by decade.

TCU, transportation, communication and utilities; Entertainment, includes arts and recreation,
Mft, durable and nondurable manufacturing; Public/​Educ, public administration and education;
Personal, personal services, including lodging; Health, hospitals and all other health facilities; Trade,
wholesale and retail trade; FIRE, finance, insurance, and real estate; Ag, agriculture, fisheries, and
forestry.

regulated period. Unionization then generally eroded, especially after the

1970s. However, the extent of the erosion also varied. Mining experienced
a huge decline—​from over 60 percent density mid-​century to 13 percent in
the twenty-​first century. Personal services, health, and trade were not ini-
tially highly unionized but also did not experience as severe a decline. Public
administration/​education, on the other hand, did not experience a similar
drop, and was unique in its success in maintaining relatively high unioniza-
tion levels into the twenty-​first century.
A key question is what we should consider to be high, medium, or low
union density. We base our answer on the specific U.S. context we study. We
deem high density to be industries where over 20 percent of workers were
unionized. This threshold would be considered far too low for many other
industrialized countries, and it is even low for the height of our second pe-
riod. However, within the U.S. context over 115 years, there aren’t many time
 Introduction 9

periods or industries that sustain over 20 percent density, making it a rea-

sonable cutoff. A more apt description would be “high density for the U.S.
20th and early 21st context.” We deem medium industry density to be 5–​
20 percent density and low industry density to be under 5 percent. We use
these high, medium, and low categories as a useful way of categorizing union
strength.
Because union density is the ratio of union members to employment, and
employment grew and shifted over the century, density does not map di-
rectly onto the number of union members by industry. Industries with high
density did not necessarily have the most union members. For example, con-
struction, mining, TCU, and entertainment were high density for most of
the twentieth century. However, their absolute membership numbers pale
in comparison to manufacturing and, in later decades, to public administra-
tion/​education, as Figure 1.3 shows. By contrast, health services and trade
both had less impressive union density in the late twentieth century—​but
still had more absolute members than the historically highly organized
industries such as mining and entertainment.
10,000
8,000
Members (in thousands)
6,000
4,000
2,000
0

ft

al

lth

de

RE

Ag
uc
en
in
tio

on
TC

a
ea
Ed

FI
m
in

Tr
uc

rs

H
in
M

ic/

Pe
tr

rta
ns

bl
te

Pu
Co

En

00s 10s 20s 30s 40s 50s

60s 70s 80s 90s 00–15

Figure 1.3 Number of union members by industry, average by decade.

10 Union Booms and Busts

Overall employment, as well as industry employment, changed dramati-

cally over the century. Figure 1.4 shows employment by industry, based on
census estimates beginning in 1910. Even in the early 1900s, manufacturing
employed a substantial proportion of the labor force, and by mid-​century
it had become the dominant employer. While manufacturing had only
10 percent organized in 1910, it grew to nearly 50 percent union density by
the 1950s. Had that unionization surge not occurred, the aggregate union
density trajectory would have been much smaller—​and the actual working
conditions of manufacturing workers would have been much different. In
other words, a good part of the surge in aggregate density that we see in
Figure 1.1 is due to the organization of manufacturing.
As the economy changed, the labor movement faced new challenges. By
the twenty-​first century, retail and wholesale trade had come to dominate
employment, surpassing the employment numbers in the union strongholds
of manufacturing and public administration. Low union density in this large
industry pulled overall density downward. Going forward, it is difficult to im-
agine a contemporary increase in aggregate union density without organizing
the trade sector. An opposite dynamic occurred in agriculture: it had large
30
Employment (in millions)
20
10
0

ft

c.

al

RE

Ag
en

ad
in

lt
tio

du

on
TC

ea

FI
m
in

Tr
uc

/E

rs

H
in
M

Pe
tr

ic
rta
ns

bl
te

Pu
Co

En

10s 20s 30s 40s 50s

60s 70s 80s 90s 00–15

Figure 1.4 Employment by industry, average by decade.

 Introduction 11

employment and very low union density in the early period, contributing to
overall low density. In later periods, its union density remained very low, but
agricultural employment declined drastically. So by the dis-​regulated period,
its consequence for overall union density had declined.
The majority of Americans (and workers) report that they approve of labor
unions, and that has been true for almost every year since the Gallup Poll
began polling in 1936 (Gallup Poll 2022). But, as we discuss in Chapter 4,
organizing new union workplaces has become increasingly difficult in re-
cent decades, and unions made few new inroads, especially in the growing
trade sector. Unions working there need new strategies and reinvigorated
support to counter the structural and employer-​based obstacles they face. As
we discuss in Chapter 3, two industries that were union-​resistant early on—​
manufacturing and public administration—​grew to have large employment
by mid-​century and, with great effort, unions won widespread unionization
there. It can happen in trade, too.

Orienting Mechanisms: Understanding Union Booms and

Busts by Industry Over Time

To understand union booms and busts by industry, we focus on the evolu-

tion of key mechanisms: the role of the state and macro context, replacement
costs, and union and employer organizing strategies. Throughout, we con-
sider the role of race and gender dynamics. As actors act on and change these
factors, they create altered conditions for each subsequent period.

The State and Macro Context

State actions and macro-​contexts set the stage for labor relations. In partic-
ular, laws and institutions that effectively protect the ability of workers to or-
ganize and maintain unions are important to understanding union density.
Cross-​national comparative studies stress the importance of state
institutions for explaining union density. The scholarship is clear: countries
with more robust labor institutions and supportive political configurations
have had higher density—​or at least less decline in the contemporary era—​
than countries with less supportive institutional arrangements. Scholars
point to the strength of factors such as leftist political parties, centralized
12 Union Booms and Busts

collective bargaining, and union-​administered unemployment insurance to

account for differences in union strength (Carré and Tilly 2017; Ebbinghaus
and Visser 1999; Eidlin 2018; Wallerstein and Western 2000; Western 1999).
Our analyses build on this literature in two ways. First, we document how
employers and unions have attempted to influence state actions and the
macro-​context in the United States since 1900. Second, we show how state
actions and macro-​contexts have varied by industry, which in turn has im-
pacted where and how unions grow.
Employers and unions are well aware that labor laws, political alignments,
and economic policy shape the playing field, and both have worked hard
to impact them. As aptly put by U.S. labor historian Erik Loomis (2018,
7): “There is simply no evidence from American history that unions can suc-
ceed if the government and employers combine to crush them. All the other
factors are secondary.” Throughout our three periods, employers fought re-
lentlessly to win the support of the state—​or at least lax enforcement of labor
laws (De Leon 2015; Domhoff 2015; Griffin, Wallace, and Rubin 1986; Lafer
2017). For their parts, unions and workers have also aimed to influence laws
and policies through lobbying and rallying around labor-​friendly politicians.
Importantly, workers’ strike waves have been critical to winning big institu-
tional change. Most major advances to U.S. labor law have come on the heels
of widespread strikes and disruption (Goldfield 1989a, 1989b).
For most of its history, the United States has had relatively decentralized
bargaining and weak labor institutions, especially compared to many
European countries. However, within the United States, the role of the state
has varied over time, and some industries have received greater state support
than others. In the early 1900s the state did very little to bolster the existence
of unions. The institutional environment changed dramatically in the 1930s
with the passage of the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA). Importantly,
the NLRA regulated union activity for most private sector industries. It
also created the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to govern union
elections and ULP cases. Notably, the NLRA and subsequent laws did not
cover some types of workers, including those disproportionately comprised
of women and workers of color, such as the public sector, agricultural
workers, and domestic workers (Perea 2011). Later, after significant strikes,
many states adopted laws to allow for public sector collective bargaining
(Dixon 2020; Goldfield 1987; Valletta and Freeman 1988). By the turn of the
twenty-​first century, many of the laws established during the New Deal and
later in individual states were either weakened or less protective in practice
 Introduction 13

due to changes in the organization of work, court decisions that narrowed

workers’ rights, and the passage of newer restrictive laws. Courts have played
an especially central role in shaping U.S. labor relations policy. While New
Deal legislation in the 1930s established workers’ rights to organize and
strike, in decision after decision, the courts have slowly chipped away those
rights (McCammon 1993). The cumulative effect has eroded workers’ right
to organize and placed extreme limitations on their right to strike. A host of
new regulations also emerged that further eroded union strength, such as the
deregulation of transportation industries in the 1980s, which made union
organizing in trucking and air more difficult.
Although political power is important in understanding state actions,
throughout our 115-​year coverage, the United States maintained a two-​party
system, and neither of the parties proports to directly or even predominantly
represent workers and unions. Rather, U.S. unions have been junior partners
in the Democratic Party coalition, and no matter their contributions to po-
litical campaigns, normally receive only partial attention in return. Still, the
more favorable court and government appointments as well as legislation
enacted by Democratic politicians have been more beneficial to unions than
those enacted by Republicans.
The state’s decisions to enter wars, implement trade deals, and deploy
the National Guard, as well as its reaction to major economic swings also
have important consequences for labor relations. New wartime demand for
munitions and war supplies drives the development of political representa-
tion schemes (National War Labor Boards) to negotiate the new economic
dynamics, including labor shortages, augmented production schedules,
wage and price freezes, and so forth. The War Labor Board during World War
II restricted workers’ right to strike (though workers did not always comply)
in exchange for other union fortifications. And much of the New Deal leg-
islation, following the upheavals spurred by the Great Depression, aimed
to protect union organizing and to institutionalize collective bargaining.
Conversely, trade deals, such as the North American Free Trade Agreement
(NAFTA), created new possibilities for capital flight and global competition
over wages.
Economic factors also set the stage for unionization prospects. Unions
operate within specific economic contexts, which lay the foundation for
their organization. Economists have stressed the importance of economic
factors, from inflation and unemployment to business cycles (Ashenfelter
and Pencavel 1969) in determining unions’ fate. The economic context is
14 Union Booms and Busts

intertwined with our concept of replacement costs and state actions, because
business cycles and government policies tighten or loosen the demand for
labor, thereby situating more or less power with employers or unions. Usually
unemployment, by increasing the available supply of labor, lowers workers’
bargaining power. Yet during the Great Depression, the most extreme eco-
nomic downturn of the twentieth century, accumulated grievances among
workers and the unemployed helped to fuel the rise of the CIO. Inflation
decreases the value of wages, thereby increasing workers’ sense that their
wages are insufficient.
It is also important to note that in addition to regulating labor relations,
the government also employs federal, state, and local workers. The public
sector differs from the private sector in significant ways, and this difference
has shaped union trends. Unionism came first in the private sector due to
harsh laws and policies in force in the public sector during the unregulated
period. For example, the executive order known as the gag rule (1902–​1912)
forbade federal workers from seeking to “influence legislation in their own
behalf ‘individually or through associations, save through the heads of their
departments.’ ” And after World War I many local governments passed laws
prohibiting public servants (police, firefighters, teachers) from organizing
and striking (Spero 1972, 3–​4). This strong aversion to public unionism ex-
tended through the 1950s, when new legislation began to provide collective
bargaining rights to some public workers (with restrictions on the right to
strike and some collective bargaining issues) (Budd 2008). However, the
strong aversion to public sector unionization faded somewhat with the
spread of collective bargaining laws and the growth of public sector un-
ionism. Public sector employment grew substantially over the century, and
by the late twentieth century, public sector employers took less aggressive
anti-​union positions than private sector employers. Public sector unions
were much more likely to win union elections (Bronfenbrenner and Juravich
1994), and these workers were more successful in forming and defending
their unions compared to many private sector workers at the turn of the
twenty-​first century. The unique characteristics of the public sector create
important differences in the ways public sector unions organize and use
strikes. Public sector unions tend to focus on their political positions and
coalition building rather than their market positions. And unlike in the
private sector, much public sector work is regulated at the state level, with
varying strike restrictions by state, occupation, and time period. One of
the eleven industries that we analyze (public administration/​education) is
 Introduction 15

almost entirely public and another (health services) has a substantial public
component.
In sum, the state plays a major role in union formation—​and precisely be-
cause of that, employers and unions have tried to influence laws, institutions,
and politics. We see that industries have had different experiences with state
regulation, which partially explains variations in union density. Next, we turn
to another important factor in shaping union density: replacement costs.

Replacement Costs

We define replacement costs as the ease with which employers replace

workers when they act collectively, especially when they strike. Strikes are
the most powerful form of direct action because they have the potential to
create crises for employers—​and occasionally for politicians. However, when
employers more easily replace strikers with non-​striking workers (also called
“scabs”) and continue business as usual, they are better able to diffuse strikes’
power. At their core, replacement costs are about power relations. Workers
were able to form and maintain unions because they had power to do so—​
they raised employers’ costs until they relented. Although strikes have his-
torically been the main arena for replacements, some employers have also
sought to replace workers who may become engaged in collective action, in-
cluding by firing leaders of organizing drives or moving entire plants to non-​
union locations.
Both employers and unions have actively aimed to shape replacement
costs to their favor. While some replacement cost factors reflect structural
features, they also reflect the strategies and actions of workers and employers.
On the structural side, labor laws (and their enforcement) impact whether
workers can be replaced when they strike or engage in collective actions. In
addition, some workers have greater disruptive capacities because of their
strategic locations, especially those able to produce “bottlenecks” in inter-
dependent economic systems. Workers in logistics and some manufacturing
industries possess this sort of positional power to disrupt production
(Perrone 1983; Wallace, Griffin, and Rubin 1989). Similarly, the concept of
“structural power” shows how some workers are better positioned in the ec-
onomic system to disrupt production (Silver 2003; Wright 2000). Still, we
see instances where workers were successful in organizing “non-​strategic”
industries, such as entertainment. While strategic and locational advantages
16 Union Booms and Busts

are helpful for unionization, we focus on how both structures and actions
impact replacement costs, which we think is key to understanding union
density.
We build on the work of Howard Kimeldorf (2013), who shows that high
replacement costs were critical to explaining where unions were able to
gain footholds in the early 1900s. Kimeldorf argues that some workers had
greater disruptive capacity because they had a higher cost of being replaced
during strikes. These workers were able to generate strikes that were costly
for employers—​and therefore more likely to be successful. In turn, they were
able to form durable unions. Three conditions were associated with high re-
placement costs in the early 1900s: scarcity of skilled labor, time-​sensitive
tasks that made replacement workers impractical, and geographically iso-
lated worksites that raised the cost of importing strike breakers (Kimeldorf
2013). We extend this work by expanding the concept of skill (to include pro-
fessional and technical workers), by showing how strikes mattered, and by
analyzing how these features interacted with race, gender, and professional
organizations.
We demonstrate how replacement costs evolved over time, and we con-
sider how new factors influenced replacement costs over time. New laws,
organizing tactics, and work arrangements all shaped relative replacement
costs as the century progressed, giving unions the advantage at mid-​century.
By the close of the dis-​regulated period, employers regained the upper hand
in terms of replacement costs, and in turn, unions struggled to maintain
themselves.

Scarcity of Skilled Labor

One component of high replacement costs is a scarcity of “skilled” labor.
Highly skilled workers have higher replacement costs because their skills are
scarce, and therefore fewer workers are available to serve as strike breakers.
The concept of “skill” is itself shaped by gender and race, with occupations
dominated by women and workers of color considered less skilled and
compensated at a lower rate (Branch 2011; Steinberg 1990). Most scholar-
ship of the early 1900s identifies craft work as high skill. We broaden this
conceptualization, adding that technical and professional workers were also
high skill, holding unique skills that required training and/​or education,
and could not easily be replaced with untrained workers. These workers,
in theory, could have more readily formed unions, as they had the poten-
tial to leverage their replacement costs. However, most of these technical and
 Introduction 17

professional workers did not form unions until much later in the twentieth
century.
We use broad occupational categories to identify workers who may be
hard to replace due to rare skills, credentials, or other forms of closure: craft
workers and technicians and professionals. Here we use “high skill” to
identify work that is hard to replace due to either the technical skills that
workers master after long-​term training (apprenticeship) processes (such as
carpenters and plumbers) and/​or licensing/​credentialing requirements that
specify the procedures required before individuals are allowed to perform
certain work (such as teachers and nurses). Both types create closure—​the
ability to restrict labor supply, thus heightening workers’ power and their lev-
erage to make demands (Weeden 2002).
Table 1.1 presents census data on the percent of the workforce characterized
in craft or professional/​technical occupations by industry, which change over
time. The construction industry had far more craft workers than any other in-
dustry in all periods. Professional and technical workers were ­always the most
prevalent in health services, public administration/​­education, and entertain-
ment. As we show, occupational features contributed to, but did not define, re-
placement costs.

Table 1.1 Percent of Employment by Occupation: 1910, 1960, and 2015

Craft Professional or Technical

1910 1960 2015 1910 1960 2015

Construction 69 54 41 1 5 3
Mining 9 22 16 1 8 18
TCU 19 22 14 1 4 11
Entertainment 6 8 5 50 24 28
Manufacturing 24 20 15 1 8 18
Public Administration 1 5 2 56 41 55
Personal Services 2 3 2 1 3 7
Health Services 1 3 1 75 45 50
Trade 7 7 3 2 2 5
FIRE 1 2 2 1 3 14
Agriculture 0 1 5 0 1 7

TCU, Transportation, Communication, and Utilities; Public Administration, Public Administration,

and Education; Trade, Wholesale, and Retail Trade; FIRE, Finance, Insurance, and Real Estate;
Agriculture, Agriculture, Forestry, and Fishing.
18 Union Booms and Busts

Both unions and employers have aimed to influence the scarcity of craft
labor. Especially in the early 1900s, unions developed extensive apprentice-
ship programs that aimed to control the number of skilled crafts people (and
hence the ability to replace union labor in the common event of a strike).
Employers, on the other hand, have sought to deskill work processes, rend-
ering tasks more easily interchangeable among workers (Braverman 1974).
They have also adopted scientific management, automation, and comput-
erization as strategies to avoid dependence on skilled labor (Kristal 2013).
Changes in the construction industry illustrate these shifts: in 1910, 69 per-
cent of construction workers were craft workers; by 2015, that number had
dropped to 41 percent.
We also conceptualize professional and technical workers as skilled (unlike
Kimeldorf 2013), as these workers had the potential for closure and higher
union density. In the early 1900s, both public administration/​education and
health services had at least 50 percent professional and technical workers.
However, these industries remained largely union-​free during the early cen-
tury, only moving towards unionization later in the century. By contrast,
the entertainment industry had high proportions of professional/​­technical
workers and was relatively successful in unionizing in the early 1900s. These
industry-​level differences suggest that high skill is one component of union
strength and replacement costs, but not sufficient to explain variation.
The benefits of high skills are mediated by other factors, including race,
gender, professional orientation, and willingness to strike. Scarcity of skilled
labor can also arise from professional closure though credentialing and
licensing. Professional status is somewhat elusive. While certain professions
have captured the spoils of professional status (doctors and lawyers), others
have not quite made it (nurses and teachers). As they pursued professional
status, both education and health workers largely ignored the possibility for
unionization, and thus, both industries had low union density during the
early twentieth century. Encouraged by professional associations and cul-
tural gender norms, these workers pursued professional avenues in their
workplaces. But they never fully accomplished their desired professional
status, along with its financial and other rewards. Not until later in the cen-
tury did these workers turn from their professional orientation and forge a
union identity, at which point their licenses and credentials became a way to
increase their replacement costs during strikes.
Finally, major events can influence the labor supply. Wars, in particular,
instigated a scarcity of skilled labor as enlisted soldiers left the workforce,
 Introduction 19

and the demand for war production ramped up. World War II tempo-
rarily shifted the balance of power in favor of manufacturing workers,
including women and workers of color who were able to enter coveted
manufacturing jobs as northern men left for the war (Milkman 1987;
Ruiz 1987).

Timing
Whether an industry is time sensitive serves as another factor in high re-
placement costs. If striking workers cannot quickly be replaced, strikes in
these time-​sensitive industries can more readily disrupt production or
service. When transportation workers strike in a city dependent on public
transportation, widespread disruption in all travelers’ workday routines
occur, placing pressure on employers to settle the strikes quickly and thereby
affording unions more power. Employers have used various strategies to re-
duce their time sensitivity, including automation and stockpiling. Workers,
on the other hand, often used timing to strategize when to strike.

Spatial Factors: Isolation and Capital Flight

Socially isolated workers are difficult to replace for several reasons. First, ge-
ographical distance may complicate the delivery of replacement workers.
Second, workers in isolated communities tend to develop cohesive
communities that are able to sustain collective action (Kerr and Siegel 1954).
So isolation contributes to high replacement costs, especially in mining in
the early period (Kimeldorf 2013). However, as transportation technologies
developed, workplace isolation became rare in the United States.
As the century progressed, new spatial factors became increasingly rele-
vant to union organization. The most important of these was capital flight,
which ramped up over the century. Facing the threat of strikes in union-​
dense cities, employers who were mobile, especially in manufacturing,
often relocated to non-​union areas, what Silver (2003) calls a “spatial fix.” As
Bronfenbrenner (2000) demonstrated, employers regularly used the threat of
plant closure when workers made demands. Plant closures and capital flight
are the ultimate replacement mechanisms—​(potentially) striking workers
are replaced by non-​union workers in a different production location. But
some industries are much more place-​bound, including health services and
public administration/​education. Workers in these industries enjoy the spa-
tial advantage of not being as easily replaced during strikes or relocated if
there is a hint of union activity.
20 Union Booms and Busts

Organizing to Limit Replacements

By the 1930s, workers and unions had secured additional ways of increasing
replacement costs. The newly formed CIO championed industrial
organizing, or wall-​to-​wall organizing rather than the dominant AFL ap-
proach of organizing by craft. At the same time, the new labor legislation
of the NLRA protected “concerted activity,” giving strikers a legitimacy
that they did not previously enjoy. Workers also took up a new tactic, the
sit-​down strike, which required replacement workers to physically remove
striking workers from the workplace in order to resume production. These
innovations helped unskilled workers discourage would-​be replacements.
But soon thereafter, sit-​down strikes were outlawed, and the 1938 Mackay
decision declared permanent replacement workers legal. Picket lines were
another tool used to block (or at least made it very uncomfortable for)
replacements to enter the workplace and pleas for solidarity with poten-
tial replacements sought to keep the use of replacements at bay, especially
when the replacement workers had limited rights and replacement jobs were
considered temporary (it is more difficult to justify the negative aspects of
crossing a picket line for a temporary job). Replacements were also harder to
obtain when the community supported striking workers.

Contingent Work, Subcontracting, and Other Profit Sources

The growing use of contingent workers also eroded workers’ high replace-
ment costs. Contingent workers are temporary workers, part-​time workers,
or independent contractors who are not in permanent full-​time positions
(Kalleberg 2009; Katz and Krueger 2019). Such work arrangements create a
pool of labor that is insecure, theoretically mobile, and even potentially avail-
able as direct replacements during strikes. Some of these workers, such as
independent contractors, are not covered by the NLRA, which complicates
their ability to unionize (Boris and Klein 2015; Viscelli 2016).
Likewise, subcontracting allowed employers to more readily replace de-
manding workers. With competition among subcontractors, employers
could select an arrangement to their liking and dismiss any subcontractor if
a dispute arose.
Firms’ structures also evolved over time, generating profits from a range
of new sources (such as in conglomerate organization and financial activi-
ties) and responding to new economic pressures (such as financialization).
Strikes are less impactful when employers are not dependent solely on
labor to generate profits. The need to replace workers is less acute, as profits
 Introduction 21

continue to roll in. Increased financialization in the late twentieth century

contributed to this dynamic (Lin and Tomaskovic-​Devey 2013), with some
firms able to increasingly rely on financial income rather than on income
from productions and sales. Importantly, financial income has also created
a new hierarchy of pressures on firms. The rise of conglomerates that span
multiple industries or geographic locations also changes the landscape for
both firms and workers/​unions.

Weakening of Legal Strike Protections and Norms

Finally, how the law is interpreted and acted upon shapes replacement
costs. Since 1938, it has been legal to replace workers who are on strike for
economic reasons. However, employers rarely acted upon this right until
President Reagan permanently replaced striking air traffic controllers in the
1981 PATCO strike. Once Reagan signaled the cultural shift in the use of re-
placement workers, the floodgates opened up for employer action (LeRoy
1995b; McCartin 2006). Collective bargaining contracts that increasingly in-
cluded “no strike” clauses and mandatory arbitration also weakened workers’
strike protections.

Recap of Replacement Costs

In sum, our use of the replacement costs concept traces how workers’ and
employers’ use of skill, timing, spatial, and other factors changed over the
century. Race, gender, and professional orientation as well as deskilling
and automation all shaped the enactment of replacement costs based on
skill. Replacement costs based on spatial factors changed over the cen-
tury: isolation became irrelevant while capital flight became a powerful
employer spatial strategy. The timing mechanism, which is determined by
the nature and delivery of the work, remained relatively constant. New
factors impacting replacement costs arose over time. Inclusive solidarity
and sit-​down strikes, as embodied in the CIO, enabled unskilled workers
to raise replacement costs and to organize during the 1930s and 1940s.
By the dis-​regulated period the use of contingent work and employers’
use of alternative profit sources both reduced replacement costs. And
importantly, state actions, especially the dwindling of strike protections
and norms against replacing striking workers, reduced replacement costs.
In general, in the U.S. context, replacement costs mattered most when
workers acted upon them by striking. Strikes put the concept of replace-
ment costs to the test.
Exploring the Variety of Random
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of Pretty Polly
Perkins
This ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States
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Title: Pretty Polly Perkins

Author: Ethel Calvert Phillips

Illustrator: Edith F. Butler

Release date: August 2, 2024 [eBook #74175]

Language: English

Original publication: Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1925

Credits: Susan E., David E. Brown, and the Online Distributed

Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was
produced from images generously made available by The
Internet Archive)

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PRETTY POLLY

PERKINS ***
GRANDMOTHER PLACED HER IN PATTY’S ARMS (page
9)
 Pretty
Polly Perkins
By
ETHEL CALVERT PHILLIPS

Illustrated by
EDITH F. BUTLER

Boston and New York

HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY
The Riverside Press Cambridge
1925
COPYRIGHT, 1925, BY ETHEL CALVERT PHILLIPS

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

The Riverside Press

CAMBRIDGE · MASSACHUSETTS
PRINTED IN THE U.S.A.
 TO

DR. GORDON KIMBALL DICKINSON

MY FATHER’S FRIEND AND MINE
 CONTENTS
I. How Polly Perkins was Made 1
II. Where is Polly Perkins? 12
III. Polly Perkins goes on a Journey 25
IV. What Anne Marie saw from the Window 38
V. Out in the Snow 49
VI. Wee Ailie McNabb 59
VII. Three Little Girls and Polly Perkins 68
VIII. Grandmother King’s Christmas Party 78
IX. Anne Marie and the Christmas Angel 90
X. What Santa Claus brought to Ailie McNabb 103
XI. The Very Best Christmas of All 112
PRETTY POLLY PERKINS
∵
 CHAPTER I
HOW POLLY PERKINS WAS MADE
Polly Perkins was a big rag doll, the prettiest, the softest, the most
comfortable rag doll that ever belonged to a little girl.
Grandmother King made her for Patty, who was five years old and
visiting Grandmother at the time, and this is just how it all
happened.
In the first place, Patty fell downstairs. She was on her way to the
kitchen where Grandmother was baking a cake, and in her arms she
carried Isabel, the doll she loved the very best of all. Indeed, Isabel
was the only doll that Patty had brought with her from home. She
was a china dolly, with pretty golden curls and blue eyes that
opened and shut, and she wore a blue dress with pockets, very
much like one of Patty’s own.
Now, as I said, Patty was on her way downstairs with Isabel in her
arms when suddenly she tripped and fell. Down the whole flight of
stairs she went, bumping on every single step, it seemed, and
landed in a little heap at the foot of the stairs.
Grandmother heard the sound of the fall, and came hurrying out of
the kitchen with a cup full of sugar in one hand and a big spoon in
the other.
‘My precious Patty! Are you hurt?’ cried Grandmother, picking Patty
up and rubbing her back and rocking her to and fro all at the same
time.
When Patty could stop crying, she shook her head.
‘No,’ she said, with a little sniff, ‘I think I am not hurt. But where is
Isabel?’
Oh, poor Isabel! She lay over by the front door, her head broken into
a hundred pieces!
At first Patty couldn’t believe her eyes. Isabel broken! Then whom
would Patty play with? Whom would she dress and undress and take
out for a walk every day? Who would lie beside her on the bed at
night while Grandmother was reading by the lamp downstairs and
Patty felt the need of some one to keep her company just before she
fell asleep?
Isabel broken to pieces!
Then Patty did cry.
‘My dolly! My dolly!’ she wailed. ‘My dolly is broken! My dolly!’
She struggled out of Grandmother’s arms to the floor, and there,
sobbing and crying as loud as ever she could, she danced up and
down. She felt so badly she simply couldn’t stand still.
At first Grandmother didn’t say a word. Very carefully she picked up
all that was left of Isabel. Then she took Patty by the hand.
‘Patty,’ said Grandmother firmly, ‘stop crying and stand still.’
Patty was so surprised to hear Grandmother speak in this way that
she did stop crying and stood still.
‘Patty,’ went on Grandmother cheerfully—so cheerfully that Patty
couldn’t help listening to what Grandmother had to say—‘Patty, we
are going to find a box and put Isabel in it. Then we will send her
home to Mother, who will buy a new head for her, I know. We will
play that Isabel has been in an accident and that she has gone down
South to be cured. That is what Mother did last winter when she was
so ill, you remember.’
Patty nodded slowly. Perhaps Isabel could be cured, after all.
‘But whom will I play with while she is gone?’ asked Patty with a
quiver in her voice. ‘I don’t like Darky. He scratches and spits.’
Darky was a black barn cat who lived next door to Grandmother, and
it is quite true that he was not a pleasant playmate for a little girl.
‘There is no one for me to play with but you, Grandmother,’ finished
Patty, two plump tears rolling down her cheeks as she thought how
lonely she would be now without Isabel.
For a moment Grandmother stood without speaking. She was
thinking, her foot softly tapping the floor as Grandmother often did,
Patty knew, when she was making up her mind.
Then Grandmother spoke.
‘Patty, I am going to make you a doll,’ said Grandmother, ‘an old-
fashioned rag doll such as I used to make for your mother years
ago. She always loved hers dearly, and I expect you will, too. And
the best of such a doll is that it can never be broken.’
While Grandmother was speaking, Patty’s face grew brighter and
brighter, until, as Grandmother finished, she really looked her own
merry little self once more.
‘To-day?’ cried Patty hopping up and down, but this time for joy. ‘Will
you make her to-day, Grandmother? To-day?’
‘This very day,’ answered Grandmother, picking up her cup of sugar
and big spoon from the corner where she had hastily set them down
when Patty fell. ‘First, I will finish my cake, and then you and I will
go out shopping to buy what we need to make the new doll.’
So a little later Patty and Grandmother, hand in hand, went down the
road and round the corner to Mr. Johns’ store, where you could buy
almost anything in the world, Patty really believed.
It was the only store in Four Corners, the little village where
Grandmother lived, and so of course it kept everything that anybody
in Four Corners might want to buy. On one side of the store were
rows of bright tin pails, and lawnmowers, and shovels, and rakes,
and a case of sharp knives, and a great saw, too, big enough to cut
down the largest tree that ever grew. On the other side were
dresses and aprons, a hat or two, gay-colored material and plain
white, ribbons and laces, needles and pins. There were boxes of
soap and boxes of crackers and boxes of matches. There were
shelves filled with cans and packages of all shapes and sizes. There
was a case full of toys, and a case full of candies, too, where Patty
had been known to spend a penny now and then. There were great
barrels standing about, and rolls of wire netting, and coils of rope.
And on the counter there sat a plump gray cat, who blinked sleepily
at Grandmother and Patty as they came in and opened his mouth in
a wide yawn.
When Mr. Johns heard what Grandmother was going to make—for
Patty told him just as soon as Grandmother had inquired for Mrs.
Johns’ rheumatism—he was as interested in the new dolly as
Grandmother or Patty herself.
He measured off the muslin with a snap of his bright shears. He
whisked out a great roll of cotton batting with a flourish. He helped
Patty decide between pink and blue gingham for a dress. She chose
pink. And last of all it was Mr. Johns who said,
‘What are you going to put on the dolly for hair?’
Patty looked at Grandmother and Grandmother looked at Patty.
‘I hadn’t thought yet about hair,’ began Grandmother slowly, when
Mr. Johns disappeared beneath the counter.
Patty could hear him pulling and tumbling boxes about, and at last
up came Mr. Johns from under the counter with his face very red,
indeed, and a smudge of dust on his cheek, but holding in his hand
a little brown curly wig.
‘Will that do?’ asked Mr. Johns, smiling proudly at his surprised
customers. ‘I knew I had a little wig somewhere, if only I could put
my hand on it. It has been lying around here for two years or more.’
Two years old or not, the little brown wig was as good as new, and
Patty was so anxious to have the dolly made and to see how the wig
would look on her head that she pulled at Grandmother’s hand all
the way home and couldn’t help wishing that Grandmother would
walk faster or perhaps even run, instead of stopping to chat with her
neighbors on the way.
It took a day or two to make the dolly, although Grandmother’s
nimble fingers flew. And one night, after Patty had gone to bed,
busy Uncle Charles drove down from the Farm and painted the
dolly’s face, a pretty face, with rosy cheeks and gentle dark-brown
eyes that Patty thought the loveliest she had ever seen.
At last the dolly was finished, and in her gay pink dress, with her
soft brown curls that matched her brown eyes, Grandmother placed
her in Patty’s outstretched arms.
‘I am so happy,’ said Patty, her face aglow, ‘I am so happy that I
don’t know what to do.’
So, standing on tiptoe, Patty first kissed Grandmother and then the
dolly and then Grandmother again. And perhaps, after all, that was
the very best thing that she could do. Grandmother seemed to think
so, at any rate.
‘Isn’t she beautiful?’ said Patty next, holding the dolly out at arm’s
length the better to see and admire. ‘Her curls are beautiful, and so
are her eyes, and her dress, and her cunning little brown shoes.
What shall I name her, Grandmother? Don’t you think she is
beautiful? Isn’t she the most beautiful dolly that you have ever
seen?’
‘Yes, indeed,’ answered Grandmother, smiling to see Patty’s pleasure.
‘She is as beautiful as a butterfly.’
And, to Patty’s further delight, Grandmother began to sing a little
song:
‘She’s as beautiful as a butterfly,
And none can compare
With pretty little Polly Perkins,
Of Abingdon Square.’
Patty clapped her hands and spun round for a moment like a top.
‘Sing it again, sing it again,’ she cried.
So Grandmother obligingly sang her little song again.
And the moment it was ended, Patty, her cheeks as pink as the
dolly’s and her eyes quite as round and bright, exclaimed,
‘That is my dolly’s name—Polly Perkins! Pretty Polly Perkins! Don’t
you think that is a good name for her, Grandmother? Don’t you think
Polly Perkins is a good name for my new dolly to have?’
‘A very good name, indeed,’ was Grandmother’s reply. ‘She looks like
a Polly to me.’
‘She looks like a Polly to me, too,’ agreed Patty happily, ‘a Polly
Perkins.’
And hugging Polly Perkins close, Patty whispered in her ear.
‘If Isabel is cured,’ whispered Patty to Polly, ‘I shall be glad that I fell
downstairs. Because if I hadn’t fallen, I never would have known
you. Wouldn’t you be sorry, Polly Perkins, if you had never known
me?’
Patty put her ear close to Polly’s red lips to hear her answer, and she
was not disappointed.
‘Yes,’ whispered back Polly Perkins, ‘I would.’
 CHAPTER II
WHERE IS POLLY PERKINS?

Aunt Mary had come down from the Farm to spend the day with
Grandmother and with Patty. She had really come to say good-bye,
for to-morrow Grandmother’s house at Four Corners would be closed
and she and Patty would start for the city, where Grandmother was
to spend the winter at Patty’s home.
Aunt Mary had brought presents with her from the Farm, presents
that were neatly packed in boxes ready to be placed in
Grandmother’s big black trunk.
There was a box of home-made sausages, such as you couldn’t buy
in the city no matter how hard you tried. There was a loaf of Father’s
favorite cake, ‘raised’ cake it was called, covered over with snowy
icing and full of raisins, as Patty well knew. There were two squash
pies for Mother, packed so carefully that they couldn’t possibly be
broken. Last of all there was a present for Patty that did not have to
be packed in a box because it was an apron, a pretty blue pinafore
that covered Patty from top to toe, and that had two pockets large
enough to hold a handkerchief or a ball or anything else that Patty
might choose to put in them. And on each pocket Aunt Mary had
embroidered a tiny bunch of orange and yellow and brown flowers.
Patty was delighted with her present.
‘The little flowers look as real as real can be,’ she declared, patting
and sniffing the flowers and patting the pockets again. ‘I think they
smell sweet, Aunt Mary. I truly think they do.’
Very carefully Patty placed her pinafore in Grandmother’s trunk, and
ran to fetch Polly Perkins to show her to Aunt Mary.
‘Uncle Charles painted her. Did he tell you?’ asked Patty, dancing
Polly up and down before Aunt Mary until the dolly’s brown curls
flew. ‘Isn’t she beautiful, Aunt Mary? Hasn’t she the prettiest eyes,
and doesn’t her mouth look smiling? I can brush and brush her hair,
too, all I like, and it curls right up again. Isn’t her dress pretty? How
I wish she had pockets like my new apron! She would be just perfect
if she had pockets on her dress, Aunt Mary.’
‘Run and ask Grandmother for a bit of this pink gingham,’ said good-
natured Aunt Mary, ‘and I will make the pockets for you while we all
sit here and talk.’
Grandmother shook her head and said that Patty would be spoiled if
Aunt Mary were not careful. But she gave Patty the gingham, and a
moment later Aunt Mary was measuring and cutting the pockets for
Polly Perkins’s dress.
‘Would you like a bunch of flowers or a little rabbit embroidered on
each pocket?’ asked Aunt Mary, who was so skillful with her needle
that nothing seemed too hard for her to do.
Patty thought for a moment.
‘A rabbit, I think,’ she began slowly.
Then suddenly she spun round on the tips of her toes.
‘I have thought of something, Aunt Mary!’ cried Patty, smiling a wise
little smile. ‘I have thought of something so nice. Could you sew
Polly’s name on her pockets—Polly on one pocket and Perkins on the
other? Could you do that, Aunt Mary, do you think?’
Yes, Aunt Mary thought that she could.
‘Here is some green thread in Grandmother’s basket,’ said she. ‘It
will be pretty if I embroider her name in green on the pink dress,
don’t you think?’
Patty thought it would be beautiful, and said so. She stood close
beside Aunt Mary and watched her take the first stitches in Polly
Perkins’s name.
Just at that moment who should drive up to the house but the
expressman come for Grandmother’s trunk hours before he had
been expected. And then such a hurry and bustle to crowd the last
odds and ends into the trunk and to lock it and to strap it, all in the
twinkling of an eye.
But at last it was done, and away went the trunk, bumping down the
porch steps on the expressman’s back, bumping into the wagon, and
bumping off down the road, round the corner, and out of sight.
And then, and not until then, it was discovered that Polly Perkins,
pockets and all, had been left behind. There she lay in Aunt Mary’s
chair where she had been tossed when the expressman came.
‘Now I can carry her home myself to-morrow,’ said Patty, delighted
with this turn of affairs. ‘I can carry her all the way in my arms, can’t
I, Grandmother? Do say that I may!’
‘Yes, I suppose that you may,’ answered Grandmother, who did not
look so pleased with the plan as did Patty. ‘I am afraid there will not
be any room for her in my bag.’
Aunt Mary worked away until the pockets were finished, and when
Patty looked at her dolly in her gay pink frock, with a green ‘Polly’ on
one pocket and a green ‘Perkins’ on the other, she thought she had
never seen anything so pretty in all her life.
Uncle Charles came to supper and to take Aunt Mary home, and,
before he was inside the door, Patty was all ready to whisper in his
ear and to give him three kisses, one on each cheek and one on his
chin.
‘I think you paint the loveliest dollies in the world,’ whispered Patty
in Uncle Charles’s ear. ‘And that is why my dolly is named Polly
Perkins. Because she is as beautiful as a butterfly. Grandmother said
so. And I am going to carry her all the way home in my arms.
Grandmother said that, too.’
But the next morning when Patty woke the rain was pouring down,
and there was no question, in Grandmother’s mind, at least, about
Patty carrying Polly Perkins in her arms.
‘We will send your dolly home in a box by express,’ decided
Grandmother. ‘You wouldn’t enjoy carrying her in the rain, I know.’
‘She might catch cold,’ agreed Patty, ‘for she hasn’t any coat. That is
the way Isabel went home, in a box, and I expect she enjoyed it,
too.’
So Polly was wrapped in a pink-and-blue tufted coverlet, that was to
have been used as a traveling-rug, and carefully placed in a large
pasteboard box.
‘Be a good girl,’ whispered Patty, tenderly kissing Polly good-bye on
her rosy mouth.
Then she watched Grandmother wrap the box in heavy paper and tie
it with stout brown twine.
‘I will have my hands full with a bag and an umbrella and a child,’
said Grandmother to Uncle Charles, who had come to take them
down to the train. ‘I can’t think of allowing Patty to carry her doll. I
have packed it in a box and addressed it to Patty’s mother, and I
want you to leave it at the express office as you go home, Charles, if
it won’t be too far out of your way.’
Uncle Charles promised to send Polly Perkins along that very day. So,
with a farewell pat on the outside of the box that held her dolly,
Patty and Grandmother started on their journey in the rain.
It was fun traveling in the rain, Patty thought. She liked to see the
people bustling along in the wet. She liked to watch the dripping
umbrellas bob in and out of the stations that they passed. She liked
the muddy and almost empty roads, with only now and then a
procession of ducks waddling along, or a lonely dog trotting by, or a
farmer driving into town with perhaps a colt tied at the back of his
cart.
As they drew near to the big city, Patty peered out of the misty
window-pane over which ran rivulets of raindrops so thick and fast
that the tall houses could scarcely be seen and the street-lamps
looked like cloudy little suns dotting the way.
‘Are we nearly there?’ asked Patty for at least the hundredth time.
And at last Grandmother could answer, ‘Yes, Patty, we are. In five
minutes more you will see Father, I hope.’
Grandmother was right. As the train drew into the station and men
in little red caps, who wanted to carry your bag, Patty knew, came
running down the platform, there on the platform, too, stood Father,
and a second later Patty was in his arms.
Through the rain they rode home to Mother, waiting for them in the
large white apartment house where Patty lived.
There were many houses on the long city street—tall white
apartments, low red-brick houses, then tall white apartments again.
Patty pressed her nose against the window of the cab, peering out
at the familiar scene.
‘There are our Christmas trees!’ she cried, catching a glimpse of the
two little fir trees that, in white flower pots, stood one on either side
of the entrance to their apartment house.
‘And there is Thomas in the doorway. He is watching for me, I do
believe.’
Thomas was the hall boy, and a good friend to Patty, too.
‘And there is Mother in the window. Mother! Mother!’
Patty pounded on the window of the cab and called and waved. The
moment the cab stopped, without waiting for Father’s umbrella,
across the sidewalk went Patty with a skip and a jump, up the steps,
and into the hall where she flung both arms about Mother’s neck.
‘I knew you would come down to meet me,’ said Patty, giving Mother
the tightest squeeze she could and smiling broadly at Thomas over
Mother’s shoulder. ‘I have come home, Thomas. I am home.’
And so she was.
Oh, how much there was to tell and to see! Patty’s tongue flew, and
her bright eyes glanced hither and thither, and her quick little feet
sped up and down the hall and in and out of the rooms she
remembered so well.
And in her own room who should be waiting for Patty, sitting in the
middle of her very own little bed, but Isabel, home from her trip to
the South and as good as new, only perhaps a little prettier than
before, Patty thought.
‘Now, Isabel,’ said Patty that night in bed, as Isabel lay where Patty
could put out her hand and touch her if she felt at all lonely before
she fell asleep, ‘now, Isabel, I must tell you all about your new sister,
Polly Perkins. I hope you are going to be good friends. She will be
home perhaps to-morrow, perhaps the day after, and I hope you will
love her very much indeed.’
Isabel promised that she would. And all the next day—another rainy
day, too—she and Patty watched for Polly Perkins, though both
Mother and Grandmother said it was far too soon to expect Polly
home. All the next day and the next and the next Patty and Isabel
watched for Polly, but Polly did not come.
‘Has Polly come?’ was the first question Patty asked every morning.
And every night when she went to bed she said, ‘Please wake me up
if Polly comes to-night.’
But Polly did not come.
So Grandmother wrote to Uncle Charles to ask if he had forgotten to
send Polly. And Uncle Charles wrote back that he had sent her off
the very day that Grandmother and Patty left Four Corners.
Next Father went to the express office, and the express office
promised to find Polly Perkins, if it possibly could.
‘Perhaps she has been shipped out West. Perhaps she is lying in the
Four Corners office,’ said the express people. ‘We will find out and let
you know.’
Meanwhile Patty watched, and talked, and wondered what could
have become of Polly Perkins.
‘My darling Polly! She is as beautiful as a butterfly, Mother,’ said
Patty, not once, nor twice, but many times. ‘You don’t know how
beautiful she is. Grandmother thinks so, too. That is why I named
her Polly Perkins. She has a pink dress and brown curls and the
prettiest brown eyes. And pockets with her name on them, Mother.
Just think! I can’t wait to have you see her. I do wish she would
come home.’
But still Polly did not come.
Where is Polly Perkins? What can have happened to her? Where can
she be?
Patty and Mother and Father and Grandmother all asked these
questions over and over and over. But not one of them guessed the
answer, though they tried again and again.
And now I will tell you what had happened to Polly Perkins.
 CHAPTER III
POLLY PERKINS GOES ON A JOURNEY

While Patty was watching from the window all up and down the long
city street, hoping that every passing wagon or automobile would
stop at her door with Polly Perkins, what was Polly herself doing all
this time?
To begin at the beginning, there is no doubt that Polly was
disappointed not to be carried home in Patty’s arms.
‘I would like to see a little of the world,’ thought Polly, when she
heard how she was to make the journey, ‘and I would like to ride on
the train that Patty talks about. I will be as good as gold, and then
perhaps Patty will always take me with her when she goes traveling.
Who knows?’
So when Polly saw the rainy day and heard Grandmother plan to
send her home in a box, Polly couldn’t help being disappointed,
though of course she didn’t show it in the least. She smiled as
sweetly as ever when Patty wrapped her in the pink-and-blue tufted
coverlet and kissed her good-bye. And though she wanted dreadfully
to give the cover of the box just one gentle kick with her pretty
brown slipper, to work off a little of her disappointment as it were,
still Polly said to herself,
‘No, I won’t kick the box, for I know Patty wouldn’t like it. And I
want to please Patty in every way I can.’
For Polly had grown to love Patty in the short time she had lived with
her, and she believed that Patty was the very best mother that ever
a dolly could have.
‘She might leave me out all night in the grass,’ thought wise little
Polly. ‘She might stick pins into me, or pull my hair, or drop me down
the well. But she never, never does. Oh, I am glad that Patty is my
mother.’
And if, once in a while, Patty gave her a spanking or put her to bed
in the middle of the day, why, that was no more than happened to
Patty herself, once in a while, and so of course Polly could find no
fault.
Polly liked Uncle Charles, too. Hadn’t he given her a pretty face and
a sweet smile? So when Uncle Charles tucked Polly under his arm to
carry her to the express office, Polly gave one or two gentle bumps
on the lid of the box just to show that she was friendly. But if Uncle
Charles heard them, no doubt he thought that Polly was simply
slipping about, and that he must carry the box more carefully.
It was not pleasant in the express office, Polly found. There was a
strong smell of tobacco smoke that sifted straight into Polly’s box,
and there seemed to be men all about, with loud voices, who tossed
packages back and forth, and hauled heavy boxes from one side of
the room to the other. Polly herself was tossed up on a shelf where,
after a moment or two, she snuggled down in her coverlet and
sensibly fell fast asleep.
She was awakened after a long, long nap by being lifted off the
shelf. She thought it must be morning, the express office was so
busy and noisy and so many people were hurrying to and fro.
Then came a great roaring and puffing and snorting just outside the
office door, and Polly knew in a moment what it was.
‘It is the train,’ thought Polly, who had never heard one before. ‘That
is just the sound Uncle Charles made when he played train with
Patty the night he came to supper at our house.’
And Polly was right. It was the train.
Now the bustling grew greater than before. Trunks and heavy boxes
were hoisted aboard the train. Packages, large and small, were flung
on helter-skelter, and among them was Polly, who went flying
through the air and luckily landed face-up on top of a trunk, where it
took a whole moment to get her breath again. But Polly didn’t mind
being tossed about, not one bit. She thought it was exciting, and
much better than lying in the smoky express office on a shelf.
Then the train whistled and puffed and panted and was off.
Roar, roar, roar! Clatter, clatter, clatter!
At first Polly couldn’t hear herself think. But after a short time she
grew used to the noise of the train and could hear the different
sounds all about her in the baggage car in which she lay.
Cluck! Cluck! Cluck! Squawk! Squawk!
‘Hens,’ thought Polly, who had often gone with Patty to visit the
chicken coops at the back of Grandmother’s yard.
Then she heard a low whining and scuffling as in answer to the
outcry of the hens, and the next moment a dog lifted his voice in a
series of sharp little barks.
And, would you believe it, Polly understood every word he said.
‘I am Twinkle. Bow-wow!’ said the little dog.
And if Polly could only have looked through her box and seen him,
she would have thought that he couldn’t have a better name. For
not only was there a gay twinkle in his bright black eye, but the
curly tuft of hair on the tip of his tail seemed to twinkle also as he
waved it to and fro. While his soft black nose was a shining little
spot that might easily have been called a twinkle, too.
‘Bow-wow!’ said Twinkle again. ‘I belong to Jimmy, and Jimmy has
broken his leg. Wow! Wow!’
‘Cluck! Cluck! Cluck!’ answered the sympathetic hens. ‘Too bad! Too
bad! Too bad!’
‘I wish I could talk to him,’ said Polly to herself. ‘I am going to try.’
So in her politest voice she called out, ‘Twinkle, I am in this box and
my name is Polly Perkins. I belong to a little girl named Patty, and I
want to talk to you. How did Jimmy break his leg?’
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