Background: On November 22, 1909, the International Ladies’ Garment Workers Union gathered at Cooper Union to discuss going on a strike. Many prominent leaders spoke to offer their support, but also cautioned the working union members that a strike might be too risky or too dangerous.

… In the midst of all the admirable speeches a girl worker—Clara Lemlich by name, got up and shouted “Mr. Chairman, we are tired of listening to speeches. I move that we go on strike now!” and other workers got up and said “We are starving while we work, we may as well starve while we strike.” Pendimonium [sic] broke lose [sic] in the hall. Shouts, cheering, applause, confusion and shouting of “strike, strike” was heard not only in the hall but outside as well.

… During the weeks and months of the strike most of them would go hungry. Many of them would find themselves without a roof above their heads. All of them would be cold and lonely. But all of them also knew and understood that their own courage would warm them; that hope for a better life would feed them; that fortitude would shelter them; that their fight for a better life would lift their spirit.

pandemonium: Wild or noisy disorder, confusion, or uproar.

[sic]: When an author spells a word wrong in a primary source, the text is left as it was in the original document and historians or editors use [sic] to note that it was spelled incorrectly in the original.

Source: Pauline Newman, Pauline Newman papers, Arthur and Elizabeth Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe. Box 1, folder 3, pp. 17, 23–24.