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| 93 10 Working Women Unite (1893–1894) Women’s Societies Among the countless fareynen, or voluntary societies, established during the 1890s were those dedicated to promoting socialism among women. The following three announcements, published in Di arbeter tsaytung and the anarchist newspaper Di fraye arbeter shtime, provide glimpses into their activities. Progressive Women’s Society, Paterson, NJ Under this name, a group of more or less goal-oriented women have established a society in Paterson to cultivate the spirit of freedom in working women. The first meeting took place at the Proletariat Club, 59 Hamburg Ave. It was decided that, on every Saturday evening, formal readings and business meetings should take place at the Proletariat Club. All women are invited to the large mass meeting on Sunday, July 2, where Comrade Leontieff1 will hold a lecture on The Women’s Question. Source: Di fraye arbeter shtime, June 23, 1893, p. 4. Workingwomen’s Society, New York City Last Friday evening, the Workingwomen’s Society held its first mass meeting at 165 East Broadway and had an unexpectedly great success. The hall was packed with five or six hundred women and men, as well, and many people had to be turned away because of lack of space. The well-known German orator Mrs. Kantsius and Comrade Zametkin2 gave inspired lectures in which they explained the goals and aspirations of the new society, namely, the organization of the women’s trades and the achievement of political rights by struggling hand in hand with the male proletariat for the liberation of all of humanity regardless of sex. The speeches were greeted with strong 94 | In Struggle applause, and 20 new members joined the society. The first lecture will be given by Dr. Ingerman3 at 412 Grand St. next Friday evening on the topic: “Women in the Past, Present, and Future.” All are welcome. Source: Di arbeter tsaytung, Dec. 15, 1893, p. 3. “A Women’s Gathering” The cloak makers have hit upon an outstanding plan. Everybody knows that the greatest enemies of strikes are often the wives of the strikers themselves. That which the bosses cannot achieve with money, policemen, and Pinkertons ,4 they achieve much easier by hiring people to incite the wives against their striking husbands. This inadvertent alliance is usually the greatest danger for all strikes. In order to avoid this danger, the cloak makers yesterday took their wives to Walhalla Hall, where S. Miller, S. Pollack, and M. Sheynfeld gave them moral instruction. Over 500 wives of the strikers listened with great attentiveness to the speeches, and, at the end, they fervently swore not only not to chastise their husbands anymore for striking but, on the contrary, to allow the men not to return to work until the bosses give in to the union’s demands. Source: Di arbeter tsaytung, Nov. 7, 1894, p. 3. Translated by Tony Michels. Notes 1. Pseudonym of Leon Moisseiff (1872–1943), Yiddish writer and lecturer associated with the anarchist movement. A suspension-bridge engineer, Moisseiff gained a national reputation as a designer of the Manhattan Bridge. 2. Adele Kean Zametkin (1864–1931), socialist activist and cofounder of the Workingwomen ’s Society. 3. Dr. Anna Amitin Ingerman (1865–1931), frequent lecturer in English, German, Russian , and Yiddish, cofounder of the Workingwomen’s Society, and active in the Socialist Labor Party, the Socialist Party, and Russian-émigré politics. 4. Private detectives hired to break strikes. ...

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