Jan. 31, 1938, San Antonio, Texas is the capital of pecans, 50%
of the national pecan process, shelling, and packaging was done on the west side
of the city. More than fifty percent of the commercial pecan crop was grown
within 250 miles of the city. There were 400 shelling factories in the city.
The center of the Hispanic community was also in the westside American
with Mexican ancestry and Mexican nationals made up 40% of the city’s
population and lived on the west side of town, so it made sense for the
companies to use this labor pool almost exclusively. Until this day when 12,000
pecan shellers walked out protesting a cut in pay and poor working conditions.
While it might not seem to be a dangerous job shelling by hand
was hazardous and hard. Shellers usually worked more than 10 hours a day, seven
days a week for $2 to $3 weekly. Lighting was poor, inside toilets and
washbowls were nonexistent, and ventilation was inadequate. The fine brown dust
released by pecans exposed shellers to tuberculosis. This was a major disease
concern, San Antonio averaged 148 TB deaths for every 100,000 persons, compared
to the national average of fifty-four.
The strike began because of a pay cut. The Southern Pecan
Shelling Company reduced the pay of shellers who had earned six or seven cents
a pound (six cents for pieces, seven cents for halves) to five and six cents a
pound. Wages for crackers were cut from fifty cents to forty cents for every 100
pounds.
The walkout brought an immediate halt to the processing of the
pecans. Most of the workforce were women and it took courage to do the walkout,
but there was little to lose. The west side of town, where most Mexican
Americans lived, featured one of the worst slums in the United States with
unpaved roads crowded with tiny tar paper homes. Many of the houses rented for
as little as fifty cents a week, had dirt floors, and were without electricity,
running water, or plumbing. Infant mortality was high as were dysentery and other diseases.
San Antonio’s city government’s reaction to the strike was
immediate. The police chief, Owen Kilday, claimed publicly that only a few of
the 12,000 workers employed in the pecan industry were participating. Propaganda
by the city was quickly introduced to the local newspapers and radio. City
officials tried to both downplay the severity of the strike and accuse the
strikers of communism.
These accusations took on an unfortunate appearance of reality
because the original strike leader, Emma Tenayuca, was a well-known figure in
San Antonio politics who had connections to the Worker's Alliance, a
national organization formed by the Communist party. Tenayuca’s husband was
also an unapologetic Communist who had run for governor of Texas and often was
in court fighting for immigrant rights. Donald Henderson, president of the
United Cannery union, arrived to direct the strike. He soon passed this
responsibility to CIO organizer J. Austin Beasley, however, Tenayuca stayed
involved in the day-to-day activities of the strike and their lives, organizing
to make sure there was food and other needs were met.
The picketing of the 400 factories was met with police actions
as well. Kilday claimed that there was no strike and dispersed demonstrators
and arrested picketers. In one week in February, 90 male pecan shellers were
arrested and imprisoned with 200 other prisoners in a county jail designed to
hold 60. Other organizations backed the city and the pecan industry. The Mexican Chamber of Commerce, the American
Chamber of Commerce, LULAC, and Archbishop Drossaerts of the Catholic Church in
San Antonio also spoke out against the strike. They spoke out against radical
activism and urged the strikers to return to work.
thirty-seven days after the strike’s inception, the striking
shellers agreed to submit their case to arbitration. Governor Allred also
convinced the Southern Pecan Shelling Co. to abide by the decisions of a
three-man arbitration board.
There was an unintended consequence of agreeing to arbitration,
the strikers and the companies agreed to a new wage but the national labor
board ordered a 25 cents an-hour wage. The appeals by both the union and the
companies were denied. By November of the year, the Southern Pecan Shelling Company
had turned to mechanized shelling, as did most of the companies. Over the
next few years, the labor force dropped from 12,000 to 800.
While in the long term, the Pecan Shellers strike changed the
industry and eliminated this huge source of jobs it also changed the political
nature of San Antonio. This included Maury Maverick who became mayor and began
working hard to include Mexican Americans in the city’s decision-making and the larger community. While improvement occurred slowly and fitfully, the end of
the 1930s saw changing attitudes in San Antonio towards the poorest citizens of
the city.
Picture, Pecan shellers striking in front of Southern Pecan
Shelling Company in 1938. Courtesy San Antonio Light Photograph Collection,
UTSA Special Collections--Institute of Texan Cultures
Sources:
https://guides.loc.gov/latinx-civil-rights/pecan-shellers-strike
https://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/entries/pecan-shellers-strike
https://www.uiw.edu/sanantonio/gower.html
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