Dover, Fall River and New York. They consisted mainly of working women, but many broad-minded middle class women, particularly pioneers of the suffrage movement, became interested in these organizations and loyally supported them.
The New York association was organized during March of 1845. Despite public discouragement and newspaper ridicule, it was launched with a membership of several hundred women. Among them were tailoresses, shirt makers, cap makers, straw workers, book folders, lace makers, etc. The association did not accomplish much in the way of actual reform, but it certainly did call public attention to the wretched conditions under which women of this city toiled, and it did teach the women themselves that, although laboring at different occupations, they had common grievances and common aims. The public attitude of the time was clearly reflected in the following report of that organization meeting, taken from the New York Herald: "About seven hundred females, generally of the most interesting age and appearance, were assembled." That these women were organizing to improve their lot seems to have been unimportant from the reporter's and the average reader's point of view. That they were females and females of an interesting age and appearance was regarded as the most noteworthy feature of their meeting. Such was the disgusting sex prejudice by which working women and middle class women alike were confronted.
THE FIGHT FOR THE TEN HOUR DAY
By far the most important activity of these "Female Labor Reform Associations" was the beginning of an agitation for a ten-hour day, carried on jointly with organized workingmen. The Lowell association secured thousands of signatures of factory operatives of both sexes to a petition addressed to the legislature for a ten-hour day, and a committee of working girls, led by the courageous Sarah G. Bagley, went before the Massachusetts legislative committee and testified as to conditions in the textile mills. This was the first time that working women sought protection directly from the lawmakers of one of
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