I Missed White Shirt Day, Did U?
written by bendygirl
at Tuesday, February 17, 2009
Over at Unbossed, they didn't:
Did you know that February 11 was White Shirt Day? And do you know its significance in Michigan history?
White Shirt Day was first celebrated on February 11, 1948, as a way of honoring the men and women who participated in the 1936-37 sit-down strike at Fisher Body Plant No. 1 in Flint.
The strike began on December 30, 1936, when the night shift stopped the company from loading dies and shipping them to places where the labor movement wasn't as strong. The fledgling UAW, led by a young organizer by the name of Walter Reuther, urged the workers to sit down inside the plant and lock themselves in to keep GM from outsourcing their jobs. There's a good account of the sit-in and the events that led up to it in the Detroit News Michigan history archive.
I regret not wearing a white shirt that day.
