Happy Labour Day, eh!

Shh, I think I hear something. It… it sounds like distant fizzing and the faint jostling of aluminum. Why, it’s the sound of a billion cans of beer carbonating in anticipation of the three day weekend! Woooo!!!  Barbecues! Beer! Wooo! Why? I don’t care! Beer!

I didn’t realize we were due for a holiday weekend until about a week ago, and even then was confused (“Wait, when? Are you SURE? It’s Labor Day?? Really? Okay! Woo!!!”). Maybe I could retain information like this if I knew a bit more about the holiday. We’re celebrating labor, right? And beer?

Labor Day was actually given to us by our Northern comrades, les Canadiens. Back in the 1800s – after industrialization was in full swing but before workers’ rights had improved much – it was not uncommon for the average worker to be expected to work a 12 hour day. In 1872, a group of Canadians in Hamilton decided they were fed up with the hours and set about organizing to change the requirement. Called The Nine Hour Movement, support spread very quickly from Toronto to Montréal to Ontario and as far east as Halifax. After a failed printers’ union strike in March of that year, leagues of “Nine Hour Pioneers” united union and non-union workers in one epic 1500-person march for workers’ rights.

The Nine Hour tour

It didn’t really work.

Employer hostilities, divisions among the working class and the fact that women were (sigh) marginalized and overlooked all figured to stunt the progress the group was able to make. But! The Nine Hour Movement put up a really great front and people were starting to take notice of the political, social and economic impact that the labor group indeed had. The right to associate with trade unions was obtained and some pockets of activists won concessions immediately. Eventually the Nine Hour Pioneers would turn into the Canadian Labor Union.

Sounds like a reason to celebrate to me.

The clothes have changed, the idea remains the same

The Canadians were rightfully proud of the working person’s bravery and the printers’ strike and the Nine Hour Movement march were commemorated every year by parade to honor the labor movement. In 1882 an American labor leader Peter J. McGuire was up in Toronto checking out one of the commemorative labor festivals and he liked what he saw. If I was writing the “based on actual events” made for TV movie, my McGuire’s eyes would grow large over a pint of foamy brew and we would hear his internal monologue:

“By God, beer! The movement will organize itself around a beer tap!”

So on September 5, 1882, New York City hosted the first ever Labor Day celebration in the United States. Labor Day was henceforth to be a day for “A street parade to exhibit to the public the strength and esprit de corps of the trade and labor organizations, followed by a festival for the workers and their families.” In 1894 President Grover Cleveland adopted the holiday as a national event.

So, thank you Canadian workers for the great idea.

Au revoir summer!

Labor Day symbolizes other things too: the end of summer, the beginning of the school year, barbecues, beer, a day off… All valid reasons to celebrate. It’s one of those pesky holidays that doesn’t fall on a specific date. It happens on the first Monday of every September and it’s shocking that it came so fast, but here it is.

In honor of the Canadian Labor movement and of my newly minted Canadian brother-in-law, I suggest you pick up a 6-pack of Labatt on the way to one of your barbecues this weekend. Canadians love their beers, they love their workers and at least one of them loves my sister. They seem smart… maybe us Americans have more to learn from them.

A toast to our nation’s health! 

Cheers eh!

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