t L FE F b ontinued from Page One © province. Sompany property is described "80,000 acres of freehold tim- t acquired by Crown grant in 3 Comox district and 60,460 res leased partly from the do- mion and partly from the pro- ace of British Columbia.” Its oming grounds adjoin land med by Coguitiam municipal- r, which renders sale of this ad virtually impossible. Thus, in constituting its own od aS a seperate municipality, caser Mills established, by a agle stroke, a stranglehold on e whole community of Coquit- m and on the econemic and jlitieal life of its employees. In 1912, when it was called “the reest lumber company in the orld,” Fraser Mills had a water ontage of 4,000 feet on the Fra- r River, an area of 425 acres id a ten-hour working produc- on output of frem 350,000 to 450- ‘0 feet of “every kind of wooden lilding material” on the three ggers still in use. @ nO live on company property, = aman must work in the mill, ait he can never own his own ouse or the land it stands on. Fhen he quits work, either from ld age, sickness or accident, he lust move and seek help else- there, usually in Coquitlam mu- icipality. When he dies, his fam- y is asked to leave and no pen- on is provided by the company. Wo worker living on the com- any townsite ‘has to pay taxes ad his rent is only $io a month. ‘e has, however, to pay a ‘poll xx’ required by the government nd $5 a year for school fees. chool tuition is not provided by ne company, but by the Coquit- tm taxpayers, and the ‘poll tax’ pes not, as it should, give the rorker any right to vote in a emocratic election of municipal fficers. True, the townsite does iave elections,- but since only roperty Owners can vote, and io worker can own land in Fra- er Mills unless allowed to do so ry the company, obviously only hose favored by the company can rote or administer townsite af- airs. Reeye and councillors are isually company officials elected xy acclamation. In addition, because of its finan- ‘ial strength in the district, Fra- ser Millis is able to influence elec- tion of pre-company candidates to Coquitlam municipality. ‘Honest’ John Oliver, Liberal premier in the “twenties, seeing the injustice of such -a setup, tried to force Fraser Milis back into Coquitlam municipality, but without success. Despite these obvious draw- backs, there has always been 2 waiting list for company houses because of the big economic ad- vantage in low rent and freedom from taxation in contrast to the high taxation and added respon- sibility placed on workers living in Goguitlam, who must carry re- lief costs for millworkers, main- tain roads used by mill traffic and make up school deficits. e ne is this watertight plan which established the company’s hold a the community and enabled it to maintain that hold in varying degree for 33 years. But the effect. of those years of company gain has not been lost on the workers. It has served to disillusion them of the ‘pater- nal’ interest displayed by the com- pany and convince them that their strength will be most ef- fective when organized solidly in a trade union. The company’s stranglehold, first Seriously weakened by the 1931 strike struggles is now be- ing broken. Qf some 1,600 work- ers employed at the mill, more than 1,200 are members of the International Woodworkers -of America. While in the past their struggles have mainly centered on economic gains, their chief demand is now for union recogni- tion, for they realize that in ob- taining the right to bargain col- lectively through, their own union they will strengthen their demand for jeint discussion with the management of the problems of industrial relations and increased production. e LDTIMERS, who have worked for the company since settling here in 1909, realize very clearly how the company has dom- inated their lives. In the words of one woman, who came here with the first French-Canadian families, “I’ve had enough of that company. -I'm sick of it.” She told me how her husband had worked for the company for 81 years. He was sick for two years and during the whole time of his illness, the company did not offer to contribute even a loaf of bread towards their main- tenance. A load of wood from the mill for heat was charged on a boarder’s pay, because the head of the house was “not working for the company.” The family was only allowed to continue living in the company house because the same boarder, another pioneer who came out with Father O’Boyle in 1909, was also work- ing at the mill. Another old-timer told how he had worked for Fraser Mills for the whole 33 years, but had re- cently been goaded into quitting after expressing sympathy with the rapidly growing union organ- ization. “When the company tried to set up a so-called union itself,” he said, “I told the boys it was no good. I showed them that they never saw any minutes of the committee meetings and didn’t know what was being done. “You should stick to your own union, that’s the one,’ I told them. TI couldn’t join the union itself, I was foreman,’ he added. Formerly night foreman in the big mill, he explained that many men had quit the day shift and fone to shipyard work, glad of an opportunity to break away. But then the company shifted skilled workers from night to day work and all green men had to be broken in on the night shift. “Then- they blamed me because night production dropped,” he said. "solidarity. Instead of firing him outright, he, was told that his work was unsatisfactory—after 33 years— and offered him a job in the plant, a less skilled job at lower wages. Disillusioned, he quit and now has a good job in another mill, 2 HESE are the workers who remember what gains they were able to make through union They remember with pride how the whole community stuck together during the 1931 Strike, even though they had to subsist for weeks on fish caught from the Fraser River—if they caught any! They also remember the gains they obtained from this strike, even though it was not wholly successful. Wage increases were given to the whole mill after the strike, and since then, every time any degree of organization has made itself evident the company _ has raised wages. Conditions in the Oriental and Hindu section of the community were greatly improved after the strike, although rents collected for the miserable shacks called houses in which the Oriental workers live must have paid for them a hundred times. e ICTORIES are constantly be- ing chalked up for the union now and the workers are not go- ine to be easily dissuaded from pressing their demands. A recent victory in the Coquitlam elections added fuel to the fire, when workers for the first time elect- ed their candidate Percy Smith, vice-president of Fraser Mills IWA Local 1-357, as-councillor in the municipality. Conditions in the mill and the problem of stepping up produc- tion are two things with which the newly chartered union local is vitally interested. While it is anxious to see production in- Union Organized After _ Thirty Years’ Struggle ow the company, which changed its name in 1910, one year after the settlement was established, acquiced its zht to a separate townsite is not quite clear. Oldtimers tell yw the company accountant became reeve of Coquitlam when le townsite was split off from that municipality and point out at the deal was consummated during the McBride admini- ration which saw some of the most notorious land grabs in creased, safety measures have also to be considered and many accidents have occurred which eould have been prevented had proper safety measures been taken. Quite recently, Ex-Councillor Tom Allard’s only son died as a result of injuries received three years ago in the mill when his hand was pulled off in the roller case and he received a severe blow in the stomach which caused peritonitis. Although the blow was receiv- ed at the time of his accident, and an autopsy has now revealed that death was caused by compli- cations from this blow, Amedie Allard was only given compensa- tion for the loss of his hand. His hospital bills had to be partly paid by his father because the company medical aid only allows for public ward treatment, yet his condition from peritonitis ne- cessitated a private room. This accident is one which could have been prevented and guards have since been placed in front of the voller case to pre- vent similar tragedies. Since this occurrence, the company offers a bonus to workers who suggest measures to prevent accidents in the mill. Other mills award prizes when the accident rate is reduced in certain departments. Many other proposals haye gone in from workers through their union to help cut down accidents and save lives. Ps Co) : Ls development in Fraser Mills is the setting up of a production committee to try to iron out the bottlenecks in the production of lumber needed for the war effort. Production figures given me by one old time worker do not com- pare very favorably with the pro- duction quoted in 1912, but there are probably many factors to ac- by Kay Gregory count for this. One is that in those early days, mills were get- ting better logs, but now, because of the constant drain on timber, logs are smaller. Fraser Mills is also still operating on the same three riggers it had in 1912, but many other additions and altera- tions haye been made to the plant since that year. In the 1926-9 boom, the com- pany floated bonds to build a cedar mill, which never operated and was later torn down. A veneer sash and door plant was added, with the result that Fraser Mills is now the largest mill on the coast, operating three full shifts. Knowing, as only workers on the job can know, what measures could be introduced in various departments to speed up produc- tion, the union shop stewards’ council elected a production com- mittee from among the most skilled workers in the mill and submitted several proposals, which if put into effect, would iron out many of the hold-ups. Instead of welcoming the pos- sibility of joint co-operation be- tween its employees and manage- ment to assist in production, the company rejected the proposed production committee and insisted that members of such a committee should be elected from the whole mill, thus holding up application of union proposals and prevent- ing immediate speeding up of pro- duction. Members of the Fraser Mills local feel, however, that they will be successful in obtaining their production committee and that it will be instrumental in * solving many production prob- lems in the mill, in the same way that they believe that their union will not be defeated again, but will grow and in going for- ward, advance the interests of . all workers in that district. Here are the officers of Fraser Mills Local 1-357 of the International Woodworkers of Am- erica. Above, reading from left to right (seated) Councillor-elect Perey Smith, vice-presi- dent; Harold Pritchett, president; Vera Smith, trustee; Ora Cole, financial secretary; George (Standing) George Pulling, trustee; Jack Lindsay, warden; Mitchell, recording secretary. Stewart Alsbury, vice-president; Sam Ostrikoff, conductor.