O a group of a hundred-

odd newsvendors in

Vancouver, ranging in
age from 18 to 80, June 5,
1946—the day the Typo-
graphical Union struck the
Vancouver Daily Province—
will always have a special sig-
nificance. For their union was
born out of the struggle to keep
a scab-produced paper off the
streets of a union-conscious city.

On two previous occasions, the
first as long ago as 1916, the
newsies tried to organize them-
selves into a union, and in both
instances their. attempts were
defeated in short order, and for
several reasons. '

The average newsie, who has
had to eke out an_ existence
from hustling the local dailies
on downtown street corners, is
perhaps a disabled war veteran,
an industrial casualty or handi-
capped by congenital deformity.
His handicap may only be old
age, but whatever it is he has to
rely on his aggressiveness and
initiative in competition with his
fellow newsies to make a meag-
er living from his papers. Con-
sequently, through this ‘dog-eat-
Gog’ aspect of the newsvendors
tusiness; he becomes a ‘rugged
individualist.’ This is the main
reason for the defeats the news-
ies have suffered in their past
attempts to build a union,

The old-timer whose _ useful-
ness in industry has ended by
failing vision or want of agility
becomes a potential newsie, His
slender savings gone, his unem-
ployment insurance run out, his

only alternative is relief or sell-

ing papers.

Industry casts off another po-—

tential newsie in the victim of
industrial accident. He may have
lost an arm or a leg, so that
he is physically incapacitated
and unable to resume his job
~ after his hospitalization period is
over. He is probably a little too
old to be retained for another
_ job, and even if he isn’t too
old, there are no facilities for
training him,

Ask him if he can live on the
pension he receives from the
Workmen's Compensation Board
for his permanent disability.
He'll counter with, “Can you
live on $19 a month? That's
what I’m getting for the loss
of my arm.”
= ‘True, he will tell bm: he didn’t
have to go without a job when
the war was on. Then men with
disabilities could find work
building aircraft, ships, and mu-
nitions of all types. But things
are different now. So, ten
chances to one, the only alter-
native he has to selling news-
papers is getting along on $19
a month—for life.

Then there’s the man who suf-

_ FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 7, 1947

fers from a physical deformity,
either congenital, caused by some
accident for which he can draw
no compensation or brought |
about by some progressive dis-
ease such as arthritis. During
the war he may have made his
living by packing rivets in a
plane factory or as a watch-
man in the shipyards. But, for:
him too, the war is over.

Now, he also can choose be-
tween going on relief or selling
papers. And he soon learns that
the peculiar part about . this
phase of the newspaper . game
is that to be a good salesman
you have to survive by the law
of the jungle, because it’s a
long climb to a good corner,
and good paying corners are
rare.

@

4 hee amount of
written about
amazing,

periodically in the local dailies
explaining the benefits of the

pure fiction
newsies_ is

business training one can get,

as a youth, through
newspapers. _

The local ty¢oon, who spends
most of his office hours getting
other people to produce his prof-
its for him, may convince some
of his lodge members (after a
sumptuous meal) that he emu-
lated Alger. But he wouldn’t get

selling

-

very far with that line with

any of the corner vendors I
know. They are striving to
make enough to pay room rent
and get enough to eat when the

Advertisements appear

paper hits the street. The tycoon
who boasts that he made his
start selling papers more than
‘likely was covering a paper
route in a swankey suburban
district when he was in the
game. And his folks were pay-
ing his way and his schooling
expenses while he was pushing
the home edition.

The newsie on the street
knows it takes a long time te
build up enough customers to
make his job worth while, and
nobody pays his rent or sup-
plies his food and clothing while
he is doing it. The newcomer
to the street-hawking business
doesn’t always get a corner to
boost his paper when he starts
off, and he knows that his

chances of becoming a tycoon —

are nil. His back is pau ele the
wall.

- Since the days when rive
major dailies found the newsie
an essential factor for competi-
tive purposes, the newsie has
had his established conditions
threatened from all sides.

At first he had to contend
with physical violence. Good
corners were held by those who
were able to beat off all invad-
ers with their bare knuckles.
This meant that a vendor who
suffereq from a physical disab-
ility regardless of how he came
by it, didn’t get the best corn-
ers.

Then there was the threat ef
having his corner sold on him.
A wholesaler, if he was unscrup-

ulous, could give papers to any-
cne selling on a certain corner,

and supply a newcomer— for
2, price—with the papers that
would enable him to move in
on the other chap’s corner. True,
this practice doesn’t exist these
days, but it has existed, and

_can be revived. Like any other

employer, the wholesaler still
has the last say as to who will
sell, and on what corner. And
if he stops supplying papers to
a vendor, the vendor is out of a
job.

This is the main reason why ©

he hasn’t been able to protect
himself, and why he and his
fellow workers have been de-
feated in their previous
tempts to build a union.
®

ee PUBLIC is often given a

distorted picture of the men
who sell papers on street corners.
Sometimes they are portrayed

as small capitalists making far

more in a day than most of
the people who buy their papers.
But more often than not they
are lucky to make a day’s wages.
During the war years, when
news of major offensives and
victories from the fighting
fronts made spectacular head-
lines any newsie could make a

‘fair living. Papers then were

eagerly snatched up _ because
people were following events.
V-Day and V-J Day were the
bonanza days that the newsies
still discuss while waiting

around the circulation room for

at-_

’Many newsies
are forced to
live under the
slum conditions
shown her e.
This ‘home’ is
in a back lane
in the 500
block Alexan-
der Street.

the next edition to come off the
press. But the war is over and
pseudo - sensational headlines
about ‘Red conspiracies’ do not
draw sales from people who re-
call with what anxiety four
years ago they bought papers
headlining the titanic battle for
Stalingrad.

The newsies, with nothing
more to hope for, than security
on their corner, and a fair share
cf the retail price of the periodi-
cals they ‘push,’ regard them-
selves as workers whose earn-
ings are determined by their
sales ability. Many of the ven-
dors who have taken an active
part in organizing the union
have had some experience in
the labor movement and these
ex-seamen, ex-loggers anq one-
time industrial workers don’t
intend to be pushed around.
They don’t care whether their
wholesaler classes them as em-
ployees or sellers; all they want
are the rights and consideration
won by any other workers.

They don’t want to stop hand--
ling any paper, so long as it
isn’t on labor’s unfair list, but
they are determined to win rec-
ognition of their union. The
code of the jungle is being ex-
changed for a labor code.

The newsies have enough prob-
lems to face, as well as the ~
‘butcher, the baker and all their
other creditors, Some of them
have families to keep, and de-
spite'their handicaps, they have _
no doubts about their ability to _
earn a livelihood. But. they also
feel the need for organization
to protect themselves against
unfair practices, the use of me- —
chanical vendors and the like.
In short, they want some as-
surance of security and that’s
why Vancouver newsvendors
have taken the first step to-
wards winning of security—the
organization of sue own union,

PACIFIC: TRIBUNE — PAGE 10