Miss Kate Mullaney, their leader, was so highly thought of that in
1868 she had been made national organizer of women for the National
Labor Union, the first appointment of the kind of which there is any
record. She tried to save what she could out of the wreck of the
union by forming the Cooeperative Linen, Collar and Cuff Factory, and
obtained for it the patronage of the great department store of A.T.
Stewart, in Broadway.
The experiences of the women printers have been typical of the
difficulties which women have had to face in what is called a man's
trade of the highly organized class. The tragic alternative that is
too often offered to women, just as it is offered to any race or class
placed at an economic disadvantage, of being kept outside a skilled
trade, through the short-sighted policy of the workers in possession,
or of entering it by some back door, whether as mere undersellers or
as actual strike-breakers, is illustrated in all its phases in the
printing trade.
As early as 1856 the Boston Typographical Union seriously considered
discharging any member found working with female compositors.
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