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Originally published in 1939
Some of this information may no longer be current and in that case is presented for historical interest only.
Edited by GET NJ, COPYRIGHT 2003
Dutch settlers were early attracted to the great cataract on the Passaic which had been described-to them by the Indians. In 1679 they obtained the first tract of land within the present bounds of Paterson. Many of the Dutch pioneers bore names still common in the city. For more than a century the Falls were merely an attraction for visitors, and the settlement remained small.
Then in 1791 Alexander Hamilton, Secretary of the Treasury, helped form the Society for Establishing Useful Manufactures (S.U.M.). The New Jersey Legislature voted the company perpetual exemption from county and township taxes and gave 'it the right to hold property, improve rivers, build canals, and raise $100,000 by lottery. The company selected, from a number of sites offered, the Great Falls of the Passaic River, which at that time had "no more than ten houses." Hamilton had favored this important strike was a three-week walk-out in 1902, led by McQueen and Grossman, two Philosophic Anarchists.
That year brought a series of major disasters to the city. A fire started
on February 8 and destroyed almost 500 buildings, including the City Hall and the entire business section. It was halted a mile from its starting point with the help of Jersey City and Hackensack firemen, who fought the blaze from roofs. Ruins of the fire had barely cooled when on March 2 the swollen Passaic River engulfed the lower portions of the city and swept away bridges, homes and buildings, causing damage of more than j $1,000,000. Several months later a tornado struck the city, uprooting trees and houses and crippling vital services.
The silk industry reached its peak in 1910 when 25,000 workers in 350 large plants wove close to 30 percent of the silk manufactured in this country. Three years later all mills came to a standstill when workers, under the leadership of the Industrial Workers of the World, struck for the maintenance of the two-loom system (two looms for each worker to tend) against the owners' plans for an increased number.
The workers walked out on February 15; the employers raised the American flag on their empty mills and declared a lock-out. Carlo Tresca, Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, "Big Bill" Haywood, and John Reed, the young Harvard poet, came to lead the picket lines. When one picketer was killed, Haywood led 15,000 workers in the funeral procession School children
children
struck in sympathy with their parents, and gigantic gigantic meetings were held in the neighboring borough of Haledon, whose residents were largely sympathetic. Reed, who was jailed during the walk-out, staged the famous "Paterson Pageant" in Manhattan's Madison Square Garden for the benefit of the strikers. It was the greatest strike in Paterson history, but the workers went back to their looms in July, defeated.
In 1924, 20,000 workers waged an unsuccessful fight against the fourloom system. Manufacturers, blaming labor troubles, began hunting for sites with lower taxes, cheaper power, and more docile workers. By 1925 the exodus had begun. There were 700 plants then, but the factories were much smaller than formerly.
Although Paterson is still the largest single silk-producing center in the country, the industry has been seriously curtailed. Reasons for the decline are: antiquated plants that are unable to compete with newer mills of the South, Pennsylvania, and New England; the introduction of rayon; and the break-down of large units into small "cockroach" shops. Today 4,000 workers weave about 12 percent of the Nation's silk.
The growth of the dyeing industry in Paterson has offset the decline of silk manufacturing. Some of the largest plants in America, processing 70 percent of the Nation's silk and rayon, are here. Proximity to the New York market and the soft waters of the Passaic River led to the establishment of this industry. Its 15,000 workers emerged from the 1933 strike with the Dyers' Local 1733, the largest union in New Jersey. Inspired by the collective-bargaining clause of the National Industrial Recovery Act, the strike was the first successful one in many years.
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