Anna MacLaren: Lethbridge labour leader

One of the most influential labour leaders in Lethbridge had to have been Anna MacLaren.

She was the first woman elected as the vice president of the Alberta Federation of Labour and the first woman elected as president of the Trades and Labour Council in Lethbridge in 1954. She also helped organize a hospitality union in Lethbridge, which she later became the secretary of, a position she held for years.

But who was Anna MacLaren?

She was born Anna Lola Clara Hannant on 16 June 1904 in Woodside, Montana, USA. Her father, William Hannant, was from Ontario, and her mother, Alma Ella Freeman, was from Montana.

Anna was the eldest of 4 children. Her 3 siblings were Catherine, Elizabeth, and Edith. Her family moved to Alberta in September 1918, just months after she turned 14.

Her first job was working in a box office, which she started as a 19-year-old, but the time the 1931 federal census came along, she had moved on to being a server, making $600 a year. This occupation was also duplicated in the 1935 voter list.

In 1942, she married Hugh Alexander MacLaren, who was 17 years her senior, a WWI veteran, and originally from Scotland.

Two years after getting married, in the summer of 1944, Anna MacLaren organized with 60 other hotel and restaurant workers to form Local 198 of the Hotel and Restaurant Employees International Alliance, an affiliate of the American Federation of Labor.

MacLaren was working as a server at the White Lunch Café at the time.

The newly unionized workers elected MacLaren as their first president, a position she held for 3 years, according to the Lethbridge Herald; although a 1946 article in the Herald referred to her as Local 198’s secretary.

At the time of unionizing, these workers typically made $12.50 per week in gross pay, and MacLaren argued to the Lethbridge Herald that after deductions, board, and rent, workers had only around $5 to last them the entire week. One of their new collective demands was to increase their pay to $15 per week after deductions. Workers had also grown tired of inadequate help, long hours, and having to deal with ungrateful customers.

Local 198 joined the Lethbridge Trades and Labor Council that September, and MacLaren was their rep on the council.

A month later, the union had bargained agreements with several restaurants; although negotiations had to go to arbitrations with others.

The following May, Local 198 had collective agreements with 6 Lethbridge restaurants: Marquis Coffee Shop and Dining Room, Mike’s Cafe, Ritz Cafe, Shasta Cafe, White Lunch Cafe, and Yale Cafe.

MacLaren became vice-president of the Alberta Federation of Labour in November 1946, the first woman to do so. Not only was she the first woman to become AFL vice-president, she was the first woman to hold any officer position with the organization. The newly elected president, Douglas Morrison, was also from Lethbridge.

In December 1946, Local 198 of Hotel and Restaurant Employees International Alliance teamed up with Local 54 of Beverage Dispensers International League to advocate “for the improvement of working conditions for employees in cafes and hotels”, according to a Lethbridge Herald article from 18 December.

The two organizations formed an executive board, and MacLaren was made its secretary.

At the time, workers in the hospitality industry had 9-hour shifts, and the executive board was petitioning the Alberta Board of Industrial Relations to reduce the work week to 40 hours a week with no loss in pay, down from 48 hours.

The executive board also recommended improving stat holiday pay and time-off allocations, as well as changing shifts for female workers so they would not have to start or end their shift between 23:00 and 06:00, when transit was not running.

On 20 October 1947, servers at Yale Cafe went on strike. An article in the Herald covering the strike quoted MacLaren, who by that time was now the secretary of Local 198. The strike lasted only half an hour, after the owner of the cafe did not sign the collective agreement Local 198 had negotiated with restaurant proprietors and the Hotelmens’ Association.

In a caption under an image in the previous issue, the newspaper had claimed that the owner of Yale Cafe had not seen the agreement, so was unable to sign it. However, MacLaren insisted in the 20 October issue that this was inaccurate and that instead, the owner, after receiving a copy of the agreement, “immediately pushed it back to the officer representing this urion, saying that it should be thrown in the garbage and made some remarks which cannot be printed”.

In November 1948, MacLaren was reelected as vice-president of the AFL, overseeing the union label committee. She was elected out of office the following year: the first ballot was deadlocked, but then she lost by 12 votes on the second vote. She was replaced by Charles Gilbert of Edmonton.

In April 1949, MacLaren, as secretary of Local 198, in partnership with the Lethbridge Trades and Labor Council, presented two briefs to the Alberta Industrial Relations Board. The LTLC’s brief was regarding pay increases and paid holidays.

MacLaren’s brief urged the AIRB to set up schools in Calgary, Edmonton, and Lethbridge “to educate and train restaurant personnel”. MacLaren argued that “our work is a profession equally as important as any doctor or nurse” and felt that an apprenticeship programme could benefit restaurant workers and improve the industry as a whole. Local 198 also advocated, once again, for a 40-hour workweek in the hospitality industry.

Lethbridge City Council appointed MacLaren to the city’s board of health in June 1950, replacing G. F. Wilson, who had resigned. Her term expired 6 months later.

MacLaren was selected, along with 2 other women, to represent Local 198 at the Alberta Federation of Labor convention in October 1950. She also represented hotel and restaurant workers at the May 1953 convention.

In January 1954, the Lethbridge Trades and Labor Council elected MacLaren as their president, which made her the first woman elected to that role. In fact, the Lethbridge Herald reported at the time that she may have been the first woman to preside over a labour council anywhere in Canada. She succeeded Edward Castles.

By the time she headed up the LTLC, her time with Local 198 was marked by increased wages for its members, paid holidays, a 44-hour work week, and a set salary schedule.

As president of the LTLC, she vowed to continue advocating for the council’s policy of equal pay for equal work for men. She also supported Local 198’s desire for a training school for hospitality workers.

When Lethbridge bartenders from 7 establishments threatened to strike in March 1954, MacLaren declared that any workers who were members of unions affiliated with the LTLC would not cross the picket line, if it occurred.

MacLaren attended the Trades and Labor Congress convention in Regina in August 1954. She was also selected as a delegate to the 1955 convention in Windsor.

In November 1955, MacLaren proposed to the Lethbridge Board of Health that they petition the provincial government to establish a laboratory in Lethbridge for pathological and bacteriological testing. The board approved the proposal. The province initially rejected the proposal, claiming that they do not establish laboratories in centres serving under 100,000; although at the time, Lethbridge served over 150,000 people.

At the beginning of 1956, MacLaren was named vice-president of the Lethbridge Board of Health for the first 6 months of the year. Also in January, MacLaren decided to step down as president of the Lethbridge Trade and Labor Council to run for the secretary–treasurer position. She unseated the sitting secretary-treasuer, Harry Boyse, who had been in the position for 13 years. It was the only contested position that year.

One of MacLaren’s first actions as secretary–treasurer was to oppose what seemed to be the rejection of a $100 operating grant for the labour council from the City of Lethbridge. The city had awarded the grant to the council every year for several years, but for some reason never approved the grant (at least not as of 29 March 1956) that year, despite giving $1,800 to the Lethbridge Chamber of Commerce and S23,000 to the Lethbridge Exhibition and Fair Board.

Lethbridge city council updated their bylaws in May 1956 to mandate that retail stores in the city close at 18:00 on Saturdays. Previously, the bylaw allowed for stores to stay open until 21:00; although pretty much no one did. However, at least one grocery chain was making plan to open until 21:00, which sparked pushback from other retails, and even workers. MacLaren, representing the Lethbridge Trades and Labour Council, said that the council had surveyed several several retail workers to gauge their thoughts on the issue, and they were against anything that would result in shift staggering.

By February 1959, MacLaren was back with Local 198 and had once again been elected as its secretary.

The following February, Local 198 of the Hotel and Restaurant Employees International Alliance had become Local 73 of the Hotel and Restaurant Employees and Bartenders International Union.

By March 1961, Local 73 had also become disaffiliated from the Lethbridge labour council. According to MacLaren, “all differences had now been ironed out”—whatever those were—and the union was readmitted to the council.

The Lethbridge and District Labour Council (the new name of the Trades and Labour Council) nominated MacLaren—along with two others—in November 1961 as a possible choice for members of the court of revision in 1962.

MacLaren was elected to the board of directors for the Lethbridge and District Labour Council, representing Local 73, in January 1964.

Local 73 experienced significant friction with employers during the first half of the 1960s.

The union, for example, began negotiations on a new collective agreement with the Hotelmen’s Association in November 1961, asking for higher wages, as well as sick leave.

Despite several meetings with the employer, “all proposals put forward by the local had been turned down” by the association. MacLaren said the following April they “had quite a hard time negotiating and getting to talk with the association” and were planning to take the issue to a conciliation board.

The following month, the employer had still not appointed a representative to the conciliation board, even though Local 73 had. MacLaren accused the association of unionbustion, “doing everything possible to break up the union”. She accused the Alberta Industrial Relations Board of “playing right into management’s hands” and displaying “favoritism toward management”.

MacLaren said that the Labor Act, at the time, required that either “a representative must be appointed to the conciliation board within seven days after notice from the industrial relations board or action taken by the board to appoint a representative”. That notice was sent out on 21 April, and there was still not conciliation board as of 10 May.

Two years later, in February 1965, talks broke down again between Local 73 and the association.

The two sides could not come to an agreement on wages. They had been tryig to negotiate since July 1964 but remained far apart. They managed to go to conciliation, but the employers refused to adopt the conciliation board’s recommendation.

The employers had offered weekly increases of $2 to tapmen and clerks, $1.50 to waiters, $1.65 to janitors and $1.15 for maids, but the workers rejected them.

The workers, according to MacLaren, had not received a wage increase in over 6 years (since 1958), and they felt that this was just not enough. Weekly wages were $63 for tapmen, $58.50 for waiters, $49 for clerks, and $45 for janitors. Maids were paid hourly at $1 an hour`.

The conciliation board recommended weekly increases of $3 to tapmen, male helpers, maintenance men, and clerks and a $2 increase to maids, bellboys, and janitors.

As a result, Local 73 held a strike vote. Of those who participated, 50 workers voted in favour of striking, a majority. Workers from the four hotels who refused the conciliation package—Alexandra Hotel, Garden Hotel, Lethbridge Hotel, and The York Hotel—went on strike on 24 February.

This was the first hotel strike since bartenders voted 47 to 3 in March 1954 to go on strike, which they did the following month. The strike lasted for 3 months, ending in July. The workers belonged to what was then Local 54 of the Beverage Dispenser’s International Union.

Even though workers from only 4 hotels were on this new strike, they picketed in front of the Arlington Hotel and the Dallas Hotel, too, because they also rejected the conciliation offer. Workers there had voted to not go on strike. As a result, MacLaren said that their union house cards were removed and they were no longer considered union house.

The Dallas Hotel was owned by 5 men—William Hudema, John Ambrosie, Nick Cherniak, Andy Ewoniak, and William T. Lupul. All of them but Hudema were from Edmonton. They were not even local; they were just in the hotel business to extract surplus labour value from the Lethbridge workers and siphon to Edmonton.

None of the affected hotels shut down during the strike. They continued operating but with scab labour—and themselves—and they told the Herald that unionized workers who did not show up to work during the strike would lose their jobs.

The Marquis Hotel had accepted the conciliation board’s award, so they were not involved with the wage dispute. While the other 6 hotels saw a decline in business in the first few days, The Marquis Hotel saw an increase in business.

According to Herald reporter Laurie Graham, the increased traffic was “the union men, the lunch bucket customers and others who refuse to cross picket lines, the ones who the day before were regular frequenters of their favorite hotel.”

As well, during the strike, the El Rancho Hotel workers joined Local 73, making it a union house. Their business also increased during the early days of the strike.

Two weeks into the strike, the Hotelmens’ Association told the Herald that “business in the hotels is improving slightly but still is not good”.

According to MacLaren, in the same article, the association was trying to move to an open shop model, in which workers would not be required to join Local 73 when hired. MacLaren claimed that the hotels ran on a closed shop model for 25 years. She said that the workers were determined to strike to get their conciliation wages, including retroactive pay, and to remain closed shops.

Two days later, on 13 March, the hotelmen’s association—which was now called the Lethbridge Hotel Association (The Lethbridge Herald was so bad for being inconsistent with the names they used for organizations and political bodies in the mid-20th century)—wrote an open letter. In it, they blatantly advocated for an open shop model in their hotels.

They also framed the strike as them being the small businessmen and the workers being thar giant, international unions, and claimed that the union had rejected a recent offer to implement the conciliation award because they refused to become an open shop.

A week and a half later, MacLaren (in conjunction with the Local 73 president) wrote her own open letter to lay out facts and clarify some of the claims from the employers.

According to Local 73’s open letter, the union had requested “weekly wage increases of $7.00 for tapmen, S5.00 for clerks and maintenance men, and $3.50 for all other classifications”, as well as extended vacations with pay.

And they reminded the public that these would have been their first wage increases in over 6 years, since 1958.

The letter they received from D. Royer, chair of the Hotel Association Labour Committee, allegedly responded to that proposal, “The Lethbridge Hotels have no intention and cannot consider any increase in the present salaries. We find it impossible to even consider any part of your proposal.”

To be clear, they were not just rejecting this increases: they rejected any increase.

The open letter goes on to say—an which I outlined earlier above—that Local 73 followed the conciliation process outlined in the Alberta Labour Act at the time. The conciliation board awarded a 2-year contract, expiring in August 1966, that kept everything in the previous contract the same, except wages, and here is what they specifically proposed for weekly wages:

Tapmen	$68.00
Housekeepers & assistants	$45.85
Waiters	$60.50
Glass washers	$50.00
Clerks	$52.00
Porters & janitors	$47.35
Bell boys	$43.35
Elevator operators	$40.35
Switchboard operators	$41.85
Chambermaids	$41.85
Maintenance men	$45.35–51.35

As mentioned earlier, this amounted to an extra $3 per week for tapmen, clerks, housekeepers, and maintenance men and $2 per week for everyone else.

The union accepted this conciliation, even though it was significantly less than what they originally proposed. The Marquis Hotel also accepted it, as mentioned, and the other 6 hotels rejected it. And they continued rejecting it for 7 months, right up until the strike.

Regarding the claim that the association made in their open letter that they had agreed to the conciliation in a recent meeting, Local 73 clarified that while that was technically true, what was left out was that they only accepted it as of the date of settlement: they would not agree to retroactive wages, even though they were already 8 months past when the conciliated contract was supposed to go into effect.

Moving to an open shop, according to MacLaren, never came up in negotiations. The first time they heard of it, apparently, was during the conciliation process, and the chair of the conciliation board ruled it out. given that everything in the previous contract, other than wages, was to remain intact.

According to their open letter, Local 73 claimed that various unions in Calgary, Drumheller, Edmonton, Lethbridge, and Medicine Hat were generously supporting the strike financially. The union had been silent on how much striking workers were being paid, but rumours indicated that it was $20 per week.

A 15 April 1965 article in the Herald reported that MacLaren claimed the hotel owners had each posted $1,000 to ensue that they stubbornly insist on an open shop business model. It also reported that a delegation from the Calgary Labor Council was planning to join the picket lines in a couple of weeks.

The strike finally ended on 19 May 1965, running for almost 3 months straight.

A Herald article the following June reported total donations of $13,520.55 that Local 73 received during the strike. It also reported more details regarding the new collective agreement.

Workers still got a 2-year contract, but it was effective from 15 May, not the previous August, which is what the conciliation award had recommended; although wage increases were retroactive to January. Anyone who had been let go were rehired, retaining their seniority and benefits. The hotels terminated all the scab labour. There was no indication on what the wages ended up looking like. Unfortunately, none of the hotels retained union shop status, which would have had all workers joining the union within 30 days of being hired. However all workers had to pay dues under the Rand Formula.

In January 1969, the secretary–treasurer of the Lethbridge and District Labour Council was voted out office and MacLaren was appointed in his place temporarily, until the annual labour conference the following month; although she ended up being elected into the position anyhow.

Her husband died nearly 3 years later, in December 1971. I was unable to find much about her after that, at least in the Lethbridge Herald, other than a passing mention of a history she wrote in 1988 about the Lethbridge & District Labour Council.

MacLaren died on 7 December 1997, arguably one of Lethbridge’s most influential labour leaders.

Rest in power, Anna.