Revolution was brewing in America’s factories in the 1930s, as autoworkers and other blue-collar workers fought for the right to be represented by unions.

The Sit-Down Strike of 1936-37 was fought and won in Flint. Historian Sidney Fine calls it "the most significant American labor conflict in the 20th century."

The strike hit GM factories nationwide, but attention was focused on the Fisher Body No. 1 factory on S. Saginaw Street and the smaller Fisher Body No. 2 on Chevrolet Avenue, and later at the nearby Chevrolet Plant 4.

"Money wasn’t involved," said Robert Keith, 91, of Grand Blanc Township, who was a sit-down striker at Fisher No. 1 and is one of the charter members of UAW Local 581. "We didn’t talk at all about money."

He said the strike was more about working conditions, lack of job security, treatment and about piecework – paying workers based on the number of parts made – than about wages.

He explained how the company would set a piecework rate. When workers found ways to do the job quicker to earn more, the company would set the pay rate lower.

Keith said employees had no job security before the union. Factory workers of the 1920s and ’30s were like migrant farm laborers, going from place to place to find work, he said. After summer layoffs, management hired back only those whom they wanted.

"If you was 35 years old, you had a hard time getting back in there, unless you had pull with somebody," said Keith, whose wife, Florence, also worked at Fisher No. 1 and was one of the first women there to join the union.

The sit-down in Flint began on Dec. 29, 1936. The UAW had planned to go on strike against General Motors here, but workers at Fisher No. 1 heard that GM was removing dies as a suspected countermove. The union seized the opportunity to call the strike. Earlier that day, Fisher No. 2 went on strike after management transferred three inspectors who refused to quit the union.

A picket line outdoors is vulnerable, and there had been countless strikes in which local police or the National Guard broke up marches or picket lines. In a 1930 strike at Fisher No. 1, Flint police on horseback rode down the picketers and literally ran them out of town, chasing them past Grand Blanc.

But workers inside could use barricades and other tactics to hold off authorities, and plant owners had to worry about damage to their property in an assault.

The value of the sit-down was shown Jan. 11, 1937, when Flint police attempted to storm Fisher No. 2. Officers with tear gas guns were met by a barrage of car door hinges and other missiles, were sprayed with fire hoses, and the wind blew the tear gas back at them.

The strikers fought off two gas assaults by police, then police drew guns and opened fire. Police also fired gas grenades into spectators at the end of Chevrolet Avenue after rocks were thrown at them.

UAW organizer Victor Reuther and others used the union’s sound car to direct the battle. His brother Roy was a strike leader.

The melee injured 14 strikers and sympathizers, and two spectators – 13 of them by gunshot. Nine police officers, the sheriff and a deputy were injured.

The GM strike already was under way before workers sat down in Flint. And it continued in other cities after it was settled here with GM recognizing the union on Feb. 11, 1937.

All told, the strike closed GM plants in Detroit; Atlanta; Cleveland; Toledo and Norwood, Ohio; St. Louis, Mo.; Kansas City, Kan.; Janesville, Wis.; and Oakland, Calif.

But for GM and the UAW – and also for newspaper and radio reporters – the focus of the strike was here. The union chose Flint for its major assault because it was GM’s stronghold.

The company and the police probably chose to attack Fisher 2 on Jan. 11, 1937, because it was the smaller of the two and more lightly defended. A small force held only the second floor, while company police controlled the main gate. Sidney Fine, in his book "Sit-Down," said no more than 100 strikers were in the plant.

Strikers occupied the entire north unit at Fisher No. 1, and the huge building was more strongly held.

Gov. Frank Murphy ordered in the National Guard, but he made it clear that the troops were there to keep the peace, not to evict the strikers.

That was a distinct departure from conflicts in other places, where the National Guard arrested and even shot at strikers. Murphy’s orders gave the union a fighting chance in the negotiations and conflicts that followed.

Murphy acted as a mediator and was joined later in that role by President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s secretary of labor.

The leader of the strike was Bob Travis, who had been picked to succeed organizer Wyndham Mortimer after there were complaints about all the "Reds" on Mortimer’s team.

With the strike over a month old, the union decided to expand its control by targeting the vital engine plant – No. 4.

Travis and other union leaders planned to fake a takeover of Chevrolet Plant 9, a parts operation. The word was leaked to suspected company spies.

The assault was a feint, but there was nothing phony about the battle that took place Feb. 1, 1937, at Plant 9. Company guards and workers fought hand to hand.

Guards launched tear gas into the plant; outside, members of the Women’s Brigade and other supporters smashed windows to air it out. The union assault eventually was beaten back, as expected.

Meanwhile, union members stormed into Chevrolet Plant 4. They were joined by UAW leader Walter P. Reuther, who led a contingent from his Toledo local.

Company police who tried to retake the plant were met with a barrage of engine parts, as well as blasts of water from fire hoses.

When police tried to storm one of the gates, Women’s Brigade members locked arms and refused to let them pass. It was a risk, because in other labor confrontations, police and troops had not hesitated in arresting or firing on women.

But Flint police were not prepared to go that far, and the strike again reached a stalemate.

The focus then shifted to Fisher 1 on S. Saginaw as the union braced for an assault that never came. Thousands gathered outside to support the strikers.

In his book "The Many and the Few," Henry Kraus says that there were deer rifles and pistols inside the factory, and strikers with guns occupied a room above a restaurant across the street.

There was a gradual change in attitude and in Flint’s image after the Sit-Down Strike. Previously seen as a typical company town, Flint became increasingly viewed as a union town.

Fine says that UAW membership nearly doubled in one month, from about 88,000 in February to 166,000 in March, and grew to almost 400,000 by October.

The UAW next organized Chrysler workers, and in 1939, GM recognized the UAW as the exclusive labor organization for all its hourly workers. The union got contracts at Ford and other automakers before World War II began.

And many local workers – union and nonunion, blue collar and white collar – enjoy wages, working conditions and benefits that they might not have if the UAW and other unions had failed in their efforts.

"... Two wars we’ve been through and this last one we knew what we were fighting for ..."

Leaner auto industry emerges from slow-moving slump

It took a few years for the full effect of the 1929 stock market crash to make itself felt in the auto factories.

Chevrolet’s production bottomed out at 323,100 in 1932, then rebounded to more than 600,000 in 1933. Buick production hit a low of 46,000 in 1933 � its lowest year since 1915 � and some wondered if Buick would reopen after it shut down for changeover in 1933.

Harlow H. Curtice, head of AC Spark Plug, took over at Buick and led its recovery.

Five new buildings at Buick in 1936 added 400,000 square feet of factory area. In 1938, a two-story, 354,000-square-foot building facing Hamilton Avenue replaced old factories.

Car companies that folded in the ’30s included Auburn, Cord, Duesenberg, Jordan, LaSalle, Pierce Arrow, Reo and Stutz. When the decade was done, the industry was down to the Big Three and only a handful of independents.

Strike changes Flint – and a nation

Leaner auto industry emerges from slow-moving slump