As early as 1856 the Boston Typographical Union seriously considered
discharging any member found working with female compositors. This
feeling, though not always so bluntly expressed, lasted for many
years. It was not singular, therefore, that under these circumstances,
employers took advantage of such a situation, and whenever it suited
them, employed women. These were not even non-unionists, seeing that
as women they were by the men of their own trade judged ineligible for
admission to the union. It is believed that women were thus the means
of the printers losing many strikes. In 1864 the proprietor of one of
the Chicago daily papers boasted that he "placed materials in remote
rooms in the city and there secretly instructed girls to set type, and
kept them there till they were sufficiently proficient to enter the
office, and thus enabled the employer to take a 'snap judgment' on his
journeymen."

After this a wiser policy was adopted by the typographical unions. The
keener-sighted among their members began not only to adopt a softer
tone towards their hardly pressed sisters in toil, but made it clear
that what they were really objecting to was the low wage for which
women worked.

The first sign of the great change of heart was the action of the
"Big Six," of New York, which undertook all the initial expenses
of starting a women's union. On October 12, 1868, the Women's
Typographical Union No. 1 was organized, with Miss Augusta Lewis as
president. Within the next three years women were admitted into the
printers' unions of Chicago, Washington, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh
and Boston. Meantime, the Women's Typographical No. 1 was growing in
numbers and influence, and was evidently backed by the New York men's