The Empire Zinc Strike — Women on the Picket Line

In the autumn of nineteen fifty, miners at the Empire Zinc Company mine near Hanover, about thirteen miles from Silver City, walked off the job. They belonged to Local Eight Ninety of the International Union of Mine, Mill and Smelter Workers, and their grievance was clear. Empire Zinc paid its Hispanic miners less than it paid white workers for the same work and maintained separate, inferior facilities for the Hispanic workforce.

The strike lasted fifteen months and became one of the most significant labor actions in New Mexico history. The company obtained a court injunction prohibiting the male strikers from picketing. In response, the miners' wives, mothers, and sisters took their places on the line.

Women from the mining families formed their own picket and held it through months of confrontation, arrests, and sustained intimidation. The sheriff's department arrested dozens of them, and some women brought their children along. The strike ended in early nineteen fifty-two with a negotiated settlement.

Afterward, a film called Salt of the Earth dramatized the events. It was directed by Herbert Biberman, one of the Hollywood Ten who had been blacklisted from the film industry, and written by Michael Wilson, also blacklisted. The film was shot on location around Silver City with actual miners and their families in most of the roles.

Congressional denunciation and pressure from industry groups kept it out of most theaters. Today it is considered a landmark of American social realism and one of the most important labor films ever made.