Railroad Shopmen's Strike of Nineteen Twenty-Two

In July of nineteen twenty-two, more than three hundred thousand skilled tradesmen walked off the job at railroad shops across the United States. The shopmen, who maintained and repaired locomotives and rail cars, were fighting to preserve the union gains they had won during World War One, which management now wanted to roll back.

The Pennsylvania Railroad shops here in Altoona became a center of anti-union opposition, with the railroad keeping operations running through strikebreakers. The strike ultimately failed to achieve its immediate goals, but it left a legal legacy. The bitter conflict and its chaos helped push Congress toward the Railway Labor Act of nineteen twenty-six, which enshrined the right of railroad workers to organize and bargain collectively. Altoona's role was to show how hard management would fight, and in doing so, made the law necessary.