The origins of the Labour Day Parade

Last year I marched in the Toronto Labour Day parade for the first time with other graduate students from U of T, but despite my background in Canadian history, I realized that I didn't know much about the history of the holiday itself. As it turns out, Toronto played a pretty central role in the founding of what has become a (inter)national holiday.

In the late 1860s and early 1870s, a labour movement began in Hamilton among printers who were petitioning their employer for a nine-hour workday. The Nine-Hour Movement spread to Toronto where it was taken up by the Toronto Printer's Union who demanded that their hours be reduced to nine a day, and 54 hours a week. These demands were at the vanguard of the fight for shorter working hours. George Brown, owner of the Globe, and other print shop owners, denied the union's request and called the demands "absurd" and "unreasonable."

As a result, the printers went on strike on March 25, 1872. A few weeks later, workers in Toronto held a huge demonstration in support of the printers, and about 2000 of them marched through the city, led by marching bands. The parade ended at Queen's Park, where the crowd had grown to roughly 10,000 people.

While the strike wasn't immediately successful, it did result in the passage of the Trade Unions Act, legalizing unions, and soon after, the creation of nine hour days and 54-hour work weeks in Canada.

The 1872 parade, and others held in support of the Nine-Hour Movement, resulted in the establishment of annual celebrations of labour. In fact, when American labour leader Peter McGuire visited Toronto in 1882 and witnessed a local labour festival he was so inspired that upon returning to New York, he organized the first American Labour Day on September 5 that year. Despite the parade's Toronto origins, our American neighbours seem to have forgotten who gave them the idea!

Despite the fact that workers had been celebrating and parading on that day for years, it wasn't until 1894 that the Canadian government declared Labour Day an official holiday. Since then, Toronto has been home to a massive parade where workers march, celebrate gains made by the labour movement, and demand further improvements. Presently, the Toronto and York Region Labour Council organize the parade, and invite workers from across the city to march. The parade begins at Queen and University, and as is tradition, it ends up at the Ex where parade marchers get in for free (unless, of course, you're Rocco Rossi or Sarah Thomson.)

Alison Norman teaches Canadian women's and First Nations history at the University of Toronto and Trent University.

Photos one and two depict Labour Day parades in Toronto during the 1920s (from the Wikimedia Commons and snap-happy1, respectively). The third image is from the City of Toronto Archives and shows the 1928 parade (Series 330, File 569).