In honor of Labor Day, let’s take a look back at this article from Editor and Publisher of Feb. 5, 1921, datelined Albany, in which the New York State Publishers’ Association, keepers of the possessive apostrophe, detail their reasoning for opposing the 44-hour week then being championed by the typographers and stereotypers.
The president of the NYSPA then was media mogul Frank Gannett of Rochester’s Times-Union, unaffiliated with Albany’s own T-U, which was part of Hearst’s empire. After their first annual meeting, held in Albany, he said, “We submit that the tendency to shorter hours of labor cannot be supported indefinitely. The 48-hour week was the desire and ultimate contention of organized labor through years of struggle…
“In view of the business conditions to-day, labor costs cannot be advanced. Any increased cost such as proposed, would necessarily have to be absorbed by the publishing business, which the Unions and the public are well aware, are in no position to stand such financial loss. The increasing number of papers ceasing publication and consolidating is proof of this point.”
(Wildly confused youth take note: stereotyping wasn’t always a bad thing.)