ABSTRACT
The women match workers were model trade unionists at a time when their sisters in other factories and in the sweated trades remained unorganized or were unable to assure the survival of their unions. 1 The behavior of the match workers and their cohorts in the Tobacco Federation was so exceptional, in fact, that it merits closer analysis. In this chapter we will examine why these unions organized successfully and why the men in the Tobacco and Match Workers' Federations cooperated so heartily with their female fellow workers at a time when most union men were hostile to the presence of women in the workforce at all and more hostile to those women who sought to join their unions. Finally, we will look at one aspect in which the two Federations were different: the unequal representation of women among their leadership.
