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→Origins of the strike: americanisation
In [[1906]], Pensacola's streetcar system was purchased by the Boston-based firm Stone and Webster, ending local ownership of the system. Stone and Webster incorporated the Pensacola Electric Company and administered the company through a local manager. In January 1908, the system's motormen and conductors had organized and formed a union, affiliated with the Amalgamated Association of Street Electric Railway Employees of America (now the [[Wikipedia:Amalgamated Transit Union|Amalgamated Transit Union]]). Over the next several months, various issues, including pay and company rules and practices, were disputed. At the center of the dispute was a company rule which required workers whom the company had suspended for whatever reason to report to the company's car barn thrice daily for a roll call. The workers contended that the rule was “unjust” and that it would “deprive [suspended workers] of the opportunity of doing other work while under suspension”. The company held, however, that the rule was instead a “very necessary discipline for [workers] who have been in the habit of purposefully and willfully violating some rule of the company in order to secure a holiday which otherwise would not have been granted them”.
On Saturday, April 4, the union's president, [[G. C. McCain]], was fired by the company. The next evening, the workers voted to strike. While the union maintained that the strike was the result of unresolved disputed over key issues including the roll call rule, the company, through its local manager, [[John W. Leadley]], contended that the dispute and the strike were engineered solely by McCain and those sympathetic to him, and that no real dispute existed. Furthermore, the company refused to recognise recognize the workers' union.<ref>“Street Railway Employees of Pensacola Go Out on Strike, Tying Up the City Lines,” Pensacola Evening News, April 6, 1908 (Special Morning “Extra” Edition)</ref>
According to the union, the mayor was notified of the impending strike at 6:40 pm, and was furthermore asked to notify the company, although he was unable to do so until the following day. The union officially declared the strike at 7:10 pm. Shortly thereafter, the striking motormen and conductors started bringing streetcars into the the barn, disrupting service across all lines except the Bayshore line. The cars on the Bayshore line were operated by agents of the company and continued to run until midnight.