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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 organised 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”.