We're proud to be a member of the @generalstrike100 national partnership .
Explore our interactive map and sign up to visit your nearest #GeneralStrike100 history and visit organisations taking part via our link in bio.
#𝐆𝐞𝐧𝐞𝐫𝐚𝐥𝐒𝐭𝐫𝐢𝐤𝐞𝟏𝟎𝟎: 𝐀 𝟏𝟎-𝐏𝐚𝐫𝐭 𝐒𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐬 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐏𝐫𝐨𝐟𝐞𝐬𝐬𝐨𝐫 𝐑𝐚𝐥𝐩𝐡 𝐃𝐚𝐫𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐭𝐨𝐧
📽️ 𝐕𝐢𝐝𝐞𝐨 𝟖: 𝐖𝐚𝐬 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐆𝐞𝐧𝐞𝐫𝐚𝐥 𝐒𝐭𝐫𝐢𝐤𝐞 𝐚 𝐫𝐞𝐯𝐨𝐥𝐮𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐚𝐫𝐲 𝐨𝐩𝐩𝐨𝐫𝐭𝐮𝐧𝐢𝐭𝐲?
In this video, Ralph debates if the General Strike was close to a revolution.
Follow along and share as we explore this pivotal moment in history across 10 short videos.
➡️ Next week: 𝐖𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐩𝐞𝐧𝐞𝐝 𝐚𝐭 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐞𝐧𝐝 𝐨𝐟 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐬𝐭𝐫𝐢𝐤𝐞?
Visit your nearest General Strike site via our links in bio.
Part of Salford 100 celebrations
Manchester and Salford Film Society & WCML are proud tp present a special screening of Walter Greenwood’s ‘Love on the Dole’ as part of Salford 100 celebrations, an afternoon of film and poetry with the UK’s oldest active film society and a chance to see a character inspired by our libraries founder Eddie Frow in his former home.
Date: Saturday 27th June 2026
Time: 1.30pm for a 2pm start
Location: WCML annex
Refreshments will be available and a limited edition artwork by Carol Moores will also be for sale.
Join us for an introduction to the Working Class Movement Library with Naomi Buckley, the Manchester and Salford Film Society with Carol Moores and poetry by award winning poet Oliver Lomax.
Delve into the Manchester and Salford Film Society archives and take a peak at the beautiful, stylised film posters and ephemera in a special archival session in the reading room.
Tickets in the link below
/e/love-on-the-dole-an-afternoon-of-film-and-poetry-tickets-1989296162372?aff=oddtdtcreator
Wrapping up the People’s Papers
As a final wrap up of her research Arielle Lawson provides an overview of the newspapers she has researched and a summary of the paper profiles she has put together.
This project - that explored radical community newspapers from the late 1960s forward - will also have a dedicated research page on our website soon.
Read the post here -
.uk/blog/wrapping-up-the-peoples-papers-project/
and follow @peoplespapers
A new poem inspired by the amazing @wcmlibrary archive to mark the 100th anniversary of ‘The Cramlington Train Wreckers’. A group of striking miners who accidentally derailed the Flying Scotsman on the 10th of May during the 1926 General Strike. Bill Muckle and his pals had aimed to stop a blackleg coal train they believed was being used to break the strike.
The poem is righty dedicated to the wonderful Dan Edmonds @dan_headwounds for all his astonishing research and recent work with the Working Class Movement Library General Strike archive. He’s been inspirational, and I certainly wouldn’t have written it without him.
I was most proud to read it at the opening of ‘A Great Betrayal?’ The stunning new WCML exhibition marking 100 years of the General Strike, wonderfully curated by Andy, Dennis, Sue, Seth, helped by all the staff and volunteers at the Library. If you are in or around Salford in the coming weeks please go and see it, it’s a truly beautiful and unique insight into General Strike happenings.
(A little more context to events below)
The men removed a rail on the mainline, but the train that arrived was the famous Flying Scotsman passenger service. The train left the tracks at approximately 20mph, but there were no fatalities, and only one person suffered a minor foot injury.
After weeks of silence from the local community, eight men were eventually arrested and convicted based on evidence from a fellow striker who ‘turned King’s evidence’ The mens combined 48 year sentence was a cruel and vindictive move by the government to “make an example” of the miners.
Much solidarity, love and longing Ol. #poet #poetry #poem #workingclassmovementlibrary #generalstrike2026
A sister archive - the @maydayrooms - based on Fleet Street in London - is currently building a dedicated archive of punk materials - redressing punk’s impact on radical working class politics during the 1980s/90s and beyond.
If you were in a punk band, made a punk zine or organised punk benefits to build support for political campaigns- and have any punk related materials you no longer want - then why not email them on [email protected]
The MayDay Rooms is open Wed - Friday each week between 11am - 6pm.
No appointment is needed.
The MayDay Rooms houses over 100,000 items - the majority of which relates to the ‘post-68’ extra-parliamentary left. Follow their account above to find details of their website, the work they are currently involved in and a list of their collections.
On Monday 4th May 2026 the Working Class Movement Library welcomed marchers for the 2026 traditional May Day march & rally, this year being an important one, 100 years on from the 1926 general strike. Marchers enjoyed our new General Strike exhibition before setting off and it was lovely to talk face to face to Salford Trades Union Council and many of our affiliated trade union branches and see all the beautiful banners. #mayday #internationalworkersday #tradeunions
The Working Class Movement Library welcomed Sounds From the Other City at the weekend for another year of a successful partnership, if you would like to hold your event at the library, please do email [email protected]. A big thank you to our wonderful volunteers for welcoming festival goers to our library and the General Strike exhibition. #SFTOC
A magical day @blueprintstudiosuk with my friend and Playwright @joelhwall recording and editing the script of our Ruth and Eddie Frow documentary for @wcmlibrary . So much love and gratitude to @garyhadfield_ for his mixing desk wizardry and his generosity in helping preserve and edit this wondrous archive interview with the Working Class Movement Library founders. Ruth and Eddie spoke with such spirit and humour, about falling in love, their shared activism, and building this unique collection, we all got pretty emotional in the playback, a beautiful day. Much love and longing, Ol. X #workingclassmovementlibrary
New Exhibition:
A Great Betrayal? One Hundred Years On. The lessons of the 1926 strike revisited.
To mark the centenary of the 1926 General Strike the Working Class Movement Library has produced a new exhibition. The exhibition features archive material and objects from the library’s unique collection and tells the story of the strike from the beginnings of the conflict, through the nine days of the strike and onto its aftermath and legacy.
The exhibition also explores the stories of some of the individuals who took part in the strike including Bill Muckle, a striking miner involved in the derailment of the train at Cramlington, Isabel Brown a trade unionist imprisoned during the strike for her vocal support of workers and local activist, Jack Forshaw, also imprisoned for his involvement in the strike.
On display you can see the typewriter on which the Hackney strike bulletin was produced alongside other bulletins and hear recordings of our founder, Ruth Frow, speaking about the strike.
This exhibition is part of the General Strike 100 national partnership of museums, libraries, archives and history groups, coordinated by the General Federation of Trade Unions. To learn more about the strike, discover other General Strike 100 places of history and find other organisations taking part, use the interactive map at
This exhibition and its accompanying events programme have been generously supported by Salford City Council’s Salford Centenary Fund, celebrating a century of pride in our city.
The exhibition will open May 1st 2026
#generalstrike
#100yearsofthegeneralstrike
#classstruggle
#workingclasspower
#OTD 24 April 1908
Barmaids 1, Winston Churchill 0! On this day in 1908, Winston Churchill was defeated in a North West Manchester by-election, losing his seat in part because of a high-profile campaign to defend barmaids’ jobs.
Churchill supported a Licensing Bill introduced by Liberal Prime Minister Herbert Asquith that aimed to impose much stricter regulation on pubs. Its most controversial proposal was a ban on the employment of women behind the bar. Although presented as a “protective” measure, it was widely criticised as moralistic and discriminatory, threatening the livelihoods of tens of thousands of working-class women.
In Manchester, sisters Eva Gore-Booth and Constance Markievicz helped establish the Barmaids’ Defence League and campaigned vigorously against both the bill and Churchill’s re-election. Their tactics included public meetings, leafleting, and dramatic street actions, such as touring the city in a horse-drawn carriage and addressing crowds in Stevenson Square.
The dispute also exposed tensions within socialist politics. Many socialists supported temperance and backed Asquith’s proposals, viewing alcohol as damaging to working class organisation, family life, and economic security. Others argued that banning women from bar work punished workers rather than addressing exploitation, highlighting the tension between moral reform and the defence of women’s right to work.
Come to the Working Class Movement Library and learn more! We hold a range of material illuminating the 1908 Barmaids’ Defence League campaign and its wider political context: pamphlets in the Temperance and Licensing section debating women’s employment behind the bar; Women’s Labour League pamphlets on conditions for women working in pubs and hotels; annual reports of the National Union of Women Workers, which frequently discuss service-sector employment campaigns.
#OnThisDay #WomensLabourHistory #WorkingClassHistory #BarmaidsDefenceLeague #WomensRightToWork #SuffrageHistory #ManchesterHistory #RadicalHistory #TemperanceDebate #WCML
