37.766016, -122.428878
(Market St. Railway mural) SECTION 2: Bloody Thursday
This red-tinted section shows the riot on "Bloody Thursday," July 5th 1934, during the Longshoremen's waterfront strike.
The strike was repressed by police using tear gas, in one of its earliest uses against civilians, as well as live ammunition, leaving 2 strikers dead and about 100 wounded. This event led to the general strike of July 16th, 1934.
Details in the painting:
The "No fink hall" picket signs refer to the worker's hatred of the waterfront hiring halls, where workers used to gather every morning with hopes to be picked for a day's work on the docks. One of the main demands of the strike had been for joint control of the hiring process by employers and unions, to remedy unchecked corruption and exploitation surrounding the "fink (rat) halls" at the time.
The "I.L.A." in some of the picket signs stands for the International Longshoremen's Association, antecedent of the ILWU, which had a role in the described events that can be read about on FoundSF's articles about SF labor history.
