The significance of the 9 am to 5 pm work day is partially a matter of circumstance. Thanks to the sun’s rising and setting, these times make sense when determining a standard beginning and end to an eight-hour work day. 

Of course, we know that many people work different hours than this, but most people still work eight-hour shifts five days a week in the United States. 

This was not always the case, and it might be surprising to find out just what it took to demand an eight-hour day for reasonable pay, how hard the fight was, and how some people even lost their lives in the battle.

The Early Origins of a Shorter Work Day

During the early years of the US, most people worked on their own farms or were what we might consider self-employed. However, by the 1830s, this was beginning to change. 

Still, workers were expected to work from sun-up to sundown six days a week, with a day of rest on the Sabbath. 

Yet in 1833, a group of labor organizers formed the General Trade Union (GTU) in Philadelphia and made the unprecedented move of including unskilled workers in their organization. 

Two years later, coal heavers went on strike to demand a ten-hour day. As they marched through the city, others joined their cause. 

The GTU printed posters and organized parades, and soon, 20,000 workers, including city employees, joined the strike. 

The general strike proved successful, and many employees received their ten-hour work days and raised wages. Once their demands were met, the GTU gradually disintegrated.

Albert Parsons Fights for the eight hour work day

By the 1860s, workers were arguing for an eight-hour work day, as 10 hours was still too harsh in many industries. This movement steadily grew.

Things came to a head in May of 1886 when the leader of the Chicago Knights of Labor, Albert Parsons, led 80,000 workers through the streets demanding an eight-hour workday. 

Parsons was born in 1848 and was raised in Texas, serving for a time in the Army of the Confederacy during the American Civil War. 

Despite this, he worked as a lawyer to defend ex-slaves’ rights after the war and married Lucy Waller, a woman of mixed-race origins. 

Their marriage caused a scandal, and they fled to Chicago and eventually joined the socialist and labor movements. 

Lucy Parsons would go on to be a labor leader herself. The Chicago Police Department once claimed that she was “worse than 1,000 rioters.” 

Albert Parsons’ actions sparked a national movement, and an estimated 350,000 workers went on strike with the same demand, an eight-hour day. 

Parsons spoke at a demonstration in Haymarket Square on May 4th, 1886, partially demonstrating against the Chicago police who had killed four protesters the day before. 

A large police presence was at Haymarket that day, and someone threw a bomb toward a group of police officers and killed eight men, including one police officer. 

A battle ensued in which many more people were killed or injured. Witnesses pointed to the man they believed threw the bomb, but he was released for unknown reasons.

Parsons, suspected of being part of the plot to bomb the police, was wanted and appeared in court of his own free will. 

While the prosecution could provide no key evidence linking their suspects to the bomb, they used the labor leaders’ words against them to say that they influenced the bomber to act. 

All eight suspects were found guilty, and five were sentenced to hang, including Albert Parsons. He was hanged on November 10th, 1887, a martyr to the cause of the eight-hour work day.