The Operative Bricklayers' Society (OBS) was a British New Model Trade Union based in

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

History

The society was founded in 1818 as the London Bricklayers' Society, but by 1829 had developed into a national operative union. By the 1840s the union had about 1,400 members, roughly 2% of the total number of bricklayers in the country at the time. In 1848, twelve former members of the Operative Bricklayers refounded the organisations as the London Order of Operative Bricklayers' Society. They led a strike in 1851 which won an early finish on Saturdays, and in 1854 succeeded in gaining a wage increase for bricklayers in the capital.Arthur Marsh and Victoria Ryan, ''Historical Directory of Trade Unions'', vol.3, pp.38-39 In 1859 the union became embroiled in a dispute with employers over the introduction of a nine-hour working day, and the consequential London builders' strike was led by George Howell. The OBS was defeated, and subsequently only developed very gradually outside London. In 1867, the union increased contributions from 3d to 10½d a week, and membership dropped from 5,000 to 2,000. However, in the long run, this improved the union's financial position and strength, and by 1877 it had 6,749 members. By 1900 the union had 38,830 members, but roughly half were based in London. In 1921 the OBS merged with the Manchester Unity of Operative Bricklayers' Society and the Operative Society of Masons, Quarrymen and Allied Trades of England and Wales to form the

Amalgamated Union of Building Trade Workers The Amalgamated Union of Building Trade Workers (AUBTW) was a British trade union. History The AUBTW was founded in 1921 when the Operative Society of Masons, Quarrymen and Allied Trades of England and Wales, the Operative Bricklayers' Society ...

(AUBTW). The People's History Museum in

Manchester Manchester () is a city in Greater Manchester, England. It had a population of 552,000 in 2021. It is bordered by the Cheshire Plain to the south, the Pennines to the north and east, and the neighbouring city of City of Salford, Salford to ...

holds the original emblem painting of the Operative Bricklayers' Society. It was painted in 1869 by Royal Academician

Arthur Waudby Arthur Waudby (1821–1872) was an English painter of the nineteenth century who specialised in carrying out work for the trade union movement. He published his first book ''Sketches on the Wye'' in 1839 when he was 18 and by 1844 he exhibited ' ...

, and hung in the Bricklayers' Head Office in London. It shows the society's work, proudly depicting the bricklayers' trade along with symbols of truth, architecture and science.

Secretaries

:1848: Henry Turff :1860: Edwin Coulson :1891:

John Batchelor John Calvin Batchelor (born April 29, 1948) is an American author and host of ''Eye on the World'' on the CBS Audio Network. His flagship station is New York's 710 WOR. The show is a hard-news-analysis radio program on current events, world his ...

:1919: George Hicks

References

External links

Catalogue of the OBS archives
held at the

Modern Records Centre, University of Warwick The Modern Records Centre (MRC) is the specialist archive service of the University of Warwick in Coventry, England, located adjacent to the Central Campus Library. It was established in October 1973 and holds the world's largest archive collecti ...

1818 establishments in the United Kingdom Defunct trade unions of the United Kingdom Bricklayers' trade unions Craft unions Trade unions established in the 1810s Trade unions disestablished in 1921 {{UK-trade-union-stub