Week-end?

So is it week-end or weekend? The thought of trying to write around 600 words on the subject of the hyphen is appalling. So I will ignore it.

I’ve just been reading a book based in the 1850s and there was no mention of workers having a Saturday afternoon off. Sunday was the day of rest even though it was back in 1842 that a campaign group called the Early Closing Association was formed. 

a fete at the Crystal Palace in connection with the Early Closing Association

It lobbied government to keep Saturday afternoon free for worker leisure in return for a full day’s work on Monday. The association established branches in key manufacturing towns and its membership was drawn from local civic elites, manufacturers and the clergy. Employers were encouraged to establish half-day Saturdays as the Early Closing Association argued it would foster a sober and industrious workforce.

On top of this for much of the 19th century, for example, skilled artisan workers adopted their own work rhythms as they often hired workshop space and were responsible for producing items for their buyer on a weekly basis. This gave rise to the practice of ‘Saint Monday’. While Saint Monday mimicked the religious Saint Day holidays, it was in fact an entirely secular practice, instigated by workers to provide an extended break in the working week. I’d never heard of this practice but apparently it was so popular that music halls, theatres and singing saloons staged events on this unofficial holiday.

'Saint Monday' celebrants circa 1818

Religious bodies and trade unions fought to make this unofficial day off into an official one. Religious bodies argued that a break on Saturday would improve working class ‘mental and moral culture’. For example, in 1862 Reverend George Heaviside, writing in the Coventry Herald newspaper, claimed a weekend would allow for a refreshed workforce and greater attendance at church on Sundays.

For Trades unions and workers’ temperance groups Saturday afternoons were singled out as the day in which the working classes could enjoy ‘rational recreation’, a form of leisure designed to draw the worker from the public house and into elevating and educational pursuits. For example, in Birmingham during the 1850s, they wrote in the Daily News newspaper that Saturday afternoons would benefit men and women who could:
Take a trip into the country, or those who take delight in gardening, or any other pursuit which requires daylight, could usefully employ their half Saturday, instead of working on the Sabbath; or they could employ their time in mental or physical improvements.

Trades Unions campaigning for an established weekend

The adoption of the afternoon off was neither swift nor uniform as, ultimately, the decision for a factory to adopt the half-day Saturday rested with the manufacturer. Campaigns for an established weekend had begun in the 1840s but it did not gain widespread adoption for another 50 years. This start to the current structure of the weekend is one of the proudest achievements of the Trades Union movement.

It certainly helped that across the country the newish leisure industry saw a half-day Saturday as a business opportunity. Train operators embraced the idea, charging reduced fares for day-trippers to the countryside on Saturday afternoons. With increasing numbers of employers adopting the half-day Saturday, theatres and music halls also switched their star entertainment from a Monday to Saturday afternoon. Perhaps the most influential leisure activity to help consolidate the Saturday afternoon off was the decision to stage football matches on Saturday afternoon.

Saturday afternoon football match 1894

The concept of the weekend is, of course, related to workers in traditional 9-5 occupations. Staff who can’t work those hours, such as in the NHS, have their 2 days off during the week or other patterns of shifts. And now there is a movement to a 4 day week based on the same principles of the original fight for a work and life balance.

But we should not forget the people, nowadays, on zero hour contracts or being forced to work whenever employers want them to work. The struggle is not over.

I’ve always been a fan of Roy McFarlane. He was the 2022 Canal Laureate.

Kings Cross to Camden on a Weekend

Under a footbridge
where water serenades,
towering blocks are rising high,
skeletons putting on flesh.

Cranes godlike stretch
breathing life into giants,
on the sixth day as they
watch over the waters.

At the feet of giants
people walking along towpaths.
Canal boats, river boats resting,
tied, tethered, charged and connected.

Runners and people strolling
whilst a man on a bike
wearing a bowler hat,
plays Leon Bridge,
Take me to your river
Tip me in smooth waters.

Here, green is limited
they climb up walls
claiming back their spaces
tufts of green line towpaths
while walls are tagged
where vines leave signatures.

And the sun is falling down
on a beautiful equinox
the turn, the tilt of the world
is barely felt as light shimmers
on the black ribs

of a small tunnel.
Light dances on the ceiling
like a disco-ball and pigeons
party, coo to the soul and funk
of the canal and runners
drum the beat of a lazy afternoon.

And there are other tunnels
like church archways entreating
obeisance to times past
to lean, to bend
to always remember.

Here, locks are like waterfalls
more than keepers of waters;
a chorister for the song
and sounds of water

and back into the theatre
of café and eateries, where people
sit at the water’s edge, the sun gently caress
and whispers to bleached, blue skies.

And we lean into the equinox
on the day god rested,
whilst a man on a bike
wearing a bowler hat,

umbrella for a sword
slung over his back,
suede waistcoat,
and a paisley yellow shirt

plays a sweet, soulful tune
like a shaman of the equinox.

Thanks for reading, Terry Q.