DDR: International Workers’ Day | StampNinjaStampNinja

The International Workers’ Day celebration is very important all over the World with roots in the 19th century. It was very important in communists and socialist countries, so today we’ll commemorate this date with a few stamps from DDR.

Haymarket affair

One of the events that led to May 1 celebrations was the protest held in Chicago and many other cities in the USA in 1886. Protesters demanded “Eight-hour day with no cut in pay.” and the date when this should be implemented was May 1, 1886. While this might sound like something we’re very used to today, in these years, it was a pretty radical demand and there was no intention to fulfill these demands.

The 60th Anniversary of the 1st.of May Celebrations

1950/05/01

Denomination: 30 pfennigs

As this usually goes when a ruling class doesn’t want to fulfill requirements of the people, the police is used to suppress demonstrations. That led to violence and the death of the few police officers in an event known as the Haymarket affair. Business owners used that opportunity to provide financial support to the police that took many actions against union leaders and immigrant communities, mostly Germans and Bohemians.

International Socialist Congress, Amsterdam 1904

On the other side of the political spectrum are socialist and communists. The Sixt Conference of the Second International called “all Social Democratic Party organizations and trade unions of all countries to demonstrate energetically on the First of May for the legal establishment of the 8-hour day, for the class demands of the proletariat, and for universal peace.”

National Reconstruction Program

Clearing Land, Bricklaying, Carpentry, and Inspecting Reconstruction Plans

1952/05/01

Denomination: 12+3, 24+6, 30+10, and 50+10 pfennigs

You might like or don’t like socialism and communism, but the fact remains that these demands led to 8-hour work day. Even some capitalist countries decided to implement some of these demands in order to avoid the rise of the popularity of socialist and communist ideas among its’ citizens.

DDR

DDR (Deutsche Demokratische Republik or East Germany) existed as a country from 1949 to 1990 and, of course, issued stamps during this period. After WWII Germany was divided into four occupation zones: American, British, France, and Soviet.

West Germany (BDR) was formed in 1949 out of American, British, and France zones, while Soviet occupation zone became East Germany. Since DDR was part of the communist bloc and Soviet influence, it was “workers’ and peasants’ state”. Therefore, workers’ rights and important work leaders were the part of the whole society and numerous stamps were devoted to them.

Work Leaders

One such series was the Work Leaders series was issued on 1955/06/20 and the Copyright© goes to 1952 Deutsche Post. This series presents 7 leaders that were important in the history of German workers’ movement.