Biography
Freda Reicher was a Chicago garment-strike picket associated with the International Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union. The authorities imprisoned this union activist in 1926 for defying the anti-picketing injunction during the 1924 strike.
Daily Worker, June 15, 1926, page 1: The front-page report names this picket among those beginning terms at Cook County Jail under Judge Denis E. Sullivan for violating the injunction during the 1924 garment strike. Individual listed sentence: 30 days and a $200 fine. Printed Frieda Reiker. About four hundred fellow union members accompanied the defendants and red carnations were handed out. The article’s relative “today” does not establish an exact physical admission day. This is the already recorded 1926 imprisonment; later release evidence and any conflicting duration reports remain in the existing case. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1926/1926-ny/v03-n131-NY-jun-15-1926-DW-LOC.pdf
The March 20 four-woman garment-strike committee appeal names Reicher with Margaret Welch, Mary Goorvitch and Eugenia Schlacter and explicitly describes repeated imprisonment during the strike. These earlier police detentions precede the separately documented 1926 Cook County contempt term. No continuous 1924–1926 interval or complete early detention total is inferred. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1924/v02a-n004-mar-21-1924-DW-LOC.pdf#page=1
The June 19, 1926 Chicago garment-prisoner account adds personal and prison-life detail. The report identifies Reicher as head of the prisoners’ committee and describes her return from a Colorado sanitarium to serve the sentence. It attributes to the women criticism of cramped cells, an open toilet, vermin, food and restrictions on reading and visits, with union support supplying meals and flowers. The nominal thirty-day sentence here is not a newly measured total. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1926/1926-ny/v03-n135-NY-jun-19-1926-DW-LOC.pdf#page=3
The July 15, 1926 account explicitly describes their physical release from Cook County Jail after completing thirty-day injunction-contempt terms arising from the 1924 garment strike. Fellow unionists met them with flowers and marched through the garment district. The issue supplies no exact physical discharge day; none is calculated from the term. Daily Worker, July 15, 1926, original PDF page 1. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1926/1926-ny/v03-n156-NY-jul-15-1926-DW-LOC.pdf#page=1
A jail telegram and return to serve her sentence
The June 29, 1926 Daily Worker prints a telegram from the International Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union pickets in Cook County Jail, signed by Frieda Reicher on their behalf. Its page 2 continuation calls her Freda Reicher and identifies her as the prisoners’ representative, reporting that she returned to Chicago from a Colorado tuberculosis sanitarium to serve her sentence. The account concerns imprisonment for defying the injunction during the 1924 garment strike. It supplies no exact physical admission or release day and does not replace the later report of her completed term. The spelling variants are reported as printed, not assigned to a different person.
Daily Worker, June 29, 1926, printed pages 1–2. Contemporary allegations and quotations are attributed to the newspaper. The available PDF contains printed pages 1, 2, 5 and 6; missing issue pages 3–4 were not reviewed.
The June 27, 1926 Daily Worker prints a joint letter signed by Freda Reicher and Florence Corn from Cook County Jail, where they were serving sentences for defying Judge Denis E. Sullivan's anti-picketing injunction during the 1924 garment strike. Their letter advocates open labor opposition to injunctions. This is an actual custody observation, not a new admission or discharge date. The separate Reicher feature gives a thirty-day imposed term and reports that she left a Colorado tuberculosis sanitarium to serve it; that medical context is attributed to the newspaper rather than an independent diagnosis. The reproduced portrait is Lydia Gibson's original drawing, captioned individually as Reicher and drawn at Cook County Jail; it is not a photograph.
Daily Worker, June 15, 1926; relevant page stated in the accompanying profile note.
