Remington Rand then announced it had purchased a typewriter plant in nearby Elmira and might close the Tonawanda and Syracuse facilities. The union demanded information on possible plant closures, which the company refused. The union then threatened a strike. In retaliation, the company distributed its own strike ballots and claimed that it alone could speak for workers. Outraged union officials seized and destroyed the company's ballots, interrupted and broke up meetings at which ballots were handed out, and harassed and physically intimidated managers trying to conduct balloting. The Joint Board quickly held its own strike vote. More than 75% of the union's members voted to strike. Union officials asked the company to submit the dispute to a federal mediator, but the company refused to do so. Instead, Remington Rand fired the presidents of the local unions in Tonawanda and Syracuse along with fifteen other union activists. Infuriated workers in Ilion, Syracuse and Tonawanda walked off their jobs on May 25, 1936, followed by Remington Rand workers in Ohio and Connecticut the following day. Violence during the strike The Remington Rand strike was a particularly violent strike. Although no one died during the strike, both sides engaged in beatings with fists and clubs, rock and brick throwing, vandalism, threats and physical intimidation. But historians and federal officials point out that the company went out of its way to antagonize workers and use private security personnel (sometimes disguised as workers) to instigate violence and riots. The record before the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) and the scholarly literature show that the level of violence in the strike was deliberately manipulated by Remington Rand, and was several orders of magnitude higher than it would have been had the company not taken the actions it did. Notable incidents include: In mid-June 1936, the company sent 100 strikebreakers through the picket line toward the front gate of the plant in Tonawanda. The company deliberately withdrew its protection of the workers when they reached the picket line. A fight broke out between the strikebreakers and the 500 picketers. Tonawanda police, waiting nearby, descended on the picketers and beat hundreds with billy-clubs. Beginning July 3, 1936, a four-day running riot began around the Middletown, Ohio, plant. The riot began when the company attempted to bring hundreds of strikebreakers through the picket lines unprotected. Over the following two days, workers hurled stones at strikebreakers, keeping them from entering