Approximately 3,000 unemployed workers and labor activists marched from Oakwood to the Ford Employment Office to deliver demands for better working conditions. After the 1929 stock market crash, the Great Depression devastated Detroit. Ford Motor Company employment fell from more than 122,000 workers to 37,000 by August 1931, while thousands were homeless and workers faced strict assembly-line rules, short lunch breaks, and unpaid waiting time for repairs or parts. On March 6, 1932, a rally at Danceland led local leaders to finalize plans for the next day's march and a list of fourteen demands for Henry Ford, including jobs for laid-off workers, partial wage payments, a six-hour day without reduced pay, slower line speeds, rest periods, nondiscrimination against Negroes, free medical aid, winter fuel, an end to factory guards, protection from foreclosures, winter relief payments, full wages for part-time workers, an end to graft in hiring, and the right to organize. Participants included communists, socialists, anarchists, unionists, Catholics, Jews, members of other faiths, nonbelievers, and others showing solidarity with the jobless or support for related causes. On March 7, 1932, the marchers crossed the First Street Bridge and turned north on Miller Road, where Dearborn Police Inspector Charles W. Slamer and about 50 uniformed policemen ordered them to turn back because they lacked a permit to march in Dearborn. The marchers continued into Dearborn, intending to present their demands to Henry Ford. Police used tear gas, but wind blew it back toward the police line; a second volley came with icy water from fire hoses, and marchers answered by throwing rocks, ice, and pieces of brick. Four marchers died that day, and a fifth died weeks later from his injuries.