
Hellraisers Journal, Monday December 25, 1916
Merry Christmas to All From The Duluth Labor World
Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: Merry Christmas from The Duluth Labor World”

Hellraisers Journal, Monday December 25, 1916
Merry Christmas to All From The Duluth Labor World
Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: Merry Christmas from The Duluth Labor World”

Hellraisers Journal, Saturday December 23, 1916
Mesabi Range, Minnesota – Plea Agreement & Vindication Meeting
Today’s Duluth Labor World discusses the issues of Justice surrounding the plea agreement reached last week which led to the release of I. W. W. organizers Tresca, Scarlett, and Schmidt:
OTHER DEFENDANTS DRAW
INDEFINITE TERMS
———-
Tresca, Scarlett and Schmidt are freed. Last Friday they were let out of the dingy, over-crowded St. Louis county jail and given their liberty.
Months ago The Labor World made the prediction that the cases against these men would never come to trial; that as soon as the trouble on the ranges blew over these men would be let go. Our prediction was correct, although we have no inclination to claim the virtues of a prophet.
I loved the people on the Range…
the blond children of the Finnish workers,
with their rosy cheeks…
the dark-eyed Italian children,
trying to be friends.
-Elizabeth Gurley Flynn
Hellraisers Journal, Friday December 22, 1916
Mesabi Range – Three Strikers to Be Sent to Prison
From the Bemidji Daily Pioneer of December 16, 1916, we learn the sad news that three strikers will be sent to the state penitentiary in Stillwater as a result of plea deal reached in Duluth:
THREE SENT TO “PEN” FOR
KILLING SHERIFF*
—–[*Note: the so-called “sheriff” in the title of this article was actually a deputized company gunthug who committed an illegal and violent raid upon the Masonovich home.]
Duluth, Dec. 16.-Three of the eight persons indicted for the murder of Deputy Sheriff Thomas James C. Myron during the strike trouble at Biwabik on July 3 last appeared before Judge Cant in district court here and pleaded guilty to charges of manslaughter in the first degree. They were each sentenced to terms of not more than 20 years in the state penitentiary at Stillwater.
The prisoners who pleaded guilty to manslaughter in the first degree were:
Philip Masonovich, 35; Joe Cernagorcevich, 37, and Joe Nickich, 22.
The murder charge against two others, one a woman, was dismissed and the defendants were given their freedom.
In the three remaining cases which are those pending against the Industrial Workers of the World organizers Carlo Tresca, Sam Scarlet [Scarlett], and Joe Schmidt, continuances were ordered. These three were given their freedom in the mean time.
In justice to the other boys accused,
I feel that I should share their lot
as well as the accusation.
-FW J. H. Beyer
Hellraisers Journal, Thursday December 21, 1916
Seattle, Washington – Forgotten Prisoner Turns Himself In

One of the 74 members of the Industrial Workers of the World, now accused of first degree murder for the crime of being among those who did not perish in the Everett Massacre, was mistakenly turned loose when his fellow workers were transferred from the Seattle jail to the Everett bastile. After announcing that he was available for arrest in Seattle and waiting patiently for the authorities to provide him with transportation to the city of death, he has now paid his own expenses to Everett and presented himself for arrest there. The Snohomish County authorities have granted his request to join his fellow workers behind bars but have refused to refund his travel expenses to Everett. (See more on this story below.)
From the Everett Labor Journal of December 15th we learn of attempts by the Commercial Club to suppress the Northwest Worker, organ of the Socialist Party of Snohomish County:
Hellraisers Journal, Thursday December 20, 1906
From the Appeal to Reason: The Cry of Big Bill’s Little Daughter

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Hellraisers Journal, Wednesday December 19, 1906
From The Labor World: Young Lives Ground Up for Profit

Mother Jones has never forgotten the cruelty of Child Labor since the summer of 1903 when she led the mill children of Philadelphia on a march to Oyster Bay. They made the long trek in the summer heat in order that they might tell President Roosevelt about the hardships of their lives spent at work instead of in school. The President refused to meet with the children and Mother takes a few jabs at the “Great Prosperity” President in the following article on the subject of Child Labor in the American South.
BABY WAGE-EARNERS IN
SOUTHERN MILLS
—–“Mother” Jones Writes Stirring
Article on Iniquities of
Child Labor in South.
—–
Cotton Mills Produce a Type of
Children Easily Recognized
As Most Puny.
—–(By “Mother” Jones.)
After thirteen years of absence I returned to see what improvements had been made in the industrial conditions of the mill workers of the sunny south.
I found that there had been marvelous progress made as far as the mills and machinery were concerned. Looking at the advancement in that line, one would think that the day of rest for the workers must be near. Instead of bringing rest and leisure to the workers, however, this perfected machinery brings only a more merciless exploitation than was ever practiced before. With the advancement in machinery has come a corresponding advance in the methods of exploitation. That is all the difference the improvements have made upon the workers.
I stood one morning in the early dawn and I watched the slaves as they entered the pen of capitalism. I could see the shadows of the slaves passing along in the brush to the mill at twenty minutes to six in the morning. Children, roused from the heavy sleep of youth, left their beds reluctantly and entered the institution of capitalism to create wealth for others to enjoy.
Hellraisers Journal, Monday December 18, 1916
San Francisco, California – The Closed Shop Fight and Frame-Up
From the December edition of the International Socialist Review:
Will Labor Stand for Another
Haymarket?By THEODORA POLLOK
SAN FRANCISCO in 1916; Chicago in 1886. The closed shop fight now; the 8-hour fight then. In both cases, a crime of violence occurs and is tied around the necks of innocent labor men in the hope of helping to crush the spirit of labor.
In Chicago in 1886 a slavish press and an inflamed public mind, and the labor and radical groups, too weak to save the chosen victims. Today in San Francisco a slavish press, but a public mind open to conviction. Yet young Billings, first of the San Francisco Preparedness Day explosion defendants to be tried, has been convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment, and only the fighting working class of the country can save him—by saving his four co-defendants.
Tom Mooney’s trial, the second trial, is set for the 27th of November. It is Tom Mooney’s life that is desired above all others by this gang of ruffians, the “gentlemen” of the Chamber of Commerce, the United Railroads, and the Pacific Gas & Electric, and their tools in the District Attorney’s office. For Mooney, helped by his little music teacher wife, Rena, who is one of his co-defendants—Mooney recently dared actually try to organize the carmen of the United Railroads, who have been beaten down, spied upon and “weeded out” since the great car strike before the earthquake.
The tactics of the prosecution are such as might rather be expected in some backwoods lumber baron’s camp than in a great urban center. Indeed, with the “Law and Order” Committee from the Chamber of Commerce censoring all the press, the truth is even harder to get to the people than in a small town where it flies from mouth to mouth.
You that never done nothin’
But build to destroy
You play with my world
Like it’s your little toy
You put a gun in my hand
And you hide from my eyes
And you turn and run farther
When the fast bullets fly
-Bob Dylan
Hellraisers Journal, Sunday December 17, 1916
From The Masses: “The Instigators” by Art Young

Thomas Paine from Rights of Man:
As war is the system of Government on the old construction, the animosity which Nations reciprocally entertain, is nothing more than what the policy of their Governments excites, to keep up the spirit of the system. Each Government accuses the other of perfidy, intrigue, and ambition, as a means of heating the imagination of their respective Nations, and incensing them to hostilities. Man is not the enemy of man, but through the medium of a false system of Government. Instead, therefore, of exclaiming against the ambition of Kings, the exclamation should be directed against the principle of such Governments; and instead of seeking to reform the individual, the wisdom of a Nation should apply itself to reform the system.
I am loyally yours for a damn fine fight.
-Mother Jones
Hellraisers Journal, Saturday December 16, 1916
Mother Jones Found in Washington D. C. During November
We pause to review the activities of Mother Jones, that fearless champion of the cause of working-class men, women and children in their struggle for industrial freedom. We first find her remembered for her work on behalf of the children of the mills when she led them on the March of the Mill Children during the summer of 1903.
From the Iowa Bayard Advocate of November 2, 1916:
TENEMENT CHILDREN WILL
VISIT WILSON
—–
Their Welcome Will Be Unlike That
Once Given at Oyster Bay.
—–
New York, Oct. 28.-Fifty mothers of New York’s east side, with their children, who have been emancipated from sweatshops by the enactment of
the child labor law, are going to Shadow Lawn, Saturday, in person to thank President Wilson.
A “kind lady,” who prefers to conceal her identity, has donated a special car to be attached to one of the trains bearing pilgrims from New York to Shadow Lawn to hear the president’s address on “Wilson day.” The children will carry armsful of artificial flowers which they used to make in the factories, before their emancipation.
No such pilgrimage of the children of the poor has been attempted since the one when Theodore Roosevelt was president of the United States and a carload of children from the Pennsylvania coal mines [textile mills] journeyed to the summer capital at Oyster Bay to petition for a national child labor law.
“Mother Jones,” who conducted that excursion, told recently in public of the refusal of the guards at Oyster Bay to allow the children to pass the outer gate, and of their return home to wait 14 years for a Woodrow Wilson to set them free.
[Photograph added.]
While life remains I shall always
be with you conflict.
-Mother Jones
Hellraisers Journal, Saturday December 15, 1906
Mother Jones Found Campaigning for Comrade Dettrey During November

In the New York Worker of November 3, 1906, under “Party News,” National Secretary J. Mahlon Barnes reported on the whereabouts of Mother Jones:
PARTY NEWS
NATIONAL SECRETARY’S REPORT
The report of National Secretary Barnes to the National Executive Committee is in part as follows:
[…]
“Mother” Jones, in Arkansas, Oklahoma, Illinois and Pennsylvania;…
From the Wilkes-Barre Times of November 5, 1906:
From the Wilkes-Barre Times of November 6, 1906:
THE SOCIALISTS held a final rally in this city last night. William Dettrey and Mother Jones were the chief speakers.