The heritage we leave to
the next generation
will be in the conditions
that we make now.
-Elizabeth Gurley Flynn
Hellraisers Journal, Tuesday January 23, 1917
Seattle, Washington – Miss Flynn Speaks at Dreamland Park
From The Seattle Star of January 22, 1917:
MORE THAN 5000 HEAR
ELIZABETH GURLEY FLYNN
—–
Before a record-breaking crowd at the Dreamland rink, Sunday afternoon, Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, noted woman labor speaker, and H. Scott Bennett, former labor member of the Australian parliament, spoke under the auspices of the Everett Defense league, in behalf of the 74 I. W. W. held for murder.
Charles Ashleight [Ashleigh] presided.
Forceful, vigorous, speaking with intense feeling, Miss Flynn fired volley after volley against the capitalistic system, which, according to her, permitted the murder of five I. W. W. at Everett.
Bennett also carried tremendous force in his remarks as he reviewed the labor struggle.
Resolutions asking a federal investigation of the affair at Everett were passed, and a collection netted $331.52 for the defense fund. More than 5,000 attended the meeting.
A dance in the evening netted $200.
———-
The Speeches of Fellow Worker Flynn and Comrade Bennet
Elizabeth Gurley Flynn was the principal speaker at the event. She described the Everett struggle and stated that it was first a fight against an employers’ offensive against all of organized labor on the entire Pacific Coast, and she emphasized that only within that context was this a free-speech fight. Miss Flynn reminded her audience that
Now is the time to defend yourselves in the persons of those 74, for the heritage we leave to the next generation will be in the conditions that we make now.
She was followed by Scott Bennett who made it clear that, while he himself was not a member of the Industrial Workers of the World nevertheless,
They are dear to me, for by God, they fight, they fight, they fight.
SOURCES
The Seattle Star
(Seattle, Washington)
-Jan 22, 1917
https://www.newspapers.com/image/145422272/
The Industrial Workers of the World, 1905-1917
-by Philip S Foner
International Publishers, 1965
(search with: dreamland flynn bennett)
https://books.google.com/books?id=e-KlAAAAMAAJ
IMAGES
EGF, Everett Northwest Worker, Jan 18, 1917
https://www.newspapers.com/image/64453745
H. Scott Bennett, ISR, Sept 1916
https://books.google.com/books/reader?id=SVRIAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover&output=reader&source=gbs_atb&pg=GBS.PA145
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