If Joe Hill dies, spare your tears. Erect no monument to his memory,
as the man by his example has builded himself a monument
that shall endure for all time.
-Big Jim Larkin
Hellraisers Journal, Thursday November 11, 1915
From The New York Times: Mass Meeting for Joe Hill
From the Times of November 10th:
More Pleas for Hillstrom.A mass meeting was held in Manhattan Lyceum, at 62 East Fourth Street, last night, to adopt measures that might induce the Governor of Utah to stay the execution of Joseph Hillstrom, who is to die in Salt Lake City on Nov. 19 for murder. Among those who addressed the meeting were Joseph Ettor, its Chairman; Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, and Jack Reed, the war correspondent. At the end it was decided to send telegrams to President Wilson and Governor Spry of Utah asking for mercy for Hillstrom, and one to the condemned man himself telling him of their love and sympathy.
—–[Photograph added.]
Also speaking at the meeting was Big Jim Larkin, the Irish labor organizer known as the “Dublin Giant,” who insisted that Class Solidarity could yet save the life of Fellow Worker Joe Hill. Larkin exhorted the crowd:
If Joe Hill dies, spare your tears. Erect no monument to his memory, as the man by his example has builded himself a monument that shall endure for all time. At the moment of this man’s death you will have erected a monument, not to the man but in commemoration of the weakness of class union and the failure of solidarity. But let the monument of failure and of shame be not erected. Let the case of Joseph Hillstrom go to the greatest jury of all-the jury of the workers. Let the working class pass judgment and liberate Joe Hill. If we but say the word nothing can stop us. So let us speak and act that Joe Hill may again be with us and sing for us as we march on toward industrial emancipation.
From The Salt Lake Tribune of November 10, 1915:
MAKING LAST EFFORT TO SAVE HILLSTROM
—–
Enlistment of Aid of Swedish People
in United States Is Plan.
—–
Efforts are now being made by the I. W. W. leaders to organize all the Swedish people in the United States in a mighty protest to President Wilson against the execution of Joseph Hillstrom, the condemned assassin of Grocer J. G. Morrison and his son.
This latest move to save Hillstrom was announced last night in New York at a mass meeting of protest conducted by the I. W. W. and attended by more than 1000 men and women, according to dispatches from the metropolis.
At this mass meeting, which was held in the Manhattan lyceum, a number of I. W. W. leaders, among them Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, exhorted their hearers to aid in preventing the execution of Hillstrom. Above the heads of the speakers was suspended a huge canvas, bearing these words in flaring letters:
On November 19 Joseph Hillstrom will be shot through the heart by six hired gunmen of the state of Utah. Shall we let him die!
It was Joseph Ettor, chairman of the meeting, who announced the propaganda which had for its purpose a wholesale enlistment of racial sympathies and influence in Hillstrom’s behalf. Ettor stated that I. W. W. leaders were agitating among the Swedish people in the United States, urging them to organize and protest en masse to the highest authorities in the country against the carrying out of Hillstrom’s sentence.
The men and women at this meeting were instructed by the I. W. W. leaders to send letters of protest against Hillstrom’s execution to President Wilson, the governor of Utah, the mayor of Salt Lake and the two United States senators from Utah. The leaders dispatched such messages after the meeting.
Nine days from today is the time set for the execution of Joseph Hillstrom.
Letters from I. W. W. members and their sympathizers continue to be received by Governor William Spry and other state officials, but the governor announces that there will be no deviation from the schedule for Hillstrom’s shooting. The date set is November 19.
Text of recent letters in the Hillstrom matter received by the governor have not been made public. “They are similar in tone to those that have been received right along,” said John K. Hardy, Governor Spry’s secretary, yesterday. “Some of them make more threats than others, but the governor is paying no attention to any of them.”
Mr. Hardy added that the appeals and threats from the I. W. W. sympathizers would have no effect upon the governor or members of the board of pardons.
Soren X. Christensen, one of Hillstrom’s attorneys, went to Pocatello last night. It was reported that his mission in the Idaho city had to do with a phase of the case.
E. B. Critchlow, retained by W. A. F. Ekengren, the Swedish minister to the United States, to examine the records in the case and keep an eye on Hillstrom’s interests, said last night there were no late developments.
———-[Photographs and emphasis added.]
From The Day Book of November 9, 1915:
We offer this story, which is being featured in newspapers across the nation, without comment.
Joe Hill
by Gibbs M. Smith
Gibbs Smith, Sep 1, 2009 –
https://books.google.com/books?id=wFwsHQVuHVUC
The Man Who Never Died:
The Life, Times, and Legacy of Joe Hill, American Labor Icon
-by William M. Adler
Bloomsbury Publishing USA, Aug 30, 2011
https://books.google.com/books?id=nCwHDiXYMRMC
The New York Times
(New York, New York)
-Nov 10, 1915
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9C06E1D91239E333A25753C1A9679D946496D6CF
The Salt Lake Tribune
(Salt Lake City, Utah)
-Nov 10, 1915
http://newspaperarchive.com/us/utah/salt-lake-city/salt-lake-tribune/1915/11-10/page-16
The Day Book
(Chicago, Illinois)
-Nov 9, 1915
http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83045487/1915-11-09/ed-1/seq-9/
IMAGES
Elizabeth Gurley Flynn
http://dp.la/exhibitions/exhibits/show/breadandroses/strikers/elizabeth-gurley-flynn
James Larkin, 1876-1947, Big Jim Larkin, Dublin Giant
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Larkin
Joe Hill arrest record, Salt Lake County Jail, ab Jan 14, 1915
http://local.sltrib.com/charts/joehill/gallery/joehill.html
Joe Ettor Speaks in Boston for Joe Hill, Boston Globe, Nov 8, 1915
http://newspaperarchive.com/us/massachusetts/boston/boston-daily-globe/1915/11-08/page-28
She’d Shoot Comrade Joe Hillstrom (Joe Hill), Day Book, Nov 9 1915
http://www.newspapers.com/image/64119912/
IWW Don’t Buy Jobs
http://www.folkarchive.de/coffee.html
Information from Archie Green via Gibbs Smith:
After the Sixth Edition of the IWW songbook (Little Red Songbook), dated August 21, 1913 and before the Seventh Edition, dated June 1914, an unnumbered and undated edition was published by IWW locals of Seattle, Washington. This edition featured four new songs by Joe Hill including “Nearer My Job To Thee” on page 1.
Nearer My Job to Thee
-Joe Hill
Nearer my job to thee,
Nearer with glee,
Three plunks for the office fee,
But my fare is free.
My train is running fast,
I’ve got a job at last,
Nearer my job to thee
Nearer to thee.
Arrived where my job should be,
Nothing in sight I see,
Nothing but sand, by gee,
Job went up a tree.
No place to eat or sleep,
Snakes in the sage brush creep.
Nero a saint would be,
Shark, compared to thee.
Nearer to town! each day
(Hiked all the way),
Nearer that agency,
Where I paid my fee,
And when that shark I see
You’ll bet your boots that he
Nearer his god shall be.
Leave that to me.
Source for lyrics:
http://www.folkarchive.de/nearer.html
Nearer My Job to Thee – Katyusha