I have been on the firing line
of the industrial battle for years,
and when democratic bullets shot workingmen,
their blood watered the highways just the same
as when republican bullets shot them.
-Mother Jones
Hellraisers Journal, Sunday October 21, 1906
Oklahoma Territory – Mother Jones Travels and Speaks
From the Appeal to Reason of October 20, 1906:
MESSAGE FROM MOTHER JONES
—–
Dear Appeal:-I want to report conditions as I find them in the new states. I entered the territory at Wilburton. There the democratic nominee for United States Senator was holding a meeting. The committee called on me and asked that the meetings be held jointly, as mine was also billed. I wanted to hear how he presented the struggle of the toiling millions from a democratic standpoint. He showed the wrongs of the republican party, and the beauties of his own. I followed, and showed up that they were both wings of the vulture class and if that class did not have both those wings they could not exist twenty-four hours. I explained to the audience that I had been on the firing line of the industrial battle for years, and that democratic bullets shot workingmen, and their blood had watered the highways just the same as when republican bullets shot them. The result was that a Socialist local of seventy of eighty members was organized soon after.
At Hartshorn, the next stopping place, a tremendous meeting of men and women was held although there was but an hour to bill the meeting. Haleyville is strictly made up of miners. There was a splendid meeting held and they are ready for organization. Dow, another mining town, has sent for organizers.
They are ready for the new gospel all along the line. I have had tremendous meetings, and met the Appeal everywhere I went. It has done glorious work for humanity’s cause. Long may it live to continue the battle for justice.
I want to say a word for Comrade Snyder, the Territorial secretary. He has done yeoman work for the cause, and his compensation has been to see it grow. I held a meeting at Enid on the 10th. The court house was filled to overflowing with enthusiastic men and women. At Cleo the city band turned out, with all the citizens. It was a glorious meeting, and no doubt will bear good results for the cause.
At Alva, Okla., they had tremendously large meetings, which were attended by the school board. Everywhere there is a glorious message to humanity who have hope for the new day, and to no one does the working class of this country owe a deeper debt of appreciation than it does to the Appeal, and its hero champion, Comrade Debs.
I have not been well since I have been in the Territory. I shall end my tour on the 24th, and go to take up the battle with my comrades in Pennsylvania. I have promised the comrades everywhere to return this winter, and keep up the work for them. Yours for the Revolution,
MOTHER JONES.
[Photograph added.]
From The Washington Herald (D. C.) of October 20, 1906:
“MOTHER JONES” AND HER FOLLOWERS.
—–
Jack London, in his latest address at Harvard University, referred to “Mother Jones” as the woman I should be proud to call ‘Mother’; the heroine of her century.”
In John Spargo’s book, “The Bitter Cry of the Children,” “Mother Jones” is pad a high tribute.
Who is “Mother Jones”?
She is a woman who has been so busy forcing a way to the heart of the public that she has never found time to pause before its eyes. She is over seventy years old. Were she younger, she might pose as a modern Joan of Arc. Were she less a patriot of humanity than a patriot of a particular country-her own, for instance-Maud Gonne might not occupy today her particular niche in the world of fame.
The name of “Mother Jones” is a benediction in the family of every laboring man in the United States.
It is held in respectful reverence by the world’s reformers, thinkers, and writers.
She is equally at ease in a Pullman car or a caboose; as likely to be found in the home of Wilshire, discussing “The Great White Plague” with Eugene Weed, or “The Jungle” with Upton Sinclair-as standing between strikers and the militia.
At Wilshire’s, one gets as near an approach to a “Salon” as New York can offer. Here gather the brains, brushes, and voices that record the progress of the country. Here, thoroughly at ease, sitting quietly in a corner-always surrounded by a group of eager men and women, is “Mother Jones.”
In temperament she is wonderful; in manner of life unique. She owns neither trunk, umbrella, nor rubbers. She never received an education; she is without kindred, home, or bank account. When questioned as to these things, she says;
I received my education in the University of Life; the world is my home, and the little children are my kindred.
That is the keynote to her character-motherly love for the weak, the oppressed, and those who labor without hope.
—–
When “Mother Jones” led an army of factory children from Philadelphia to Oyster Bay three years ago, it was not with the intention of seeking and interview with the President. It was, rather, to give the children a holiday-the poor, ill-fed, pale-faced children!-and enlist the sympathies of the well-to-do along the line of march. As a result, hundreds of pairs of shoes, garments of every description, and nourishing food were the things held in the hands outstretched to “Mother Jones'” charges.
She is called “the laborer’s friend;” therefore she is feared by all who are opposed to incipient socialism. Her influence is enormous, but never incendiary. She stops the grumblings of the discontented laborer and teaches him or her to seek relief below the surface of anarchism and rebellion; to better self before combining to upset existing standards and conditions; first of all, to begin with the little children.
—–
To hear this woman plead the cause of these unhappy children is to listen to a Mother of Sorrows. Her voice is wonderful, and an expression of inspiration leaps to her face and takes off the years as she talks. Alas, how sad are the stories, and how logical her arguments in favor of getting down with bare hands to put food into the mouths and brains before putting work into the hands of the children!
“Mother Jones” has little patience with organizations and boards and associations. Theories and red tape too often bind the hands and hearts; organizers get into politics and rings; unions restrict.
The socialistic problem will never be solved and the people of the world put upon a plane of equal possibilities until the great government becomes a father to its children.
“Mother Jones” pleads the cause of humanity. Personally she has nothing to lose or win. She is a freelance helper. Her heart goes out to the Russian and the Pole, and the American impartially. She has figured in every strike in this country for the past twenty years.
—–
All during the summer that preceded the great coal strike, when more than 100,000 workmen were planning and perfecting their mighty project, there was but one unpaid outsider who watched the gigantic gathering together of the striking forces. This was “Mother Jones.” No one paid much attention to the rumors of the strike beyond the newspapers. People waited until cold weather brought the necessity for coal before they woke up to the miners’ attitude.
All during that hot, seething summer, “Mother Jones” lived in the midst of the miners; slept in their hovels; ate their coarse food; soothed their savageries of thought, taught and urged moderation wherever she could find a box upon which to stand. She never lacked an audience. The workmen loved her; they hung upon her words; they accepted her council. Had another stood in “Mother Jones;” place she would have been driven forth, as likely as not stoned.
Oh, the immensity of trust she inspired, and the wise “mothering” she gave these inflamed men!
And she knows her subject by heart. She was herself a factory worker. She began as a little child. She lived for years through the thick of miseries. She placed her trust three times in organizations. In other words, three times she put her hard-earned pittance into savings banks -factory system-and lost. That was after her husband died, and she was left to care for her children. It was before, those children-unhappy victims of a system-sickened and died. It was the crucial time, when “Mother Jones” was softened, instead of embittered, and came through her sufferings purified.
After all, what is she? Perhaps a medium between the constructive and destructive socialists. In sympathy with the former class, she is opposed to restraint of law where it impedes progress; out of sympathy with the ethics of the latter class, she holds some intangible thing in common with it-otherwise her influence would fail.
—–
“Mother Jones” has a fresh, clear white skin, with pink cheeks. That is the Irish in her. She always wears black with a quaint touch of soft white about the neck. She carries a small black silk bag from which every toilet and temporal need seems to proceed.
She has friends all over the United States. She was in Washington a year ago, very quietly and unobtrusively. Her mission was to gather certain statistics from the Department of Commerce and Labor. She did not seek to see the President. She stopped in the home of delightful Washington family. One Sunday evening, after an informal supper, “Mother Jones” asked if she might go into the pantry and wash the dishes. This was rather touching, and showed the domestic side of a nature that renounced all personal interests when she chose her career. “Mother Jones,” in a wide apron, with hands plunged in soap suds, wore a smile of rare happiness as she played at housekeeping in another woman’s pantry. An hour later, she was taking part in an animated discussion with several literary men in the drawing-room. Her knowledge was amazing, and she reads everything from current magazines to works of science.
“Mother Jones” is fair and patient in argument; her statements are specific. She is an optimist, and believes in the eventual settlement of all socialist affairs by the government. Everything short of the governmental hand upon the lever of national life is but temporary easing of hard conditions. Her favorite saying is: “Trust to the human heart; it is all right.”
The conservative person would hesitate to attend a workingman’s meeting with “Mother Jones.” She can not sit tolerant beneath a lie, and would-if occasion required-refute incorrect statements. Even an interruption is accepted from this woman, who has the magnetic faculty of holding any kind of audience directly she begins to speak.
“Mother Jones”-in common with most patriots and ardent champions of reform-has tasted prison life, but it did not upset her serenity. Wherever she is, she enjoys, loves, and labors, and altruism dwells with her.
—–
[Photograph added.]
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
SOURCES
Appeal to Reason
(Girard, Kansas)
-Oct 20, 1906
https://www.newspapers.com/image/67586737/
The Washington Herald
(Washington, District of Columbia)
-Oct 20, 1906
http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83045433/1906-10-20/ed-1/seq-7/
NOTE: This article should not be used as source on the life of Mother Jones as there are many incorrect facts stated therein. However, the article is interesting for its length and glowing review of the work of Mother Jones, unusual for the non-Socialist, non-labor press of the day. A good place to begin to study the life of Mother Jones is with her Autobiography (see below.)
IMAGES
Mother Jones, Mar 11, 1905, AtR
http://www.newspapers.com/image/66992169/
“Mother Jones by Bertha Howell (Mrs Mailly), ab 1902
http://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/2004672082/
See also:
The Autobiography of Mother Jones
http://digital.library.upenn.edu/women/jones/autobiography/autobiography.html