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Hellraisers Journal – Friday January 22, 1904
Denver, Colorado – The Polly Pry Claims Mother Jones Could Be Former Madam
Leonel Ross Campbell, Denver journalist now turned scandal monger, writing under the name of Polly Pry, has recently directed her prying gaze upon Mother Jones. In her magazine, The Polly Pry, Campbell claims to have evidence, supplied by the Pinkertons, that “proves” that Mother Jones once ran various houses of ill-repute in Denver, Omaha, Kansas City, Chicago, and San Francisco. The file, it is claimed, dates back to 1889.
According to the report, Mother Jones could be the madam who hired the “best looking girls on the row” for her house on Market Street in Denver where she went broke after her paramour, “Black-leg,” supposedly ran off with one of her girls. She then began drinking and was arrested and jailed several times. The Prying Polly further reported that this woman was:
…an inmate of Jennie Rogers’ house on Market street, Denver, some twelve years ago. She got into trouble with the Rogers woman for bribing all of her girls to leave her and go to a house in Omaha-for which act she was paid a procuress fee of $5 to $10 apiece for the girls.
She was a confidential servant in Rose Lovejoy’s private house on Market street, Denver, and with her several years. …
Lived in Eva Lewis’ house on Market street at the time the Coxey Army passed through here, and took a prominent part in the Denver preparation for their care.
Is known to Harry Loss, a piano player at 1925 Market street, who says he knew her first in Omaha in 1894, when she lived in a house at tenth and Douglass.
She was then selling clothes to the girls. A sewing woman for the sporting class living on Lawrence street…says it was commonly reported that she was a procuress by trade.
[Emphasis added.]
The Pinkerton report goes on to claim that a Mary Harris (using her maiden name) was a “vulgar, heartless, vicious creature, with a fiery temper and a cold-blooded brutality rare even in the slums.”
Now, in the slander sheet which bears her pen name, Miss Polly Pry is careful to maintain a distance from her lurid charges by reporting on a supposed report on Mother Jones. Very clever of her, and also in keeping with her usual style of reporting on labor leaders who are the often made the targets of her attacks. She has previously defamed U. M. W. District 15 President Howells, U. M. W. National Organizer William Wardjon, and U. M. W. National Executive Board Member John Gehr. Anti-union newspapers across the country see fit to pick up these sordid stories from The Polly Pry and reprint them.
For her part, Mother Jones refuses to give dignity to the charges by responding to them in any way. U. M. W. attorneys doubt that a law suit would be successful since the charges made by The Polly Pry are implied rather than made directly.
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[Announcement:] At Coliseum Hall, Sunday night, January 3, 8 p.m., a mass meeting of union labor people and their sympathizers.
J. Warner Mills, presiding.
Judge Frank Owners, J. O. Morris, O’Neil, Sullivan, Haywood, Moyer, “Mother” Jones, speakers.
That is the announcement which is expected to crowd the big hall to suffocation. The real attraction is “Mother” Jones, national labor agitator, about whom is curious, the story may be of interest:
Mary Harris, born in Cork, Ireland, 60 years ago, of respectable parentage and good antecedents.
Brought to New England at an early age. People settled in Maine. Educated in common school. Taught at country school for several years.
Married a prosperous farmer, and when widowed immediately allied herself with a labor movement, then attracting attention in the East, claiming, that, she wanted to elevate the laboring classes, and socially.
Began to associate with labor leaders and reformers at the time of the A. R. in 1894.Since then has kept pretty busy stirring things up. Has bad a record for never advocating peace, nor arbitration; but always for strife and war.
Was particularly prominent in the strike’ of 1895, miners’ strike of 1897, central Pennsylvania strike of 1899 and 1900, the coal strike of last year in the anthracite district in Pennsylvania, and textile strike in Philadelphia.
During the latter strike she placed herself at the head of 100 men, women and children, and started with them on a march to Oyster Bay to interview President Roosevelt and demand his intervention in behalf of the strikers. She held daily meetings along the route, soliciting subscriptions for the maintenance of her party, and finally landed at Oyster Bay with a handful of her followers-but she did not see the President and the expedition ended there.
That is the record, so far as the labor movement is concerned, of the woman known from Maine to California as “Mother” Jones, labor agitator and leader-“Mother” Jones, who is always to the front when there is strife, with her battle cry of “We’d rather fight than work”; “Mother” Jones, who gets $5 per day and expenses so long as there is trouble brewing, who since 1900 has received a salary from the mine workers’ organization, and who is said to be worth any five men as an agitator.
But down in the “Pinkerton” office there is another record, one that reaches back to 1889, when “Mother” Jones was a well-know-character, not alone in the “red-light” district of Denver, but in Omaha, Kansas City, Chicago, and far-off San Francisco.
That record covers many pages, but a few of the facts are all that are necessary to show you the character of this petticoated reformer. They say of her:
“Vulgar, heartless, vicious creature, with a fiery temper and a coldblooded brutality rare even in the slums.”
“An inmate of ‘Jennie Rogers’s’ house on Market street, Denver, some 12 years ago. She got into, trouble with the Rogers woman for bribing all of her girls to leave her and go to a house in Omaha, for which act she was, paid a procuress’s fee of $5 to $10 apiece,for the girls.”
“She was a confidential servant in Rose Lovejoy’s house on Market street, Denver, and with her several years.
“Was well known to Annie Wilson, another Denver woman, who ran a place on Market street, afterwards had a place in Cripple Creek, and now lives in Kansas City.”
“Known to Lolo Livingston, with whom she went to San Francisco.”
“Lived in Eva Lewis’ house on Market street at the time Coxey’s army passed through here, and took a prominent part in the Denver preparations for their cars.”
“Is known to Harry Loss, a piano player at 1925 Market street, who says he knew her first in Omaha in 1894, when she lived in a house at Tenth and Douglas, he was then selling clothes to the girls.”
“A sewing woman for the sporting class, living on Lawrence street (name withheld,) knew her 12 or 15 years ago, when she lived with Minnie Hall, and afterwards with Jennie Rogers; says it was commonly reported that she was a procuress by trade,” etc.
From The Polly Pry of January 9, 1904:
“Mother” Jones didn’t appear at the Coliseum hall mass meeting last Sunday night. Neither did she formally launch the new political party for which she stands sponsor. All to the great disappointment of the crowd that had gathered to see her.
She came to Denver early last Sunday morning from Trinidad, with the avowed intention of making one of her speeches at the meeting. She went to the Oxford, got some Denver papers, and suddenly became indisposed-at least, that is the story she gave out.
And now “Mother” Jones has disappeared-utterly vanished from Colorado. She left the Oxford early Monday morning, and since that time not a trace can be found of her. They say that she is not in Trinidad nor Telluride; neither can she be found in the northern fields nor at Cripple Creek; or, if she is, her usual haunts know her no more.
However, “Mother” Jones always was a changeable being, ever since she was known as “Mother” Harris, in May, 1899 when she leased the house then standing on what is now 2114 Market street, between Twenty-first and Twenty-second streets.
She refurnished it from top to bottom and soon opened it as a “house” afterwards became one of the most notorious in the city.
Had seven inmates, who were known as the “best looking girls on the row.” For several months took great pride in the character of her house and the class that patronized it. At that (time) it was the most exclusive “house” on Market street.
Made a specialty of midnight lunches and social card games, at which unlimited gambling was indulged in.
Catered entirely to the “gang” then to control of the city, county political machines; and a few wealthy mining men.
Four months after opening the house had over $15,000 on deposit in city banks.
Had a “friend” at that time called “blackleg.”
He deserted her in September, and went to New Mexico with an inmate of the house. After that “mother” went to the bad.
Took to drink and was arrested several times on the charge of drunkenness and disorderly conduct. Left her “house”” to manage itself, and in a short time it became one of the typical dives of Market street.
By November 15 she had spent the $15,000 she had on deposit in the bank only a few months before and borrowed $2500 from H. S. Engel, a loan broker, giving a chattel mortgage on the furniture in the “house.”
On December 20, 1889, the mortgage was foreclosed, the furniture sold, and the house closed.
“Mother” Jones then became an inmate of the “Minnie Hall house.” Then came the record as I told it last week.
And this is the woman the wives and children of the deluded call “mother.”
Interesting, isn’t it?
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SOURCES & IMAGES
Quote Dorothy Adams re Mother Jones asleep moonlight,
Tammany Tx p10, Aug 12, 1901
https://books.google.com/books?id=cqo6AQAAMAAJ&pg=RA39-PA10&dq=%22dorothy+adams%22+%22mother+jones%22&hl=en&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjS_fTB-_iDAxVqliYFHXuFBdAQ6AF6BAgLEAI#v=onepage&q=%22dorothy%20adams%22%20%22mother%20jones%22&f=true
Mother Jones
The Most Dangerous Woman in America
-by Elliott J Gorn
NY, 2002
(search: polly pry)
https://books.google.com/books?id=MUJeyIbSwPsC
Mother Jones The Miners’ Angel
-by Dale Fetherling
So IL U Press, 1974
(search: polly pry)
https://books.google.com/books?id=Sf7uyRYxePIC
The Daily Tribune
(Florence, Colorado)
-Jan 5, 1904
https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn90051356/1904-01-05/ed-1/seq-1/
Congressional Record of June 13, 1914, p638
Rep. Kindel of Colorado reads into the Record
the Polly Pry (Jan 1904) attack on Mother Jones.
https://books.google.com/books/reader?id=Tjo4AQAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&output=reader&source=gbs_atb&pg=GBS.PA638
See also:
Hellraisers Journal – Sunday January 10, 1904
Trinidad, Colorado – Mother Jones Critically Ill, Taken to Hospital
Polly Pry
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polly_Pry
Tag: Colorado Coalfield Strike of 1903-1904
https://weneverforget.org/tag/colorado-coalfield-strike-of-1903-1904/
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Angels We Let Go · Tom Breiding