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Hellraisers Journal – Monday October 19, 1908
The Red Special Heads East, Debs Speaks to School Children
From the Appeal to Reason of October 10, 1908:
RED SPECIAL GOES EAST.
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Speech to Young Americans at Trenton, Ohio,
That was Not on the Program,
but Enjoyed by All.
—–Special Telegram to Appeal to Reason.
Rochester, N. Y., Oct. 2.-The eastern trip of the “Red Special” has begun in dead earnest. As if to mark the change, the weather man has dumped us precipitately from the broiling heat of mid-summer to the freezing cold of mid-winter. This has had its effect upon some of the meetings as it is entirely too cold for outdoor assemblies and this doubtless keeps many people away. But still the crowds are large and the enthusiasm remarkable.
At Dunkirk, where the trust locomotive works are located, a large number of employes took advantage of the noon meeting and heard and applauded the speakers. When Roosevelt was at Dunkirk he was invited to the locomotive works, which were shut down so that the thousands of wage slaves could be impressed with the beauties of capitalism by one of its big chiefs. One enthusiastic worker who had voted the republican ticket all his life, announced yesterday that he had had enough and was now a Socialist, and was cheered by the crowd. A remarkable feature of all the meetings is the loud demonstration that is made when Roosevelt is stripped naked and shown up as a cheap politician, hypocrite and corruptionist.
When the Alton deal is laid bare Roosevelt’s connection with it established and the Appeal’s five thousand dollar offer is added, there is the liveliest kind of cheering as evidence that the people are at last awakening to the fact that instead of a bold and brave man being in the white house, the executive chair is being held down by the lowest type of a demagogue and rat-hole politician.
The New York meeting will shake up Gotham like an earthquake. Fifty thousand people are expected at the east side demonstration.-Theordore Debs.
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When the triumphant tour of the Red Special ended with its return to Chicago it was found to have traveled 9,000 miles, to have made 190 stops, and its speakers to have addressed, in the aggregate, 275,000 people. With this record to its credit and with thousands of people in the West agitated if not enthusiastic over the series of remarkably successful meetings, the Socialist special tarried in Chicago but a few hours and moved on toward the Atlantic coast.
Reports from those aboard are to the effect that not only were the closing days of the western trip marked with splendid meetings, a fitting climax to the first half of the journey, but that Debs is again in fine form and well prepared for the hard work ahead.
Large and enthusiastic meetings were held at South Bend, Kokomo, Indianapolis and other points in Indiana; at Detroit, Albion, Jackson and several stops not scheduled in southern Michigan; and at many Ohio cities including Fostoria, Cleveland and Toledo.
School Children Came Through Rain.
The Toledo Times tells a story so characteristic of Debs that we strain the crowded columns of the Appeal this week to give it to our readers. When the train reached the town of Trenton [Michigan] on its way to Toledo [from Detroit] it was found that the school children had planned to visit the train in a body, but its arrival ahead of time threatened to interfere with their plans.
But when Debs heard of it he declared that the train should wait until school was out. Although it was raining when school was dismissed the youngsters were soon seen running toward the train, the girls as fresh as daisies in a shower and the boys barefooted so a reporter said and continued as follows:
At one end of the coach is the Red Special band, and in amongst them are crowded the school children, their curls wet with the rain, and their cheeks aglow with running, their eyes full of wonder. Gene mounts a seat, and crowded behind him are the members of his crew, Socialists who are traveling for the day, railroad officials, and even our dusky brothers who do us the service of waiting upon us at the table. All are craning forward, eager to catch every word that falls from Gene’s lips, for all of us feel something somehow. In soft tones and simple words, Gene talked to those dear little ones. I can’t convey to you the warmth of these words, but I’m glad to say I can give you the words, because I took them all down. Bending over the children and with a voice husky, a little through his own emotion, Gene said:
“Clover.”
I wish to say to you boys and girls that I regard your coming here to visit this train and to see us as one of the most beautiful compliments paid us on the entire trip. You have all heard of James Whitcomb Riley the children’s poet. I happen to think just now of a beautiful poem he wrote a long time ago, which I think will interest you children. I will try to repeat it to you. You know that James Whitcomb Riley wrote “Orphan Fannie,” and “The Goblins Will Get You If You Don’t Watch Out.” You children who live here in this small place in the country are accustomed to the grass and the clover. You don’t know how lucky you are to live in a place like this. If you went to New York you would see children who never have seen any grass. They have never seen a live chicken or anything of that kind. They live in cellars and crowded places. They don’t know what clover is.
After reciting the poem, Eugene Debs went on to say:
Meaning of The Train.
You children are perhaps too little to understand the meaning of this special train. This train represents an effort to make it possible for all children everywhere to have time for play, and time to go to school, and opportunity to grow up, and be useful. You know in this system there are a good many children, the children of the poor, who have got to go to the mills and the factories and have to work hard, and don’t get any chance to enjoy themselves. They don’t get any chance to enjoy life. There are many of these poor little children, and we are going to try to bring about a change so that all little boys and girls may have time to enjoy themselves, so that they may have good health, and go to school, and be well fed and educated, so that they may get all the benefits possible in order that they may grow up to strong manhood and lovely womanhood. You are just on the edge of these things, and you will understand them by and by. You will remember, one of you perhaps, that you saw the Red Special train that represented the Socialist movement. For when you have grown up you will get the benefits that these men and women connected with this train are working for. On behalf of the Socialist party, I want to thank each of you for having come here, for having given us this little visit, and for having given us a chance to look into your bright faces and shake hands with you. I shall ask the band to give you another piece of music. We wish you well in every way.
And the band did play with pleasure. Gene shook the children by the hand, not forgetting the dear little bare-legged boy with the crutch. And the folks looked at each other awkwardly and foolishly, because their eyes were wet with tears.
And that’s all. Except that it was a little drama that none of us will ever forget.
———-
[Emphasis and Poem by Riley added.]
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SOURCES & IMAGES
Appeal to Reason
(Girard, Kansas)
-Oct 10, 1908
https://www.newspapers.com/image/67587477
Poems and Prose Sketches of James Whitcomb Riley
Neighborly Poems and Dialect Sketches
Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1900
https://books.google.com/books?id=38BLAQAAMAAJ
“The Clover” by Benj. F. Johnson of Boone
-actually by James Whitcomb Riley (see below)
https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=38BLAQAAMAAJ&hl=en&pg=GBS.PA36
https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=38BLAQAAMAAJ&hl=en&pg=GBS.PA37
Note: First appeared in Indianapolis Journal of Sept 16, 1882
-signed “Benj. F. Johnson,” actually composed by JWR.
https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=z88RAAAAYAAJ&hl=en&pg=GBS.PA552
See also:
Tag: Red Special of 1908
https://weneverforget.org/tag/red-special-of-1908/
“The Appeal to Reason and the Alton Steal”
From The Outlook of April 24, 1909
https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=xUKU2RBXENcC&hl=en&pg=GBS.PA905
“Roosevelt and His Regime” by Debs
From AtR of April 20, 1907
https://www.marxists.org/archive/debs/works/1907/1907-roosevelt.htm
Note: For Trenton, Illinois, rather than Ohio or Michigan, see Lapworth’s “Tour of Red Special” from ISR of Dec 1908, however, I believe this author and the author of AtR article above are mistaken as Trenton, MI, is directly between Detroit and Toledo. Both Trenton OH and Trenton IL are well out-of-the-way from Detroit to Toledo.
http://www.marxisthistory.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1908/1200-lapworth-redspecial.pdf
Note: From the Mattoon (IL) Journal Gazette of Sept 28, 1908
https://www.newspapers.com/image/73234486/
It appears that the interaction with the school children occurred at Trenton, Michigan, on Tuesday afternoon, September 29, 1908.
Red Special at Detroit.
Detroit, Mich, Sept. 28.-Eugene V. Debs, Socialist candidate for president, arrived here Sunday in his “Red Special.” A crowd of several hundred people gathered at the depot to welcome the candidate and a mass meeting was held at Light Guard armory. In his speech. Mr. Debs directed a general criticism against both Roosevelt and Bryan. The “Red Special” leaves tomorrow morning for Toledo.
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