—————
Hellraisers Journal – Sunday June 8, 1902
Mother Jones News Round-Up for May 1902, Part II
Found Organizing Coal Miners of West Virginia, Describes Terrible Conditions
From The Minneapolis Tribune of May 9, 1902:
THE COAL MINER
-BY CHARLOTTE TELLER
(Copyright, 1902)
Hundreds of thousands are indebted to the coal miners for their light and heat during the winter months. Much of the comfort of the world depends upon the labor of men who work ten hours a day in the midst of darkness.
It is a strange life. And few there are who ever give it a thought unless a strike be announced and the price of coal goes up in consequence.
Those upon whom many communities are dependent for the means of running factories, manufacturing gas and heating houses are scarcely considered in the course of a year’s thought. Men are bound together by the very strands of smoke sweeping up into the air from engines and chimneys, but they do not know it, and live thousands of miles apart in thought.
A woman who has for years worked among the grimy men and hopeless women of the coal districts-“Mother Jones”-writes that the life in the coal regions of West Virginia amounts to slavery. They are unorganized miners who live at [Kanawha?], because if they dare to make a protest or a move to help themselves, they are quickly discharged and their names put on the black list.
Nearly all the houses and stores at this place belong to the corporation, and this proprietorship adds to the troubles of the miners. “Mother Jones” writes: “Every rainstorm pours through the roofs of the corporation shacks and wets the miners and their families.” And she says she has seen the miners “drop down exhausted and unconscious from the effects of the poisonous gases amid which they were forced to work.”
The corporations do not seem to believe in “free competition,” for they make it impossible for any storekeeper or smithy to get a start near the mines. “Ten tons of coal go to the company each year for house rent; two tons to the company doctor. * * * Two tons must go to the blacksmith for sharpening tools, two tons more for the water which they use and which they must carry from a spring half way up the mountain side, and ten tons more for the powder and oil.“
“And this,” she says, “must be paid before a penny comes with which to buy things to eat and wear. When one hears their sad tales, looks upon the faces of their disheartened wives and children and learns of their blasted hopes and lives with no ray sunshine, one is not surprised that they have a disheartened appearance as if there was nothing on earth to live for.”
[….]
——————-
[Photograph added.]
From the Baltimore Sun of May 14, 1902:
TROUBLE IN WEST VIRGINIA
———-
Miners Say They Were Discharged
Because They Were Union Men.(Special Dispatch to the Baltimore Sun.)
CHARLESTON, W. Va., May 13.-Several miners from Cedar Grove report that they had been discharged from employment for the reason that they had affiliated with the United Mine-Workers.
One of the men reported that he had been discharged because he had invited “Mother” Jones, the friend of the union miners, to become the guest of his family in one of the houses owned by the company. Several workers state that the men who were affiliating with the organization are being discharged as soon as it is known that they are members, and that a strict watch, is kept over their movements.
A miner said that the situation in that section is getting critical, and that a suspension of work might result. Some of the discharged miners express the hope that a settlement will be reached by which the men will be allowed to return to work.
The trouble seems to be more of a recognition of the United Mine-Workers rather than the price paid for mining coal.
—————
From Hinton Daily News of May 17, 1902:
“Mother” Jones at Glen Jean
The great labor agitator, Mother Jones, of Ohio, is in Glen Jean [West Virginia] today. What course she is speaking upon we do not know, but we do hope, that she is not. agitating a strike. A strike will be no benefit to this community we know.
“Mother” keep your children at work. The devil finds some mischief still for idle hands to do.
—————
Note: Emphasis added throughout.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
SOURCES
Quote John Mitchell to Mother Jones re WV Fairmont Field, May 10, 1902
https://digital.library.pitt.edu/islandora/object/pitt%3A31735057897435/viewer#page/82/mode/2up
The Minneapolis Tribune
(Minneapolis, Minnesota)
-May 9, 1902
https://www.newspapers.com/image/180110672/
The Sun
(Baltimore, Maryland)
-May 14, 1902
https://www.newspapers.com/image/370566465
Hinton Daily News
(Hinton, West Virginia)
-May 17, 1902
https://www.newspapers.com/image/667452571
IMAGE
Mother Jones, Ipl Ns p11, Jan 21, 1902
https://www.newspapers.com/image/37784565/
See also:
Mother Jones News Round-Up for May 1902, Part I
Found Organizing Coal Miners of West Virginia and Advocating General Strike
Tag: Great Anthracite Coal Strike of 1902
https://weneverforget.org/tag/great-anthracite-coal-strike-of-1902/
Tag: UMW West Virginia Organizing Campaign of 1900-1902
https://weneverforget.org/tag/umw-west-virginia-organizing-campaign-of-1900-1902/
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
She’ll Be Coming Round the Mountain -Ken Carson and the Choraliers