Tag: Industrial Workers of the World

Hellraisers Journal: Louis Duchez on Strikes Ongoing in McKees Rocks, Butler & New Castle, Pennsylvania, Part II

Janet RayeHellraisers Journal
Share

Quote Mother Jones, Powers of Privilege, Ab Chp III———-

Hellraisers Journal – Saturday September 4, 1909
“The Strikes in Pennsylvania” by Louis Duchez, Part II

From the International Socialist Review of September 1909:

McKees Rocks Strike, Indian Mound Meeting, ISR p193, Sept 1909—–

[Steel Trust Bulls and Pennsylvania Cossacks]

The steel trust “bulls” and “Pennsylvania Cossacks” were rushed in by the hundreds to club the laborers to death. One poor Hungarian while on the run was shot twenty-four times in the back. Comrade J. W. Slayton has the coat and every bullet hole shows up. The victim is lying in the hospital at the point of death. Another one, an Italian, looked through a knot hole in the fence surrounding the company’s property and two “bulls” ran out with drawn revolvers. One of them kept him covered while the other beat him so badly that he had to be dragged away by his fellow strikers and carried to the hospital. It would take volumes to relate in all its detail the brutality and boldness and lawlessness of the Pressed Steel Car Company.

It is no wonder that the country was aroused over the matter. No one with human feeling and a cent to give could refrain from offering it to the poor, starving men and children and sick women, who were treated a thousands times worse than the serfs of the Middle Ages or the black chattel slaves of the South.

In Butler the strikers were treated about the same as in McKees Rocks. Before the “Cossacks” came all was quiet, aside from the fact that the company “bulls” did everything to start a riot.

When the “Cossacks” came into town, naturally, the striking men and their families would crowd along the main streets. Hundreds of them got out in the middle of the streets of the little village of Lyndora, the Standard Steel Car Company’s town, and the mounted constabulary rushed into them without warning.

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: Louis Duchez on Strikes Ongoing in McKees Rocks, Butler & New Castle, Pennsylvania, Part II” →

Hellraisers Journal: From the Spokane Industrial Worker: News of McKees Rocks Strike: “Massacre of Working People”

Janet RayeHellraisers Journal
Share

Quote Mother Jones, Powers of Privilege, Ab Chp III———-

Hellraisers Journal – Friday August 27, 1909
Industrial War at McKees Rocks, New Castle, & Butler, Pennsylvania

From the Spokane Industrial Worker of August 26, 1909:

-from page 2

Massacre of Working People

IWW McKees Rocks, HdLn re Mass Mtg Indian Mound Aug 15, Ptt Pst p2, Aug 16, 1909The strike of the workers at the Pressed Steel Car plant, and at McKees Rocks, New Castle and Butler, Pa., near Pittsburg, is being fought by the employers and their troops with all the brutally and outrage which remind one of Homestead and the other slaughter pens of America. In addition to numerous outrages on the part of the employers’ troops, on August 22, 10 strikers were killed buy the militia, who opened a volley fire on the crowd of men, women and children. Four of the bloodthirsty soldiers were killed in the fight. They, at least, will never kill any more strikers. The account of the affair, while distressing, is a reminder that the fighting spirit of the workers is not dead, and that the working people are realizing that they have no rights to life, liberty, or the pursuit of happiness, unless they have the power themselves to enforce those rights. It is not for the parlor, kidglove revolutionist to preach meekness and “peaceful methods” to these brave workers who are fighting for their lives and to protect the honor of their families, nor for other working people to lay down hard and fast rules for those who are goaded and stung by tyranny and oppression……

It has taken untold tears and bloodshed to prove that the working class must unite as a class. The I. W. W. is the hope of those who detest bloodshed, and who, not deluded by reliance on the laws of the enemy, are still able to recognize that industrial control includes military control, and that the supreme court of society is in the world’s bread-basket.

The principal speaker at a mass meeting at Indian Mound on August 15 was the general organizer of the I. W. W., Wm. E. Trautmann. There were over 8,000 present at this meeting. The account of this meeting will be found in an extract from an employing class paper, the Pittsburg Post, on pages 1-3 of this paper [page 2 of August 16th edition, see newsclip]. This fight is against the United States Steel Corporation-an industrial union of employers. It is up to the working people of American and the world to help themselves by giving money to the strikers, and publicity to the cruelties practiced on the striking workers in Pennsylvania. An injury to one is an injury to all.

———-

[Newsclip added is from Pittsburgh Post of August 16, 1909.]

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: From the Spokane Industrial Worker: News of McKees Rocks Strike: “Massacre of Working People”” →

Hellraisers Journal: Eugene V. Debs Speaks to 1,000 Strikers at McKees Rocks: 15 Nationalities; One Class

Janet RayeEugene Victor Debs
Share

Quote EVD to McKees Rocks Strikers, Aug 25, Butler PA Ctzn p1, Aug 26, 1909———-

Hellraisers Journal – Thursday August 26, 1909
McKees Rocks, Pennsylvania – Eugene Debs Speaks to Strikers

From Pennsylvania’s Butler Citizen of August 26, 1909:

Eugene V. Debs Makes Good His Declaration
and Speaks to Men
—–

EVD Photo Crpd, AtR p3, Nov 21, 1908

PITTSBURG, August 25.-Eugene V. Debs, late candidate for President on the Socialist ticket, today addressed the strikers of the Pressed Steel Car Company on the Indian Mound, McKees Rocks.

Debs and J. W. Slayton, Socialist organizer for Pittsburg, went to McKees Rocks by trolley and were met at the foot of the bridge by a committee of strikers. They were then escorted to Indian Mound, where more than l,000 men had gathered. Only four women were at the meeting.

Mr. Debs’ remarks were terse and to the point. His voice could be heard plainly for quite a distance, and his denunciation of the Pressed Steel Car Company aroused much enthusiasm. He said:

There are 15 nationalities represented here this morning, but you are of one class. You are workmen, united in a single cause. You are wage-slaves in the eyes of the corporation. Though I cannot understand your language I can read your hearts and can make myself understood to you.

I, too, have suffered. I have been on strike and have become involved in riots. I know what it is to face a heartless power.

This desperate fight must be continued. The eyes of the civilized world and the eyes of all the laborers of the world are upon you. It is the greatest labor fight in all history. The laboring men in Pittsburg particularly should stand by their fellow workers in this fight,

I want to warn you of traitors, beware of spies. They circulate among you and talk your language. They pretend to suffer with you when in reality they are employes of the Press Steel Car Company.

They are employed by parasites who are lounging in their summer retreats while you are suffering and starving. You make the money which the degenerate sons of these parasites squander on champagne. They hold that the cheapest thing in the world is human flesh. Your blood means nothing to them. Because you have walked away from your work you are be shot.

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: Eugene V. Debs Speaks to 1,000 Strikers at McKees Rocks: 15 Nationalities; One Class” →

WE NEVER FORGET: Martyrs of the McKees Rocks Pressed Steel Car Strike, Bloody Sunday, August 22, 1909

Janet RayeEugene Victor Debs
Share

Quote Mother Jones, Pray for dead, Ab Chp 6, 1925———-

WNF McKees Rocks PA Bloody Sunday Aug 22, 1909———-

WE NEVER FORGET
The Martyrs of the McKees Rocks Strike
Who Lost Their Lives in Freedom’s Cause
on Bloody Sunday, August 22, 1909

Funeral of Joseph Hruska, Russian Striker, Age 20
-from The Pittsburg Press of August 24, 1909:

WNF Crpd, Joseph Hruska, McKees Rocks Bloody Sunday, EVD, WDC Eve Str p2, Aug 24, 1909

FUNERAL OF HRUSKA

The funeral services for Joseph Hruska, aged 20 years, of Shingiss street, McKees Rocks, who died as a result of a wound received during the riot Sunday evening, were held this morning in the Greek Catholic church on Helen street, Stowe township.

Hruska was unmarried and is survived by a father and mother living in Russia. The mass was celebrated by the Rev. Father Anton Knoseskes, pastor, the body being carried into the church at 9:30 o’clock.

A parade from the church to St. Mary’s cemetery was planned by the strikers. In the line places were given to the Lodge No. 390, Arch-Michael Greek Catholic Russian society, of McKees Rocks, to which the dead man belonged, and to 200 members of the Spolok Slavish society, Lodge No. 95, K. J., of McKees Rocks.

[Emphasis adde.]
[Newsclip added from Washington Evening Star of August 24, 1909.]

Continue reading “WE NEVER FORGET: Martyrs of the McKees Rocks Pressed Steel Car Strike, Bloody Sunday, August 22, 1909” →

Hellraisers Journal: Bloody Sunday at McKees Rocks Pressed Steel Car Strike, “Six Are Dead and More Dying”

Janet RayeHellraisers Journal
Share

Quote Mother Jones, Powers of Privilege, Ab Chp III
———-

Hellraisers Journal – Tuesday August 24, 1909
McKees Rocks, Pennsylvania – Bloody Sunday Leaves Six Dead

From The Pittsburg Press of August 23, 1909:

WNF McKees Rocks Bloody Sunday edit, Ptt Prs p1, Aug 23, 1909

Detail 1: McKees Rocks Strikers Battle “Cossacks”

WNF McKees Rocks Bloody Sunday Detail 1, Ptt Prs p1, Aug 23, 1909

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: Bloody Sunday at McKees Rocks Pressed Steel Car Strike, “Six Are Dead and More Dying”” →

Hellraisers Journal: From Spokane’s Industrial Worker: “I.W.W. Song Books Now Ready.” -Revolution & Blanket Stiffs

Janet RayeHellraisers Journal
Share

Quote Richard Brazier, BRSB p388 from Lbr Hx Winter 1968———-

Hellraisers Journal – Sunday August 22, 1909
Spokane, Washington – I. W. W. Publishes Songs Of Revolution & Blanket Stiffs

From the Spokane Industrial Worker of August 19, 1909:

AD First Edition IWW Song Books LRSB, Spokane IW p3, Aug 19, 1909

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: From Spokane’s Industrial Worker: “I.W.W. Song Books Now Ready.” -Revolution & Blanket Stiffs” →

Hellraisers Journal: “Bisbee, for the Second Anniversary” by Card No. 512210: “Comes the day, ah! we’ll remember…”

Janet RayeHellraisers Journal
Share

Quote Frank Little re Guts, Wobbly by RC p208, Chg July 1917———-

Hellraisers Journal – Tuesday August 5, 1919
Bisbee Deportations of 1917: “Come the day, ah! we’ll remember…”

From The One Big Union Monthly of August 1919:

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: “Bisbee, for the Second Anniversary” by Card No. 512210: “Comes the day, ah! we’ll remember…”” →

Hellraisers Journal: The Messenger: Ben Fletcher in Leavenworth for a principle: “to the workers belongs the world.”

Janet RayeA. Philip Randolph
Share

Quote Frank Little re Guts, Wobbly by RC p208, Chg July 1917———-

Hellraisers Journal – Sunday August 3, 1919
Leavenworth Penitentiary – Ben Fletcher Imprisoned for Principle

From The Messenger of August 1919:

Ben Fletcher

IWW, Ben Fletcher, 13126 Leavenworth, Sept 7 or 8, 1918
Fellow Worker Ben Fletcher

Negro newspapers seldom publish anything about men who are useful to the race. Some parasite, ecclesiastical poltroon, sacerdotal tax gatherer, political faker or business exploiter will have his name in the papers, weekly or daily. But when it comes to one of those who fights for the great masses to lessen their hours of work, to increase their wages, to decrease their high cost of living, to make life more livable for the toiling black workers-that man is not respectable for the average Negro sheet.

Such a man is Ben Fletcher. He is one of the leading organizers of the Industrial Workers of the World, commonly known as I. W. W. He is in the Leavenworth Penitentiary, Kansas, where he was sent for trying to secure better working conditions of colored men and women in the United States. He has a vision far beyond that of almost any Negro leader whom we know. He threw in his lot with his fellow white workers, who work side by side with black men and black women to raise their standard of living. It is not uncommon to see Negro papers have headlines concerning a Negro who had committed murder, cut some woman’s throat, stolen a chicken or a loaf of bread, but those same papers never record happenings concerning the few Negro manly men who go to prison for principle. Ben Fletcher is in Leavenworth for a principle-a principle which when adopted, will put all the Negro leaders out of their parasitical jobs that principle is that to the workers belongs the world, but useful work is not done by negro leaders.

We want to advocate and urge that Negro societies, lodges, churches, N. A. A. C. P. branches and, of course, their labor organizations begin to protest against the imprisonment of Ben Fletcher and to demand his release. He has been of more service to the masses of the plain Negro people than all the wind jamming Negro leaders in the United States.

[Photograph and emphasis added.]

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: The Messenger: Ben Fletcher in Leavenworth for a principle: “to the workers belongs the world.”” →

Hellraisers Journal: From the Spokane Industrial Worker: “Women Workers of the World” -Fight for Emancipation

Janet RayeHellraisers Journal
Share

Quote re IWW Women, Scarlet Letter Flag, IW p2, July 29, 1909———-

Hellraisers Journal – Monday August 2, 1909
“True respect for women is mostly confined to the working class.”

From the Spokane Industrial Worker of July 29, 1909:

THE WOMEN WORKERS OF THE WORLD

Honor the Women, Schiller, IW p2, July 29, 1909

58 Lodging House women Freed to Leave Spokane, IW p4, July 29, 1909

True respect for women is mostly confined to the working class. Strange as it may sound to the unthinking, and the unobserving, a woman or girl is safer from insult in any crowd of workingmen, however plain and rough, than in any crowd of idlers, however well-dressed and worthless. To take the modern miniature of Sodom, Spokane for example: decent women may pass up and down Stevens street-even among the spiritless slaves who are saying mass to the job signs of the employment sharks, and not a man who would breathe a word of offense.

How many women do not look down and feel nervous and apprehensive as they pass the crowd of loafers at the corner of Howard and Riverside streets, and these loafers are the very cream of Spokane society-yes, more, they are the refined cream, the Limburger cheese of the town. The same thing is true in all cities; it is the workingmen who are chivalrous, and the loafers who are curs.

The sharpest quote in the battle hymns of all nations has been the call to defend “wife, home and children,” but how could this affect our modern American employing class? What a task! “To defend wife?” Which wife? Which one of the modern employing class concubines could stir the spirit of bravery in the breast of a spaniel? The task is too great; too much responsibility! Love of home and wife may do well enough for a plain workingmen, but our advanced employers, with their plural marriages, have not bravery and “love” enough to go ’round.

In all ages, women, from their comparative bodily weakness, have been treated as inferiors. St. Paul says that “It is a shame for a woman to speak in the church.” Paul was right. It is a shame not only for women, but for men to speak in the church, which has been and is, one of the chief influences used to keep the female sex in submission. “Let her ask her husband at home”-for information, says Paul. Fancy a woman asking an A. F. of L. scab, with a broken back, for “information!” Men have fought and bled for religious liberty for themselves, and have thought to win real freedom by gaining the baubles of suffrage and theoretical “political” rights. The modern suffragette agitation among women may cause some of the men to smile, but they are following where the political “socialist” saints have trod-the ballot is the way, the truth and the life!

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: From the Spokane Industrial Worker: “Women Workers of the World” -Fight for Emancipation” →