Hellraisers Journal: Whereabouts & Doings of Mother Jones for June 1901, Part IV: Found Speaking at Memorial Service for Martyrs of St. Louis Streetcar Strike

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Quote EVD, re St Louis Streetcar Strike Massacre, LW p1, June 23, 1900—————

Hellraisers Journal – Friday July 12, 1901
Mother Jones News Round-Up for June 1901, Part IV
Found Speaking at Memorial for Martyrs of St. Louis Streetcar Strike

From The Indianapolis Journal of June 14, 1901:

“Mother” Jones in the City.

Mother Jones, Drawing, SDH p4, Mar 9, 1901

“Mother” Jones, known the United States over by organised labor, and particularly by members of the United Mine Workers of America, with whom she has been personally identified in many strike, made an unexpected visit to the Mine Workers’ headquarters yesterday. She is on her way to St. Louis to deliver an address, and then will visit the Illinois miners. “Mother” Jones is a regularly employed organizer of the miners’ organization now, and is said to be one of its most successful workers, especially in time of strikes.

[Drawing of Mother Jones added.]

From the St. Louis Post-Dispatch of June 17, 1901:

MOTHER JONES SPOKE
———-

HER ADDRESS WAS FEATURE OF
LABOR MEMORIAL SERVICES.
———-
LEON GREENBAUM PRESIDED
———-
Exercises Were Held in Memory of Men
Killed in Street Car Strike Riot.

At the Odeon Sunday afternoon, services in memory of the three men killed, June 10, 1900, during the parade of former street car employes on Washington avenue, were held under the auspices of the Central Trades and Labor Union.

The hall was well filled, the widows of George Rine [Ryne] and Arthur E. Burkhart [Ed Burkhardt], two of the men killed, being among those present. Each was accompanied by two little children.

The principal address was made by “Mother” Mary Jones of Chicago. All of the speeches had special reference to the street car strike, its causes and the conditions which preceded it, with a general bearing upon the rights of organized labor.

Leon Greenbaum presided and the services were in charge of the memorial committee of the Central labor body, consisting of J. H. Rakel, chairman; David Kreyling, secretary; R. M. Parker, treasurer; A. Hamberg and Leon Greenbaum. Music was furnished by the United Singing Societies.

In opening the meeting, Mr. Greenbaum, who was the Socialist candidate for mayor last spring, reviewed the events which led up to the strike of 1900. He described the scene on Washington avenue, when Thomas Rine and Burkhart fell before the riot guns of the posse.

William M. Brandt, business agent of the Cigar Makers’ Union, who helped organize the street car men in preparation for the strike, told of the conditions as he found them at the time the work was undertaken.

“Mother” Jones, the organizer of the Mine Workers’ Union, was next introduced and made an address of two hours’ duration. She was received with cheers from the audience, which proclaimed her the “friend of the laboring man,” and was frequently interrupted by applause. Her remarks were directed chiefly against corporations and the trusts.

She said she was engaged in helping the miners of Maryland win a strike while the St. Louis trouble was in progress, and, hence, was unable to be here, but her heart went out in sympathy to those who were struggling for their rights.

She advocated a revolution, if Congress and the state legislatures did not soon “give the people their rights.”

“Mother” Jones said she had been charged with inciting trouble, and believed that, in rousing the people, lay the only safety for this country.

“The most dangerous thing on earth,” she declared, “is a contented slave.”

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: Whereabouts & Doings of Mother Jones for June 1901, Part IV: Found Speaking at Memorial Service for Martyrs of St. Louis Streetcar Strike”

Hellraisers Journal: Whereabouts and Doings of Mother Jones 1898, Part I: January-May; Found in St. Louis, Missouri

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Quote Mother Jones, Perish in Sight of Plenty, St L Rpb p14, May 12, 1898—–

Hellraisers Journal – Friday February 10, 1899
-Mother Jones News Round-Up for the Year 1898, Part I

Mother Jones, Factory Girls, St L Rpb p14, May 12, 1898
The St. Louis Republic
May 12, 1898

During February of 1898, Mother Jones was found in St. Louis, Missouri, preparing for a Conference of Labor and Labor Reform Organizations scheduled to be held in that city on May 2nd. She was also found advocating for Domestic Workers in that city who were seeking to establish “a home of their own.”

Mother departed St. Louis in early March and headed out on a tour of Eastern cities in order to “stir up sentiment among the several reform organizations in behalf of the reform convention” to be held in May. Mother was back in St. Louis in time to present at that convention which was, sadly, not well attended. Nevertheless, Mother was soon busy attempting to organize factory girls, of whom, she declared:

The factory girls should be organized because their condition should be improved. This can be effected by organization, and by no other means. The girls are, as rule, underpaid, kept in cramped, unhealthy quarters, and ground down till their young lives have been dwarfed and stunted. Through the children the world is made what it is. In the unions they could be educated how to better themselves.

I have been all through the factories of this and other cities, and find conditions in them such that the lives of these children will be shortened many years by having worked in them. We have war abroad and war at home. The conflict with Spain is not half so grinding upon humanity as the battle for bread. A few hundred go down in a naval battle; thousands perish beneath the grinding tread of greed every day. We have reconcentrados in our own country-they are the poor, without wealth or friends, who perish in sight of plenty.

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: Whereabouts and Doings of Mother Jones 1898, Part I: January-May; Found in St. Louis, Missouri”