Today in Labor History June 3, 1913: IWW Marine Transport Workers Union in New Orleans continued their strike against United Fruit Company (now known as Chiquita) after wages were cut by five dollars per month. The strike, which started on June 2, turned deadly on June 13, when police opened fire on strikers trying to stop scabs from loading a ship, killing two of them. The IWW lost this strike. However, they were highly successful in other longshore strikes up and down the Eastern Seaboard. At this time, the IWW controlled all but 2 of the Philadelphia docks. Their multiracial union was led by Ben Fletcher, an African-American docker. Fletcher was also instrumental in organizing the Baltimore dockers.

You can read my longer article about Ben Fletcher here: https://michaeldunnauthor.com/2021/05/13/ben-fletcher-and-the-iww-dockers/

#workingclass #LaborHistory #IWW #wobblies #union #strike #racism #neworleans #philadelphia #police #policebrutality #acab #policemurder #scab #antiracism #solidarity #BlackMastodon

Today in Labor History June 3, 1900: The International Ladies’ Garment Workers Union (ILGWU) was founded. In 1909, they led the Uprising of 20,000, a 14-wk strike of mostly immigrant women, sparked by a walkout at the Triangle Shirtwaist Company. It led to a General Strike. Management used thugs to brutally beat the women, while police looked the other way. The women’s success surprised many of the labor leaders of the era, who had believed that neither women, nor immigrants, could be effectively organized. Meetings were often translated into Yiddish and Italian. Clara Lemlich, 23 years old, was one of the main organizers. Her family had immigrated to the U.S. in 1903 to escape antisemitic pogroms in their hometown of Kishinev, Ukraine. During the Uprising of 20,000, she returned to the picket line, even after thugs hired by the bosses had beaten her up and broken several of her ribs. As an organizer, she repeatedly challenged the male leadership of the mostly female union. The strike lasted until February, 1910, with increased wages, better working conditions, and shorter hours, but without universal union recognition. A number of companies, including Triangle, refused to sign the agreement.
Lemlich was blacklisted from the industry for her leadership of the strike. So, she turned her attention to organizing for women’s suffrage, and later organizing with the Communist Party.

In 1910, the ILGWU led an even bigger strike, The Great Revolt, of 60,000 cloak-makers. The Triangle Shirtwaist fire, in 1911, prompted many more women to join the union. In 1919, many members left to join the Communist Party. Many of those who remained were anarchists with dual membership in the radical IWW. They challenged the autocratic leadership of the ILGWU. The 1920s was marred by sectarian battles between left- and right-wing factions, and by violence from hired gangsters. Ironically, it was Arnold Rothstein (the Jewish gangster behind the Chicago Black Sox scandal, and who mentored mobsters Meyer Lansky and Lucky Luciano) who got the gangsters to withdraw from the union. Over the years, the ILGWU merged with other unions and is currently part of UNITE-HERE.

#workingclass #LaborHistory #union #strike #ilgwu #IWW #TriangleShirtwaist #mafia #LuckyLuciano #GeneralStrike #communism #anarchism #arnoldrothstein #meyerlansky

Today in Labor History June 2, 1919: Anarchist Galleanists carried out a series of 9 coordinated bombings across the Eastern United States. They damaged the homes of U.S. Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer, as well as then Assistant Secretary of the Navy, Franklin D. Roosevelt. They also targeted a number of judges. None of the targeted men died, although a night watchman, a former editor of the Galleanist publication “Cronaca Sovversiva,” did accidentally get killed. The bombs were delivered in packages that included the following note: “War, Class war, and you were the first to wage it under the cover of the powerful institutions you call order, in the darkness of your laws. There will have to be bloodshed; we will not dodge; there will have to be murder: we will kill, because it is necessary; there will have to be destruction; we will destroy to rid the world of your tyrannical institutions.”

The response by Palmer included mass illegal search and seizures, unwarranted arrests and the deportation of several hundred suspected radicals and anarchists. He also carried the nationwide witch hunts known as the Palmer raids in November 1919 and January 1920, arresting 10,000 anarchists, communists, and labor leaders, imprisoning 3,500, and deporting 556, including Emma Goldman and Alexander Berkman. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), was founded in response to the raid, by IWW organizer Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, Helen Keller, and others.

#workingclass #LaborHistory #anarchism #bombings #palmerraids #redscare #policebrutality #prison #deportations #fdr #union #communism #EmmaGoldman #alexanderberkman #elizabethgurleyflynn #HelenKeller #IWW #aclu #classwar

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İşçi Tarihinde Bugün 1 Haziran 1906: Meksika’nın Sonora eyaletinde kanlı Cananea bakır madencileri grevi başladı. Madenciler, yanlarında çalışan ABD vatandaşlarının kazandıklarına denk düşecek şekilde günlük 5 peso ve 8 saatlik çalışma süresi talep ediyorlardı. Grev sırasında çoğu şirket için çalışan ABD vatandaşları tarafından öldürülen 100’e yakın madenci hayatını kaybetti. Her ne kadar taleplerinin hiçbirini elde edemeden işe geri dönmek zorunda kalsalar da, bu olay nihayetinde Meksika Devrimi'ne yol açan genel kargaşaya katkıda bulundu.

Anarşist Ricardo Flores Magón, Partido Liberal Mexicana üyeleriyle birlikte, orada çalışan tüm Amerikalıları ortadan kaldırmak amacıyla Arizona'dan Cananea bakır madenlerine giden bir devrimci tugayını örgütledi. Arizona Rangers, bu gruptan birkaç kişiyi yakaladı. Magón ve diğer birçok kişi, ABD tarafsızlık yasalarını ihlal etmekle suçlanarak Arizona'nın Tombstone kentine iade edildi ve 1910 yılına kadar hapis yattı. Bundan sonra, Magonistler Meksika Devrimi sırasında Tijuana da dahil olmak üzere Baja California'nın bazı bölgelerini ele geçirdi. ABD'den birçok IWW üyesi, Magonist güçlere katıldı. Tombstone, Bisbee'den sadece birkaç mil uzaklıkta, 1917'de milislerin IWW'ye üye göçmen madencileri kaçırıp sınır dışı ettikleri OK Corral çatışmasının yaşandığı yerdi.

#işçisınıfı #İşçiTarihi #cananea #meksika #bakır #madencilik #anarşizm
#RicardoFloresMagon #grev #katliam #meksika #Devrim #IWW

Today in Labor History June 1, 1916: The predominantly immigrant iron miners of the Mesabi Range, Minnesota, launched a spontaneous strike in response to overpriced housing and goods, long hours and poor pay. The group was led by radical Finns who quickly drew the attention and aid of the IWW, including Carlo Tresca, Frank Little, and Elizabeth Gurley Flynn.

Bob Dylan’s song, “North Country Blues,” is about this strike. The lyrics reference "iron ore," "red iron," and "red iron pits," all of which likely refer to the Mesabi Range. Dylan's childhood home in Hibbing, Minnesota is located nearby.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pid0Ud4y3XY&list=RDpid0Ud4y3XY&start_radio=1

#workingclass #LaborHistory #IWW #union #strike #wildcat #mesabi #iron #mining #solidarity #immigrant #ElizabethGurleyFlynn #FrankLittle #racism #vigilantes #nativeamerican #indigenous

Today in Labor History June 1, 1916: The predominantly immigrant iron miners of the Mesabi Range, Minnesota, participated in a seemingly spontaneous strike in response to overpriced housing and goods, long hours and poor pay. The group was led by radical Finns who quickly drew the attention and aid of the IWW. Wobbly organizers, including Carlo Tresca, Joe Schmidt, Frank Little, and later Joe Ettor and Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, came to help local strike leaders draw up a list of demands which included an 8-hour day, timed from when workers entered the mine until they were outside; a pay-scale based upon the actual hours worked; paydays twice monthly; immediate back-pay for hours worked upon severance; abolition of the Saturday night shift; abolition of the hated contract mining system. In the Contract Mining system, the bosses hired and paid “skilled” miners to do most of the mining. The contract miners then had to hire their own laborers and pay them out of their meagre wages. The contract miners were often native-born people, while the laborers were usually immigrants. This created a racialized two-tiered system that divided the workers and made it harder to organize. The bosses would routinely offer the contract miners a small concession to get them back to work, while offering the even more poorly paid laborers nothing, destroying their solidarity and ending the strike. Flynn would later go on to cofound the American Civil Liberties Union. Tresca would go on to became a leading organizer against both fascism and Stalinism. He was assassinated in 1943, possibly on orders of the Genovese crime family, possibly on orders of Stalin, and possibly Italian fascists. Frank Little, who was Native American, was later murdered by vigilantes during a strike in Butte. You can read my biography of Frank Little here: https://michaeldunnauthor.com/2024/04/05/frank-little/

#workingclass #LaborHistory #IWW #union #strike #wildcat #mesabi #iron #mining #solidarity #immigrant #ElizabethGurleyFlynn #FrankLittle #racism #vigilantes #nativeamerican #indigenous #fascism #antifascism #soviet #stalin #aclu #mafia

Corrido de Cananea, sung by Linda Ronstadt, about getting arrested during the Cananea strike, in Sonora, Mexico, 1906, a prelude to the Mexican Revolution.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jzJAovNXcU4

#workingclass #LaborHistory #cananea #mexico #copper #mining #anarchism
#RicardoFloresMagon #strike #massacre #mexico #Revolution #IWW

Today in Labor History June 1, 1906: The bloody Cananea copper miners' strike began in Sonora, Mexico. The miners were demanding 5 pesos a day and an 8-hour workday, commensurate with what the U.S. citizens who were working side-by-side with them were earning. As many as 100 miners were killed in the strike, mostly by U.S. citizens working for the company. Although they were forced back to work without winning any of their demands, it contributed to the general unrest that led ultimately to the Mexican Revolution.

The anarchist, Ricardo Flores Magón, along with members of his Partido Liberal Mexicana, organized a brigade of revolutionaries, who traveled from Arizona to the Cananea copper mines with the goal of exterminating all Americans employed there. The Arizona Rangers captured several of them. Magón and many others were extradited to Tombstone, Arizona, charged with violating U.S. neutrality laws, and imprisoned until 1910. After this, the Magonistas conquered parts of Baja California, including Tijuana, during the Mexican Revolution. Many IWW members from the U.S. joined the Magonista forces. Tombstone was the site of the gunfight at OK Corral, just a few miles away from Bisbee, where vigilantes would kidnap and deport IWW immigrant miners in 1917.

You can read my full article on the Bisbee Deportation here: https://michaeldunnauthor.com/2026/06/01/the-bisbee-deportation/

#workingclass #LaborHistory #cananea #mexico #copper #mining #anarchism
#RicardoFloresMagon #strike #massacre #mexico #Revolution #IWW

Today in Labor History May 31, 1913: The IWW Marine Transport Workers strike against United Fruit ships in New Orleans spread up the Atlantic coast. The Sailors Union of the Atlantic (AFL) joined them in New Orleans. On June 13, 1913, police officers and private security guards opened fire on the strikers, killing two and wounding several.

#workingclass #LaborHistory #IWW #NewOrleans #PoliceBrutality #police #acab #union #strike

Today in Labor History May 31, 1819: Poet Walt Whitman was born. Whitman published his first and most famous collection of poems, Leaves of Grass, in 1855, using his own money. It was criticized as obscene for its sensuality. During the Civil War, he volunteered in hospitals caring for the wounded. Many believe Whitman was gay or bisexual, based on his writings, though it is disputed by some historians. Oscar Wilde met Whitman in the United States in 1882 and told the homosexual-rights activist George Cecil Ives that Whitman's sexual orientation was beyond question—"I have the kiss of Walt Whitman still on my lips." Whitman is considered by many to be America’s first and greatest poet. He inspired many who came after him, including Ezra Pound, Langston Hughes, Kerouac, Ginsberg, Ferlinghetti, Gary Snyder and June Jordan.

Whitman’s commitment to solidarity inspired many leftists of the late 1800s and early 1900s, including Emma Goldman, and the IWW, which distributed copies of Whitman’s poems to its members in the form of The Little Blue Book. Bartolomeo Vanzetti, Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, Ralph Chaplin also claimed Whitman as an inspiration. He also inspired Cuban poet and revolutionary Jose Marti, as well as Pablo Neruda and Jorge Luis Borges.

#workingclass #LaborHistory #waltwhitman #civilwar #poetry #books #poet #writer #lgbtq #gay #obscenity #oscarwilde #allanginsberg #IWW #solidarity @bookstadon