Today In Labor History March 27, 1912: Start of the 8-month Northern railway strike in Canada by the IWW. Over 8,000 construction workers walked off the job at Northern Railway workcamps Wobblies picketed employment offices in Vancouver, Seattle, San Francisco, Tacoma and Minneapolis in order to block the hiring of scabs.

Fellow workers pay attention to what I'm going to mention,
For it is the fixed intention of the Workers of the World.
And I hope you'll all be ready, true-hearted, brave and steady,
To gather 'round our standard when the red flag is unfurled.

CHORUS:
Where the Fraser River flows, each fellow worker knows,
They have bullied and oppressed us, but still our union grows.
And we're going to find a way, boys, for shorter hours and better pay, boys
And we're going to win the day, boys, where the river Fraser flows.

For these gunny-sack contractors have all been dirty actors,
And they're not our benefactors, each fellow worker knows.
So we've got to stick together in fine or dirty weather,
And we will show no white feather, where the Fraser river flows.
Now the boss the law is stretching, bulls and pimps he's fetching,
And they are a fine collection, as Jesus only knows.
But why their mothers reared them, and why the devil spared them,
Are questions we can't answer, where the Fraser River flows.

(Lyrics by Joe Hill, 1912, to the tune of “Where the River Shannon Flows.”)

#workingclass #LaborHistory #IWW #strike #union #railroad #FraserRiver #joehill #scabs #sanfrancisco #vancouver #seattle #minneapolis

Today In Labor History March 27, 1904: The authorities kicked Mother Jones out of Colorado for “stirring-up” striking coal miners. Earlier in March, the authorities deported 60 striking miners from Colorado. In June, they arrested 22 in Telluride. For nearly 2 years, strikers, led by the Western Federation of Miners, were violently attacked by Pinkerton and Baldwin-Felts detectives. 33 strikers were killed. At least two scholars have said “There is no episode in American labor history in which violence was as systematically used by employers as in the Colorado labor war of 1903 and 1904.”

#workingclass #LaborHistory #colorado #union #strike #mining #motherjones #WorkplaceViolence #scabs #coal #pinkertons #minewars #wfm #WesternFederationOfMiners #womenshistorymonth

#ICE #TSA #scabs #scabbing #LaborIssues

"ICE agents expected to arrive at U.S. airports to assist with TSA shortages

President Donald Trump has suggested the agents would be arresting undocumented immigrants at airports.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents are expected to arrive at airports Monday to assist with staff shortages, a day after President Donald Trump threatened he would do so unless congressional Democrats agreed to a GOP-backed funding deal to end a partial government shutdown."

https://archive.ph/c3SVk#selection-323.0-323.287

Today in Labor History March 23, 1970: President Richard Nixon declared a national emergency and sent 30,000 troops to New York City to serve as scabs to break the first nationwide postal strike.

#workingclass #LaborHistory #nixon #scabs #USPS #strike #union

Today in Labor History February 7, 1913: A county sheriff and his deputies on the “Bull Moose Special” (an armored train fitted with machine guns), attacked a miners’ tent colony at Holly Grove, in West Virginia. This was during the Paint Creek-Cabin Creek Strike (4/18/1912 through July 1913). Mother Jones was one of the main organizers. Over 50 people died during the violent confrontations with scabs, goons and private detectives. Countless more died from starvation and malnutrition. In terms of casualties, it was one of the worst strikes in U.S. history. It was a prelude to the bigger and even more violent Battle of Matewan, and the Battle of Blair Mountain (Aug-Sep, 1921). The latter was the largest labor uprising in U.S. history, and the largest armed insurrection since the Civil War. 10,000 minors battled 3,000 lawmen and scabs, and only ended with the U.S. army intervened. Up to 100 people died. And during the battle, bombs were dropped on the striking miners by airplane, the 2nd time in U.S. history that had been done. (The first was just months earlier, during the Tulsa Race Massacre).

Read my full article on the Battle of Blair Mountain, and the history leading up to it, here: https://michaeldunnauthor.com/2024/04/14/the-battle-of-blair-mountain/

#workingclass #LaborHistory #motherjones #coal #mining #massacre #bombing #matewan #westvirginia #machineguns #scabs #strike #police #army #insurrection #civilwar

Miners #strike for safer work conditions. Management brings in #scabs. “As far as I know, they fled and refused to work under those conditions.”

https://www.panorama.am/en/news/2026/01/24/miner-ptotest/3150458

#strikes #union #unions #Armenia #WorkplaceSafety #capitalism #exploitation #ClassWar

Today in Labor History January 19, 1915: Factory guards, and sheriff’s deputies, under the pay of factory bosses, fired at striking workers at the Williams and Clark fertilizer factory in Roosevelt, New Jersey. They shot 20 workers, including children as young as 12. Two of the men died from their injuries. The workers were on strike, demanding the restoration of a recent 20% pay cut. Remarkably (as this seldom happens), several of the deputies were arrested and tried. 9 of them were convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to prison terms of 2-10 years each. Despite the violence, the workers persevered, ultimately winning the restoration of their original salaries.

#workingclass #LaborHistory #roosevelt #massacre #strike #wages #prison #scabs #newjersey #sheriff #children #solidarity

Today in Labor History January 14, 1895: The Knights of Labor (KOL) initiated the Brooklyn trolley strike over wages and safety (lasting until Feb. 28). It was the largest strike Brooklyn had ever seen. The bosses brought in scabs from Boston, Philadelphia and Pittsburgh. The drivers cut the wires, surrounded trains and assaulted the scab drivers. 2 people died. On January 19, the mayor called out the National Guard and declared martial law. Militiamen, with fixed bayonets, battled workers in the streets. Sympathetic locals threw rocks and bottles at the militiamen. When a supporter tried to disarm a soldier and was subsequently stabbed, the crowds of supporters swelled into the thousands. One New York paper called it another Paris Commune. However, the KOL had been weakened by years of poor leadership, and by the witch hunt that followed the Haymarket Bombing, and its membership had dwindled to under 100,000. They hadn’t waged a successful strike in years. In the end, the militia effectively quashed the strike and things returned to business as usual without the workers winning any of their demands.

#workingclass #LaborHistory #brooklyn #trolley #strike #knightsoflabor #union #martiallaw #haymarket #wages #scabs #ParisCommune #militia