Hellraisers Journal: Brutality Against Striking Miners of Telluride Continues; Many Arrests and Harry Maki Chained to Telephone Pole in Bitter Wind and Cold

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

Hellraisers Journal – Tuesday March 8, 1904
Telluride, Colorado – Brutality Against Striking Miners Continues

Guy Miller Reports From Telluride

Telluride CO Harry Maki Chained to Pole, SL Hld p2, Mar 3, 1904

From the Telluride strike zone comes this disturbing report from Guy Miller, President of the local miners’ union (W. F. of M.):

[On Tuesday, March 2nd] thirty-four men were arrested in the justice court on the charge of vagrancy, twenty-seven of them were fined $25 and costs and given until two o’clock [Wednesday] to pay their fines, leave the county or go to work. Sixteen reported for work…they were taken to the jail by Willard Runnels and put to work on the sewers of the town. One of the men, Harry Maki, refused to work. Runnels led him to a telephone pole, compelled him to put his arms around the pole, then fastened handcuffs on his wrists. The wind was blowing a gale and the snow filled the air. He was left standing chained like a beast for several hours. After many protests had been made against this cruel treatment Runnels took him to the jail….

Brother Maki remains in jail at this time and has not been given anything to eat since his ordeal began.

Brother Miller describes the type of men brought in by the mine owners to lead the fight against the Western Federation of Miners:

Runnels and Robert Meldrum were imported from Wyoming by the mine managers for the avowed purpose of discovering the murderer of Arthur Collins. But their only contact with the union was when some man was held up on his way to town and searched for stolen ore, without warrant or any process whatever. Runnels and Meldrum were pals of Tom Horn, the leader of a band of desperadoes who had been hired by the cattle ranchers to fight the sheep ranchers. Horn was hanged at Cheyenne, Wyoming, in November, 1903, for the murder of little Willie Nickell, the twelve-year-old son of a sheep rancher. The evidence indicated that he received $600 for the murder. It is characters like these who lead the “law and order” brigade for the Mine Owners and Citizens’ Alliance—men skilled and reckless in the use of the gun. When a corporation pays fancy prices for skilled labor of any kind—carpenters, electricians, engineers or man-killers—it expects the employe to give value received for the wages paid, and they never pay for anything they do not expect to need.

Striking Miner Harry Maki, Western Federation of Miners:

Henry Maki WFM Telluride, Chained to Pole Mar 2, 1904

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: Brutality Against Striking Miners of Telluride Continues; Many Arrests and Harry Maki Chained to Telephone Pole in Bitter Wind and Cold”

Hellraisers Journal: Unemployed of New York City Seek Shelter in Blizzard; 200 Arrested Including Frank Tannenbaum

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Quote Joe Hill, Poor Ragged Tramp, Sing One Song, LRSB 5th ed, 1913—————

Hellraisers Journal – Saturday March 7, 1914
New York City – Police Attack and Arrest Unemployed Men Seeking Shelter 

200 Unemployed Men Held after Arrests
at St. Alphonsus’ Catholic Church

UE Storm Church, Frank Tannenbaum, NY Tb p1, Mar 5, 1914

Some 200 unemployed men were arrested during a blizzard on the night of March 4th as they sought shelter at St. Alphonsus’ Catholic Church. Frank Tannenbaum is being held on a felony charge with his bail fixed at $5,000. The others could be bailed out at the cost of $1000 each, were that amount available. The men are being held at four different prison: the Tombs, Jefferson Market, West 57th Street, and West 53rd Street.

At the Jefferson Market prison, the men are being kept in a large pen without cots and with only eight blankets for 50 men. Conditions at West 57th are much the same. At the Tombs and the West 53rd Street prison, the men have been crowded five and six to cell, and are being kept in unsanitary conditions described as vile.

Mary Heaton Vorse explains how the arrests came about:

Frank Tannenbaum, [Frank Strawn] Hamilton and [Charles] Plunkett had asked Father Schneider of St. Alphonsus if they might have shelter in his church. Father Schneider had refused on the ground that the Blessed Sacrament of the Body of our Lord was exposed and it would be sacrilege to allow men to sleep in the church at such a time.

The crowd of unemployed had not understood their instruction to wait outside and had started going inside to sit down in the back seats. A police officer told Tannenbaum to go into the church and bring the men out. Tannenbaum obeyed. The doors were closed and locked on him as soon as he went inside. The arrest followed before he could speak to the men. The papers had been told that the Catholic Church was going to stand for no nonsense and there was a battery of reporters and cameramen ready for the trouble.

It so happens that the newly formed Labor Defense Conference was holding its first meeting at the home of Mary Heaton Vorse and her husband, Joe O’Brien, the same night that the men were arrested. The Conference was organized by Big Bill Haywood of the Industrial Workers of World, and has attracted what Vorse calls “a strangely assorted group.” All of them are committed to defending workers, whether currently employed or not.

In the middle of the meeting, Heber Blankenhorn entered the room, and said, “We have your first case for you. Frank Tannenbaum and a crowd of two hundred men have just been arrested down at St. Alphonsus’.”

The Labor Defense Conference launched into action immediately. Justus Sheffield was contacted and will act as the attorney for men.

Note: Newsclip from New York Tribune of March 5, 1914

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: Unemployed of New York City Seek Shelter in Blizzard; 200 Arrested Including Frank Tannenbaum”

Hellraisers Journal: Duluth Labor World: Hastings, Colorado-“Mother Jones Says Rockefeller Oppresses the Coal Miners”

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Quote Mother Jones, CFI Owns Colorado, re 1903 Strikes UMW WFM, Ab Chp 13, 1925—————

Hellraisers Journal – Sunday February 7, 1904
Hastings, Colorado – Mother Jones Exposes Rockefeller’s “Sunday School Methods”

From the Duluth Labor World of February 6, 1904:

MOTHER JONES
Says Rockefeller Oppresses the Coal Miners.

Mother Jones Gives 500 Dollars to CO Strikers, LW p4, Feb 6, 1904

Hastings, Colo., Feb. 5.-[Mother Jones, the miners’ friend, who is now going up and down among the striking miners in Colorado, says:]

Rockefeller’s mining company cleared $39,000 [*] last year, and every dollar of it was wrung form the miners.

At some of these mining camps a miner is not even allowed to bring a pound of butter from the outside. He is compelled to buy everything at the company’s store. Every man who comes to the mines to work must be searched, and when he goes to visit a friend outside the camp an armed guard goes with him.

What would a Chicago workingman think if he had to pay 90 cents for a quart of syrup that cost at wholesale $1.25 a gallon? What would he think if his employer taxed him a dollar a month for a doctor whether he needed one or not? What would he think if he was obliged to pay his employer 50 cents a month for a preacher?

Yet such are Mr. Rockefeller’s Sunday school methods of conducting his mining business in Colorado,” says Mother Jones.

[Emphasis added. Newsclip added.]

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: Duluth Labor World: Hastings, Colorado-“Mother Jones Says Rockefeller Oppresses the Coal Miners””

Hellraisers Journal: “Fifteen Men Plunge to Death Down 1500-Foot Victor Mine Shaft; Engineer Lost Control of His Engine and Cable Broke at Top of Wheel”

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Quote Mother Jones, CFI Owns Colorado, re 1903 Strikes UMW WFM, Ab Chp 13, 1925—————

Hellraisers Journal – Thursday January 28, 1904
Victor, Colorado – Disaster at Independence Mine Claims Fifteen Lives

From The Denver Post of January 26, 1904:
Victor CO, Stratton Independence Mine Ds,  DP p1, Jan 26, 1904Victor CO, Stratton Independence Mine Ds 2,  DP p1, Jan 26, 1904

Wednesday January 27, 1904 – Victor, Colorado
– Horror at Stratton’s Independence Mine

A horrific accident occurred at about 2:30 a. m. Tuesday January 26th at the Independence mine when Engineer Gellese was not able to control the engine he was running. A cage carrying sixteen men hit the sheave wheel hurling the men inside to their deaths.

Mrs. Emma F. Langdon reports from Victor:

The victims were mostly men of family, and a majority of them were new men in the district. Early in the morning hundred of people rushed to the mine to ascertain if their relatives were among the victims…the military were hastened immediately to the scene and took complete control, not even allowing press representatives near enough to gain facts. As near as the writer could learn particulars they are as follows:

Frank T. Gellese, engineer from Cour D’Alene, was on duty during the night and had experienced no difficulty with his engine, he stated, and at 2:30 he started to hoist the machine men from the sixth, seventh and eighth levels. Sixteen men were on the cage and started for the top. At the seventh level the men noticed that the cage was acting peculiar, and it appeared as if the engineer had lost control of it as it advanced in an unsteady manner. They soon reached the top and were hoisted about six feet above the collar of the shaft and suddenly lowered about thirty feet, then up they went to the sheave wheel and the disastrous accident was the result.

It is believed that the men were thrown against the top of the cage, from the force of the sudden stop, that they were knocked unconscious and knew but little, if anything, after that took place; that in the drop of the cage the speed was so rapid that through the force of the air pressure they were thrown out against the walls of the shaft, which caused them to be literally torn to pieces. When the cage struck the sheave wheel it not only threw Bullock (the only one saved) out, but also threw out a man by the name of Jackson and killed him.

No one aside from the engineer saw the accident. A miner stepped into the shaft house just after the the accident and saw a number of hats laying around. He then looked up and saw Jackson in the timbers with the sheave wheel on top of him.

The military and Manager Cornish were immediately notified and hastened to the mine. Engineer Gellese was arrested and held for investigation.

The remainder of the force, numbering about 200 men in the mine, were obliged to be taken out on a small cage that would accommodate but two men at a time, and they did not all succeed in getting out until about 6 a. m.

Most of the men killed fell to the sump below and it was twenty-four hours before all the bodies could be found. There were portions of them found from the top to the 1,400 foot level The bodies were almost all beyond recognition, heads, legs and arms being torn from the trunks. It was a gruesome sight.

[Emphasis added.]

Coroner Doran will convene a coroner’s jury to investigate the cause of the accident. The Mine Owners’ Association and the Citizens’ Alliance are already spreading rumors placing the blame upon the striking miners of the Western Federation of Miners.

—————

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: “Fifteen Men Plunge to Death Down 1500-Foot Victor Mine Shaft; Engineer Lost Control of His Engine and Cable Broke at Top of Wheel””

Hellraisers Journal: Scandal Monger, Polly Pry, Claims Mother Jones Could be Former Madam Who Once Ran Houses of Ill-Repute

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Quote Dorothy Adams re Mother Jones asleep moonlight, Tammany Tx p10, Aug 12, 1901—————

Hellraisers Journal – Friday January 22, 1904
Denver, Colorado – The Polly Pry Claims Mother Jones Could Be Former Madam

Mother Jones per Polly Pry, Florence CO Dly Tb p1, Jan 5, 1904

Leonel Ross Campbell, Denver journalist now turned scandal monger, writing under the name of Polly Pry, has recently directed her prying gaze upon Mother Jones. In her magazine, The Polly Pry, Campbell claims to have evidence, supplied by the Pinkertons, that “proves” that Mother Jones once ran various houses of ill-repute in Denver, Omaha, Kansas City, Chicago, and San Francisco. The file, it is claimed, dates back to 1889.

According to the report, Mother Jones could be the madam who hired the “best looking girls on the row” for her house on Market Street in Denver where she went broke after her paramour, “Black-leg,” supposedly ran off with one of her girls. She then began drinking and was arrested and jailed several times. The Prying Polly further reported that this woman was:

…an inmate of Jennie Rogers’ house on Market street, Denver, some twelve years ago. She got into trouble with the Rogers woman for bribing all of her girls to leave her and go to a house in Omaha-for which act she was paid a procuress fee of $5 to $10 apiece for the girls.

She was a confidential servant in Rose Lovejoy’s private house on Market street, Denver, and with her several years. …

Lived in Eva Lewis’ house on Market street at the time the Coxey Army passed through here, and took a prominent part in the Denver preparation for their care.

Is known to Harry Loss, a piano player at 1925 Market street, who says he knew her first in Omaha in 1894, when she lived in a house at tenth and Douglass.

She was then selling clothes to the girls. A sewing woman for the sporting class living on Lawrence street…says it was commonly reported that she was a procuress by trade.

[Emphasis added.]

The Pinkerton report goes on to claim that a Mary Harris (using her maiden name) was a “vulgar, heartless, vicious creature, with a fiery temper and a cold-blooded brutality rare even in the slums.”

Now, in the slander sheet which bears her pen name, Miss Polly Pry is careful to maintain a distance from her lurid charges by reporting on a supposed report on Mother Jones. Very clever of her, and also in keeping with her usual style of reporting on labor leaders who are the often made the targets of her attacks. She has previously defamed U. M. W. District 15 President Howells, U. M. W. National Organizer William Wardjon, and U. M. W. National Executive Board Member John Gehr. Anti-union newspapers across the country see fit to pick up these sordid stories from The Polly Pry and reprint them.

For her part, Mother Jones refuses to give dignity to the charges by responding to them in any way. U. M. W. attorneys doubt that a law suit would be successful since the charges made by The Polly Pry are implied rather than made directly.

—————

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: Scandal Monger, Polly Pry, Claims Mother Jones Could be Former Madam Who Once Ran Houses of Ill-Repute”

Hellraisers Journal: Colorado Militia Inflicts Military Despotism Upon Striking Miners at Telluride and Cripple Creek

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Quote EVD Workers n Parasites, SDH Jan 30, 1904—————

Hellraisers Journal – Monday January 11, 1904
A. H. Floaten, of the Western Federation of Miners, on Colorado’s Military Despotism

From the Appeal to Reason of January 9, 1904:

[The Grip of the Monster by G. H. Lockwood]The Monsters Grip, AtR p5, Jan 9, 1904—–
[Colorado Military Despotism by A. H. Floaten]CO Military Despotism by Floaten, AtR p4, Jan 9, 1904

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: Colorado Militia Inflicts Military Despotism Upon Striking Miners at Telluride and Cripple Creek”

Hellraisers Journal: Martial Law Declared in Telluride; Union Men Arrested and Deported, Must Scab or Leave Town

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

Hellraisers Journal – Thursday January 7, 1904
Telluride, Colorado – Martial Law Declared; Union Men Deported

From the American Labor Union Journal of January 7, 1904:

Militia to Telluride, ALUJ p1, Jan 7, 1904

[News from Telluride by A. H. Floaten]

Telluride by Floaten, ALUJ p3, Jan 7, 1914Telluride by Floaten 2, ALUJ p3, Jan 7, 1914Telluride by Floaten 3, ALUJ p3, Jan 7, 1914

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: Martial Law Declared in Telluride; Union Men Arrested and Deported, Must Scab or Leave Town”

Hellraisers Journal: Western Federation of Miners Executive Board Issues Statement on Industrial Situation in Colorado

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Quote BBH Corporation Soul, Oakland Tb p11, Mar 30, 1909—————

Hellraisers Journal – Wednesday December 9, 1903
Denver, Colorado – W. F. of M. Executive Board Addresses Colorado’s Labor Conflicts

From The Denver Post of December 5, 1903:

WFM Ex Brd after May 1903 Convention, EFL 223, 1904WFM Ex Brd Statement re Colorado Miners Strikes, DP p5, Dec 5, 1903WFM Ex Brd Statement re Colorado Miners Strikes cont, DP p5, Dec 5, 1903

[Photograph added. Note: James Kirwin replaced T. J. McKean on the Executive Board during November.]

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: Western Federation of Miners Executive Board Issues Statement on Industrial Situation in Colorado”

Hellraisers Journal: Mother Jones Speaks to Reporter in Denver, Describes Conditions in the Coal Camps of Southern Colorado

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Quote Mother Jones, CFI Owns Colorado, re 1903 Strikes UMW WFM, Ab Chp 13, 1925—————

Hellraisers Journal – Monday November 16, 1903
Denver, Colorado – Mother Jones Describes Conditions in Southern Coalfields

From The Denver Post of November 13, 1903:

Mother Jones, Dnv Pst p1, Nov 13, 1903Mother Jones Interview re CO Coal Strike, Dnv Pst p1n3, Nov 13, 1903 Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: Mother Jones Speaks to Reporter in Denver, Describes Conditions in the Coal Camps of Southern Colorado”

Hellraisers Journal: UMWA Declares Strike of District 15’s Coal Miners Will Begin November 9th. Order Signed by President Mitchell So Instructs President Howells.

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Quote Mother Jones, CFI Owns Colorado, re 1903 Strikes UMW WFM, Ab Chp 13, 1925—————

Hellraisers Journal – Sunday November 1, 1903
Indianapolis, Indiana – United Mine Workers Issues Strike Call for District 15

From The Rocky Mountain News of October 30, 1903:

CO etc District 15 Strike Declared by UMWA, Mother Jones Prominent, RMN p1, 9, Oct 30, 1903

Note error above: District 15 coal miners are members of the United Mine Workers of America, not the Western Federation of Miners (metal miners).

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: UMWA Declares Strike of District 15’s Coal Miners Will Begin November 9th. Order Signed by President Mitchell So Instructs President Howells.”