Book Promotion: Books you can't put down - available to download free! A great selection of action-adventure, horror, and murder mysteries only available until the end of the month. #guns #contemporary #legendary #writing #future #sleuth #readers #adventure #detective #amateur #suspense #private #steampunk #travel #reading #vigilante #reader #fedibookfair #classic #thrills #murder #action #excitement #monster #bookstodon #mystery #whodunnit #amreading #goodbooks (5035) https://books.bookfunnel.com/booksyoucantputdown/pp9ctnlwfg?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=mastodon

Book Promotion: Books you can't put down - available to download free! A great selection of action-adventure, horror, and murder mysteries only available until the end of the month. #mystery #goodbooks #sleuth #amreading #legendary #reader #excitement #steampunk #future #thrills #whodunnit #travel #amateur #detective #bookstodon #suspense #classic #adventure #contemporary #guns #readers #action #reading #murder #vigilante #private #fedibookfair #monster #writing (fa1c) https://books.bookfunnel.com/booksyoucantputdown/pp9ctnlwfg?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=mastodon

Today in Labor History March 5, 1917: Members of the IWW went on trial in Everett, Washington for the Everett Massacre, which occurred on November 5, 1916. In reality, they were the victims of an assault by a mob of drunken, vigilantes, led by Sheriff McRae. The IWW members had come to support the 5-month long strike by shingle workers. When their boat, the Verona, arrived, the Sheriff asked who their leader was. They replied, “We are all leaders.” Then the vigilantes began firing at their boat. They killed 12 IWW members and 2 of their own, who they accidentally shot in the back. Before the killings, 40 IWW street speakers had been taken by deputies to Beverly Park, where they were brutally beaten and run out of town. In his “USA” trilogy, John Dos Passos mentions Everett as “no place for the working man.” And Jack Kerouac references the Everett Massacre in his novel, “Dharma Bums.”

#workingclass #LaborHistory #IWW #everett #massacre #policebrutality #vigilante #strike #union #police #policemurder #FreeSpeech #kerouac #dosassos #hisfic #novel #literature #writer #author #books @bookstadon

Today in Labor History January 28, 1918: Ranchers, Texas Rangers, and the U.S. Army attacked the Mexican-American village of Porvenir, in West Texas, slaughtering 15 men and boys in their sleep. The remaining villagers fled town, which soldiers burned to the ground. The Rangers had been sent to stop banditry. They accused the villagers, without any evidence, of firing weapons at them. However, investigations by the Army and the State Department found that the villagers were unarmed. Activity by the Rangers along the border had increased in the wake of Pancho Villa’s 1916 raid on Columbus, New Mexico. Tensions were particularly high because of the December 25, 1918 raid on the Brite Ranch, in the same west Texas region as Porvenir, thought to have been committed by Villistas.

Today in Labor History October 9, 1936: A lettuce strike had recently ended in Salinas, California. However, when red flags went up throughout town, the authorities feared communist agitators had returned and removed the red flags, only to find out later that they were part of a traffic check being done by the state highway division.

The first effective organizing in the Salinas Valley began in 1933, with the mostly female lettuce trimmers demanding equal pay to the men. The Filipino field workers supported the women’s demands. In 1934, members of the Filipino Labor Union (FLU) struck the lettuce farms. So, the farmers brought in Mexican and Anglo scabs. They used vigilante mobs and the cops to violently attack the strikers and arrested their leaders. When the Filipino Labor Union and the Mexican Labor Union joined forces, a mob of vigilantes burned their labor camp down and drove 800 Filipinos out of the Salinas Valley at gunpoint. The 1934 strike ended soon after, with the growers recognizing the FLU and offering a small raise. This violence inspired John Steinbeck to write “In Dubious Battle” and “Grapes of Wrath,” for which he won both Pulitzer and Nobel Prizes.

#workingclass #LaborHistory #salinas #union #strike #filipino #mexican #racism #communism #police #policebrutality #vigilante #author #books #writer #johnsteinbeck #novel #fiction #novelprize #pulitzer @bookstadon

Today in Labor History October 4, 1887: 10,000 Louisiana sugarcane workers went on strike with the Knights of Labor over terrible living and working conditions. On November 23, the Louisiana Militia, aided by white vigilantes, murdered 60 unarmed black workers during the Thibodaux Massacre. Hundreds were injured, murdered or went missing, including women and children. The massacre ended the strike and any concerted effort to organize black cane workers until the 1940s. Democrats in the state passed a series of laws in the wake of the strike that disenfranchised black voters and enforced segregation and Jim Crow.

Today in Labor History September 22, 1934: The United Textile Workers (UTW) strike committee ordered strikers back to work, ending the largest U.S. textile strike to date. Over 400,000 workers participated, mostly women. At least 18 of them died at the hands of militias, vigilantes and police. The strike began in the south and spread up the Eastern Seaboard. The governors of North and South Carolina deputized citizens (i.e., created vigilante squads) during the first week of the strike, issuing shoot-to-kill orders against any picketers who tried to enter a mill. As a result, 14 strikers were murdered in that first week. In the second week of the strike, the governor of Rhode Island mustered the National Guard, who used machine guns against strikers armed with flower pots and headstones they had taken from a nearby cemetery. The National Guard was also deployed in Maine, New York, Connecticut and Massachusetts. In Georgia, strikers were arrested and held without charge, in World War I concentration camps. 34 strike leaders were held incommunicado.

Today in Labor History August 19, 1916: Strikebreakers attacked and beat picketing IWW strikers in Everett, Washington. The police refused to intervene, claiming it was federal jurisdiction. However, when the strikers retaliated, they arrested the strikers. Vigilante attacks on IWW picketers and speakers escalated and continued for months. In October, vigilantes forced many of the strikers to run a gauntlet, violently beating them in the process. The brutality culminated in the Everett massacre on November 5, when Wobblies (IWW members) sailed over from Seattle to support the strikers. The sheriff called out to them as they docked, “Who is your leader?” And the Wobblies yelled back, “We all are!” The sheriff told them they couldn’t dock. One of the Wobblies said, “Like hell we can’t!” And then a mob of over 200 vigilantes opened fire on them. As a result, seven died and 50 were wounded. John Dos Passos portrays these events in his USA Trilogy.

#workingclass #LaborHistory #IWW #union #strike #washington #everett #vigilante #massacre #policebrutality #police #fiction #historicalfiction #novel #writer #books #author #dospassos @bookstadon

Today in Labor History July 3, 1936: Striking workers battled scabs and undercover cops outside the Remington Rand plant in Norwood, Ohio. The riot last four days, as the company repeatedly tried to bring in scabs on buses, without uniformed police protection, in hopes of provoking violence they could exploit to discredit the union. On July 7, strikers boarded the buses and drove off the scabs. On August 12, police shot 2 Remington Rand workers in Syracuse, NY, provoking the governor to threaten calling in the National Guard. Much of the violence in this strike was instigated by undercover cops, posing as scabs. The strike had begun in May and lasted through April of 1937. During the strike, company president James Rand, Jr. devised the "Mohawk Valley formula" a corporate plan for strikebreaking that was utilized by many corporations since. The plan included strategies for discrediting union leaders, frightening the public with threats of violence, use of local cops and vigilantes to intimidate and bully the strikers, puppet organizations composed of of "loyal employees" to influence public debate, fortified workplaces, the hiring of strikebreakers, and threats to close the plant and ruin the local economy if work was not promptly resumed. One example from this formula was when Rand lied to the media that the strike was over. This led to an uproar amongst the rand and file, who accused union leadership of selling them out. In another dirty trick, the company told the picketers that many of their fellow workers had decided to come back to work. They had 85 security guards dress up as workers and armed them with bricks and clubs. When they “came back to work,” picketers attacked them. The media photographed and printed images of these “labor goons’” unprovoked attack on “honest working men.”

https://youtu.be/IDdYlHV64rs

Today in Labor History June 7, 1929: Striking textile workers battled police in Gastonia, North Carolina, during the Loray Mill Strike. Police Chief O.F. Aderholt was accidentally killed by one of his own officers during a protest march by striking workers. Nevertheless, the authorities arrested six strike leaders. They were all convicted of “conspiracy to murder.”

The strike lasted from April 1 to September 14. It started in response to the “stretch-out” system, where bosses doubled the spinners’ and weavers’ work, while simultaneously lowering their wages. When the women went on strike, the bosses evicted them from their company homes. Masked vigilantes destroyed the union’s headquarters. The NTWU set up a tent city for the workers, with armed guards to protect them from the vigilantes.

One of the main organizers was a poor white woman named Ella May Wiggans. She was a single mother, with nine kids. Rather than living in the tent city, she chose to live in the African American hamlet known as Stumptown. She was instrumental in creating solidarity between black and white workers and rallying them with her music. Some of her songs from the strike were “Mill Mother’s Lament,” and “Big Fat Boss and the Workers.” Her music was later covered by Pete Seeger and Woodie Guthrie, who called her the “pioneer of the protest ballad.” During the strike, vigilantes shot her in the chest. She survived, but later died of whooping cough due to poverty and inadequate medical care.

For really wonderful fictionalized accounts of this strike, read “The Last Ballad,” by Wiley Cash (2017) and “Strike!” by Mary Heaton Vorse (1930).

https://youtu.be/Ud-xt7SVTQw?t=31

#workingclass #LaborHistory #EllaMayWiggans #textile #women #feminist #union #communism #vigilante #policebrutality #police #acab #solidarity #racism #poverty #northcarolina #fiction #HistoricalFiction #author #writer #books #novel @bookstadon

Today in Labor History March 5, 1917: Members of the IWW went on trial in Everett, Washington for the Everett Massacre, which occurred on November 5, 1916. In reality, they were the victims of an assault by a mob of drunken, vigilantes, led by Sheriff McRae. The IWW members had come to support the 5-month long strike by shingle workers. When their boat, the Verona, arrived, the Sheriff asked who their leader was. They replied, “We are all leaders.” Then the vigilantes began firing at their boat. They killed 12 IWW members and 2 of their own, who they accidentally shot in the back. Before the killings, 40 IWW street speakers had been taken by deputies to Beverly Park, where they were brutally beaten and run out of town. In his “USA” trilogy, John Dos Passos mentions Everett as “no place for the working man.” And Jack Kerouac references the Everett Massacre in his novel, “Dharma Bums.”

#workingclass #LaborHistory #IWW #everett #massacre #policebrutality #vigilante #strike #union #police #policemurder #FreeSpeech #kerouac #DosPassos #hisfic #novel #literature #writer #author #books @bookstadon

#MissMeadows, 2014, #DirectedBy (and written) #KarenLeighHopkins and starring #KatieHolmes, is the absolute darkest bit of #twee I've ever seen.

The cloying sweetness is cut with layers of rancid truths mostly implied, never stated, but without doubt as to what they are.

Weird and sad, it's a much better #vigilante #movie than the typical #macho bullshit, like #DirtyHarry, because it's original and human, though just as unbelievable.

#RokuChannel

#link: https://therokuchannel.roku.com/

Today in Labor History October 9, 1936: A lettuce strike had recently ended in Salinas, California. However, when red flags went up throughout town, the authorities feared communist agitators had returned and removed the red flags, only to find out later that they were part of a traffic check being done by the state highway division.

The first effective organizing in the Salinas Valley began in 1933, with the mostly female lettuce trimmers demanding equal pay to the men. The Filipino field workers supported the women’s demands. In 1934, members of the Filipino Labor Union (FLU) struck the lettuce farms. So, the farmers brought in Mexican and Anglo scabs. They used vigilante mobs and the cops to violently attack the strikers and arrested their leaders. When the Filipino Labor Union and the Mexican Labor Union joined forces, a mob of vigilantes burned their labor camp down and drove 800 Filipinos out of the Salinas Valley at gunpoint. The 1934 strike ended soon after, with the growers recognizing the FLU and offering a small raise. This violence inspired John Steinbeck to write “In Dubious Battle” and “Grapes of Wrath,” for which he won both Pulitzer and Nobel Prizes.

#WorkingClass #LaborHistory #Salinas #union #strike #filipino #mexican #racism #communism #police #PoliceBrutality #vigilante #author #writer #JohnSteinbeck #novel #fiction @bookstadon

Today in Labor History September 22, 1934: The United Textile Workers (UTW) strike committee ordered strikers back to work, ending the largest U.S. textile strike to date. Over 400,000 workers participated, mostly women. At least 18 of them died at the hands of militias, vigilantes and police. The strike began in the south and spread up the Eastern Seaboard. The governors of North and South Carolina deputized citizens (i.e., created vigilante squads) during the first week of the strike, issuing shoot-to-kill orders against any picketers who tried to enter a mill. As a result, 14 strikers were murdered in that first week. In the second week of the strike, the governor of Rhode Island mustered the National Guard, who used machine guns against strikers armed with flower pots and headstones they had taken from a nearby cemetery. The National Guard was also deployed in Maine, New York, Connecticut and Massachusetts. In Georgia, strikers were arrested and held without charge, in World War I concentration camps. 34 strike leaders were held incommunicado.

Today in Labor History August 19, 1916: Strikebreakers attacked and beat picketing IWW strikers in Everett, Washington. The police refused to intervene, claiming it was federal jurisdiction. However, when the strikers retaliated, they arrested the strikers. Vigilante attacks on IWW picketers and speakers escalated and continued for months. In October, vigilantes forced many of the strikers to run a gauntlet, violently beating them in the process. The brutality culminated in the Everett massacre on November 5, when Wobblies (IWW members) sailed over from Seattle to support the strikers. The sheriff called out to them as they docked, “Who is your leader?” And the Wobblies yelled back, “We all are!” The sheriff told them they couldn’t dock. One of the Wobblies said, “Like hell we can’t!” And then a mob of over 200 vigilantes opened fire on them. As a result, seven died and 50 were wounded. John Dos Passos portrays these events in his USA Trilogy.

#WorkingClass #LaborHistory #IWW #union #strike #washington #vigilante #massacre #PoliceBrutality #police #fiction #HistoricalFiction #novel #writer #books #author #DosPassos @bookstadon

Today in Labor and Writing History July 10, 1917: The Jerome Deportation occurred in Arizona. On July 5, IWW workers struck at Phelps Dodge mines, in Jerome, Az. Mine supervisors, along with a hastily formed “Citizens Committee” made up of local business leaders, rounded up and deported over 100 Wobblies (IWW members) to Needles, CA, and told them to never return. Two days later, after seeing how successful they had been in Jerome, they launched an even bigger deportation in Bisbee, Az. This time, they rounded up roughly 2,000 Wobblies from the Phelps Dodge mines in Bisbee, Az, and deported them to New Mexico.

“Bisbee ‘17,” (1999) by Robert Houston, is a historical novel based on the Bisbee deportations. There was also a really interesting film of the same name that came out in 2018. In the film, the town’s inhabitants reenact the events of the Bisbee deportation 100 years later. It also includes interviews with current residents.

#WorkingClass #LaborHistory #bisbee #deportation #IWW #arizona #mining #vigilante #film #book #novel #writer #author #HistoricalFiction @bookstadon

Today in Labor History June 10, 1937: The mayor of Monroe, Michigan organized a vigilante mob of 1,400 men armed with baseball bats and teargas to break the picket line at Newton Steel. As a result, eight strikers were injured and hospitalized. The vigilantes also vandalized sixteen of the workers’ cars dumped eight of them into the river.

Today in Labor History June 10, 1904: The National Guard deported 79 striking Colorado miners to Kansas, following a battle between the Colorado Militia and striking miners at Dunnville that had occurred two days prior. The battle ended with six union members dead and 15 taken prisoner. Dozens were arrested without warrants and held without formal charges. All this occurred during the infamous Colorado Labor Wars (1903-1904) in which dozens of striking workers were slaughtered by cops, national guards and vigilantes and hundreds were deported. The miners, organized by the Western Federation of Miners, and led by future IWW founders Big Bill Haywood and Vincent Saint John, often fought back with guns, and engaged in sabotage, blowing up mines.