Civil Rights & Labor History Consortium | Photo and Document Gallery | 1919 Seattle General Strike | General Strike photos | Minute Men headquarters/Arcade Building

Dedicated to fighting radicalism, the Minute Men claimed thousands of members and sent spies to monitor unions and radical groups The Minute Men, a branch of the American Protective League, held its first meeting in Seattle on November 17, 1917. The Seattle group started out as 20 patriotic men and soon grew to numbers as high as 12,000. The Minute Men were used as labor spies during WWI and their job was to filter out un-American activities. Their targets included Germans, Socialists, and members of the radical labor movement. Their tactics included monitoring meetings and rallies and sending spies to join radical organizations. The Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) were a prime target for the Minute Men because of their open support for the Bolshevik Soviet. During the General Strike the Minute Men organized patrols in each precinct of the city with instructions to arm themselves at the first sign of trouble. Courtesy Museum of History & Industry, Seattle Post Intelligencer Collection.

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