The IWW won a textile strike in New York that raised wages from five percent to twelve percent, but things don’t look good in Merryville because the lumber association is trying to starve the workers back to work. [2] After two months of being on strike in Merryville, the governor of Louisiana has also given the lumber company two hundred rifles to go along with two machine guns. [3]

There were a few other victories to go along with the win in New York and they include twenty five members winning pay for legal holidays at a diamond shop in Seattle, [4] and plantation workers in Hawaii were able to get a four dollar a month increase from twenty dollars a month to twenty four dollars a month. This happened despite the organizer being beaten up and run out of the county. [5]

February: Free speech fights erupted in Denver as the authorities arrested nineteen people for given a speech in public. They were giving speeches at noon in order to reach garment workers on their lunch break. The police don’t want anyone speaking on the streets of Denver. [6] The IWW answered this infringement on free speech by rushing men to Denver to exercise their right to free speech.

In Merryville, The Santa Fe railroad and American Lumber Co. raided the offices of the union and took all books and papers, wrecked the kitchen and deported all union men. [7] A large number of silk workers in Pennsylvania went on strike as well as rubber workers in Akron, OH. Most of the silk workers decided to join the IWW, even though the AFL was on the scene as well. [8]

March: The rubber workers strike in Akron has become the largest IWW strike since the Lawrence textile strike with almost twenty thousand workers on strike. Around the clock chain picketing is being employed and they march around the Goodyear plant. A sign of the solidarity is the fact that fifteen thousand workers stood in the mud to listen to speakers speak in diverse languages and hear the wage scale being proposed. [9] On March seventh, the police and deputies charged the peaceful picketers after three weeks of peaceful protests. The attack landed one person in the hospital with serious injuries and eight other people in jail. [10]

April: The Akron rubber strike has been called off and the men have gone back to work. They hope to organize better in the future and have created a good local IWW as a result of seven weeks of dissent against the rubber industry. [11]

May: Lucy Parsons, widow of Haymarket martyr Albert Parsons, has been arrested for selling literature without a license and held for twenty-four hours. [12] Some judges in Washington decided that if you possess membership in the IWW then you are barred from becoming a citizen. [13] The fight for free speech in Denver has been declared a victory and the IWW will be permitted to speak at four designated points from noon until eleven at night. A stipulation in the agreement states that the men who took part in the fight will leave town if they can’t find work soon. [14]

The striking silk workers have been going strong for about fourteen weeks. There are twenty five thousand workers out in Paterson NJ, while there has been solidarity in the strike and mills in New York and Pennsylvania are also struck. [15]

June: A general strike has been called against United Fruit Company’s ships. The reason given is because the company cut wages by five dollars a month. On June eleventh, city police and detectives fired into the sailors and marine transport workers union, even though the men were unarmed. [16]

Lumberjacks in the Puget Sound Area decided to proceed with a general strike for an eight-hour day and other things, which include increased wages and better living conditions. [19] The lumber strike started off strongly but faltered because many of the men were itinerant workers and that made it difficult to form effective picket lines. Also, Alexander Scott was sentenced to serve not less than one year for reporting the truth on conditions in Paterson, NJ. He called the police chief “strike breaker Bimson,” and the authorities didn’t take kindly to it. [18]

July: The strikers in Utah have called off a strike because most of the contractors have given a twenty-five cent raise and began improving the living conditions for the workers. The contractors have done this even though they still don’t recognize the union. [20]

In Massachusetts, there has been a strike for at least nine weeks at a knitting mill that pays just six dollars per week. This wage makes it the lowest paid knitting mill in the country. On June 10th, the workers were picketing when the police began to shoot and club the picketers. This resulted in the death of a woman striker while several other people were wounded. [21] It is ironic that the owner of the mill is a bishop. Later, he would forcefully evict all the strikers from company owned houses.

August: A great battle has broken out with the effort to organize workers harvesting wheat in Minot, North Dakota. Eleven socialists and twenty-seven IWW’s were arrested. They were charged with obstructing sidewalks and using obscene language. It’s a never-ending fight for free speech.

An IWW-led strike by harvest workers who are camped at a hop farm in Wheatland, California, ends in a deadly clash. When authorities try to break up a strike rally and arrest IWW leaders, gunfire kills the Country District Attorney, a deputy sheriff, and two strikers. A massive roundup of Wobblies follows and two strike leaders are convicted of second degree murder.

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[1] “The Situation in Eugene,” IWW, February 6, 1913, 1.
[2] “Merryville Men Need Aid,” IWW, January 9, 1913, 1.
[3] “Machine Guns at Merryville,” IWW, January 16, 1913, 1.
[4] “Seattle Workers Win Strike,” IWW, January 23, 1913, 1.
[5] “Corean Organizer Beaten by Thugs,” IWW, January 2, 1913, 4.
[6] “Nineteen IWW Men Jailed in Denver,” IWW, February 13, 1913, 1.
[7] “Mob Violence in Merryville,” IWW, February 27, 1913, 1.
[8] “Silk Workers Strike in Hazelton, PA,” IWW, February 27, 1913, 1.
[9] “Rubber Workers on the Firing Line at Akron,” IWW, March 6, 1913, 1.
[10] “Police Start Violence in Akron,” IWW, March 20, 1913, 1.
[11] “Akron Rubber Strike is Called Off,” IWW, April 10, 1913, 1.
[12] “Lucy Parsons Maltreated,” IWW, May 1, 1913, 3.
[13] “Take This Away Judge,” IWW, May 1, 1913, 1.
[14] “Denver Free Speech Fight is Won,” IWW, May 8, 1913, 1.
[15] “Striking Silk Workers Need Assistance,” IWW, May 22, 1913, 1.
[16] “Forty-three are Jailed in New Orleans,” IWW, June 19, 1913, 1.
[17] “The IWW to have a Book,” IWW, April 24, 1913, 3.
[18] “Free Press Denied in Paterson,” IWW, June 26, 1913, 1.
[19] “Strike Proclamation,” IWW, June 5, 1913, 1.
[20] “Tucker Contractors Concede Demands,” IWW, July 10, 1913, 1.
[21] “Labor Skinner a Sky Pilot,” IWW, July 10, 1913, 1.