Hunter Gray
2014-03-23 15:17:48 UTC
This is a little scattered -- but should be of interest.
The Idaho legislature is heavily Republican, mostly of quite conservative bent. Son-in-law Cameron's (with Josie) mother, Peggy Evans, has announced for State Representative and, simultaneously, his grandfather, Lin Whitworth, has announced for State Senate. All of this, of course, is on the Democratic ticket which does have populist feathers in the Gem State. Lin, a retired railroad man, was formerly in the State Senate for several terms and was Labor's advocate therein. Of course we wish them very well indeed.
(Which brings to mind a reminiscence. In May, 1968, I was traveling by train (my favorite public conveyance) from Seattle to Cedar Rapids, Iowa. (I always have a private compartment.) Late that night, in Idaho, I briefly met the two conductors. The junior one was a guy about my age with a very impressive curled mustache. We nodded briefly. Almost thirty years later, with the Cameron/Josie connection, I met the man with the mustache again. It was Lin Whitworthe with the very same mustache.)
Labor is having a tough time these days in the Gem State. It's come a long way down from the pro-union ethos of the Frank Church era which began to end with the defeat of Church at the Reagan ascendancy in 1980. It's come even further down from the Glenn Taylor era back in the '40s. Taylor, a rambunctious, colorful and radical guy, was Henry Wallace's running mate in 1948. Both Church and Taylor lived in Pocatello.
Pocatello itself is now the major labor bastion in Idaho. Railroading (Union Pacific) and phosphorous mining and refining (Simplot) are major industries. And there are lots of unions in Poky. Hard-rock mining in the Coeur d'Alene district is virtually over and heavy lumbering in the Clearwater region has pretty much played out. Boise is undergoing high-tech and population expansion but, as yet, unionism is relatively slim.
Of course, as per our difficulties in Pocatello, this small city ain't Utopia. While we have had no more known experiences with night-riding human types, it's clear our mail and computers are consistenly being monitored. But this is, of course, Federal stuff.
Thinking about all of this led me to recall what I know about a major IWW lumber strike in the mid-1930s in the Clearwater region. It was hard-fought with company gunmen shooting strikers, some of whom died, with many wounded. The atmosphere was such that strike headquarters had to be in nearby Spokane, Washington -- and the Idaho governor moved to invoke the state's criminal syndicalism law. Organized labor across the state blocked him from doing that and the strike was essentially won. (Idaho was the first state to draw up the anti-IWW criminal syndicalism statute, 1919, and, long and extensive, it's still on the books. A secret wish of mine is to be indicted under that witch-hunting statute -- it has a truly exotic ring -- but it's been dormant for decades.)
Strangely, this particular IWW struggle has been almost completely ignored by historians. In his classic Lumber and Labor, the late Vernon Jensen of Cornell, makes no mention of it whatsoever. I am fortunate in having a a second and very rare full run (18 issues) of the IWW magazine known as the One Big Union Monthly. (The first was back in the late 1910s.) It's an excellent publication, focused on both this country and abroad. As with the first run, Ralph Chaplin was one of its editors. (Chaplin remained consistentlywith the IWW until 1936 when he entered other labor arenas. His last speech before his passing in 1961 was at the convention of the International Woodworkers of America, at which he gave a stirring presentation, recorded by Joe Glazer, on Frank H. Little, Cherokee, and a major IWW leader who was lynched at Butte by Anaconda thugs in 1917.) If interested, here are some of the magazine's covers along with a few other IWW pamphlet covers -- all from my very large collection of IWW and Mine-Mill stuff.
http://www.hunterbear.org/wobbly_art.htm
On a media note, our TV dish occasionally adds things. We've encountered thereon a TV station, out of UK, called RT -- 280 on our arrangement. It's decidedly Left, but I'm not yet sure what, if any, variety. It's covered the Ukrainian and Crimean situations fairly well. Put forth some interesting photos of far right thugs assaulting people in Kiev.
In Solidarity
Hunter Bear
HUNTER GRAY [HUNTER BEAR/JOHN R SALTER JR] Mi'kmaq /
St. Francis Abenaki / St. Regis Mohawk
Member, National Writers Union AFL-CIO
Check out our massive social justice website
www.hunterbear.org The site is dedicated to our
one-half Bobcat, Cloudy Gray, and to Sky Gray:
http://hunterbear.org/cloudy_gray.htm
See my piece ON BEING A MILITANT AND RADICAL
ORGANIZER -- AND AN EFFECTIVE ONE (Mississippi et al.):
http://crmvet.org/comm/hunter1.htm
See our very full COMMUNITY ORGANIZING
page -- with a great deal of practical material:
http://hunterbear.org/my_combined_community_organizing.htm
See my new expanded/updated "Organizer's Book,"
JACKSON MISSISSIPPI -- with a new 10,000 word
introduction by me. This page lists many reviews.
And this book is also an activist's how-to manual:
http://hunterbear.org/jackson.htm
The Stormy Adoption of an Indian Child [My Father]:
http://hunterbear.org/James%20and%20Salter%20and%20Dad.htm:
(Photos)
The Idaho legislature is heavily Republican, mostly of quite conservative bent. Son-in-law Cameron's (with Josie) mother, Peggy Evans, has announced for State Representative and, simultaneously, his grandfather, Lin Whitworth, has announced for State Senate. All of this, of course, is on the Democratic ticket which does have populist feathers in the Gem State. Lin, a retired railroad man, was formerly in the State Senate for several terms and was Labor's advocate therein. Of course we wish them very well indeed.
(Which brings to mind a reminiscence. In May, 1968, I was traveling by train (my favorite public conveyance) from Seattle to Cedar Rapids, Iowa. (I always have a private compartment.) Late that night, in Idaho, I briefly met the two conductors. The junior one was a guy about my age with a very impressive curled mustache. We nodded briefly. Almost thirty years later, with the Cameron/Josie connection, I met the man with the mustache again. It was Lin Whitworthe with the very same mustache.)
Labor is having a tough time these days in the Gem State. It's come a long way down from the pro-union ethos of the Frank Church era which began to end with the defeat of Church at the Reagan ascendancy in 1980. It's come even further down from the Glenn Taylor era back in the '40s. Taylor, a rambunctious, colorful and radical guy, was Henry Wallace's running mate in 1948. Both Church and Taylor lived in Pocatello.
Pocatello itself is now the major labor bastion in Idaho. Railroading (Union Pacific) and phosphorous mining and refining (Simplot) are major industries. And there are lots of unions in Poky. Hard-rock mining in the Coeur d'Alene district is virtually over and heavy lumbering in the Clearwater region has pretty much played out. Boise is undergoing high-tech and population expansion but, as yet, unionism is relatively slim.
Of course, as per our difficulties in Pocatello, this small city ain't Utopia. While we have had no more known experiences with night-riding human types, it's clear our mail and computers are consistenly being monitored. But this is, of course, Federal stuff.
Thinking about all of this led me to recall what I know about a major IWW lumber strike in the mid-1930s in the Clearwater region. It was hard-fought with company gunmen shooting strikers, some of whom died, with many wounded. The atmosphere was such that strike headquarters had to be in nearby Spokane, Washington -- and the Idaho governor moved to invoke the state's criminal syndicalism law. Organized labor across the state blocked him from doing that and the strike was essentially won. (Idaho was the first state to draw up the anti-IWW criminal syndicalism statute, 1919, and, long and extensive, it's still on the books. A secret wish of mine is to be indicted under that witch-hunting statute -- it has a truly exotic ring -- but it's been dormant for decades.)
Strangely, this particular IWW struggle has been almost completely ignored by historians. In his classic Lumber and Labor, the late Vernon Jensen of Cornell, makes no mention of it whatsoever. I am fortunate in having a a second and very rare full run (18 issues) of the IWW magazine known as the One Big Union Monthly. (The first was back in the late 1910s.) It's an excellent publication, focused on both this country and abroad. As with the first run, Ralph Chaplin was one of its editors. (Chaplin remained consistentlywith the IWW until 1936 when he entered other labor arenas. His last speech before his passing in 1961 was at the convention of the International Woodworkers of America, at which he gave a stirring presentation, recorded by Joe Glazer, on Frank H. Little, Cherokee, and a major IWW leader who was lynched at Butte by Anaconda thugs in 1917.) If interested, here are some of the magazine's covers along with a few other IWW pamphlet covers -- all from my very large collection of IWW and Mine-Mill stuff.
http://www.hunterbear.org/wobbly_art.htm
On a media note, our TV dish occasionally adds things. We've encountered thereon a TV station, out of UK, called RT -- 280 on our arrangement. It's decidedly Left, but I'm not yet sure what, if any, variety. It's covered the Ukrainian and Crimean situations fairly well. Put forth some interesting photos of far right thugs assaulting people in Kiev.
In Solidarity
Hunter Bear
HUNTER GRAY [HUNTER BEAR/JOHN R SALTER JR] Mi'kmaq /
St. Francis Abenaki / St. Regis Mohawk
Member, National Writers Union AFL-CIO
Check out our massive social justice website
www.hunterbear.org The site is dedicated to our
one-half Bobcat, Cloudy Gray, and to Sky Gray:
http://hunterbear.org/cloudy_gray.htm
See my piece ON BEING A MILITANT AND RADICAL
ORGANIZER -- AND AN EFFECTIVE ONE (Mississippi et al.):
http://crmvet.org/comm/hunter1.htm
See our very full COMMUNITY ORGANIZING
page -- with a great deal of practical material:
http://hunterbear.org/my_combined_community_organizing.htm
See my new expanded/updated "Organizer's Book,"
JACKSON MISSISSIPPI -- with a new 10,000 word
introduction by me. This page lists many reviews.
And this book is also an activist's how-to manual:
http://hunterbear.org/jackson.htm
The Stormy Adoption of an Indian Child [My Father]:
http://hunterbear.org/James%20and%20Salter%20and%20Dad.htm:
(Photos)