#15 - Why the Strike Vote ...

 
Fellow workers we have just completed the Country Fair Week-end.  If the Company has its way in the negotiations, there will be a part-time extra board with lower benefits and no hourly guarantee.  The work would flow to these low wage workers in our union - exploiting them.  Plus overtime for eight hours in a day will be gone.  So if there is any work distributed to regular full timers, the long day of service will result in nothing extra, unless they go over forty hours in the week.
 
My last message to you was long, and I intend on being brief this time.  I am tired from the work this weekend and my shoulders hurt.  But I wanted to remind myself and you what has been given by those before us, to enjoy the working life that we have.  Our work is hard.  But some say "why do we need to strike if called upon to do so? " Some say, "A strike would be a hardship on my good life and I feel lucky to have this job at LTD.  I mean how bad can it really get?"
 
Well, that is a question that we should not let happen so that we find out.  A strike may inconvenience us in our life.  But it is unlikely that anyone will be killed for our exercising this right.  Other have given their blood and life for this right, and it is wrong for us to turn our backs to those who gave so much for so many.  And trust me, they gave for you and me!  Let me tell you about Ludlow Colorado.
 
    The Ludlow Massacre

    The date April 20, 1914, will forever be a day of infamy for American workers. On that     day, 20 innocent men, women and children were killed in the Ludlow Massacre. The coal miners in Colorado and other western states had been trying to join the UnitedMine Workers of America for many years. 

They were bitterly opposed by the coal operators, led by the Colorado Fuel and Iron Company. 
 
Upon striking, the miners and their families had been evicted from their company-owned houses and had set up a tent colony on public property.  The massacre occurred in a carefully planned attack on the tent colony by Colorado militiamen, coal company guards, and thugs hired as private detectives and strike breakers. They shot and burned to death 20 people, including a dozen women and small children.  Later investigations revealed that kerosene had intentionally been poured on the tents to set them ablaze.  The miners had dug foxholes in the tents so the women and children could avoid the bullets that randomly were shot through the tent colony by company thugs.  The women and children were found huddled together at the bottoms of their tents.
The Baldwin Felts Detective Agency had been brought in to suppress the Colorado miners.  They brought with them an armored car mounted with a machine gun--the Death Special-- that roamed the area spraying bullets.  The day of the massacre, the miners were celebrating Greek Easter.  At 10:00 AM the militia ringed the camp and began firing into the tents upon a signal from the commander, Lt. Karl E. Lindenfelter. Not one of the perpetrators of the slaughter were ever punished, but scores of miners and their leaders were arrested and blackballed from the coal industry.

In Memory of the Fallen.
THOSE WHO DIED IN LUDLOW MASSACRE
Louis Tikas, 30
James Fyler, 43
John Bartolotti, 45
Charlie Costa, 31
Fedelina Costas, 27
Onafrio Costa, 4
Frank Rubino, 23
Patria Valdez, 37
Eulala Valdez, 8
Mary Valdez, 7
Elvira Valdez, 3 months
Joe Petrucci, 4 1/2
Lucy Petrucci, 2 1/2
Frank Petrucci, 4 months
William Snyder Jr., 11
Rodgerlo Pedregone, 6
Cloriva Pedregone, 4
We thank you, and grieve for your sacrifice even today for our fallen Union strikers.  It is only 90 years since your violent deaths for the sake of profits and the unwillingness of a Company to bargain in good faith.  Rest in the Peace of Solidarity for we shall not forget.  Let us here at LTD,  know and remember that this is but one of hundreds of deaths for our right to be a union and collectively bargain.  These deaths also assured our ability to strike for our legitimate bargaining requests.  Never forget!
In Solidarity,
Joe Hill