Wednesday June 7, 1916
Mother Jones Travels From Chicago to Arizona with Stop in Kansas

Today Hellraisers pauses to catch up with Mother Jones and to document her whereabouts and doings for the month of May 1916. We find Mother assisting strikers in Chicago, speaking in Kansas, and meeting with Governor Hunt in Arizona. We also observe two examples of the love that working men and women hold in their hearts for the Miners' Angel, Mother Jones.

From The Pittsburgh Gazette Times of May 6, 1916:

'Mother' Jones Helps Organize
Chicago Union
-----

McCormick Strikers Ask Labor Federation Charter-
I. W. W. Element Objects.
-----
SIGNALMEN MEDIATION BEGUN
-----

[SPECIAL TELEGRAM TO THE GAZETTE TIMES.]

CHICAGO. May 5.-Aided and cheered on by "Mother" Jones of West Virginia and Colorado strike fame, the strikers at the McCormick plant of the International Harvester Company were formed into a union today.

Temporary cards were issued and formal application made to the American Federation of Labor for a charter. The 7,000 strikers had heretofore been entirely unorganized.

Not all of them joined the new union as internal dissension is still rife among the ranks. Many of the strikers have already opened negotiations with the superintendents and the opposition of the I. W. W. to the American Federation of Labor has caused another split.

One thousand employes of the Western Foundry Company struck today, supposedly in sympathy with the strikers at the harvester company plants. It is understood a reduction in hours and an increase in wages will be asked.

From The Pittsburgh Press of May 7, 1916:

MOTHER JONES GIVES REASON FOR STRIKES
-----
By United Press.

Chicago, May 6.-Mother Mary Jones, heroine of many strikes, tonight declared in an interview with the United Press that labor was striking "while the iron is hot."

Mother Jones, who is in Chicago aiding 11,000 strikers at the International Harvester Co.'s plants, declared that labor throughout the country had seized an opportune time to make its demands for higher wages and better living conditions.

[Said "Mother" Jones:]

Of course...they are not striking for anything they do not deserve. It is not organized labor that is striking. The interests know enough to arbitrate with them. If the steel workers at Youngstown were organized, all that bloodshed and insane acts there would have been eliminated.

The laboring forces have been subjected for years not knowing where their next piece of bread was coming from. They have waited for the opportune time to strike for what is theirs.

The working man does not want war or as a class does not believe in preparedness. I believe that if the money interests want war, they should go out and shed their own blood.

If Roosevelt is nominated, watch me. I will speak my little piece against him. I am for Wilson. He has done all he could.

Mother Jones left for Denver late tonight.

-----

From Hellraisers Journal of May 15th & 16th:

On May 15th & 16th, Hellraisers carried two articles about Mother Jones. One was from a newspaper in Chanute, Kansas, about a speech delivered by Mother as she passed through that town. And the other was from the Arizona Republican of Tucson which spoke of a letter that was mailed simply to Mother Jones with a plea to the postmaster:

Postmaster-Please find her, for I know not where her home may be, lest it be in the hearts of the American people.

From Tucson's Arizona Daily Star of May 20, 1916:

MOTHER JONES HERE.-"Mother [was in?] the city a short time yesterday, arriving late Thursday night and leaving yesterday morning for the east. She was registered at the Santa Rita. She is accompanied by Edward Crough, of Denver, and the two were in conference with Governor Hunt at Phoenix. No statement concerning the purpose of their visit to Tucson was given out.

[-from the "CITY BRIEFS" section.]

-----

From The Decatur Review of May 22, 1916:

HE WANTED SEE "MOTHER" JONES
-----

Old Man Tells How She Saved Life of
His Son in Colorado.

While many people were disappointed in not getting to see the famous "Mother" Jones, Saturday, there was one old man who regretted it more than anyone. He was about eighty years old and he walked into a local restaurant during tie afternoon with his two grandsons to buy some ham sandwiches. Tears came in his eyes and his voice quivered.

[He told the waiter:]

I live near Murphysboro...and I read in the papers that "Mother" Jones was coming. When the fighting was going on in Colorado, my son was one of the miners there. A gun was raised to shoot at him and "Mother" Jones, who was standing near, stepped in from of my son and saved his life. He was injured later and died but I wanted to shake hands with her and thank her for what she did. I'm sorry she wasn't here.

-----

From The Bisbee Daily Review of May 27, 1916:

MOTHER JONES ARRIVES.

Mother Jones, noted woman labor leader, arrived in Bisbee last evening from Tucson where she has been spending several days. Since arriving in the state Mother Jones has made a trip to the Globe-Miami district and she will spend several days in this District. It is reported she will speak in the city park Sunday evening. While in Bisbee she is the guest of John Smith on School Hill, who is a very old friend of hers.

-----

[-from the "LOCAL" section.]

SOURCES

The Pittsburgh Gazette Times
(Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania)
-May 6, 1916
https://www.newspapers.com/image/85459806/

The Pittsburgh Press
(Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania)
-May 7, 1916
https://www.newspapers.com/image/143670227/

-May 15, 1916
Hellraisers Journal: Mother Jones: "I try to go, wherever there is a chance for a good fight against high-class burglars." -by JayRaye
http://caucus99percent.com/content/hellraisers-journal-mother-jones-i-tr...

-May 16, 1916
"Hellraisers Journal: Mother Jones Found at Home in the Hearts of the American People." -by JayRaye
http://caucus99percent.com/content/hellraisers-journal-mother-jones-foun...

The Arizona Daily Star
(Tucson, Arizona)
-May 20, 1916
https://www.newspapers.com/image/163503181/

The Decatur Review
(Decatur, Illinois)
-May 22, 1916
https://www.newspapers.com/image/7192306/

The Bisbee Daily Review
(Bisbee, Arizona)
-May 27, 1916
https://www.newspapers.com/image/42290665/

IMAGE
Mother Mary Harris Jones, Please Find Her, AZ Rpb, May 16, 1916
& ISR Dec 1915
https://www.newspapers.com/image/119003661/
https://books.google.com/books/reader?id=9VJIAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcove...

At the time that he wrote this letter, John Walker had been the president of the Illinois Federation of Labor for about three years, having been elected to that position in 1913.

May 29th, 1916

Mother Jones, c/o Chas. Moyer, Denver, Colo.
Dear Mother:

I am writing, to advise you that we had an enormous meeting at Decatur on the 20th, which was a week last Saturday. There was at least thirty thousand people at it. I never did see such a large turnout for a town as small as Decatur. They were all very much disappointed at your not being there. However, I explained that at the request of President Moyer [of the Western Federation of Miners] and President White [of the United Mine Workers of America], who believed that you could do more than anyone else in the country in this particular matter; that you were in Arizona to do what you could to assist Governor Hunt, who did so much for the Western Federation of Miners, in the Clifton Morensa [Morenci] strike, and whom the copper Mine Owners were trying destroy for that very same reason, and it was because you felt you could do more good for the movement by doing that work, than addressing the meeting at Decatur, was the only reason for your not being there.

I am writing this letter Mother, as you know it was through me that you suggested that date for the meeting yourself, and that you agreed to be there, and for fear that you might have forgotten that agreement, there is a newspaper man in Decatur, that is trying to discredit men who are making a campaign there, to organize the workers there, and it is just possible that he might write you, asking whether or not you had agreed to be there, and put it in a light that might influence you to say something to him that he could use against Carbine and the rest of the boys who are trying to organize that town.

He poses as editor of a labor paper-that is his own personal paper. He and his paper have been repudiated by the Central body there; I understand he has been expelled from the Printers Local Union there, so you know he must have been pretty bad when that organization threw him out.

He gets it printed on scab paper in a non-union shop, and is playing the game for the crooked politicians all the time whenever they will pay him for it; and for the price of an advertisement, he sells his paper to every business and employing interest that is fighting the labor movement, and I wanted you to have these things in mind, so that if he would write you, you would understand and be able to avoid saying anything to him that he could use to injure the labor movement in Decatur.

Personally, I am very sorry that you were not at that meeting. It was the greatest of its kind that I ever attended in a small town of 30,000, and I know that if you would have been able to do an immense amount of good if you could have been there at that time; still I know how important it is after what he done, for us to, if we can save Governor Hunt and even make him stronger so that not only he will be able to continue to do that kind of work and feel like doing it, but also for the effect it will have on men in public official positions everywhere in the country in the future.

I hope too, Mother that you will actually acknowledge to yourself, that you are not as strong as a steam engine of a battle ship any more, and that you won't allow your love for the cause and your desire to work, let you injure your health.

Take care of yourself; we need you, and you owe it to the labor movement as well as to yourself to stay with us as long as you can which you can only do by taking care of yourself.

With all the love in the world, I am,

Yours,
[John H. Walker]
President

[Photograph added.]

SOURCE
The Correspondence of Mother Jones
-ed by Edward M. Steel
University of Pittsburgh Press, 1985
https://books.google.com/books?id=EZ2xAAAAIAAJ&q=correspondence+of+mothe...

IMAGE
John H Walker
http://www.illinoislaborhistory.org/hall-of-honor-articles/2011

See also:
2011 Union Hall of Honor: John H. Walker
http://www.illinoislaborhistory.org/hall-of-honor-articles/2011

Hellraisers, Mother Mary Harris Jones, Arizona, Chicago, Kansas, George W. P. Hunt, Chicago Federation of Labor, Industrial Workers of the World, America Federation of Labor, Preparedness, Edward Crough, John H Walker, Decatur IL, Charles Moyer, Western Federation of Miners, John P White, United Mine Workers of America, Clifton-Morenci Strike of 1915-16, Illinois Federation of Labor, Children of Mother Jones, Pete Duffy,