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Category Archives: history
Happy Birthday Eugene Debs
Originally posted November 10, 2014 “Remember, Remember, the fifth of November!” The old school-child chant of course refers to Guy Fawkes, sometimes dubbed as “the only honest man ever to enter the Parliament.” This date–celebrating the foiling … Continue reading
Posted in history, labor, railroading, social protest
Tagged American Federation of Labor, American Railway Union (ARU), Brotherhood of Locomotive Firemen, Charles Pillsbury, Eugene Debs, George Pullman, Governor John Rogers, Great Northern Railway, Great Northern Strike, Grover Cleveland, Guy Fawkes, James Whitcomb Riley, Jim Hill, Locomotive Firemen's Magazine, Pullman Strike, sleeping car. Pullman IL, socialism, Spokesman-Review, strikes of 1877, Terre Haute IN, Theodore Roosevelt, Washington state
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The I.W.W. is 110 Years Old
By the 1890s, in reaction to the unprecedented power concentration of corporations, a labor movement had formed. The Railroad Brotherhoods and the American Federation of Labor (A.F.L.) dominated the movement, divided into crafts. Eugene Debs in the early 1890s formed … Continue reading
Posted in history, labor, Socialism, writing
Tagged AFL, AFL-CIO, Big Bill Haywood, CIO, Daniel DeLeon, Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, Espionage Act, Eugene Debs, Father Thomas Hagerty, FBI, Free Speech Movement, Great Northern Strike, HUAC, IWW, J. Edgar Hoover, Lawrence Strike, Paterson Strike, Pullman Strike, Sedition Act, Vincent S. John, Wobblies, Woodrow Wilson, World War One
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Ivan Doig (1939-2015)–I Miss Your World
Back about 1980, I was introduced to a town I’d never seen, reading a description by a newly acclaimed 40-year-old writer. And it stayed with me–a mid-1940s scene of a very young boy being happily dragged around by his ranch-hand, … Continue reading
Posted in history, labor, love, Montana, nostalgia, social criticism, writing
Tagged Ivan Doig, Montana, Rocky Mountains, sheep ranching, Village Books, Wallace Stegner, White Sulfur Springs
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Up the Inside Passage
July, 1898. 16-year-old Mike Scanlon has let himself be detained, quite willingly, at a new Utopian socialist colony along the upper reaches of Puget Sound, north of Seattle. He is now “back on track” following the original plan of his … Continue reading
A Day Trip to New Whatcom
In May of 1898, 16-year-0ld Mike Scanlon travels west from New Jersey to meet up the with his brother Jimmy in Skagway, Alaska, to work on building the White Pass & Yukon Railway. The brief war taking place in … Continue reading
Posted in history, Populism, Socialism, Utopian Movement, writing
Tagged Bellingham Wash., Brotherhood of Co-operative Commonwealth, Chuckanut Bay, Fairhaven Wash., Klondike gold rush, New Whatcom Wash., Panic of 1893, Puget Sound, San Juan Islands, Skagway Alaska, Spanish-American War, Utopian colonies, White Pass & Yukon Railway, Yukon
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Trains (large and small) and Christmas
First Posted December 20th, 2013 Our regional shopping mall here in Bellingham, Washington, dating from the late 1980s, recently had a grand re-opening showing off its multi-hundred thousand dollar face lift. I didn’t attend. I’ve got nothing against shopping malls. … Continue reading
Posted in history, nostalgia, railroading, social criticism, writing
Tagged Penn Station, toy trains
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Joe Hill–Not Forgotten
The execution of Joe Hill by the State of Utah took place on November 19th, 100 years ago. A fitting time to re-post this entry. On January 10th, 1914, A Salt Lake City grocer (a former policeman) named John G. … Continue reading
Posted in history, labor, social protest
Tagged class warfare, I.W.W., protest movements, song writing, Utah, Woodrow Wilson, World War One
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Happy Birthday Eugene Debs
“Remember, Remember, the fifth of November!” The old school-child chant of course refers to Guy Fawkes, sometimes dubbed as “the only honest man ever to enter the Parliament.” This date–celebrating the foiling of the 17th century plot to … Continue reading
Posted in history, labor, railroading, social protest
Tagged American Federation of Labor, American Railway Union (ARU), Brotherhood of Locomotive Firemen, Charles Pillsbury, Eugene Debs, George Pullman, Governor John Rogers, Great Northern Railway, Great Northern Strike, Grover Cleveland, Guy Fawkes, James Whitcomb Riley, Jim Hill, Locomotive Firemen's Magazine, Pullman Strike, sleeping car. Pullman IL, socialism, Spokesman-Review, strikes of 1877, Terre Haute IN, Theodore Roosevelt, Washington state
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Did William Faulkner Really Say This?
In writing, you must kill all your darlings. Not according to John Crowley, writer of fantasy, science fiction and mainstream fiction. I was happy to read in Crowley’s “Easy Chair” column, in the November 2014 issue of Harper’magazine, that the … Continue reading
Posted in history, self-publishing, social criticism, writing
Tagged book editing, creative writing groups, Earnest Hemingway, Gustave Flaubert, Harper's Magazine, James Joyce, John Crowley, Mark Twain, Maxwell Perkins, Sir Arthur Quiller-Couch, The Easy Chair, Thomas Wolfe, Wallace Stegner, William Faulkner, word processing, writing style
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A Visit to the Home of the Future Socialist Leader– Part Two
May, 1894: Social activist Norah O’Hanlon Quinn, now married to former priest Daniel Quinn, accompanies him on the last leg of their trip out to the Midwest. Expecting to visit American Railway Union leader Eugene Debs and his wife … Continue reading
J.P. Kenna 