Wheeling majority. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1907-192?, 1913-07-17
Pope Mill Strikers
Confident OfWinninq
by Walter B. hiIton.l


crossing in way that satisfies the
strikers. Despite the deliberate lies
being published in the daily papers in
the attempt to delude the public into
believing that the plant is working
practically in full, with over 700 ex-
Derienced men, and that the strikers
are in bad way, the exact reverse is
= true.
From personal visit this (Tues
day) morning learned that about the
only thing the Pope mill is producing
is smoke. The three stacks are send
= ing up vast black clouds reminding
one of the black legs inside the plant
and the black hearts of the labor
crushers behind the mill-and into the
air are also going the hopes OF the
mill owners to crush the workers of
Steubenvile.
But TWO Mills.
What | saw any one can see. Stand
ing just outside of the companys pri-
yate property line, so as to avoid the
uupleasantness of being shot by the
comLany's private army (Which this
land of the free permits capitalists to
naintain), great whirring of two i'm
mense fly wheels can be discerned in
side the mill. Clouds of smoke and
two whirring wheels. The clank Of
7 steel slabs, the roar Of rolls, all the
myriad noises of tin mill, are con
spicuous by their absence.
Far back in the semi gloom a few
men can De seen fumbling around one
set of rolls; midway of the plant a
few more. are about another set Of
rolls They are making a. bluff at run
ming two mills. The smoke and the
whirring fly wheels are part of the
bluff The more than 700 men"
dwindle to less than 70.
Many Thugs.
But outside the 4mills-there are
many men. Slouchy tramps, sitting
about on the bank, with hunk of
bread in one hand and a bowl of al
legged vegetable soup before them, de-
voting their whole attention to that
instead of rolling tin. But there are
more thugs than fake workers All
about the plant they lounge, in groups
of three or four, mostly, but about
every 100 feet sits brute with a rifle
in his hands. This rifle is for the
purpose of shooting the life out of any
- human being who objects to the Pope
= Tin Plate Company's method - of
squeezing the life out of human be-
ings to make profits for their holders
of Watered stock.
Have Been Shooting.
And they have been shooting. On
the west side of the plant, on the top
OF the bank, a high fence runs be-
tween the company's property and the
railroad This fence is filled with
Jo 0f Il
every one shows that the bullet was
fired from the inside of the mill prop
erty. Last Friday night hundreds of
shots were fired from the mill into the
darkness. The course Of every bull
let was toward the homes of the
workers which lie west of the railroad.
Windows were broken, women and
children were frightened, and many
had narrow escapes.
1t seems that some one put torpe-
does along the rails and passing
train set them off. Whether this was
done by little boys, for fun, or whether
the thugs themselves did it as an eX-
euSe to begin firing is not known, but
at any rate they used it for pretext
and sent showers of bullets from the
mill 1t is known, however, that the
strikers did not do it, for they were
completely surprised
Strikers Misrepresented.
Absolutely no violence has been
committed by the strikers. They are
pieketing the mill. and completely, so
that they get the men out about as
soon as they get to the mill, by pur-
suasien, and certainly get all the de-
cent rlen who may have come through
the false representations of the com
pany's agents, but they have used nc
violence.
But every scrap that occurs in
Steubenville or vicinity now is blam-
Ell upon the strikers by the corrupted
daily press. Saturday night some
iereisners who perhaps do not even
Know there is a strike, and who never
worked in the mill, got into a fight
ana one Of the number was badly
beaten up This, the dailies, blamed
upon the strikers.
Tin House Workers Stick.
Inc tin house workers came Out
with the hot mill men. thus making
the lie up complete. Some foreign
were induced to work in the places
Of the American women openers"
~ANJ SUN qu1I, Cld1u1uS lAdI IAS
work turned out by the scab crews
was SO bad that they could not make
len cents a day. The company offer
ed to pay them day wages, and sen
automobiles to their homes for them
Out they have refused to go to work
Housing the Scabs.
The asserting room is being uset
Tor boarding house There the scab
re being fed and bunked. The boXe
that formerly filed the room were pile
on the outside. The men in tn
place seem to be of two kinds; on
kind appears to be thorough goini
buns, who do not work, but crab tn
chance to eat, and the others, thug
who make theirl living as guards" be
cause they do not like to work.
Neither class will win for the Pop
Fin Plate Company For the compan
makes its dividends upon its watere
stock by the labor of foolish workers
50 the plant can be jammed and cram
med with men who will not or canno
work. and the company will fail,
If the daily papers of the countr,
and no MI