The Gem worker and the Idaho labor herald. (Boise, Idaho) 1914-1917, 1916-05-18

did not publish the names OF its
1fhcers But it delegated Isaac w.
Frank, President of the United States
Engineering and Foundry Company
and President of the Frank-K iceland
Company, to be its spokesman. The
Steel Corporation kept out of this
Association, but gave the direction to
its activities.
Mr.. Frank talked to the writer OF
this report with the same ferotity and |
violence with which the Steel Corpo- |
ration acted at its Edgar Thompson |
Works in Bradock. In the presence |
of his partner, Mr.. Edward Kheeland, |
Mr.. Frank told the writer that the
man whom he held chiefly respon-
sib1e for the eight hour day move
ment and other demands of the work
ers Should be assassinatedl" Be-
coming frightened then at his own
indiscretion, he said that his state
ment had been very "unratiohal" and
that he did not mean it. The Steel
Corporation has also expressed re-
greet at the death of the men its
guards killed-though it still has the
guards at its plant, and complaint
district attorney r. H. Jackson, has
issued whole sale warrants fpr incit-
ing to riot and for being accessory
to murder against the workers whom
the guards wounded. The coroner,
person named Jamison, has COM
mitted these men and one wpman to
Jail without bail until he may be
pleased to summon a Coronfr's jury
to hear their side of the case.
There was no violence attending
the strike, until the Steel Corpora
ton acted. The only semb1ance of
violence occurred on the first day Of
the shutting. down of the Westing
house plant when crowd of from
500 to 700 of the striking men march
ed from East Pittsburgh to the Wes-
tinghouse Air Brake plant in Viii
lmerding, about a mile away. They
went to encourage the workers there
to join them in striking for The eight
hour day They marched through
the Company's plant-whether being
first tainted by the guards accounts
differ. At any rate, no serious in
jury was done to property OF to per-
sons. But the men and women in
the Wilmerding plant all walked out
Until the fatal day of May 2 at the
Edgar Thomson Works the strikers
and men who had been locked out
by the panic or the cunning of the
various Industries were remarkably
quiet and good natured. They met
peacefully in mass assemblages and
listened TO addresses of lenders or
stood in the streets and most of them
evidently stayed in their homes.
There had been parades with and
without bands. On Monday May l.
crowds tota1ing from 5000 to 1000
marched from Wilmerding, Swiss
vale and East Pittsburgh to the Ed
gar Thomson Works in Braddock
The greater number stayed on the
hillside overlooking the works and
about half a mile from it. Toward
the late afternoon several hundred
persons of the crowd went iHto Thir-
teenth Street along the high board
fence built there, and into the tunnel
leading into the plant They met no
resistance, and going through the
works succeeded in causing probably
one half of the 10000 or so employees
of all grades to quit work. The COM
pany then banked all the furnaces and
declared the plant shut down.
1t was the next day along about
one o'clock in the afternoon, that the
first shooting by the guards occurred.
There was another fight between two
and three o'clock in the same after
noon.
As usual in cases of such confusion
stories vary as to how the fighting
started. The testimony of rnany of
the men in the street is that the
crowds were walking along in the
street hurrahing and urging men in
the works to come out and Join the
strike. Many of the workers from
the inside were trying to get over
the fence to unite with the crowds
and company guards were pulling or
driving them back The firing of
guns and the throwing of stp nes by
the men, who later tried to storm
the fence and were shot down or
driven back by the guards came in
pell nell of action.
The crowd OF strikers and by
ISLANDERS was entirely undisfiplined |
and unled, 1t included very few or
ganized labor workers. That is was
4