The labor journal. [volume] (Everett, Wash.) 1909-1976, 1922-11-10
Continued from last week.
Merry Life. But a Short One


of their friends explains. ellis agen
can wire him at any time for an!
lob at any place. Of course he don
do no more work than he has to
He's mainly there to count one S,
the papers can say the jobs goin' OF
fine-that, and to be ready to figh
in case the strikers start something
In between jobs he mebbe get
cleaned out of money. Well, all he
has to do is to go to his agent anC
say: Gimme thirty dollars on &C
COUNT Just like that. See?-anC
it's took out of his pay later on
Easy money, I'll say. The minute
things get too quiet here, hi.
agent'll probably wire him to beat
it out to some other place where
there's more trouble"
"a lot of these finks are Junkers
too" explains still another. "Yor
know-snow birds-dope fiends. The
police here has taken three hypC
needles offa one man."
Even for such workers-such al.
legged workers-the hours on the jot
in the house have their satisfac-
lions. Perhaps these come from the
sense of multiplying your own per-
sonal power-as though the work
brought it about that it is you and
not the engine that, after all the
manicuring, backs out onto the turn
table and goes out to the farm OF
the ready tracks, there to wait to
be coupled on to Number Is and
chase it up to the divisions end.
The trouble is not with the hours
Of labor, but of leisure The camps
sleeping and eating quarters are
hstily constructed. The dozen box
cars fitted up with beds look to be
the best, but these have been re-
served for the salaried guards and
foremen. We common laborers and
helpers of all colors-including one
from India-have been put into bunk
houses, sixty or a hundred of us in
a bunch. The constant chatter of the
colored walters just outside and the
swarms of hungry flies within make
it plain enough why most of the
night workers try to do their sleep
ing in the roundhouse-on the job
instead of in the camp. The more
they can sleep in the house, further
more. the more overtime they can
stand and the more pay and a half
they can get out Of the passing days
to build up their stake.
THAT camp, it is place only for
swivel" So the grease-boX worker
from Jugoslavia eXclaims. "No place
to wash except that little basin
where all that go by on the street
above can see My body, it is black
like coal. And to eat! Only by grab
bing everything with both hands.
Never in my life have | so ge-pigged
it. And everywhere the lime and the
flies. Nothing like it since my years
in the war in the old country War,
it is here toO--in our camp. Only
few days before you came, two men
were shot by outsiders. Easily from
all the hills can they shoot down
upon us-us swine! When once |
learn English, then will I never
more break strikesn'
Under these conditions, in the
in the house and in the
town in the enemy's territory out
beyond the No Mans Land shared
between our armed guards and the
strikers pickets-it is not strange
that things go pretty much hit or
miss. Oddly enough, those who are
carrying the real responsibility and
doing the real work that gets out the
engines are, for the most part. the
strike-breaking strikers. | mean the
many men who are strikers in one
railroad community but nevertheless
are earning money as strike break
ers in another. 1t is evidence of the
difficulty of holding great bodies of
workers together that many in the
country have been doing this under
such pressure as a friend here says
he did:
-Four weeks l stayed out with the
the leaders that every
day they were goin' to win. If I'd
"a been single, I'd "a stuck till the
COWS come home. Without a wife,
Il fellow can beg, borrow, steal, or
bum and still stand by his mates.
But what is a fellow goin' to do
when his wife and two kids-after
four weeks, you understand begin
to say: Daddy, | just got to have
a pair of shoes, or Papa, how shall
I start to school without a new
dress?' A fellows just got to do
something then, l tell you; he's just
got to-"
l wonder if, when the strike is
over, he will get away with his story
of farmin' with my uncle up in Yer
mont. l recall too many unhappy
endings told at the boarding house
table last week:
Cup at F. one of the boys that
hesitated several days maxim up his
mind to 90 out has been fired out of
two lodges and lost all his benefits.
Besides that, he's been in bed ever
since. guess somthing must "a
happened to him."
Jim Will Have to Leave Town
Looks to me like our old friend
Jim-you know, he has been tryin'
to get the fellows back to work and
lay down on their buddies-will have
to leave town when it's all over.
They're refusin' to sell him goods or
give him a shave downtown, and l
reckon the church members will re-
fus to stand for him."
Personally l feel fortunate to be
out of the camp again after a few
days and safe in another place away
from both the picket line and those
hard boiled finks that were sup
posed to guard us. Thank my stars
too, I'm not troubled by the sleep
lessness of the night-shift man who
tries to stick by his boss.
1t is simply impossible for the
white-collared occupant of salar.
led, year-by-year position to appre.
ciate the Importance of the day-by
day job to all the greater world that
depends on it.
BY the same token, also, it is i'm,
possible for us up-and- t.
understand the amazing bitterness
with which the fight for jobs i:
waged.