[combat_boots]

The Wobblies:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Industrial_Workers_of_the_World

Chicago
Minnesota
Washington State — Note the Everett ‘massacre’ and general strike. Dockworkers again.

I used to know someone whose parents were familiar with the goings on of the Wobblies. Decades later, no one talked about details of anything. Many secrets were buried with the people of that generation. Even here, I carefully reword certain phrases, and all I know is that I had a 30 second exchange with that person about cursory generalizations, at the same time that I read up on the ghastly tale of Frances Farmer.

[oh8eleven]

The IWW was founded in Chicago in June 1905 at a convention of two hundred socialists, anarchists, and radical trade unionists from all over the United States
Today these people are known as Democrats.

I have a slight connection to the American Federation of Labor. In 1880 NYC (Lower East Side), my gg-grandfather lived in the same tenement as AFL founder Samuel Gompers.
My ggGF was from Ireland, was a cooper and probably talked about labor issues with Gompers (who was a cigar maker).