Session: 123456789101112131415161718192021222324         Page 356357358359360361362363364365366367368369370371372373374375376377378379380381382 of 592

talk about the strike. They didn't want to talk about the strike, and he describes what had happened.

Because something had happened after the strike was over. [Albert] Ettor and [Arturo] Giovanetti, the organizers of the strike, were still in jail. Because they had been accused of the bombing, you know, of inciting. A group of workers from Boston -- can't tell whether they were Polish or Italian anarchists -- came and marched in front of the jail and carried a banner that said, “Neither God, Nor Country.” This incensed the people in Lawrence, particularly the church. A Father James O'Reilly took it upon himself to organize a movement “For God and Country”, which started a series of annual Columbus Day parades. Huge parades for God and Country, which involve many many thousands of people including, Paul says, the descendants of the strikers. They got swept up in this thing, and they began to hide the fact that their parents were involved in the strike.

In the course of that article, he tells the story of Carmela Teoli. Now Carmela Teoli at the time of the strike was fourteen years old. One of the great things about that strike was that Angelo Ruocco -- who died about two years ago at the age of 100 -- at this time was about ninety-six years old. Angelo Ruocco was at the time the strike broke out -- it was, you know, an uprising. Wage cut, people walked out. No organization, no nothing. Speaking thirty-five different languages, from forty-five different countries, they couldn't communicate with each other, nobody knew what was happening. But they were marching out in the very very cold -- January 12. It turned out that the day I was in Albany two weeks ago was January 12. It was the seventy-fourth anniversary of the strike. I guess I made it an anniversary.

Anyway so Angelo -- who had worked in the mill but was now a student at night school in the hope of becoming a lawyer, he was in high school at night -- sent a telegram to the IWW. He had met Ettor or one of them before. They had wandered through. He sent a telegram and asked them to come. Arturo Giovanetti, the poet -- who you know his descendants -- and Al Ettor came to Lawrence. They had an advantage. They spoke Italian and spoke several other languages, so they could communicate with them. They started to organize the strike. The strike later became the most widely publicized strike in the history of the labor movement today. That was the first major industrial strike in the United States. Yes!

The railroad strike of 1877.