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Judging by the traffic, we Coloradans love holiday road trips. And since it's Labor Day weekend, why not honor the occasion and enlarge your carbon footprint with a Colorado Labor War historic tour?
If you're starting from the metro area, head south on Interstate 25. At Colorado Springs, turn west to Cripple Creek. Do not tarry at the casinos, but proceed six miles to Victor, which was the labor town of the mining district.
I've toured many mining-town museums, and the Lowell Thomas Museum in Victor is the only one where I've seen displays about the Western Federation of Miners, the leading miners' union at the start of the 20th century.
The first major strike in the Cripple Creek district
came in 1894. Gov. Davis H. Waite called out the militia to
protect the striking miners from the thugs and goons hired
as sheriff's deputies
by the mine owners, then went
on to negotiate a settlement that saved the eight-hour
day.
After that bizarre development, Colorado never again made the mistake of electing a Populist governor. The next strike came in 1903, and this time the militia was on the side of the mine owners.
While in Victor, you can also check out the front of the old WFM Union Hall, which still has bullet holes; our state militia started firing into the building when striking miners fled there for refuge.
The militia was busy: imprisoning people without filing
charges, ignoring writs of habeas corpus, shutting down the
Victor newspaper. Lt. Thomas McClellend put it, To hell
with the constitution, we aren't going by the
constitution.
His commander, Gen. Sherman Bell,
declared Habeas corpus be damned. We'll give 'em post
mortems.
After touring Victor, drive down scenic Phantom Canyon to U.S. 50, then east to Pueblo and south on I-25 to the Ludlow exit, where you'll find a National Historic Landmark resulting from a long strike by coal miners in 1913-14.
The Ludlow Massacre of April 20, 1914, is pretty well known; two women and 11 children suffocated in a pit under a tent after the tent was set afire and the militia raked the area with machine-gun fire. Colorado had earlier run out of money to pay the militia, so the mine owners, among them John D. Rockefeller, Jr., funded its payroll.
The striking miners responded be exercising their Second Amendment rights and attacking mine guards. In the next 10 days, at least 50 people died. It was the most violent labor conflict in U.S. history, and ended only after federal troops were brought in.
If you're not tired of driving yet, you can head west to Telluride, site of shootings, bombings, arbitrary arrests and deportations in 1904, although the modern upscale resort seems rather embarrassed by that aspect of its history.
So you can drive north on I-25, past Denver, to the Colo. 7 exit. You'll be near the one-time company town of Serene, site of the 1927 Columbine Mine Massacre; the militia killed six demonstrating miners there.
And if you want to stay home and read, rather than explore sites from Colorado's bloody labor wars, here are three suggestions:
The Corpse on Boomerang Road
by Maryjoy Martin
details how the mine owners of Telluride fabricated a
murder in order to besmirch and break the union.
The Great Coalfield War,
a Ludlow history by
Leonard F. Guttridge and George S. McGovern (the former
South Dakota senator and 1972 Democratic presidential
candidate.
Big Trouble
by J. Anthony Lukas focuses on the
Idaho trials of miners' union leaders in 1907, accused of
conspiring to kill former Gov. Frank Steunenberg, but
there's plenty about Colorado.
One way or another, have an educational Labor Day.
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