Brother Boilerman

I had a rain day recently, and I chose to take it.

So, me & the kid hopped in the car and headed over to see the Debs home. It was somewhere like 100 miles away, so it was well within range.

Unfortunately, the place was closed when we got there, but I caught the hours of the place.

Unionization came to America through John Smith at the Jamestown colony. He recognized the shortage of skilled craftsmen, and instituted a system of apprentices, journeymen, and masters. These unions remained localized from the early 17th century until after the Civil War.

Now, my own union is descended from an Assembly of the Noble and Holy Order in Washington, DC. I was reading through a selection of writings their founder less than a week ago; he is still very important to us. Much of their character is shaped by his writings. We have since done away with ‘masters;’ we are journeymen and apprentices.

The unions for the railways developed separately. There were four national unions after the Civil War, and these were separated by various work. It was the grocer and boilerman Eugene V. Debs who started the first national union for all railway employees, the American Railway Union. He also founded the Industrial Workers of the World, the Wobblies, much later.

The Pullman strike saw the first use of government injunction as a union-busting scheme; the “Pinkerton system,” being private militias, was the prevalent technique of the day. President Cleveland sent in the US Army, presumably to secure the mail, and Debs was arrested. He was released, and then re-arrested six days later. He spent six months in prison in Woodstock, Illinois, and it was there that he became radicalized as a socialist. He later founded the Social Democratic Party and ran for President five times, gaining almost a million votes in 1920 while wrongfully imprisoned.

Samuel Gompers was a counterpoint to Debs. Gompers was a communist, and Debs a socialist. Gompers was the president of the American Federation of Labor, which became the prominent national labor union at the waning of the Noble and Holy Order. Gompers wanted everyone to be required to belong to one labor union, while Debs envisioned something more like a republic of co-operative unions. In short, Gompers was a jackass and Debs was gold.

Though the museum was closed, we walked around the back yard, reading the plaques along the fence and enjoying the evening. There is a fairly good-sized crepe myrtle there, and an arched trellis covered with honeysuckle. It was very peaceful and pleasant, very moving.

And I came back.

I had noticed that the honeysuckle to the south were putting out seed pods. So, I waited about a weed and a half, and then I came back. And sure enough, there they were.

And so, I gathered this treasure, these 54 seed pods, to plant and give as gifts in remembrance of one of our revered early leaders.

When the mariner, sailing over tropic seas, looks for relief from his weary watch, he turns his eyes toward the Southern Cross, burning luridly above the tempest-vexed ocean. As the midnight approaches the Southern Cross begins to bend, and the whirling worlds change their places, and with starry finger-points the Almighty marks the passage of Time upon the dial of the universe; and though no bell may beat the glad tidings, the look-out knows that the midnight is passing – that relief and rest are close at hand.

Let the people take heart and hope everywhere, for the cross is bending, midnight is passing, and joy cometh with the morning.

---Eugene V Debs