Workers, Remember Your History,--Kurt Gustav Wilckens.

      An anniversary we should celebrate, November 3 1886, saw the birth of Kurt Gustav Wilckens, warrior of the working class who dedicated his life to the struggle for freedom and justice for all people. Our history is written in the blood of such people, ordinary people who become giants. Our's is not the history of kings and empires, of greed for power, but a struggle for justice for all.
This from FlagBlackened:

     KURT GUSTAV WILCKENS was born 3 November 1886 at Bad Bramstedt in Schleswig-Holstein, close to the Danish border in Germany, one of the five sons of August Wilckens and Johanna Harms. Of average height with red hair and light blue eyes, he loved nature and hated cities. Starting work as a miner in Silesia, he emigrated at the age of 24 to the United States where he got work in the Arizona mines.
     In Arizona he became involved in the agitation of the revolutionary workers’ organisation, the Industrial Workers of the World (popularly known as the Wobblies). Wilckens took part in strikes and became an orator in the miners’ mass meetings, The IWW organised successfully among Mexicans and South Europeans, the lowest paid of the miners. As a result of the growing might of the miners in the Bisbee area, the local businessmen and scab miners organised into Loyalty Leagues. Early on 12 July 1916, 2000 Loyalty Leaguers commenced a round-up of miners. One miner shot dead a Loyalty leaguer in self-defence and was gunned down. There were robberies, vandalism, and beatings and abuse of women carried out by the Leaguers during the round-up. 1,186 men, including 104 Wobblies, among them Wilckens, were herded into cattle trucks and dumped across the border in the New Mexico desert. Wilckens, by now an anarchist as well as an IWW member, was interned in a camp for German prisoners. He escaped from there, was recaptured and deported to Germany in 1920 from where he departed to Argentina, arriving there in late September.---

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An Inspirational Life.

       I just received this sad news, from a wobbly friend and comrade, I'm sure he will have no objections to my sharing this with all those wobblies, friends and comrades out there, and like he said, we should use his life as an inspiration to organise for that better world.

      Dave Patterson, an electrician, who worked mostly overseas in places like Azerbaijan and Angola, died last night. Dave joined the IWW before anybody else I know of in Scotland, before the Stevenson College branch of the 90s. He joined the Clydeside IWW, at its inception. He was born in Springboig, Glasgow, and as a teenager was involved in the formation of the National union of School Students in the mid 70s. He only rarely made meetings and events due to his work, and his Scottish residence was south of Aberdeen.
      He was a dual carder also in OILC. In the course of a year I would usually see him a few times, after attending different football matches or at the STUC Mayday. In 2011 he got married to Lucy, a nurse in Edinburgh. This year in May, he was absent. A mutual friend came up to me before the Clydeside IWW took part in the procession, to explain he had been diagnosed with an aggressive and incurable strain of cancer. A few days ago he was moved to St.Columba's  hospice in Gogar near Edinburgh.

     This is a sad and sudden demise and in Scotland we mourn the loss of Dave, an unforgettable character. But knowing Dave and his affinity with the wobbly tradition, he would say - "Don't Mourn, Organise!"

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Wobblies Commercial??

A wee push for the wobblies.

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WORKERS KNOW YOUR HISTORY - EVERETT MASSACRE, 1916.

           On reading the earlier post "WHOSE SIDE ARE THEY ON" you should not be fooled into thinking this is a new phenomenon, that it is only today that the state and it apparatus tries to repress the struggle of ordinary people as they attempt to better their conditions. The bosses and the establishment have always come down hard on any individuals who find themselves at the forefront of the constant struggle of trying to defend the conditions of the ordinary people. This constant opposition to the aspirations of the people, is the most glaring proof of the diametrically opposed positions of the capitalist system and the state on the one side, and the living standards and ideals of the ordinary people on the other. Our history is a rich heritage of struggle and suffering at the hands of the bosses and their minders, the state. We would do well to remember and honour that struggle and to repeat the stories of the determination in the face of that brutal repression that goes hand in hand with the state. Only by realising that it it is not a new struggle but the next chapter in the continuing struggle of the people, will we bring an end to that struggle and victory for the people.

The Everett Massacre:

In 1916 in Everett, Washington, a passenger ferry loaded with Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) free speech activists attempted to dock. On the dock, the local sheriff, along with armed deputies and armed guards hired by local businesses, attempted to block the ship from docking. According to lore, when the sheriff asked, “Who are your leaders?” the response from the ferry was a shout from everyone aboard, declaring, “We are all leaders here.” As folk musician Utah Phillips explains, “that scared the tar out of the ol’ law you know”[1] and as a result, a gunfight ensued. The gunfight left at least five IWW members dead and became known as the “Everett Massacre.” In the documentary film The Wobblies (Bird and Shaffer 1979), which tells the story of the early years of the IWW, two IWW members recount their experience in the “Everett Massacre.” Years later, Utah Phillips recounted this story on a collaboration album with popular musician Ani DiFranco, spreading the story and message to a new generation.

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