Union Voice: Readers Write: No Rioting After All

(Metropolitan Washington Council, AFL-CIO)

“Rioting?” writes Nick Unger in response to an item in Tuesday’s Labor History referring to “Twenty rioting strikers shot.” “In boss-speak, rioting is a synonym for demonstrating.  It might be a poor choice of words.” Further research in the New York Times archives by David Prosten at UCS – our Labor History source -- found no rioting strikers, reports Prosten, “but rather out-of-control factory guards. The source of the original description is unclear, but most likely was a local newspaper influenced -- big surprise here -- by the company. Apologies to the defamed strikers and thanks to the close-reading brother.” Here’s the revised history item: January 19: Twenty strikers at the American Agricultural Chemical Co. in Roosevelt, N.J. were shot, two fatally, by factory guards. They and other strikers had stopped an incoming train in search of scabs. - 1915