Mining and Union Songs in the Early 20th Century OVERVIEW ESSENTIAL QUESTION How do Nimrod Workman’s songs and stories about his life as a coal miner illustrate the struggles of working class people during the Gilded Age and Progressive Era? OVERVIEW By the turn of the 20th century, technology had radically reshaped the American economy and the lives of those who worked within Photo: Peirce and Jones it—some for good, some for worse. In American cities, the Edison Electric Company’s ever creeping power grid provided factories with cheaper, more reliable power, and electric lights allowed factories—many of which embraced the “assembly line” pioneered by Henry Ford—to produce goods twenty-four hours a day. Railroads, empowered by the recent switch from timber fuel to the more efficient coal, also continued to expand, driving both the mineral extraction industries and the iron furnaces that produced the essential components of train tracks. The industries powered one another, and the need for labor surged. One might imagine that such a period in American history would have been a “Golden Age,” a time when the overall quality of life dramatically improved thanks to new technologies, a wider availability of goods, and the heightened flow of capital. Sadly, this was not the case. Whatever “gold” there was in the late 19th and early 20th centuries belonged mostly to the few. As such, the period was better described by Mark Twain as the “Gilded Age,” a time when a thin veneer of gold plating barely covered a tarnished core. The luster was only surface deep. The increased production capacity and technological advances of the Gilded Age could have reduced the stress on workers of all types, and the larger profit margins on the goods produced could have been dispersed in a way that rewarded all parties involved. However, for the most part, none of this occurred. Whether in factories or coal mines, most laborers found themselves working long hours for wages that left them in poverty. Workers in major metropolitan areas like New York and Chicago, most of whom came from rural America or foreign countries, ended up in overcrowded, dilapidated tenement buildings. Outside of major cities, railroad tracks that carried goods and people operated thanks to workers and miners who toiled long hours, often under the surveillance of armed guards. Meanwhile, industry magnates like John D. Rockefeller, Andrew Carnegie, Cornelius Vanderbilt, and financiers such as J.P Morgan accumulated unprecedented amounts of wealth and power, ensuring their heirs an enduring aristocratic-like status for generations to come. THE MUSIC THAT SHAPED AMERICA A MUSICAL HISTORY OF AMERICAN LABOR: THE COAL MINING SONGS OF NIMROD WORKMAN The failed promises of the industrial age were perhaps most pronounced in the Appalachian region in the United States, an area that stretches along the Appalachian Mountains from Southern New York to Northern Mississippi. Rich in materials and culture but economically poor, this region became home to “company towns,” small settlements of miners and their families who worked for a single company. Miners were often treated as dispensable. They were expected to labor long hours underground in potentially lethal conditions. There were no child labor laws and boys started work as young as 10. And there was no illusion of working for upward mobility: miners were often paid not in wages, but “scrips,” credit statements for goods and food valid only at stores owned by the mining company. There was nothing to save, and no way out. Hopeless, and living by the whim of company owners, Appalachian miners became vocal, sometimes violent proponents of unionization and working class solidarity. By the turn of the 20th century, the wealth inequality and political corruption characteristic of the Gilded Age had become untenable. Various activist groups, soon collectively known as The Progressives, began demanding a democracy beholden to all, including workers, and a fair balance between the rights of business owners, workers, and consumers. Regularly led by women, the Progressive movement fought for child labor laws, fair working hours, public health regulations, consumer protections, and women’s suffrage. Other groups demanded anti-monopoly legislation, environmental regulation, and governmental policy informed by analysis and expertise. The Progressives found an ally in president Theodore Roosevelt, who advocated for a “New Nationalism” that placed both economic development and public interest as areas of concern, but it was only later, through Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal, that much of the progressive’s demands were brought to fruition. In this lesson, created in partnership with The Association for Cultural Equity, students gain a deeper understanding of what life might have been like for a working class person during this period of American history by examining the songs and stories of Nimrod Workman. Born in 1895, Workman began working in the West Virginia coal mines at fourteen years old, and continued for 42 years. By analyzing Workman’s songs and personal stories, which were recorded by Alan Lomax in 1983, students gain a first-hand account of one of the most dangerous, violent, and least regulated industries in American history, and discover the relationships between labor, industry, and the government from the 1890s to the end of World War II. THE MUSIC THAT SHAPED AMERICA A MUSICAL HISTORY OF AMERICAN LABOR: THE COAL MINING SONGS OF NIMROD WORKMAN OBJECTIVES Upon completion of this lesson, students will: 1. KNOW (KNOWLEDGE): • Important labor leaders (Mother Jones, Eugene V. Debs, Clara Lemlich), and • The socio-political environment during the industrialists (John D. Rockefeller Jr., Henry Gilded Age and Progressive Era Ford) in US history • The mining industry in West Virginia and the West Virginia Mine Wars 2. MASTERY OBJECTIVE: • Students will be able to articulate the • The development of unions in America relationships between workers, businesses (including the UMWA, the AFL, the IWW, owners, and the federal government from and the CIO) the late 1800s to the 1940s by watching • Historic labor legislation and policy in the and discussing the work of musician Nimrod early 20th century (including Theodore Workman. Roosevelt’s “Square Deal,” The Clayton Antitrust Act, The “Business Decade” under Coolidge and Harding, and Franklin Roosevelt’s “New Deal,” and the Taft-Hartley Act) • Important moments in US labor history in the early 20th century (The Haymarket Riot, the Ludlow Massacre, the 1902 Anthracite Coal Strike, The Pullman Strike, and the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire) ACTIVITIES ENTRY TICKET ACTIVITY (OPTIONAL) 1. Have students read the overview of this lesson before class and arrive ready to articulate what they think the differences might be between a “golden” and “gilded” age. MOTIVATIONAL ACTIVITY 1. Show students Image 1, “The Bosses of the Senate,” a cartoon by Joseph Keppler, 1889, and ask: • What do you see in this image? What point do you think Keppler wished to make about life in the Gilded Age? • What do you think a monopolist is? Why do you think they’re represented so much larger than the senators? • What do you notice about the “People’s Entrance”? Why do you think it’s presented this way? THE MUSIC THAT SHAPED AMERICA A MUSICAL HISTORY OF AMERICAN LABOR: THE COAL MINING SONGS OF NIMROD WORKMAN 2. Tell students that they will explore life in the Gilded Age more closely by assuming the role of ethnographers--social scientists who study people in their own environments. Their subject, who they’ll observe via video recordings, is Nimrod Workman, a musician who spent 42 years as a coal miner. As ethnographers, students should practice a type of detailed description that anthropologist Clifford Geertz called “thick description.” They should observe the subject’s behavior, but also the context behind that behavior (the surrounding environment, the subject’s personal background, etc.). Ask students to take notes that detail the setting of the performance, the performer’s age, attire, body, body language, and anything else they notice. Play Clip 1, “Nimrod Workman, 42 Years,” and ask: • What general observations did you have while watching the video? • Where does it seem like the video was shot? • How would you describe the house seen in the video? (Students should consider the quality of the house, or the items surrounding Workman on the porch.) • How might you describe the way in which Workman and his wife are dressed? • What was Workman doing with his hands as he performed? (Encourage students to consider what he was enacting as he sang.) • What do you think Workman might have been singing about? 3. Give each student Handout 1 - Nimrod Workman Lyrics. Have the students read the lyrics to “42 Years” to themselves, and then watch the video a second time with the goal of noticing things they might not have noticed before. Ask students: • What do you think Workman is singing about? • Did you observe anything different about the video on the second viewing? • Based upon the observations the class has made, what preliminary conclusions might we draw about Nimrod Workman’s life? Do you think he felt represented by the “Bosses of the Senate”? (Encourage students to consider his socioeconomic class, his quality of life, his level of education, and what his life history might have been like.) THE MUSIC THAT SHAPED AMERICA A MUSICAL HISTORY OF AMERICAN LABOR: THE COAL MINING SONGS OF NIMROD WORKMAN PROCEDURE that a “scrip” was a type of currency given to miners in lieu of money, which 1. Tell students that they will be further could only be used at general stores investigating Nimrod Workman in order to owned by the company.) better understand what life might have been like for coal miners in and after the Gilded • How did Workman describe his Age.