PATERSON 1913 Oscar Bluemner. New Jersey Mills. 1913 THE SILK STRIKE V. 2.0 Mary Jane Treacy Simmons College To the City of Paterson, its people past and present, and to the students of New Jersey 2 TABLE OF CONTENTS INTRODUCTIONS Map of New Jersey 6 Map of Paterson 7 Historical Setting 8 THE GAME: PATERSON 1913 9 Who Is in This Game: Roles 9 The Game 10 To Play 10 Money 10 Milestones 11 Telegrams 11 To Win Paterson-1913 12 CLASS SCHEDULE Preliminary Session: Welcome to Paterson. 13 Game Session 1: Trouble in Our Fair City. January, 1913 14 Game Session 2: Strike! March, 1913 16 Game Session 3: Hunger in Paterson May, 1913 18 Final Session: Who Can Win? 20 HISTORICAL BACKGROUND 23 Preliminary Session: THE CLARION Winter, 1912 24 THE CLARION Review 29 Game Session 1: THE CLARION January, 1913 30 THE CLARION Review 36 Game Session 2: THE CLARION March, 1913 38 THE CLARION Review 44 3 Game Session 3: THE CLARION May, 1913 45 THE CLARION Review 50 Final Session: THE CLARION Summer, 1913 (To be distributed in class.) CORE TEXTS 51 Preliminary Session: • “Voices from Paterson.” (Selections from oral histories) 52 • Harriet G. Brown. The Story of Silk. 58 Game Session 1: • Advertisement for Cheney Silks (Advertisement) 62 • “The Artistic Quality of American Silks.” 63 Arts and Decoration. (Magazine article) • Joe Hill. “There is Power in a Union.” (Song) 64 • Various. On women’s condition. (Oral history) 65 • Joe Hill. “The Rebel Girl.” (Song) 69 Game Session 2: • United States Constitution. Bill of Rights. Amendment 1. 70 • Preamble. I.W.W. Constitution. 71 • Emma Goldman. “Anarchism and What It Really Stands For,” 72 Anarchism and Other Essays. (Essay) • Art Young. “Paterson. 1913” (Political cartoon) 74 • Alexander Scott. Editorial. Passaic Weekly Issue. (Editorial) 75 • Elizabeth Gurley Flynn. “The Truth about the Paterson Strike.” 76 (Speech) Game Session 3: 4 • Socialist Party Platform of 1912 (Excerpts) 78 • Meta Stern. “A Marching Song for May Day.” 80 The Call. (Song) • Rabbi Leo Mannheimer. “Darkest New Jersey: How the 81 Paterson Strike Looks to One in the Thick of the Conflict.” The Independent. (Newspaper article) • Jack Reed. “There’s a War in Paterson.” The Masses. 82 (Magazine article) • Poster for the Paterson Pageant. 89 June 7, 1913 (Poster) 5 NEW JERSEY What do you see? Look for two reasons why Paterson was chosen to be an industrial city. 6 PATERSON Look at this 1908 map. What clues can you find that suggest Paterson is already an industrial city? “Wd” means Ward or subdivision of the city into sections. Each ward was represented in city government by its elected alderman. 7 HISTORICAL SETTING Paterson 1913 begins in late January 1913, the busy season when manufacturers are producing the silk fabric that will be sold for the spring fashion market. Manufacturers must avert a strike or they may face financial ruin. Mill workers, who specialize as weavers, ribbon makers and dyers’ helpers, have different grievances and different demands. However, they are exploring a united effort to improve labor conditions for all. They know that a successful strike will bring the manufacturers to the table for negotiations. Townspeople are also involved in the strike, for this is a “silk town.” If the workers strike, they don’t get paid. If workers don’t get paid, then their landlords, grocers, and barbers also go without income. Townspeople must decide if they will support a strike. The eyes of the nation are on Paterson as the latest in a series of efforts by industrial workers to assert their goals for a better life. You will receive more detailed historical background through issues of The Clarion, a fictional newspaper that presents factual information about the City of Paterson and the labor unrest there during the pre-World War I era. The Clarion provides multiple points of view, but it is up to you to decide how to use those views. Recommended primary documents will enhance your understanding of the debates of the period: the impact of large-scale immigration on a city and an industry, how divisions between rich and poor change a community, how technology changes the way we work, the challenges to industrial capitalism, the fights for freedom of speech and assembly, the question of women’s role in industrial labor and the family. 8 THE GAME WHO IS IN THIS GAME? ROLES. Each player will be assigned a role and give a role sheet with a description of his/her experiences, goals, and hopes for Paterson in this game. * This role bears the name of a real person who participated in the labor conflicts of 1913. If there is biographical material on these individuals, it has been used to create the role. When it is not available, every effort has been made to develop a biography that is consistent with the person’s known views and life experiences. Other roles are fictional, but based on research on the period. Your instructor , the Game Master or GM, will be *Mayor (Dr.) Andrew F. McBride The Mayor of Paterson is concerned about the growing tensions between silk manufacturers and the some 25,000 workers who have made Paterson the “silk city” of America. Never a passive labor force, silk weavers have begun to threaten a strike. Such a strike would cripple a city that depends almost entirely on the silk industry for its economic health. 1. Manufacturers’ Faction: *Catholina Lambert, owner of Dexter, Lambert, and Co. *Henry Doherty, owner of Doherty and Wadsworth Co. David Zimmerman, owner of Zimmerman Silks 2. Workers’ Faction: Harry Bloom, Weaver Raymond Story, Ribbon maker Annunciato Lombardi, Dyers’ helper 3. Townspeople: Lena “Annie” Aiello, Weaver *John Bimson, Chief of Police, Paterson Police Department Mae Bornstein, Weaver Eddie Brown, Barber Maria Cravello, Ribbon Weaver Carlo Giardino, Grocer Shalom Goldstein, Baker Theodore Grady, Patrolman, Paterson Police Department *Leo Mannheimer, Rabbi, Barnert Temple Robert MacKensie, Bookkeeper, National Silk Dyeing Co. Mrs. Teresa Pallozzi, Landlady Mrs. Mary Robinson, Wife of Manager, Bedell’s Department Store Jacob Schwartz, Peddler Albert Weller, Newspaper reporter *John Steiger, Weaver 4. Visitors to Paterson: *Joseph Cutherton, O’Brien Detective Agency *John Golden, Organizer, United Textile Workers (American Federation of Labor) *Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, Speaker, Industrial Workers of the World ( IWW ) 9 *John Reed, Writer, journalist, poet, bohemian THE GAME: The Game is divided into five distinct periods: Preliminary Session. Learn about Paterson, the silk industry, and your role in the game. January 1913: Some “shops,” individual specializations within a mill or a small mill, have already gone on strike. Paterson is tense, emotions are high, players must take a stand. March 1913: The labor conflict continues. Townspeople are concerned. Outsiders are coming to Paterson to influence the proceedings. Issues reach a boiling point. May 1913: Funds are very low for everyone. Players make a last ditch effort to win this game. They must gather support for their positions Final Session: Players go to the negotiating table if they have sufficient funds to do so. They try to reach an agreement. De-briefing of the game. TO PLAY: There are two opposing factions: Manufacturers who want to keep the mills open and meet their orders for silk and Workers who want to make changes to the conditions of their labor. Each faction will privately decide on its demands, set its priorities, and secretly plan any concessions it is willing to make if necessary. Each faction needs the support of Patersonians to win. Townspeople show their support by contributing to the fight with their economic and moral support. Townspeople may support Manufacturers or Workers; they may choose not to support anyone. It is up to the factions to win their support by whatever means possible. MONEY: All faction members and townspeople are allotted a specific amount of money at the start of the game. Their role sheets will explain how much of that amount they must keep for survival and how much they can spend. Faction members must contribute a specific amount to their faction coffers at the beginning of each Game Session. They must have enough funds by the Final Session to go to the negotiating table. A wise faction will monitor its finances closely and in secret. In general, the Manufacturers try to keep the money that they have placed in their Bank. The Workers, on the other hand, must make money for their Relief Fund by soliciting support from townspeople. Both factions can expect to struggle to keep/gain their financial resources. 10 Townspeople include clergy, members of the middle classes, small business owners, a peddler as well as workers in the silk industry who are not members of the Workers’ faction. They do not share a similar point of view, experiences living in Paterson, or financial resources. Labor conflicts affect the poor more than they do the middle classes. For this reason, the poor must struggle to get enough to eat in each Game Session and the Final Session. (GS 1-3 and FS). These players include: Annie Aiello, Mae Bornstein, Maria Cravello, Jacob Schwartz, and Joseph Steiger. At the beginning of each game session, these players must buy food (give money) in one of the following places: The Relief Fund’s Soup Kitchen 50 cents per day. Carlo’s Grocery $1.00 per day Purity Cooperative Bakery $1.00 per day Mrs. Pallozzi’s home restaurant $2.00 per day Caution! Players who lose or give away their survival budget by the Final Session become paupers and lose this game. MILESTONES: Each faction has a milestone, a short-term goal, for Game Sessions 1-3.