Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to cool people who did cool stuff
Speaker 1: your weekly Joe that I'm Margaret Killjoy with me today
Speaker 1: is Andrew T Andrew Harlo.
Speaker 2: Good, how's it going.
Speaker 3: I'm loving the amazing economy of the intros thing.
Speaker 1: No orange eating on my time exactly? Wait, how are
Speaker 1: you doing on the orange?
Speaker 3: Is?
Speaker 1: Secretly it's the same. Well, you ate the entire orange.
Speaker 1: I didn't notice, and we're on zoom together.
Speaker 2: It's really gone.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that is one of your powers.
Speaker 4: It's a professional podcaster skill. Yeah, but I one a few.
Speaker 3: They were probably I would say I would. I'm going
Speaker 3: to guess there were probably twelve sections of orange. So
Speaker 3: if anyone can write in with the timecode for all
Speaker 3: the all ever each if you correctly can identify all
Speaker 3: the time codes when I an orange from the last episode,
Speaker 3: I'll send you a prize. Hell yeah, just tweet tweet Abby.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Our producer is Sophie. How are you doing today, Sophie Swell?
Speaker 4: I wish I had an orange.
Speaker 1: I wish I had an orange too.
Speaker 3: I don't have an orange. I'm the only one that's
Speaker 3: definitely orangeless. That's true.
Speaker 1: Well, I don't know. You could have a whole stash
Speaker 1: of them.
Speaker 2: That's true.
Speaker 1: And Ian is our audio engineer. Hi Ian. Everyone would
Speaker 1: say Hi Ian, including Ian. On woman wrote our theme music.
Speaker 1: Someone asked on the internet what song it is, and
Speaker 1: the answer is it is not a song. We said
Speaker 1: to a woman, can you write theme music? So I
Speaker 1: guess it's called cool people who did cool stuff the
Speaker 1: theme music.
Speaker 2: Theme?
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, that's that's see. That's why you get paid.
Speaker 1: It's the writer. And this week we're talking about strikes
Speaker 1: for no reason. It doesn't tything that's happening.
Speaker 2: No getting paid as a writer.
Speaker 3: No one should be getting paid as a SUD writer
Speaker 3: for any of the companies in the AMPTP.
Speaker 2: We are on strike the Writer's Guild of America.
Speaker 3: I don't know why I I somehow, I guess Yeah,
Speaker 3: there was a crescendo in how I thought I should
Speaker 3: be talking. But no, being on strike is not is
Speaker 3: not a fun thing, although people are making it fun
Speaker 3: and people it's other people are making it fun, but
Speaker 3: people are refusing to be beaten down.
Speaker 2: And there is a difference.
Speaker 3: Although I do appreciate some some folks from other unions
Speaker 3: who have been standing in solidarity, not loving the celebratory
Speaker 3: vibe of it, especially the teamsters and nats who I mean, honestly,
Speaker 3: we couldn't do half of these sort of like picketting actions.
Speaker 3: The efficacy would go way down as far as like
Speaker 3: shutting down productions.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah, that makes sense. You know, actors got I.
Speaker 2: Was gonna say. And also thanks to SAG h for
Speaker 2: joining us. It's been awesome.
Speaker 3: And we'll see what happens with SAG and their strike
Speaker 3: authorization vote and their negotiation. But I suspect I suspect
Speaker 3: we might see them officially joining US soon.
Speaker 1: That would rule solo there. It is a powerful weapon,
Speaker 1: I hope. Okay, my story about this is that I'm
Speaker 1: in the movie Rent, and oh I didn't ask to
Speaker 1: be in the movie Rent. Wait you told me the
Speaker 1: story in person the other day.
Speaker 2: Spoilers. This is a great story. Oh my god, my
Speaker 2: plug story good?
Speaker 1: Please kill me. So I like needed to get home
Speaker 1: for this is when I was like a squad in
Speaker 1: New York City and it was like winter, and so
Speaker 1: a big coat and a big beard because I hadn't
Speaker 1: come out as trans yet and I'm playing Melodica and
Speaker 1: Tompkins Square Park and this film crew comes up and
Speaker 1: it's like they have a sixteen millimeter film camera like
Speaker 1: a bulex, and I'm like, I know what that is,
Speaker 1: you know, And they're like, oh, we're students. Think they
Speaker 1: said they were from NYU, I can't remember exactly. And
Speaker 1: they were like, can we film you? And I was like, yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm going to get some money out of this. This
Speaker 1: is great. I need to get some money anyway, so
Speaker 1: you can film me. So they filmed me and then
Speaker 1: they're like, I was like, hey, I need five bucks
Speaker 1: ago and see my family for Christmas. Can I at
Speaker 1: least get a couple of bucks? And so they pull
Speaker 1: out a bunch of money and they pull off exactly
Speaker 1: two one dollar bills and he hands it to me
Speaker 1: and he says, you get what you ask for in life,
Speaker 1: and I was because I said a couple dollars. In
Speaker 1: my mind, I'm like, I pretty clearly asked for five dollars.
Speaker 1: That was like a fairly direct ask. I didn't like
Speaker 1: beat around the bush around this. And uh So he
Speaker 1: hands to me two dollars and walks off, and I
Speaker 1: think to myself, that's the rudest NYU film crew I've
Speaker 1: ever met, You know, Jesus, it was Sony Pictures and uh.
Speaker 1: And so a year later, my brother's like, did you
Speaker 1: know you're in rent? And I'm like, I did not
Speaker 1: know I was in rent. And so the Washington Post
Speaker 1: wrote an article about it, and Sony didn't get back
Speaker 1: to them about it, and then SAG contacted me and
Speaker 1: was like, hey, can we represent you to Sony? Yeah,
Speaker 1: and they settled out of court for the amount that
Speaker 1: they pay extras. And I've loved SAG ever since. I've
Speaker 1: been pro union for a very long time. But it
Speaker 1: just was like nice to be like they didn't make
Speaker 1: any money out of that, Like they just did that
Speaker 1: because someone was being exploited by the film industry and
Speaker 1: they wanted to step in.
Speaker 3: So I guess it also helps that it was clearly documented,
Speaker 3: like you're clearly there.
Speaker 2: Yeah, totally received nobody.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, no, totally and uh and I have an
Speaker 1: IMDb credit because of that. So amazing, amazing, Yeah, thanks Sag.
Speaker 3: Yeah for real. I mean it is like, yeah, I
Speaker 3: will say I should I should have manned. As soon
Speaker 3: as I said it, I uh, And then you went
Speaker 3: into your story. I did want to say, I don't
Speaker 3: necessarily hope they joined us on the picket line. I
Speaker 3: hope they get a fair deal with whatever means it takes.
Speaker 1: Yeah, fair enough. So speaking of solidarity and unions and stuff,
Speaker 1: this is part two in our two parter about the
Speaker 1: real life newsies, the Newsboys Strike of eighteen ninety nine. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I got that right. I always say nineteen said of
Speaker 1: eighteen when I do these things, but I didn't this time. Instead,
Speaker 1: now I'm just going to strike where we last left
Speaker 1: our gang of our plucky gang of shockingly violent heroes
Speaker 1: who may or may not have been very violent at all,
Speaker 1: as there are no reported deaths or any particular mention
Speaker 1: of hospitalizations during this wild time or whatever. They have
Speaker 1: gone on strike for not having their rates go up.
Speaker 1: And the strike is spread over all over New England
Speaker 1: and into the Midwest. And they've got two of the
Speaker 1: most powerful men in the world on their back feet
Speaker 1: with the most successful strike in New York City history.
Speaker 1: So let's see what happens next. I guess I already
Speaker 1: told you that the Empire strikes back or whatever. But
Speaker 1: the newspapers they're like, we're going to fucking stop this,
Speaker 1: and they started working things out between each other. They
Speaker 1: already had in terms of the price. I don't know
Speaker 1: if it's legally price fixing, but you know, they fixed
Speaker 1: the prices together. For one thing, the two papers made
Speaker 1: a deal that if one caved, the other had to
Speaker 1: pay two hundred and fifty thousand dollars to the other,
Speaker 1: which is about seven million dollars in today's money, as
Speaker 1: a way to like bet to like pay chicken with children,
Speaker 1: you know.
Speaker 3: Yeah, right, and that's a public thing. So they're like,
Speaker 3: we have we don't just have our normal skin in
Speaker 3: the game. In solidarity, we've yeah, put seven million bucks
Speaker 3: in s row. Yeah against in solidarity. They you know what,
Speaker 3: they put a ring on it. This is this is
Speaker 3: their pledge to each other. This is seven million dollars
Speaker 3: that we will stay faithful to each.
Speaker 1: Other absolutely and kind of in this we hate each
Speaker 1: other way, you know, in.
Speaker 2: This collusive business arrangement.
Speaker 1: Yeah. And so they were like, all right, well, we
Speaker 1: can't hire kids to sell these papers anymore, but surely
Speaker 1: we could hire grown men. Obviously, grown men can't be
Speaker 1: intimidated by teenage boys, said no one who's ever met
Speaker 1: teenage boys before it really Yeah, this plan failed spectacularly
Speaker 1: on several levels. So they hired a bunch of adult scabs.
Speaker 1: They tried to hire about seven hundred of them in
Speaker 1: the end, or they did hire about seven hundred of
Speaker 1: them in the end, and they were hired at really
Speaker 1: good rates. They got to buy one hundred papers for
Speaker 1: forty cents each instead of sixty, and they each got
Speaker 1: two dollars a day on top of it all. And
Speaker 1: the newspapers told the scabs that the reason that the
Speaker 1: kids were on strike is that competing newspapers had brainwashed
Speaker 1: the impressionable young newsies. And actually these two papers were
Speaker 1: very kind to their newsies, who had very good lives.
Speaker 1: After all, there's been all of these articles about the
Speaker 1: singing and the dancing. Maybe not the actual singing and dancing,
Speaker 1: but sure, so these grown men go out on the
Speaker 1: streets and news newsies follow them and beat them with
Speaker 1: clubs until they stop scabbing. They stopped seven hundred men
Speaker 1: this way. Also a lot of them, a lot of
Speaker 1: the ostensible scabs actually just supported the strike. As soon
Speaker 1: as they found out about it, they took their two
Speaker 1: dollars and destroyed their own papers.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think there's probably some especially with this era
Speaker 3: of like labor and these jobs specifically like it's so
Speaker 3: wild that these like the management in this case would think, oh,
Speaker 3: putting like people putting your putting people in the shoes
Speaker 3: of the of the workers doing this like very difficult job.
Speaker 3: Is not is going to keep them on our side? Yeah, totally,
Speaker 3: Like it's it's the rate that we're quibbling about. Like,
Speaker 3: you know, any any sensible person would see this is
Speaker 3: a wonderful job for you know, human being, and it's like, yeah,
Speaker 3: you do the fucking job for like half a day
Speaker 3: and they're like, yeah, I strike.
Speaker 1: Yeah, totally totally. We talked about it in an episode
Speaker 1: last year the Battle of Blair Mountain, which was the
Speaker 1: largest armed insurrection since the Civil War in the United States,
Speaker 1: and it was a black and white miners going on
Speaker 1: strike and then being attacked physically with guns and bullets
Speaker 1: by the by the bosses. So they got their own
Speaker 1: guns and bullets and fought back rights in southwest West Virginia.
Speaker 1: And and that was that thing where they like, they
Speaker 1: like bring on all these strike breakers and actually to
Speaker 1: tie into race and unfortunate history of races. Usually what
Speaker 1: they do is that if it's it's a white union,
Speaker 1: they bring in black strike breakers, people who are you know,
Speaker 1: desperately or or whatever. And at least in Battle of
Speaker 1: Blair Mountain it just didn't work. The people showed up
Speaker 1: and were like, oh this sucks. Yeah, absolutely, we're with you,
Speaker 1: you know, and adults were like, what we're doing? What
Speaker 1: to children?
Speaker 4: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean you.
Speaker 3: Have to imagine, like after a couple like, yeah, hours
Speaker 3: minutes of these margins with this work, you're like, this
Speaker 3: is fucking inhumane.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I'm getting the good version of this, yeah, totally. Yeah.
Speaker 1: At another point, seventy five men went in to go
Speaker 1: sign up at one point in one of the papers,
Speaker 1: and they listened to the bullshit pr speech from the papers,
Speaker 1: and sixty eight of them turned around and walked away.
Speaker 1: Rather than so the seven hundred men they hired, that's
Speaker 1: probably outam yeah, ten thousand or something they tried to hire,
Speaker 1: you know. In the end, seventy five percent of the
Speaker 1: scabs were hired at two dollars a day quit before
Speaker 1: selling a single paper. It's unsure how much of that
Speaker 1: was solidarity and how much of that was a good
Speaker 1: club in bail stick problems require bail stick solutions. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, also, maybe what they moved on to these
Speaker 1: paper bails with Okay, sorry, go ahead.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, it's kind of be right, Like the tool
Speaker 3: of insurrection is between ten and sixteen inches of about
Speaker 3: an inch thick wood.
Speaker 1: Yeah, totally.
Speaker 3: That's that is how you beat That's how you beat Magellan.
Speaker 3: That's how you beat Pinkerton's. That's like the thing that
Speaker 3: you have. Those sticks are around. It seems like there
Speaker 3: has to be just because of how buffoonish the management
Speaker 3: was in this case, there have to have also feels
Speaker 3: like ben word going around. It's like, hey, you can
Speaker 3: make an easy two box for free. It's a time show.
Speaker 3: Like you listen to a bullshit speech, take your two box,
Speaker 3: and then bounce.
Speaker 1: Yeah and throw the papers in the ocean.
Speaker 2: Yeah because ship.
Speaker 1: Yeah totally, what are you going to do? Like id
Speaker 1: you on your Like yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, oh you'll never You'll never get to work as
Speaker 3: a newsy again, like yeah, get get Fox.
Speaker 2: Yeah totally newspaper owner.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, I'm an adult. I don't want that job.
Speaker 1: I just want my two bucks. So there was one
Speaker 1: problem that the boys had a harder time solving. Women
Speaker 1: newsgirls weren't hired as scabs, but there were all women
Speaker 1: who ran newspaper stands and or were just like kind
Speaker 1: of newsies, but in a different cultural sense, maybe standing
Speaker 1: near the base of the bridges. And many of them
Speaker 1: were on the striker's sid side, but some of them
Speaker 1: were selling the boycotted papers under the table or literally
Speaker 1: hiding them under their skirts. And this was a pickle because,
Speaker 1: as strike leader Kid Blink put it, quote, a feller
Speaker 1: can't soak a lady, and you can't get at them
Speaker 1: women's scab papes without soaking them. We'll have to let
Speaker 1: them get along. I guess anyway, we got Annie with us.
Speaker 1: You can bet there's no worlds or journals under her skirts.
Speaker 1: And they did indeed have Annie Annie Kelly. Annie Kelly
Speaker 1: didn't apparently have a nickname, which is also a power move.
Speaker 1: I think Annie Kelly one of the only newstand women
Speaker 1: attached to the strike in a more formal way. The
Speaker 1: New York Sun called her quote the brick of all
Speaker 1: women in the most faithful of strikers. Because she supported
Speaker 1: the strike, the strikers didn't harass her customers, and even
Speaker 1: without selling the two most popular papers in the city,
Speaker 1: her profits went up because there weren't picketers there, and
Speaker 1: because the populace supported the strike, so people would come
Speaker 1: intentionally to go to strike, supporting news vendors, and also
Speaker 1: she got customers from other places because the strike the
Speaker 1: picketers were at the other places. Other news women got
Speaker 1: mad at her. One of them, missus Corkoran, threatened her
Speaker 1: for stealing her customers. Annie Kelly's response was that she
Speaker 1: could quote tie seven missus Corkoran's into a knot, and
Speaker 1: that if missus Corkoran wanted, she could come over and fight.
Speaker 1: Missus Corkoran declined to go over and fight about it.
Speaker 3: I will say there is a little bit of like
Speaker 3: like Marvel logic here, and I know this is like
Speaker 3: obviously like we're in We're trapped in a prison of gender,
Speaker 3: and I'm gonna.
Speaker 2: I don't think I'm gonna misspeak.
Speaker 3: I feel confident in this, but I guess it's definitely
Speaker 3: possible I will misspeak somewhere her but in you know,
Speaker 3: because in in, I think Marvel Movies is the most
Speaker 3: prominent place where this happens. But it's just that if
Speaker 3: there's a female antagonist, when it comes time for the big, big,
Speaker 3: you know fight at the end, you need a female
Speaker 3: protagonist to beat them up physically or.
Speaker 1: As a fella can't soak a lady.
Speaker 3: Yeah, truly, And this just says, this just brings me
Speaker 3: to the point of if you're going to run your
Speaker 3: union on street violence, this is why it's important to
Speaker 3: have a lot of diverse inn there so that you
Speaker 3: can you can opt you know, with good optics, soak anyone.
Speaker 1: I absolutely agree. I think that this was a flaw
Speaker 1: in the street organizing. Yeah, yeah, so and Kelly Annie Kelly.
Speaker 1: The strikers viewed her as a patron saint according to
Speaker 1: the papers, and she's cool. The newsies set themselves up
Speaker 1: along delivery wagon routes and would ambush the waggons to
Speaker 1: destroy their papers. Three delivery wagon drivers. This is very reasonable.
Speaker 1: They quit their jobs because they didn't want to fight
Speaker 1: literal children anymore.
Speaker 2: It is it is.
Speaker 3: I mean, look and the way that labor actions do
Speaker 3: you know, begin to start to feel like a war.
Speaker 3: I mean, like again our current strike. We can't do
Speaker 3: anything without the teamsters. It's all about supply lines and optics.
Speaker 1: Man, totally ridiculous, totally, And speaking of optics, the newsies
Speaker 1: put up signs everywhere they says. They referred to them
Speaker 1: as pasting them up so I assume that this is
Speaker 1: wheat paste all over town, and I want to talk
Speaker 1: about wheat paste. Have you ever wheat pasted? I mean
Speaker 1: I have so long? Well no, In case anyone is interested,
Speaker 1: it is one of the cheapest methods to attach papers
Speaker 1: to a wall in a hurry. You take one part
Speaker 1: white flower to four parts water. You heat it up
Speaker 1: to almost a boil while stirring, and then that's it.
Speaker 1: You now have wheat paste. It's nicer to use it
Speaker 1: while it's warm. You've got to kind of use it
Speaker 1: fairly quickly because it'll eventually go bad. Because it's wheat paste.
Speaker 1: There's other stuff you can add to it. You can
Speaker 1: look up recipes about it, but it's a very simple thing.
Speaker 1: You slop it onto a piece of paper like paper mache,
Speaker 1: you attach it to a wall, and you keep going.
Speaker 1: And one thing that's nice about wheat paste again, historically
Speaker 1: I would never advocate anyone do this. It's like not
Speaker 1: as much of a crime as most graffiti, like because
Speaker 1: it's fairly non destructive. And so it's like, again, I'm
Speaker 1: not a lawyer or a crime advocate. I don't know
Speaker 1: if I can say that I'm not a crime advocate anyway.
Speaker 1: So that's a thing that the news is not a
Speaker 1: crime lawyer. Yeah, totally. So that's what the newsies did,
Speaker 1: fun historical anecdote. And whenever they grabbed huge bundles of papers,
Speaker 1: of the yellow papers, they called them the two boycotted paper.
Speaker 1: They'd like fire them in empty lots and dance around
Speaker 1: the flames.
Speaker 3: It is kind of awesome how everything kind of gets
Speaker 3: a little Lord of the flies, he.
Speaker 1: Pret I know, like these people are having a peak experience,
Speaker 1: that is what they are doing. It is a hard
Speaker 1: come down from this kind of experience. Imagine if feels
Speaker 1: like something like burning Man, only like really mattered, you.
Speaker 2: Know, right.
Speaker 3: It is like somehow the literal opposite of burning Man.
Speaker 2: Yeah, those same aesthetically the same.
Speaker 1: Yeah. At one point four hundred boys went on a
Speaker 1: rampage around Uptown removing the yellow papers from stores and stalls.
Speaker 1: They would like, literally they just like mob into a store,
Speaker 1: find all the papers, take them out, and burn them.
Speaker 1: Occasionally the children were caught and arrested, but others carried on.
Speaker 1: Many of the arrested wound up in prison despite being
Speaker 1: like eleven or fourteen or whatever. The public really wanted leniency,
Speaker 1: the courts really wanted punishment. The courts got their way right.
Speaker 1: At one point, the newsies raised about one hundred dollars
Speaker 1: or so is a strike fund, and they used it
Speaker 1: to a print eleven thousand copies of a circular that
Speaker 1: basically said support the strike. It was like a little
Speaker 1: bit longer than that, but I didn't bother quoting it
Speaker 1: because it kind of just as support the striker. They
Speaker 1: passed it out. They're very good at passing out news
Speaker 1: so that was probably pretty effective. One black Newsy William
Speaker 1: Reese with the nickname I'm not saying, he got arrested
Speaker 1: while not breaking the law, surprising no one in the
Speaker 1: Year of Our Lord twenty twenty three, right, he was
Speaker 1: passing out the circular to support the newsies, and a
Speaker 1: cop arrested him for passing out advertisements against buying newspapers.
Speaker 1: Like that's what the cop said was the reason he
Speaker 1: wound up. Yeah, yeah, he wound up taken in front
Speaker 1: of the judge, and his defense was basically, I literally
Speaker 1: didn't break any actual laws and no one has accused
Speaker 1: me of breaking any actual laws. The judge warned him
Speaker 1: not to do it again and let him go.
Speaker 3: I mean, yeah, obviously, just immense amounts of bullshit there, but.
Speaker 2: It's it is so wild. Yeah, but there isn't a
Speaker 2: law against this, I.
Speaker 1: Know, and this happens every day. I'm certain, yes, yes, yes, like,
Speaker 1: but I literally didn't break a law. Well, don't do
Speaker 1: it again, thanks for the leniency. Later, two kids were
Speaker 1: arrested for breaking a law, which is that you're not
Speaker 1: allowed to beat people up. One of the union kids
Speaker 1: was white, one of one was black. The white kid
Speaker 1: was fined one dollar. The black kid was fined three dollars. Right, again,
Speaker 1: truly shocking information. And all the while, the newsies are
Speaker 1: still selling the non boycotted papers, So the boycotted papers
Speaker 1: they cover the shit out of this strike. This is
Speaker 1: this is the front page news while it's happening, right,
Speaker 1: because it's really catchy headlines, it's about children, and like
Speaker 1: they didn't like their competitors who were Yeah.
Speaker 3: It truly, please fucking Paramount, what are you? What are
Speaker 3: you defending Netflix for? It is so wild when they
Speaker 3: had this, This is heartwarming to hear that these people can.
Speaker 2: Sometimes stab each other. Don't even stab each other in
Speaker 2: the back. They should be stabbing each other in the front.
Speaker 2: I know they're in a fight.
Speaker 1: I know, and if you're in a fight, you might
Speaker 1: need a bail stick. And at bail sticks in porium,
Speaker 1: we sell only bail sticks, which if you go to
Speaker 1: our emporium you'll find out what they look like. I
Speaker 1: don't know because I've never been, but you, the listener,
Speaker 1: should buy a bail stick from us. And anything else
Speaker 1: that we're about advertise unless this is your only ad.
Speaker 1: Here're some ads and we are back. And so we're
Speaker 1: talking about how all of these other papers cover the
Speaker 1: shit out of the strike, and it is why we
Speaker 1: know so much about the strike. But it's also why
Speaker 1: I doubt a lot of the stories, as you think.
Speaker 1: I already talked about the golden age of newspapers making
Speaker 1: shit up if nothing else. I'm sure things were embellished
Speaker 1: or like quotes were invented, but I mean, I think
Speaker 1: the overall stuff is probably true. There's just like some
Speaker 1: specifics where I'm like, really, and there's like all these
Speaker 1: specific quotes attributed to the kids in the middle of actions,
Speaker 1: like the like quote I'm going to go distract that
Speaker 1: whatever anyway.
Speaker 3: Yeah, Yeah, it's like, how in what world do you
Speaker 3: have this access you omnipotent narrator, like, what is this?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 1: Exactly. Later in the strike, Pulitzer and Hurst start physically
Speaker 1: threatening other papers into a media blackout on the strike.
Speaker 1: There's actually a whole bunch of information that we have
Speaker 1: from one of I didn't put the front on the screw,
Speaker 1: so I don't remember exactly. One of their business managers
Speaker 1: just like wrote things being like, I'm going to go
Speaker 1: threaten these people to not cover this, and it's funny. Yeah,
Speaker 1: threaten the other newspapers. Yeah, exactly, like this will work.
Speaker 1: I don't know whatever. Anyway, fuck that guy. He's represented
Speaker 1: nicely in the Disney version. He's like the nice guy
Speaker 1: on the bad guy team.
Speaker 2: He is not.
Speaker 1: And it never quite they never quite get a media
Speaker 1: blackout on the strike. But they do influence things, and
Speaker 1: I'll talk about in a little bit something that I
Speaker 1: think they pulled off. But the newsies they're individually doing
Speaker 1: as well financially during the strike as before it, which
Speaker 1: is fairly unique for a strike because the public supports
Speaker 1: them and tips them well for the papers that they
Speaker 1: are selling. At one point, this is okay. This is
Speaker 1: actually the most heartwarming of these stories, even though it's
Speaker 1: like not the most big deal. There's this union kid
Speaker 1: and there's this old man reading one of the yellow papers,
Speaker 1: and he just runs up and snatches the old man paper,
Speaker 1: and the old man grabs the kid, and the kid
Speaker 1: like explains the strike, and the old man's like oh,
Speaker 1: and gives the kid ten cents and lets him go
Speaker 1: for the ten cents for the bail fund or for
Speaker 1: the strike fund.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean it is like you just kind of
Speaker 3: like it is a little like people never really know,
Speaker 3: especially when you're striking against media companies, like the whole story.
Speaker 3: It is remarkable in that regard.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. It's like, I mean, fortunately these
Speaker 1: other papers are covering it, but they're more minor papers
Speaker 1: and they're not you know, like and and cops would
Speaker 1: have come in and attacked crowds of kids. The kids
Speaker 1: would drive off the cops by throwing sticks, stones, old cans,
Speaker 1: and at least in one place an iron bar, a
Speaker 1: pretzel vendor named crazy a Born donated fifteen hundred pretzels
Speaker 1: to the boys. So he was elected an honorary member
Speaker 1: of the union and started like giving speeches at their
Speaker 1: their rallies and stuff.
Speaker 3: Everything you say makes from the last episode, President davely
Speaker 3: more sinister. Yeah, every nickname, every new character, I'm like, not,
Speaker 3: Dave's the fucking craziest one of all.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So the kids kept trying to have parades and
Speaker 1: the first time the cops were like, yeah, you don't
Speaker 1: have a permit, and they broke it up. They stole banners,
Speaker 1: they arrested kids. This might have been a march over
Speaker 1: the Brooklyn Bridge. Again, lots of different sources of kind
Speaker 1: of conflicting information, in which case it fits into a
Speaker 1: long tradition of cops arresting people marching over the Brooklyn Bridge.
Speaker 1: So the kids are like, all right, fine, fuck it,
Speaker 1: we'll get a permit, and the permit was denied. Of course,
Speaker 1: organized labor is conspicuously absent from at least the histories
Speaker 1: I can find about the Newsies strike. There's only one
Speaker 1: thing I was able to find, and that is that
Speaker 1: the Newsies went to the local typographical union, Typographical Union
Speaker 1: number six, and they were like, hey, buds, want to
Speaker 1: help us out since you're like fellow union and adults.
Speaker 1: And the union was like, no, fuck off, kids, we
Speaker 1: don't want to stick our neck out for you, right,
Speaker 1: So fuck them real d GA vibes here. Wait, I
Speaker 1: don't know what's d GA.
Speaker 3: The Director's Guild, you know, I guess I don't have
Speaker 3: all the facts. But they they managed to close their
Speaker 3: deal with the AMPTP, the the studios and streamers, I
Speaker 3: think like a week early.
Speaker 2: To me.
Speaker 3: It has very questionable language in it, and they were
Speaker 3: so proud of it.
Speaker 2: They announced it.
Speaker 3: Like like nearly midnight on a Saturday.
Speaker 1: Yep.
Speaker 2: So make of that what you will. But DJA classically
Speaker 2: has not could do best.
Speaker 3: Solidarity as some of the other entertainment unions we will say.
Speaker 1: Do better directors.
Speaker 4: Yeah, traditionally have not done the best job that they
Speaker 4: could do.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't I don't know why.
Speaker 3: I don't know.
Speaker 2: I don't have all the directors.
Speaker 1: Why you got to be like Typographer Union number six
Speaker 1: when you could be like the News Dealers Association, the
Speaker 1: one organized group that had their back that I could find.
Speaker 1: They joined their strike about a weekend to the strike.
Speaker 3: I mean, I guess it sort of makes sense also
Speaker 3: because the news dealers presumably are sort of one wrung
Speaker 3: op from the newsies.
Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly. Yeah, And I think that they're also a
Speaker 1: way more informal union there's no number in their name, right,
Speaker 1: and so On the seventh day of the strike, July
Speaker 1: twenty fourth, eighteen ninety nine, the Newsboys had a rally
Speaker 1: at a place called Irving Hall, which is near Union Square,
Speaker 1: which at the time was a German theater serving the
Speaker 1: immigrant community. A pro labor politician named Timothy Sullivan sponsored
Speaker 1: the meeting. Thousands of Newsies were in attendance. I've seen
Speaker 1: five thousand, I've seen seven thousand. The kids demanded to
Speaker 1: be let in early, and the proprietor was like, no,
Speaker 1: you can't give in early. It's like thirty minutes early.
Speaker 1: We so I got ready. So the kids smashed down
Speaker 1: the door, like stormed the hall for their own rally.
Speaker 1: Newsies came.
Speaker 3: Anyone that's been to see a show at Irving Hall
Speaker 3: knows you don't want to get there, So get there
Speaker 3: like forty five minutes, Like come on, kids.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, this is how you know they're kids. I know,
Speaker 1: I know they're not fashionably late. What's wrong with them?
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Newsies came from Manhattan, the Bronx, Brooklyn, and Jersey City,
Speaker 1: and most of them were actually outside. It was about
Speaker 1: two thousand people inside and everyone else was outside, and
Speaker 1: there's like all of these things where like every one
Speaker 1: time anyone on the inside would cheer, all the kids
Speaker 1: on the outside would cheer. No, they had no idea
Speaker 1: what they're cheering for and stuff. It's very heartwarming. The
Speaker 1: meeting was chaired by newspaper folks from other papers. A
Speaker 1: lot of the adults who were there were city council
Speaker 1: folks and newspaper folks who had been newsies themselves, because
Speaker 1: that's the other thing about this strike, right, is that
Speaker 1: like a ton of poor kids had come up as newsies.
Speaker 1: You know, The Brooklyn Eagle is a newspaper that lasted
Speaker 1: over one hundred years. I think it stopped in like
Speaker 1: nineteen five these or something. And they sent the Brooklyn
Speaker 1: newsies to the meeting with a big, great, big floral
Speaker 1: horseshoe for to give to the best speech and have
Speaker 1: been donated by a local florist. And the two main
Speaker 1: messages of all the speeches, and the speeches seem to
Speaker 1: be mostly from the kids. The two main messages were
Speaker 1: basically like, we'll stick together and we'll win was one
Speaker 1: of them. And the other big message that the kids
Speaker 1: had was maybe we should stop beating everyone up. All
Speaker 1: the time. I don't know, it kind of looks bad.
Speaker 1: Bob the Indian said, quote, now I'm to tell you
Speaker 1: that you're not to soak the drivers anymore. We're going
Speaker 1: to try and square this thing without violence, So keep cool.
Speaker 1: I think we'll win in a walk. On the level
Speaker 1: I do, there's a lot of like most of the
Speaker 1: media narrators are like and then they all just stopped
Speaker 1: violent and everything went great, And like, I'm pretty sure
Speaker 1: that this was like a played for the cameras kind
Speaker 1: of thing and that they kind of like toned down
Speaker 1: the violence a little bit, but also the violence might
Speaker 1: have been exaggerating the first place. Yeah, anyway, it.
Speaker 2: Feels like I had to have just met in the middle.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that's what happened. Yeah, Kid Blink won
Speaker 1: the best speech of the night, and he won the horseshoe.
Speaker 1: I like his speech. Part of it is quote, ain't
Speaker 1: that ten cents worth as much to us as it
Speaker 1: is to Hurston Pulitzer, who are millionaires? Well, I guess
Speaker 1: it is. If they can't spare it, how can we?
Speaker 1: Pretty good, I know, And then he did like a
Speaker 1: no more violence part, and his no more violence part
Speaker 1: was like kind of a like. Look, don't get me wrong.
Speaker 1: I mean I was there with you do win the violence.
Speaker 1: I'm not saying it was bad that you did it.
Speaker 1: I'm saying that we've moved past that now. And then
Speaker 1: he also said, quote we won in eighteen ninety three
Speaker 1: and will win in eighteen ninety nine, but stick together
Speaker 1: like plaster. Kid Blink was the most famous leader of
Speaker 1: the strike. His name was Louis Bellietti. He was eighteen
Speaker 1: at the time. He was redheaded, he wore an eye patch,
Speaker 1: which he may or may not have needed, and besides
Speaker 1: kid Blink, he went by red Blink, Muggsy McGee, and blind.
Speaker 2: I'm in.
Speaker 3: Jesus Christ, hell yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1: And I think he's the president of the Uptown Newsies.
Speaker 1: I can't remember exactly, but he has a sort of
Speaker 1: leadership rank in the elected system that they have. And
Speaker 1: the arbitration Committee reported how they met with Hurst. He'd
Speaker 1: refused their demands and didn't take them seriously. Said he
Speaker 1: couldn't sell the paper for less, like get out of
Speaker 1: here your kids. Annie was there, Annie Kelly, their patron saint,
Speaker 1: and people made her get up and give a talk.
Speaker 1: All she said and her entire quote Her entire speech
Speaker 1: was quote, all I can say, boys is to stick
Speaker 1: together and we'll win. That's all I've got to say
Speaker 1: to you.
Speaker 3: There is there is a real especially at a certain
Speaker 3: point in a labor rally or any kind of like
Speaker 3: thing like that, where you just it truly is like
Speaker 3: brevity will will help you totally. I know.
Speaker 1: I hate like just the speech is partly it's like yeah, but.
Speaker 2: It's also like we get it, We're here, come on, yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And the applause for her ten seconds speech lasted
Speaker 1: for minutes. People really liked her. After the rally, tactics
Speaker 1: moved from attacking scabs to more dredging up support for boycotts,
Speaker 1: since the public was largely on their side, at least
Speaker 1: as that the papers generally report, they did keep physically
Speaker 1: confronting scabs. Then then the newspapers pulled their dirtiest trick
Speaker 1: yet and this one I actually can't prove, but hear
Speaker 1: me out. On July twenty sixth day nine, a bunch
Speaker 1: of newspapers and the non yellow papers reported that two
Speaker 1: of the main strike leaders, Kid Blink and Dave, had
Speaker 1: been spotting selling the boycott spotted selling the boycotted papers
Speaker 1: and that they'd been bought off and like taking bribes.
Speaker 1: So the newsies get together and they kind of like
Speaker 1: call a tribunal and they like show up and kind
Speaker 1: of drag their their leaders to this tribunal, and the
Speaker 1: two accused deny all charges, and the tribunal acquits them.
Speaker 1: It's like, all right, I think you're telling the truth.
Speaker 1: And and all that happened was that kid Blink stepped
Speaker 1: out of leadership and Dave stepped down to treasurer. And
Speaker 1: I think that these accusations were almost certainly scab jacketing,
Speaker 1: basically like being like claiming someone's a scap when they're not.
Speaker 1: There's a chance that the kids did get bribed, took
Speaker 1: the money, and then changed their mind and rejoined the strike.
Speaker 1: Also wouldn't put it past them.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean.
Speaker 3: That as again as someone in the middle of a strike.
Speaker 3: It has been shocking, like or not shocking, But I
Speaker 3: I have been consistently surprised, how I mean, partially because
Speaker 3: I am extra ready to believe that, especially people in
Speaker 3: the upper ranks of the guild.
Speaker 2: Are willing to scab. And yeah, it is.
Speaker 3: It has been against my instincts, like pretty much always been.
Speaker 2: You know, shown to not be accurate or yeah.
Speaker 3: You know, it really is a big tactic to sort
Speaker 3: of turn us all again to each other and not
Speaker 3: to say that the like our guild is perfect or
Speaker 3: that the stratification within our guild is good or if
Speaker 3: it makes that much sense sometimes, but yeah, there is
Speaker 3: you know, probably not or there's definitely not as much
Speaker 3: scabbing happening as you know, the studio friendly media, would
Speaker 3: you have you believe?
Speaker 1: Yeah, that makes sense, yeah, because they want to project
Speaker 1: the like, oh, these insignificant people.
Speaker 3: Yeah, like you know that while the rank and file
Speaker 3: our suckers for yeah, for going along.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's totally class. That's really interesting that whole like
Speaker 1: nothing's changed in one hundred and twenty three years or whatever,
Speaker 1: twenty four years. Yeah, yeah, none of the papers actually
Speaker 1: had even seen the kids selling the papers. They just
Speaker 1: reported on rumors that other people had seen the kids
Speaker 1: selling papers.
Speaker 3: Yeah, which is also like such a it's so funny
Speaker 3: that like it would be such a PubL thing, like
Speaker 3: selling newspapers on a street is so much different than
Speaker 3: scabbing privately at your home.
Speaker 1: Totally totally and like and probably at this tribunal, if
Speaker 1: anyone had actually seen them do it, the tribunal would
Speaker 1: have gone differently, you know, yeah.
Speaker 3: It would be it would have been very obvious if
Speaker 3: they were fucking selling news sapers on the street.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I like no, I was there, remember, like, ah,
Speaker 1: what we're talking about. That's why we call you old Lai. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's true. We at first I thought it was because
Speaker 1: you only tell the truth. Yeah, you're one of the
Speaker 1: it's one of the real nickname people. Yeah, you're standing
Speaker 1: next to Big John, who's actually tall. So I think
Speaker 1: that we thought, what are the odds. Yeah, it turns
Speaker 1: out this time were and so so. Dave was like, no,
Speaker 1: the enemy has fedi these rumors. Both continued to actively
Speaker 1: participate in the strike. The next day, on July twenty seventh,
Speaker 1: Kid Blink and a hundred friends went around in trash
Speaker 1: newspapers that are being given out for free at this point.
Speaker 1: That's how desperate the newspapers were, and which is part
Speaker 1: of my theory that they didn't actually entirely move away
Speaker 1: from violence. I don't know what it looked like to
Speaker 1: go trash newspapers in this context. You know, they might
Speaker 1: have moved firmly to direct action and property destruction and
Speaker 1: away from I don't know whatever. I actually don't care.
Speaker 1: I like support them no matter which of these tactics
Speaker 1: they're doing, right, I only care because I I don't
Speaker 1: like the convenient media narrative of like, and then they
Speaker 1: became good, you know, right, and I'm like, I don't
Speaker 1: know that it was good that they're like I'm not
Speaker 1: trying to make a moral judgment here about it, but
Speaker 1: it's like, yeah, I don't know whatever.
Speaker 3: Yeah, violence is violence is just another tactic, and yeah,
Speaker 3: it is so infrequently that the labor or the marginalized
Speaker 3: side that starts it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, totally, like totally. Because also it's like you're talking
Speaker 1: about like literally starving to death at this point, you know. Yeah,
Speaker 1: like yeah, that's the thing. I like, I like, oh,
Speaker 1: they raised the raids, right, You're like they were making
Speaker 1: less than twelve dollars a day, and then someone was like,
Speaker 1: what if you only get seven dollars a day? Now,
Speaker 1: can you survive?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 3: Like no, Yeah, starving someone is just as violent as
Speaker 3: you know, snatching their news, substatching someone else's newspapers totally,
Speaker 3: or shoving throwing mud at a scab.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Uh So when Dave stepped down. A kid who loved
Speaker 1: gambling named Racetrack Higgins took over as president. So on
Speaker 1: July twenty ninth, the newspapers caved on a major issue.
Speaker 1: They didn't cave on the price. They actually for a
Speaker 1: little while a few days before this, they kind of
Speaker 1: were like, what about fifty five cents? And the kids
Speaker 1: were like, we're clearly winning. Fuck off?
Speaker 2: Yeah, what about fuck you? What about forty cents? Fuck face?
Speaker 1: Yeah exactly. The newspapers caved on a different issue entirely.
Speaker 1: They offered full buybacks of the unsold papers. And what
Speaker 1: happened is they came in and they're like, what about
Speaker 1: ten percent buybacks? And the kids were like no, and
Speaker 1: they're like twenty percent buybacks. The kids were like no,
Speaker 1: and they're like one hundred percent buybacks and the kids
Speaker 1: were like maybe right, And this actually effectively ended the strike.
Speaker 1: The strike leaders insisted that the strike was still on,
Speaker 1: but more and more people were like, nah, we we
Speaker 1: kind of won. This is good enough, Like the prices
Speaker 1: didn't go down, but the buy back was probably a
Speaker 1: bigger deal because you no longer have a situation where
Speaker 1: you're gambling in order to sell papers. Some newsies insisted
Speaker 1: that they kept up the fight, but most went back
Speaker 1: to selling the newspapers. And in August first, the union
Speaker 1: formally accepted the deal, and August second, the strike was over.
Speaker 1: And then the news Boys Union dissolved as quickly as
Speaker 1: it came into being, because it was an insurrectionary organization
Speaker 1: that existed when it was necessary and disappeared later. And
Speaker 1: that's not how all newsboys strikes went. Some of them
Speaker 1: created formal institutions that lasted, you know, for several generations
Speaker 1: and newsboys, but that's how it happened with this one.
Speaker 1: And you know what else is a formal membership organization
Speaker 1: is the new union that I'm starting called the Union
Speaker 1: of Bailstick Operators, where for the low entry price of
Speaker 1: you buy a bailstick and then think about what you
Speaker 1: think of not Margaret carefully choosing her words to not
Speaker 1: get in trouble. You can join the bailstick Union. And
Speaker 1: in case anyone's wondering, it's spelled b a l E
Speaker 1: like a bail of hay.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think what we can all agree. You extra
Speaker 3: don't want to scab against this union.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you're caught bailstick in without being in the bailstick
Speaker 1: union unless you're a farmer. Yeah, if you're a farmer,
Speaker 1: it's fine.
Speaker 3: Yeah yeah, bailstick not that way.
Speaker 2: Not that way either. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So that's one of the ads. And then here's some
Speaker 1: more and we're back. So after the strike, life continued,
Speaker 1: it didn't unfortunately magically. That's like one of the funny
Speaker 1: things about strikes, right, is you like win and like
Speaker 1: until we win, like the destruction of capitalism. What we're
Speaker 1: winning is like things didn't get worse, you know.
Speaker 3: Well, and also, this is a thing that I have
Speaker 3: been wondering. It's gonna be hard to go back and
Speaker 3: work for these fucks after this. We all know too
Speaker 3: much about them.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it really.
Speaker 2: Is like, oh, you are fucking hateful people.
Speaker 1: Yeah. God, and then it's gonna be like really obvious
Speaker 1: who's just being like pretend nice in order to get up,
Speaker 1: Like you know, like who's like just kissing ass in
Speaker 1: order to like start fuck their way up or whatever? Yeah,
Speaker 1: because you'd be like, no, I know, you know they're bad.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's really it's I that is a thing that
Speaker 3: I'm I'm risk because I mean it feels like, as
Speaker 3: as you've mentioned a couple of times, and I think
Speaker 3: is like this sort of vague we'll say management class
Speaker 3: fear is that there's like a contagion effect here.
Speaker 2: This is you know, this is why, And.
Speaker 3: I suppose there is because watching some workers take power
Speaker 3: in winter victory shows the vulnerability of you know, these.
Speaker 2: Leeches that call themselves our bosses.
Speaker 3: However, there is another side of it, which is like this,
Speaker 3: this labor action, Like for me, this strike is like
Speaker 3: and I think for many people who are like even
Speaker 3: less like thoughtful about this sort of thing or have
Speaker 3: this as their personal politics. Outside of the Writer's Guild,
Speaker 3: we're all learning way more about labor, about and about
Speaker 3: our bosses specifically that I'm just like, this feels like
Speaker 3: honestly more poisonous going forward if I were a fucking
Speaker 3: studio head then like you know, just like paying people
Speaker 3: livable wages.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's one of the it's like we hate them,
Speaker 1: we hate them, and now we know their names.
Speaker 2: I didn't know las name prior to this, Like what
Speaker 2: the fuck?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Why?
Speaker 1: Yeah, the fact that they're going to war against the
Speaker 1: people who make them rich. Like yeah, it because like
Speaker 1: to talk about like like nonprofits in unions, right, one
Speaker 1: of the reasons nonprofits are like like fake woke companies
Speaker 1: or whatever will be like, oh, we don't want a
Speaker 1: union because it creates an antagonistic relationship between the workers
Speaker 1: and the bosses. And that can be true. It actually
Speaker 1: doesn't have to be true. All you got to do
Speaker 1: is be really good to your workers and stop exploiting them.
Speaker 1: The problem is that our entire economic system, capitalism, is
Speaker 1: based on the idea of exploiting workers. It's literally based
Speaker 1: on the idea of like making other people produce more
Speaker 1: value and then skimming off that extra value. But I
Speaker 1: don't know it, it doesn't have to be right. It
Speaker 1: could just you could have a union and then the
Speaker 1: bosses could be like sick, now I know that you
Speaker 1: all have protected and everything's fine, you know, like whatever, Like.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's so funny.
Speaker 3: It's like a union can create an antagonistic relationship, and
Speaker 3: it's so weird that that rhetoric you can even get
Speaker 3: away with that because it's like, yeah, yeah, you know
Speaker 3: what else creates an antagonistic relationship prior to the existence
Speaker 3: of a union, is you being antagonistic?
Speaker 2: Yeah, the boss is totally.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Like yeah, it's like the there's that classic like
Speaker 1: style of headline. That's like the violence started at the
Speaker 1: protest when one person threw a tear gas canister back
Speaker 1: at the police, And you're like, yeah, clearly the violence
Speaker 1: started from the other direction. Sorry, when you mean violence,
Speaker 1: you mean against the systems of power? Oh right, yeah yeah.
Speaker 2: Or like some passive voice bullshit. But it is like, yeah,
Speaker 2: some subversion.
Speaker 3: Of that perpetually we're like, yeah, the fuck are you
Speaker 3: talking about? Like how do we I mean, yeah, we
Speaker 3: get let them get away with it because they're in charge,
Speaker 3: and most people don't think about it.
Speaker 2: But now we're all thinking about it.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, and that's I mean, more of us start
Speaker 1: thinking about it. Yeah, and that's good. So after the
Speaker 1: strike Hid Blink he gets into boxing and basketball and
Speaker 1: organized crime in Chinatown, and at one point he gets
Speaker 1: arrested for murder because he was bragging about killing a guy,
Speaker 1: but then he's released when they realized he was literally
Speaker 1: just lying and bragging about killing the guy needed and
Speaker 1: actually kill a guy. In nineteen twelve, he was arrested
Speaker 1: for possession of dynamite and I really want to know
Speaker 1: why he had a stick of dynamite. I just I
Speaker 1: want to know so bad. But I don't. And then
Speaker 1: he died in his early thirties nineteen July nineteen thirteen
Speaker 1: of Friend of the Pod Tuberculosis Jesus. Which is the
Speaker 1: other thing to think about when you're like anything taking
Speaker 1: place one hundred fifty years ago. It's like, look, all
Speaker 1: of our lives are kind of short in the grand
Speaker 1: scheme of things, right, but your life is extra short.
Speaker 1: But well, tuberculosis is still weal. Tuberculous is still a
Speaker 1: major killer worldwide, but in developed nations that have a
Speaker 1: better success at stopping the spread of it. Anyway, conditions
Speaker 1: for newsies actually got worse throughout the twentieth century. Unfortunately,
Speaker 1: unionized newsies held on to decent splits way better than elsewhere.
Speaker 2: I know.
Speaker 1: I was like kind of being like there were like
Speaker 1: an insurrection or union that existed and then just stopped existing.
Speaker 1: The ones that held on to unions for longer kept
Speaker 1: better percentages for decades longer than the other newsies. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but the rates just kept getting worse.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean that, Yeah, that lesson which is like
Speaker 3: you know again, I I especially as far as race
Speaker 3: politics go, you know, don't love all of the organized labor,
Speaker 3: but it is indisputable that like this is it's like
Speaker 3: the only way to have a real middle class is
Speaker 3: through the unions and things like them. I guess, like,
Speaker 3: I mean, it's just like it's it's the only way.
Speaker 1: Yeah, totally, and his only way for in a lot
Speaker 1: of places, it's the only way for people to express
Speaker 1: any kind of agency. I'm like, yea, I you know,
Speaker 1: it's like it's funny because in some ways I like
Speaker 1: the sort of more heroic period of labor, but on
Speaker 1: the other hand, during the you know, kind of late
Speaker 1: nineteenth early twentieth century chunk of it. But on the
Speaker 1: other hand, that's when more of the large labor places
Speaker 1: were like more fucked up and like more resist and shit.
Speaker 3: Well, yeah, I mean I think that's the thing. It's
Speaker 3: like the right thing. And look, it's the same with like,
Speaker 3: you know, so many pieces of history. It's like, yes,
Speaker 3: but you know, who's considered human at right time.
Speaker 1: Totally. But well it's a couple of paragraphs from now.
Speaker 1: It's going to tie into a labor union around this
Speaker 1: time that was doing good and was inspired by the kids.
Speaker 1: So besides winning some demands, the eighteen ninety nine strike
Speaker 1: brought a lot of attention to child labor in the US.
Speaker 1: The National Child Labor Committee was formed in nineteen oh
Speaker 1: four to try and draw attention to the plight of
Speaker 1: working children. But it wasn't until nineteen thirty eight that
Speaker 1: the Fair Labor Standards Act outlawed most forms of child labor.
Speaker 1: That said, and this is MESSI the newsies weren't fighting
Speaker 1: against their right to work, right. They they wanted to
Speaker 1: have jobs. Well meaning reformers wanted them to not be
Speaker 1: able to work. What they wanted was to be treated
Speaker 1: right and to be paid well. To actually stop child labor,
Speaker 1: we have to pretty much change the entire economic system
Speaker 1: so that people aren't poor shit and therefore sort of
Speaker 1: need to go work or send their kids to work. Meanwhile,
Speaker 1: currently about a half a million children pick about twenty
Speaker 1: five percent of the food we eat in the US
Speaker 1: because agriculture was mostly exempted from the nineteen thirty eight law.
Speaker 1: This exemption was crafted ostensibly. I believe it was crafted
Speaker 1: so that like because like small farmers were like, look you,
Speaker 1: Susie's got to milk the cow. Yeah, this was quickly
Speaker 1: exploited to exploit children in mass once you know, and
Speaker 1: once again, like eighteen ninety nine, mostly immigrant children, and
Speaker 1: you know the children of immigrants, and of course Republicans
Speaker 1: are trying to roll all back what child prediction laws
Speaker 1: there currently are. So the fight continues, as I guess
Speaker 1: what I'm trying to say. Puliser, speaking of the like bosses,
Speaker 1: the antagonistic workforce, Pulisher tried really hard after this to
Speaker 1: reform his image with Newsi's he either actually cared or
Speaker 1: he tried to reform his image. I don't know if
Speaker 1: there's one of them who would have sort of actually
Speaker 1: it would have been Pulitzer's. He's a little bit more right.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he wants to be the good, good guy.
Speaker 1: Yeah I got stuff slavery, you know, more than I did.
Speaker 1: But and so he started offering he did the pizza
Speaker 1: party version of good boss. Right, he brought his kids,
Speaker 1: like the Newsies would go to the movies, and he
Speaker 1: would like rent out the movie hall and let all
Speaker 1: the Newsies watch movies. And he would like sponsor holiday
Speaker 1: feasts and stuff at the lodge. I believe, right, And like,
Speaker 1: you know, I a raise is better than a pizza party.
Speaker 5: But like I don't know what, Yeah, yeah, it's it is,
Speaker 5: like yeah, I mean obviously like the nice boss, cool
Speaker 5: boss kind of thing is like not.
Speaker 3: It's it's insufficient in such a thorough way.
Speaker 2: But yeah, look it's better.
Speaker 1: Than Herst Yeah, totally, yeah, it's better than the eld
Speaker 1: really like Hitler guy. Yeah. And the thing that I, okay,
Speaker 1: my favorite union from this time period anyone who's listening
Speaker 1: to this show knows is the Industrial Workers of the World,
Speaker 1: the union that one of the founders was a black
Speaker 1: anarchist woman. They worked incredibly hard to fight racism in
Speaker 1: the labor world, especially on the West Coast where that
Speaker 1: was the most prevalent. Well, racism in the labor union
Speaker 1: was everywhere, but specifically there was a lot of racism
Speaker 1: in the labor movement in on the West coast of
Speaker 1: the United States and late nineteenth century against the East
Speaker 1: Asian immigrants. So this strike, the Newsy's Strike, was referred
Speaker 1: to in nineteen oh five by Daniel de Lyon during
Speaker 1: the creation of Friend of the Pod labor union the
Speaker 1: Industrial Workers of the World, And I'm going to read
Speaker 1: a bit of his quote because I like this quote.
Speaker 2: Quote.
Speaker 1: These little tots who by their very appearance herald in
Speaker 1: the open, the merciless cruelty of capitalism, even against the
Speaker 1: defenseless child, under clad, underfed, undershod deprived of the innocent
Speaker 1: joys of childhood that are so essential to the building
Speaker 1: up of the future. Man stunted and schooling, prematurely thrown
Speaker 1: into the temptation of vice, walking, running, yelling monuments to
Speaker 1: capitalist cannibalism. These waifs walked before Typographical Union number six
Speaker 1: and asked for support, for the support of men, many
Speaker 1: of whom were the fathers themselves, and who had they
Speaker 1: struck with the boys, certainly would have insured them victory.
Speaker 1: Did they? Of course they wouldn't. They slobbered over the
Speaker 1: boys their sympathies. They bestowed upon them all the sweet
Speaker 1: words that butter no parsnips, and the boys went down
Speaker 1: in defeat. This is like to pull out of it.
Speaker 1: I actually think that this was a fairly successful strike
Speaker 1: because of the thing that they won. But they did
Speaker 1: lose their main demand, and so that's why it's being
Speaker 1: referred to as a loss in this sense. To finish
Speaker 1: the quote, because this is my favorite part of it quote,
Speaker 1: it should be here added that when a year or
Speaker 1: so later, the identical type of graphical union had strike
Speaker 1: against the sun. Those bearded men went down upon their
Speaker 1: knees before the identical boys, whom they had left ill
Speaker 1: of a lurch, and implored their support. Let the fact
Speaker 1: be recorded as all evidence of the inherent nobility of
Speaker 1: the human hearts, and in honor of childhood the ever
Speaker 1: renewing promise that human feeling and human instinct shall not
Speaker 1: perish from the earth, that, when appealed to, the boys
Speaker 1: returned evil with good and helped the printers fight their strike.
Speaker 1: And I don't know, I think I realized.
Speaker 2: I was like, yeah, but no, I.
Speaker 1: Mean, yeah, I know, that's that's how I feel about.
Speaker 1: It's like, yeah, fuck yeah. Like and also, God, people
Speaker 1: like knew how to fucking write their labor speeches back
Speaker 1: in the day. It's a little heady, but uh. And
Speaker 1: obviously I think the most important comparison here to draw
Speaker 1: about the Newsies and their labor action is that, like
Speaker 1: the writers of Rohan, who were abandoned by the armies
Speaker 1: of Gondor at their hour of need and helms deep,
Speaker 1: how they chose to ride forth and do the assemble
Speaker 1: armies of Mordor, showing solidarity even with those who had
Speaker 1: turned their back. The Newsies threw down next year when
Speaker 1: when the typographers needed help, and uh.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it really is though.
Speaker 3: It's this thing where like, you know, I mean, yeah,
Speaker 3: obviously right now everyone's short for instance, with DGA or whatever.
Speaker 3: But like I think for me more it's like seeing
Speaker 3: like the Teamsters contract is up, I believe next year
Speaker 3: and now it's more clear than ever, like you know,
Speaker 3: we'll be with them. The UTLA strike the teachers union
Speaker 3: was a couple got months ago now as we're talking,
Speaker 3: But yeah, there was a writer's build support there, and
Speaker 3: I think it's like a thing where like, yeah, everyone
Speaker 3: is like you know, wishing and aware, wishing they had
Speaker 3: done more of prior and aware of everything in the future.
Speaker 2: So yeah, so you.
Speaker 1: All are the Rohrem ready to ride to the aid of.
Speaker 2: I think so, I mean, we'll see.
Speaker 3: I don't I don't want to put too much in
Speaker 3: the writer's skilled I don't know.
Speaker 1: I think that I think that solidarity is both a
Speaker 1: very natural thing for humans to do, but also something
Speaker 1: that like needs to be like practiced and developed as
Speaker 1: a skill as like a you know, cause like okay,
Speaker 1: like in like self defense training, they talk about like
Speaker 1: you do what you're trained to do in times of crisis.
Speaker 1: And so actually sometimes this is a problem. Right, Like
Speaker 1: in a fight, someone might like if someone's used to
Speaker 1: fighting like MMA, they might like try to destroy their opponent, right,
Speaker 1: whereas actually all they need to do is like hit
Speaker 1: them in then run away or whatever. Right, But no
Speaker 1: one's treat teaching self defense where you're like, oh, hit
Speaker 1: and then run away. Okay. So solidarity is like the
Speaker 1: more we practice it, the more people do it. And
Speaker 1: it's when because when there's crisis, you do what you
Speaker 1: have previously practiced and sort of like I've made certain
Speaker 1: decisions a kind of do Yeah. So I think that
Speaker 1: it's it's a thing that we can encourage people to be,
Speaker 1: like be your best self, be someone who doesn't scab,
Speaker 1: be someone who is in solidarity outside your own struggles. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and and willing to sacrifice when it's not your fight.
Speaker 1: I mean again, I've concain it a lot. But like
Speaker 1: you know, we are able to do things.
Speaker 3: With this writer's gold strike because teamsters are personally sacrificing.
Speaker 3: They are taking, they're using paychecks, they are refusing to
Speaker 3: cross picket lines with real consequence to themselves for a
Speaker 3: fight that is not strictly speaking, theirs, so like right,
Speaker 3: you know, beyond appreciative and like seeing that thing. And
Speaker 3: I think it is also just teamsters because they have
Speaker 3: a stronger union culture, are just more aware.
Speaker 2: This is the ship you got to do. Yeah, and
Speaker 2: they're they're practiced at it, as you said.
Speaker 1: And that's how we that's how we win. It's like
Speaker 1: we are overall safer to live in a society where
Speaker 1: we take risks for one another. You know, even though
Speaker 1: if I choose to interfere in something that's happening around me,
Speaker 1: that makes me less safe, right because I could just
Speaker 1: walk away. But by living in a society where we
Speaker 1: do interfere and stop acts of bigotry or exploitation or whatever,
Speaker 1: I'm then safer because I live in that society. I
Speaker 1: get really anyway, Okay, So.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean we talked about this last time, which
Speaker 3: is like my entry into doing sort of any mutual
Speaker 3: aid work was you know, even in a completely self
Speaker 3: interested like manner like it is because it is better
Speaker 3: for me personally Andrew only even to do.
Speaker 1: This stuff totally totally. I'm gonna I'm gonna speed run
Speaker 1: through some newsies, some more newsy strikes that came after,
Speaker 1: because this was not the end. Sure, it's near the
Speaker 1: end of the episode, but it's not near the end
Speaker 1: of the Newsy struggle. The Newsy Struggle is probably mostly
Speaker 1: over because newspapers have been destroyed. But in nineteen oh one,
Speaker 1: the Boston newsies formed the Boston Newsboys Protective Union, and
Speaker 1: they wanted the bare minimum. They were like mad that
Speaker 1: the newspapers were giving discounts early buyers, that thing that
Speaker 1: encourages kids to skip school, and they were like the
Speaker 1: union went as a paper. The union went to the
Speaker 1: paper and was like, can we have ten percent buybacks?
Speaker 1: And they were like no, your children fuck off and die.
Speaker 1: So then they went on strike and just like destroyed
Speaker 1: the paper circulation and the publisher gave him full fucking refunds,
Speaker 1: not just the ten percent they had asked for. And
Speaker 1: then later and they formally after this, they formally affiliated
Speaker 1: with the AFL the American Federation of Labor, which is
Speaker 1: now currently the AFL CIO. But in nineteen oh eight,
Speaker 1: the same union went on strike with a paper called
Speaker 1: The American, and the larger typographical union was like against them, right,
Speaker 1: and they were like no, And they ended up kind
Speaker 1: of even though there's like grown ass men going around
Speaker 1: beating up children strikers or whatever. Eventually they got the
Speaker 1: entire AFL to condemn the strike. It petered out due
Speaker 1: to lack of solidarity from adults. So not looking good.
Speaker 1: AFL is going to get a win a little later
Speaker 1: in this list, but not a win here. Who did
Speaker 1: have their backs the Hebrew Bakers Union Local forty five,
Speaker 1: they had their backs and they refused to take money
Speaker 1: from the American and yeah, and then the other thing,
Speaker 1: and part of this was that the way that they
Speaker 1: used it in within the AFL is that they're like, oh,
Speaker 1: these are they're merchants. These these children, they're not employees,
Speaker 1: they're merchants, so they don't deserve labor protections. Like fuck
Speaker 1: that we've talked about this whole time. It's like whatever,
Speaker 1: it's the same shit. That's also go ahead.
Speaker 3: Oh d yeah, the tidy soapbox there is that, Like, God,
Speaker 3: remember a time when that rhetoric at least would work,
Speaker 3: Like who doesn't deserve union protection? Because my big gripe
Speaker 3: really with the Southern California Federation of Labor is the
Speaker 3: presence of the LA Police Protective League.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's true.
Speaker 3: No one is less deserving of in solidarity than the
Speaker 3: goddamn cops.
Speaker 1: Yeah no, I yep. In Chicago, the Newsboys formed the
Speaker 1: Chicago Newsboys Protective Association and they fought against a bosses union.
Speaker 1: Speaking of that, this comes up time and time again
Speaker 1: when I researched the show that like whenever there's like
Speaker 1: a labor union doing some stuff, all the bosses get
Speaker 1: together and form a conservative and anti union union, right,
Speaker 1: and so the Daily Publishers Newspaper Daily Newspaper Publishers Association
Speaker 1: had like set all of these standards and collaborated against
Speaker 1: their against their children, the children who did their shit.
Speaker 3: I was gonna say, yeah, that should be telling, by
Speaker 3: the way, for anyone who's like anti union, I guess
Speaker 3: very very improbable that anyone is listening this long to
Speaker 3: this and remains anti union. But as far as rhetoric goes,
Speaker 3: like you know, with your for instance, like my father
Speaker 3: is like kind of an idiot anti union person, and
Speaker 3: it is like sort of telling that like the second
Speaker 3: rubber hits any kind of road, the bosses immediately unionized.
Speaker 2: Yeah, like they know it's fucking.
Speaker 3: Powerful, Yeah, and they want nothing more than to break
Speaker 3: up the opposing union.
Speaker 2: Yeah, like they know it's.
Speaker 1: Powerful, totally, Like we have to crew up and when
Speaker 1: powerful people do it, it makes them exponentially. It's an association, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: totally yeah, but uh, Chamber of Commerce, fuck all that.
Speaker 1: And so in Chicago they in nineteen oh nine they
Speaker 1: affiliate with the AFL. They joined the Pressman's strike in
Speaker 1: nineteen twelve, destroying papers in solidarity with lockdown union workers.
Speaker 1: Newsy's being the writers of Rohem again. In nineteen oh
Speaker 1: six in Goldfield, Nevada, a huge judge. A judge issued
Speaker 1: an injunction against the Newsboys union, and I believe the IWW,
Speaker 1: and I don't entirely know why. They must have been
Speaker 1: doing something cool together during the nineteen ten Spokane free
Speaker 1: speech fight, which I encourage everyone to go back and
Speaker 1: listen to our episode about that we did with Robert Evans.
Speaker 1: Sometime last fall, the Newsboys were hanging out handing out
Speaker 1: the IWW papers and getting arrested for it. In nineteen
Speaker 1: fourteen in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Newsboys destroyed newspapers and response to
Speaker 1: the rise of the price of the paper, and the
Speaker 1: IWW organized street meetings on their behalf from my point
Speaker 1: of view, basically, everything gets cooler once the IWW existed,
Speaker 1: once there was like a union being like, what if
Speaker 1: we all have each other's backs and aren't racists? New
Speaker 1: York City had notable Newsy strikes in only a couple
Speaker 1: of years eighteen eighty six, eighteen eighty nine, eighteen ninety
Speaker 1: eighteen ninety three, eighteen ninety eight, eighteen ninety nine, nineteen
Speaker 1: oh eight, nineteen eighteen, nineteen twenty two, nineteen forty one,
Speaker 1: and nineteen forty eight.
Speaker 2: Perpetual, perpetual.
Speaker 1: And I want to close with I had never heard
Speaker 1: of this strike, and I'm annoyed at myself. I'd never
Speaker 1: heard of it. Have you ever heard of the nineteen
Speaker 1: nineteen Seattle General Strike. No, it's one of the coolest
Speaker 1: strikes that's ever happened in the US. I'm not going
Speaker 1: to do it at great length, but the newsboys were
Speaker 1: in on it. That's the tie in here, and so
Speaker 1: was the AFL in Seattle. Actually, the AFL and Seattle
Speaker 1: was actually being cool, and they were actually deviating from
Speaker 1: the party line of the larger AFL at the time.
Speaker 1: They worked together with the IWW, which had a lot
Speaker 1: of in the Pacific Northwest had a significant East Asian
Speaker 1: membership as well as independent Japanese worker associations, and they
Speaker 1: called for a general strike because the socialist former head
Speaker 1: of the Seattle AFL had been arrested and tortured in
Speaker 1: jail for oposing the draft in World War One. So
Speaker 1: the Seattle longshoremen refused to load arms and manutions destined
Speaker 1: to help the counter revolution in Russia. Union membership quadruple,
Speaker 1: and they were like, you know what, let's show people
Speaker 1: that the workers cannot just shut down a city by
Speaker 1: withholding labor, but like run it on their own terms.
Speaker 1: And so most of the cities shut down completely, but
Speaker 1: the workers continued essential services. Firefighters stayed at work, laundry
Speaker 1: workers kept one shop open to handle hospital laundry. Civil
Speaker 1: order was controlled by the Labor War Veterans Guard. Who
Speaker 1: their purpose was is the quote The purpose of this
Speaker 1: organization is to preserve law and order without the use
Speaker 1: of force. No volunteer will have any police power or
Speaker 1: be allowed to carry weapons of any sort, but to
Speaker 1: use persuasion. Only twelve fit kitchens fed everyone milk. Wagon
Speaker 1: drivers supplied milk to babies, and it worked for a while.
Speaker 1: The mayor said, quote the mare didn't like it. Quote
Speaker 1: streetcar gong ceased their clamor newsboys cast their unsold papers
Speaker 1: into the street. From the doors of mill and factory,
Speaker 1: store and workshops streamed sixty five thousand workmen, school children,
Speaker 1: with fear in their hearts, hurried homeward. The life stream
Speaker 1: of a great city stopped. Major General Morrison completely contradicted
Speaker 1: the children running away in fear thing. They clearly didn't
Speaker 1: write their notes together because Major General Morrison said in
Speaker 1: forty years of military service, he'd never seen a city
Speaker 1: so quiet and orderly. And the strike lasted six days,
Speaker 1: and it was brought down by the way that these
Speaker 1: things are often brought down by the police and vigilantes
Speaker 1: attacking everyone and arresting all the reds and storming labor
Speaker 1: halls and such. But that's a story for another day.
Speaker 1: Today's story is the story of you, Andrew, and how
Speaker 1: people can support your strike and or your work.
Speaker 2: Oh God, supporting the strike.
Speaker 3: I think there's been very clear messaging from the WGA.
Speaker 3: I know there is oh I don't have it handy,
Speaker 3: but there was a strike fund. You can it's all
Speaker 3: and search for a w GA strike fund but and
Speaker 3: there's an Entertainment Strike Fund, not merely for writers who
Speaker 3: need assistants in this time, but especially for.
Speaker 2: Folks in other unions.
Speaker 3: People for whom, you know, if production is shut down,
Speaker 3: that is that is their income as well, and they
Speaker 3: are not writers, They're not necessarily going to directly benefit
Speaker 3: from any of our actions. So yeah, please look up
Speaker 3: and donate to that. And you know, I'm just at
Speaker 3: yos is racist. We do a premium podcast at suboptimalpods
Speaker 3: dot com. You know, people have been supporting us and
Speaker 3: that's been really wonderful as well, and really helpful in
Speaker 3: this time for.
Speaker 2: Me and my co host Tony. I don't know what
Speaker 2: else I say.
Speaker 1: That's it, that seems good. And yos is racist. I've
Speaker 1: said this last time Andrew came on. But I was
Speaker 1: like a little bit like, oh my god, I guess
Speaker 1: have Andrew on my podcast, because you know, is this racist?
Speaker 1: When it was on Tumblr was like all of our shit,
Speaker 1: we all just fucking loved it and read it every
Speaker 1: day and like it really I think pushed the conversation
Speaker 1: in like useful ways and was just so just like
Speaker 1: funny and not like not mean spirited or something but
Speaker 1: still like not pulling punches. I don't know.
Speaker 2: I thank you. That's very nice of you to say. Uh.
Speaker 2: I feel like it was mean spirited but at the
Speaker 2: right people.
Speaker 1: Yeah, maybe that's kind of what I mean.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's definitely petty and mean spirited, because that is
Speaker 3: who I am. But yeah, I just feel like at
Speaker 3: least that it was pointed in the right direction, which
Speaker 3: it rarely is.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I think that that's a better way to
Speaker 1: put it.
Speaker 2: Don't worry I'm a bad person.
Speaker 1: If you want to know more about what I do.
Speaker 1: At the moment, the main thing I'm pushing people towards
Speaker 1: is I'm kickstarting a tabletop role playing game called a
Speaker 1: Number City, and it has passed all of its stretch golds,
Speaker 1: so we had to make up new ones, which means
Speaker 1: that if you back it at any level, not only
Speaker 1: do you get the main book, but you get two
Speaker 1: other books, one of which will be a novella that
Speaker 1: I'm writing said in the world. You'll get digital versions
Speaker 1: of it. We don't have enough money to suddenly mail
Speaker 1: everyone three extra books, but unless I know, I know well.
Speaker 1: And then also so we made new stretch goals and
Speaker 1: at fifty thousand dollars, everyone's going to get a map
Speaker 1: of the city, and at one hundred thousand dollars, we're
Speaker 1: going to like get this one sort of a joke one,
Speaker 1: but we'll do it if we get there. We probably won't,
Speaker 1: but we're all going to get in a hot tub
Speaker 1: cost playing as characters from the game and have a
Speaker 1: pizza party. I was writing this script about the pizza
Speaker 1: party thing while I was also talking with the rest
Speaker 1: of the collective about what stretch golds to come up with.
Speaker 1: And that's why there's a pizza party.
Speaker 2: Cool gotta do it.
Speaker 1: But there's also a game and it's fun. Sophie, what
Speaker 1: do you got?
Speaker 4: Listen to Coulson Media's newest show produced by me called
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Speaker 1: Yay see y'all next week. The Cool People Who.
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