"REMEMBER THE BULL PEN" RARE & GRAPHIC WESTERN FEDERATION OF MINERS LABOR BUTTON.
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Item Description
7/8" w/"W. F. Miller" W&H back paper. A bound figure "Labor" is led into a stockade by a pair of African American troops labeled "Protection" w/slogan above. Gray spots along collet between 12 and 2 o'clock w/one just extending into field at top right. Extremely Fine. Button references the events starting in April of 1899 when the WFM was attempting to unionize mines in the Coeur d'Alene district near Wardner, ID. Push back from mine owners led area WFM members to seize a train headed to the region to transport fellow members for a massive demonstration. They also loaded the train w/dynamite later calling it the "Dynamite Express." A confrontation occurred at the Bunker Hill Co. Mill and once non-union officials were run off, over a ton of dynamite was loaded into the Mill and detonated, destroying it in a massive blast. President McKinley, at the request of Idaho Gov. Steunenberg, sent in Army troops, the majority of which were African Americans in the distinguished 24th Infantry who had fought in the Spanish American War. Big Bill Haywood, leader of the WFM, later criticized the government for attempting to sow racial tensions. The soldiers rounded up over 1,000 area men forcing them into the "Bull-Pen" a temporary prison in Wardner, ID. The arrested were in many cases held for months in the primitive conditions of the makeshift prison the last of which was released in December of 1899. A historically important button that is rarely offered.
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