On this day, July 12, 1917, vigilantes kidnapped and deported 1,300 striking miners and others from Bisbee, Arizona.

[mahatmakanejeeves]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/July_12

• 1917 – The Bisbee Deportation occurs as vigilantes kidnap and deport nearly 1,300 striking miners and others from Bisbee, Arizona.

Hat tip, Attilatheblond

Fri Jul 4, 2025: Everything old is new again. Was thinking of The Bisbee Deportation

where striking mine workers in southeastern AZ were loaded into cattle cars and dumped in the desert of New Mexico, in July, without water or food.

This ugly page of our history is seldom mentioned but sorely needs to be recognized for the raw ugliness of corporate greed and how useful racist idiots and 'law enforcement' can be tools to undermine what is sacred in this nation. Maybe if we did a better job of teaching history, today would never have been allowed to happen. And that is exactly why the powers behind the GOP hate education.

https://www.zinnedproject.org/news/tdih/the-bisbee-deportation/

On June 24, 1917, the Industrial Workers of the World (I.W.W.) presented the Bisbee, Arizona mining companies with a list of demands. These demands included improvements to safety and working conditions, such as requiring two men on each machine and an end to blasting in the mines during shifts.

Demands were also made to end discrimination against members of labor organizations and the unequal treatment of foreign and minority workers. Furthermore, the unions wanted a flat wage system to replace sliding scales tied to the market price of copper. The copper companies refused all I.W.W. demands, using the war effort as justification. As a result, a strike was called, and by June 27 roughly half of the Bisbee work force was on strike.

On July 12, 1917, the striking workers and others were kidnapped and held at a local baseball park. They were then loaded onto cattle cars and transported 200 miles for 16 hours through the desert without food or water. The deportees were unloaded at Hermanas, New Mexico, without money or transportation, and warned not to return to Bisbee.

From University of AZ Archives.

Talk of the incident goes back farther than that at DU.

Hat tip, Omaha Steve

Sun Jul 12, 2015: 7-12-15 The Bisbee Deportation in 2:00

http://laborhistoryin2.podbean.com/e/july-12-the-bisbee-deportation/



July 11, 2015
On this day in Labor History the year was 1917. That was the day that miners in Bisbee, Arizona were rounded up, taken by train and left in the desert on the New Mexico/Arizona border.