The Mines Will Open: Black Strikebreakers Headed for Roslyn
With Roslyn miners on strike and reportedly armed, a Northern Pacific manager says he will import Black miners from Tennessee and Missouri to restart the coal works.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
TACOMA, July 23.—[Special.]—Manager Kangley, of the Northern Pacific coal mines at Roslyn, returned tonight from the mines. Arrangements have been made, he says, to fill the places of the miners who are on strike there with practical Black miners from Tennessee, and probably some from Missouri. Mr. Kangley understands that some of the Roslyn miners on strike are armed, but he is emphatic in his statement that the mines will be opened and operated.
“Mr. Kangley understands that some of the Roslyn miners on strike are armed, but he is emphatic in his statement that the mines will be opened and operated.”
The Roslyn coal strike became a case study in how employers used racial division to break union power: Black workers were recruited as strikebreakers and made to bear the resentment of a white mining town. The episode still rhymes with modern fights over who is blamed when companies pit workers against each other.
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