Fannie Never Flinched: "Author's Note"–"Time Line"

by Mary Cronk Farrell
This nonfiction book chronicles the life Fannie Sellins, a garment worker and labor organizer who was tragically murdered on August 26, 1919.

This list covers the "Author's Note"–"Time Line."

Here are links to our lists for the book: List 1, List 2, List 3, List 4, List 5
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Full list of words from this list:

words only definitions & notes
  1. persistent
    never-ceasing
    The facts of the case are hardly even remarkable when viewed in the context of the persistent violence perpetrated against American workers for much of our early history.
  2. perpetrate
    perform an act, usually with a negative connotation
    The facts of the case are hardly even remarkable when viewed in the context of the persistent violence perpetrated against American workers for much of our early history.
  3. due process
    administration of justice according to rules and principles
    No official body count, no reliable numbers of physical assaults, and no definitive records of worker jailings without due process truly document the violence of the struggle for workers’ rights.
  4. redress
    a sum of money paid in compensation for loss or injury
    But evidence does exist of a distinct pattern of intimidation and harassment of workers by company-hired gunmen, local law enforcement, and National Guard troops—with little or no redress for the victims.
  5. instigate
    provoke or stir up
    Did workers, too, ever instigate violence in pursuit of their cause?
  6. blatantly
    in a completely obvious manner
    Yes, there are records of union members blatantly attacking company guards and killing scabs.
  7. condone
    excuse, overlook, or make allowances for
    However, this violence was rarely, if ever, officially condoned or orchestrated by the unions, as it was on the part of company owners and managers.
  8. orchestrate
    plan and direct (a complex undertaking)
    However, this violence was rarely, if ever, officially condoned or orchestrated by the unions, as it was on the part of company owners and managers.
  9. martyrdom
    death because of a person's adherence of a faith or cause
    After the shooting of Fannie Sellins, unions across the country used her martyrdom to rally workers in the first nationwide steel strike on September 22, 1919.
  10. fundamental
    far-reaching and thoroughgoing in effect
    The combination of anti-immigrant propaganda, armed forces, and a fundamental devaluing of the lives of workers slammed unions into submission.
  11. submission
    the condition of ceding control to someone or something else
    The combination of anti-immigrant propaganda, armed forces, and a fundamental devaluing of the lives of workers slammed unions into submission.
  12. compel
    force somebody to do something
    The power of law—President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s labor-friendly New Deal and the U.S. Congress’s 1935 National Labor Relations Act (also known as the Wagner Act)—finally compelled business and industry to pay attention to workers’ grievances.
  13. grievance
    a complaint about a wrong that causes resentment
    The power of law—President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s labor-friendly New Deal and the U.S. Congress’s 1935 National Labor Relations Act (also known as the Wagner Act)—finally compelled business and industry to pay attention to workers’ grievances.
  14. strive
    exert strenuous effort against opposition
    Though these ordinary, everyday, hardworking people might not be recorded in history books, they strove to create the change America needed.
  15. capacity
    capability to perform or produce
    Maybe each of us carries the capacity to demonstrate those qualities in some way that will make a difference.
  16. valiant
    having or showing heroism or courage
    Time lines of labor-union victories do not always show the depth of the struggles and the sacrifices made to achieve gains in workers’ rights. However, this time line shows valiant efforts by union workers that were crushed by industrial corporations with the backing of local, state, and/or the federal government.
  17. wherewithal
    the necessary means (especially financial means)
    After each instance, union people eventually found the wherewithal to rally and try again, until 1934, when companies were forced by the federal government to recognize unions and negotiate with workers.
  18. commerce
    transactions supplying goods and services
    The strike against wage cuts swept west along the rails through Chicago, Kansas City, Pittsburgh, St. Louis, to San Francisco—100,000 workers halting commerce for forty-five days.
  19. precedent
    an example that is used to justify similar occurrences
    President Rutherford B. Hayes sent federal troops to end the strike, and workers went back to their jobs, taking lower wages. This set a precedent for using federal soldiers to enforce corporate interests against labor.
  20. demonstrator
    someone participating in a public display of group feeling
    During a rally on May 4 to support workers seeking an eight-hour workday, a pipe bomb exploded in Chicago’s Haymarket Square, panicking both the demonstrators and the police, who opened fire.
  21. frenzy
    state of violent mental agitation
    In a frenzy, local police rounded up labor leaders and suspected radicals, plus hundreds of workers.
  22. radical
    a person who has revolutionary ideas or opinions
    In a frenzy, local police rounded up labor leaders and suspected radicals, plus hundreds of workers.
  23. amalgamate
    bring or combine together or with something else
    In one of the most serious disputes in U.S. labor history, after days of demonstrating, members of the Amalgamated Association of Iron and Steel Workers faced off at the Carnegie Steel Company against company-hired agents from the Pinkerton National Detective Agency in a fourteen-hour skirmish.
  24. collective bargaining
    negotiation between an employer and a trade union
    After collective bargaining failed, Carnegie shut down its Homestead plant and locked out the union workers.
  25. skirmish
    a minor short-term fight
    After several people died in skirmishes, nine workers among them, state militia arrived, armed with Winchester rifles and Gatling machine guns.
  26. militia
    civilians trained as soldiers, not part of the regular army
    After several people died in skirmishes, nine workers among them, state militia arrived, armed with Winchester rifles and Gatling machine guns.
  27. lynch
    kill without legal sanction
    When dynamite exploded at a railroad depot, killing thirteen and injuring six nonunion men, the Mine Owners Association seized control of the investigation by threatening to lynch the county sheriff—a union member who had been elected by the people and didn’t favor company interests.
  28. boycott
    refusal to have commercial dealings with some organization
    Still, the strikers held out for two years, while a national boycott of Marx & Haas Clothing pressured the company to sign a contract with the union for improved pay and working conditions.
  29. dissolution
    the termination or disintegration of a relationship
    The strike settled in June 1914, with workers re-hired at slightly better wages and working conditions but dissolution of the UMWA in the region.
  30. principal
    main or most important
    The massacre brought criticism to principal owner John D. Rockefeller and highlighted the Colorado miners’ grievances, but little improved for them.
  31. blacklist
    add to a group to be boycotted, banished, or avoided
    When the miners went on strike, coal operators hired gunmen, including sheriff’s deputies, to assault, arrest, and blacklist workers and evict their families from their homes.
  32. arbitration
    the hearing and determination of a dispute by a referee
    Employers eventually agreed to government arbitration to end the strike.
  33. avert
    prevent the occurrence of; prevent from happening
    Political pressure from President Franklin D. Roosevelt averted all-out warfare in the streets.
  34. dispatch
    send away towards a designated goal
    Company guards and Georgia National Guard troops were dispatched in at least seven states, smashing the strike in three weeks.
  35. sympathetic
    expressing compassion or friendly fellow feelings
    The presidential election of 1932 sparked a major turning point for American labor unions, bringing pro-labor president Franklin D. Roosevelt into office in 1933, along with a Congress sympathetic to labor.
Created on Mon Apr 18 13:01:11 EDT 2022 (updated Mon Apr 25 13:31:12 EDT 2022)

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