Pittsburgh IWW and Friends of Labor Celebrate May Day & Branch Charter Day
Submitted on Mon, 05/08/2006 - 2:25pm
Note: This is an official Pittsburgh GMB posting. The Branch only authorizes officially recognized news and articles to be posted under the Pittsburgh GMB banner.
Homestead, PA, -- More than one hundred members of the Industrial Workers of the World, friends of Labor, local activists, and community members celebrated International Workers’ Day in Pittsburgh, PA. The Pittsburgh IWW’s second annual celebration of workers worldwide was held on April 29th at the Bulgarian-Macedonian National Education and Cultural Center and included a midnight march to the historic Homestead Strikers’ Monument.
Members of the Pittsburgh IWW, which was also celebrating the fourth anniversary of its chartering on May Day 2002, coordinated the evening’s events which included various musical acts, labor skits, poetry and spoken word performances, and speak outs by local union members and activists. In addition to the IWW, members belonging of the Teamsters, Steelworkers, and Writers Guild were present, as were representatives of local activist groups such as the Thomas Merton Center, the anti-war Pittsburgh Organizing Group, Pittsburgh Friends of Immigrants, and the Big Idea Bookstore. Members of the of the Pittsburgh Anti-Sweatshop Community Alliance, including IWW member and PASCA co-founder Ken Miller, were also on hand and spoke of this summer’s activities around the 2006 All-Star Game to raise awareness of major league baseball’s connection to global apparel sweatshops.
The most powerful musical moment of the night came when Mike Stout, a local labor activist currently releasing his 9th CD, belted out a haunting and spirited a capella rendition of “Which Side Are You On.” The most comical moments came from skits performed by local IWW members, including Mimi Yahn & Evan Wolfson who performed aWork People’s College satire. Delivering a powerful anti-war message, IWW member Jeremy Shenk did a riveting spoken-word performance that drew enormous applause from the crowd.
As is the tradition of the Pittsburgh IWW May Day celebration, the evening concluded with a short midnight march to a monument dedicated to the Homestead steelworkers and strikers. Local labor authorities Charlie McCollester and Mel Packer spoke eloquently on behalf of the workers who fought and died at the hands of steel boss Henry Clay Frick and his hired goons, the Pinkertons. As curious passers-by honked and waved to the crowd of about thirty gathered at the monument, Charlie McCollester reminded the group that “just three blocks away Mother Jones was arrested by the police for demonstrating without a permit. But when asked by the judge if she had a permit to speak in public Mother Jones replied, ‘I indeed have a permit to speak in public, your honor, it was given to me by Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, and James Madison!’”
The vibrant group concluded the evening’s celebration by singing a loud and proud version of a May Day favorite, the “Internationale.”