happy? – Jan 11 ('Bread & Roses' strike)

Subject: happy? – Jan 11 ('Bread & Roses' strike)
From: Abby Sale
Date: 11 Jan 06 - 09:19 AM


"Better to starve fighting than to starve working":
22,000, mostly women, strike Everett Cotton Mill in Lawrence Mass,
1/11/1912 for a period of 9 weeks, to March 12th.

          In the good old pickett line,
            In the good old pickett line,
          The workers are from every place,
            From nearly every clime. 
  
                  Pete Seeger, Carry It On
  
  ALSO:
          As we come marching, marching,
          We bring the greater days;
          The rising of the women
          Means the rising of us all.
          No more the drudge and idler,
          Ten that toil where one reposes,
          But a sharing of life's glories,
          Bread and Roses, Bread and Roses.
  
                  "Bread and Roses," poem: James Oppenheim; tune various, inc. Martha Coleman

It was penned after Openheim saw a sign held by young mill girls picketing, published in Industrial Solidarity April 27, 1946. (Irwin Silber: I have to claim credit for rediscovering this old song. I found it doing some research at the NY Public Library some 35 years after it was written. [on a songsheet crediting Colma]) See http://www.breadandroses.com/mission_statement.shtml      http://www.breadandroses.com/real.audio.1.html And See Second People's Song-book, (1953, edited Silber) p.32 gives a version with a tune by Martha Colman. The text, after mentioning Lawrence, gives: " James Oppenheim, inspired by the strike and the slogan [ie, of the strike – AS] wrote this poem which was later set to music by Martha Coleman."

Steve Suffet saith:   Mimi Farina wrote the melody Judy Collins recorded. There is at least one other tune, and I believe Caroline Kohsleet wrote the one that had been most commonly used before the Farina melody. I remember hearing Wobbly song aficianados singing "Bread and Roses" in the early 1960s. The song was more of a defiant march than the haunting, dirge-like piece that Judy Collins later recorded. AND I had seen the name Caroline Kohsleet in "Rise Up Singing." However a mimeographed People's Artists song sheet I found from circa 1947 credits "Bread and Roses" to James Oppenheim and Caroline Kohlsaat. AND Silber

The full song sung by Mimi and Joan was available at the Baez website but seems gone now. I'm glad I downloaded it.

Copyright © 2005, Abby Sale - all rights reserved
What are Happy's all about? See Clicky

Subject: RE: happy? – Jan 11 ('Bread & Roses' strike)
From: CapriUni
Date: 11 Jan 06 - 10:35 AM

Thank you for this. Beautiful lyrics, and important history that ought not be forgotten.

Subject: RE: happy? – Jan 11 ('Bread & Roses' strike)
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 11 Jan 06 - 01:34 PM

There is a long post by Susanne (skw) on the strike and circumstances that led to the poem by Oppenheim, with a comprehensive bibliography, in thread 3742: Bread and Roses

As noted in that thread, The Holt Labor Library credits the music to Caroline Kohlsaat. Words and music (Kohlsaat) are found in: Edith Fowke and Joe Glazer, 1960, "Songs of Work and Freedom," first published by the Labor Education Division, Roosevelt University, pp. 70-71.

The poem was written in 1911, and first published in 'The American Magazine,' Dec. 1911, a month before the Lawrence strike began. The 'Chicago Women Trade Unionists' are credited with the slogan "Bread and Roses" ('The Public,' Oct. 1912).
There are several legends about the song and its use; see the post by Susanne.