On this day in 1917, a deputized posse in Bisbee, Arizona kidnapped more than 1,300 striking miners, their supporters, and bystanders, deporting them to New Mexico, more than 200 miles away. The miners were organized by the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), and had been on strike since June 26th.
The action was orchestrated by Phelps Dodge, the major mining company in the area, which provided lists of workers and others who were to be arrested to the Cochise County sheriff, Harry C. Wheeler.
The 16-hour journey was through desert without food and with little water. Once unloaded, the deportees, most without money or transportation, were warned against returning to Bisbee. The U.S. government soon brought in members of the US Army to assist with relocating the deportees to Columbus, New Mexico.
Phelps Dodge, in collusion with the sheriff, had closed down access to outside communications, so the story was not well reported at the time.
Although a federal commission concluded the kidnapping was done “wholly illegal and without authority in law, either State or Federal” and the U.S. Department of Justice ordered the arrest of 21 Phelps Dodge executives, no individual, company, or agency was ever convicted in connection with the deportations.
Megathreads and spaces to hang out:
- ❤️ Come listen to music and Watch movies with your fellow Hexbears nerd, in Cy.tube
- 💖 Come talk in the New Monthly queer thread
- 💛 Read and talk about a current topics in the News Megathread
- ⭐️ October Movie Nominations ⭐️
reminders:
- 💚 You nerds can join specific comms to see posts about all sorts of topics
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- 🌈 If you ever want to make your own megathread, you can go here nerd
- 🐶 Join the unofficial Hexbear-adjacent Mastodon instance toots.matapacos.dog
Links To Resources (Aid and Theory):
Aid:
- 💙Comprehensive list of resources for those in need of an abortion – reddit link
- 💙Resources for Palestine
Theory:
So I’ve been watching through Metalocalypse lately, I love this show but god damn does the writing drop off a cliff in season four. It does the thing that some shows do that absolutely drives me crazy where they’ve sped up all of the dialogue slightly and edited out the air in between sentences - it feels like watching a youtube video at double speed and it sucks. Until this point the show knew how to use a bit of silence to build tension, help a joke land, or establish a scene, but it seems that when they got squished back into the 12 minute format they had forgotten how to pace an episode of that length.
