Little, Frank

LITTLE, FRANK (1879–1917). Hobo agitator and one-eyed rebel, Frank Little was long thought to be the son of a Cherokee Indian mother and Quaker father. In 1900 he became a metal miner and joined the Western Federation of Miners (WFM). A militant direct actionist, Little left the WFM for the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) in 1906. A fearless and uncompromising agitator, he was repeatedly beaten and jailed for his union-forming activities. Helping to lead numerous free-speech fights, Little later organized Japanese and Mexican agricultural and construction workers in Fresno into IWW Local 66. Little worked as a “footloose” organizer bringing harvesters, lumberjacks, and the metal miners into the IWW. In 1914 he was elected to the IWW’s general executive board and played a critical role in the formation of the Agricultural Workers Organization and the IWW’s job delegate system. In 1916 he resumed his organizing activities among miners, participating in strikes on the Mesabi Range in Minnesota and in Arizona. With a recently broken leg, he traveled to Butte, Montana, to help striking miners shortly after the Speculator Mine fire. The night after his speech, labeled a “treasonable tirade” by the press, Little was brutally murdered by six men. His killers were never identified.

Little more is known about Frank Little, except that later research revealed his Native American ancestry was a persistent but merely a romantic myth. Growing up, he ardently supported his mother against his stepfather, a land speculator, and this relationship may have stirred his radical sentiment. His sister-in-law, utterly dedicated to him, remained at the site of the Fresno Free Speech fight, dedicated to fight for his vindication. The inscription of his tombstone, “Slain by Capitalists interests for organizing and Inspiring His Fellow Men,” preceded unofficial apology from the state of Montana, the charges against them overturned at last.

Botkin, Jane. Frank Little and the IWW: The Blood That Stained an American Family. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2017.

Chaplin, Ralph. Wobbly: The Rough and Tumble Story of an American Radical. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1948.