Industrial Workers of The World Songs

INDUSTRIAL WORKERS OF THE WORLD SONGS. When the Industrial Workers of the World formed in Chicago in 1905, the organization immediately began to encourage members to contribute to the cause through various forms of cultural expression. Historians would later consider such expressions a key element in creating what they termed oppositional or “movement culture.” They included songs, poems, cartoons, stories, skits, jokes, and artifacts such as banners, pendants, signs, and buttons. These contributions proliferated among the Wobblies, building on the traditions of earlier unions, causes, and organizations, while creatively advancing these forms to promulgate the Wobbly message. Indeed, these efforts, particularly the songs and poems, constitute one of the IWW’s most significant, lasting, and expansive contributions to labor and a larger musical-literary culture.

In the genre of labor songs, and the related poetic form, the IWW had plenty of antecedentes to build upon. From the early nineteenth century onward, Lowell mill girls, iron molders, coal miners, German socialists, printers, workers on the “tramp,” coopers, and Knights of Labor all found songs and poetry to be a useful method for self-expression on a variety of labor issues and causes, a tool for education, and a creative way to have fun and rouse others at meetings, rallies, and strikes. Many of the labor papers of the period included songs and poems from readers as a regular feature, much like letters to the editor or reports from the field. A number of songbooks were also published. These songs rarely included original music and nearly all writers borrowed their tunes from folksongs, hymns, Civil War songs, and the popular airs of the day.

The IWW leaned heavily on these traditions, but also brought new vitality, inventiveness, and creativity to the mix. As IWW newspapers appeared, readers submitted their song texts, employing tunes from hymns, parlor songs, and the latest music hall and vaudeville compositions. Then in 1909, the Spokane branch of the IWW published Songs of the Workers: On the Road, in the Jungles, and in the Shops; Songs to Fan the Flames of Discontent, a chapbook compilation of two dozen songs. That songbook found wide circulation in the ranks, and even beyond the IWW. In its varied forms, the Little Red Songbook or Wobbly Songbook went through many editions and remains in print in 2020.

Among the writers who lent their musical and poetic offerings to the Wobblies, the names Ralph Chaplin, Haywire Mac, T-Bone Slim, G. G. Allen, and Richard Brazier are noteworthy. A skillful and prolific writer among Wobbly bards, Chaplin borrowed the tune from the Civil War song “The Battle Hymn of the Republic” and composed “Solidarity Forever” in 1915. The song emerged as the anthem of American labor, is sung and recorded regularly today, and has circulated around the world. Haywire Mac, a “boomer” turned musician, became well known for his hobo songs and country recordings, and wrote the ever-popular (and sometimes controversial) “Big Rock Candy Mountain.”

None of these writers, however, achieved the legendary status of martyred songwriter Joe Hill (1879-1915). After emigrating from Sweden to the United States at the turn of the century, Hill traversed the country, joined the IWW, and wrote many of the organization’s most memorable songs, including “The Preacher and the Slave” and “Rebel Girl.” Hill took his tunes from vaudeville hits of the day and church hymns. Also he was among a select few who wrote original music for some of his works, the most notable of which was “Rebel Girl.” His musical efforts, as well as his Wobbly affiliation, also made him a target for the authorities. He was arrested for murder in Salt Lake City, with little evidence to support the charge, and executed by firing squad in 1915. His songs, however, live on to inspire musicians and audiences in the United States, Canada, England, Germany, Sweden, Italy, Australia, New Zealand, and points beyond.

As part of the larger body of cultural activities surrounding the IWW, songs were part of the membership’s regular routine. Wobbly songs and poems could be heard at union meetings, free speech gatherings, conventions, funerals, picnics, and celebrations. These songs may not have nurtured a high level of revolutionary consciousness sought by the IWW upper Echelons, or even some of the writers themselves, but they did help sustain the rebel spirit, brought smiles to audiences, educated listeners, and offered an alternative to the bourgeois paradigm prevalent among mainstream politicians, clergy, business leaders, and the press.

Among the most pronounced characteristics of many IWW songs are their humor and sing-ability, two essential components in making a song memorable and maintaining a protracted shelf life. Long after the majority of nineteenth-century labor songs were forgotten, Wobbly songs continued to be sung and find new fans. Beginning in the 1930s, younger musicians such as Pete Seeger and Woody Guthrie discovered and the songs of Hill, Chaplin, and Haywire Mac, performed Wobbly songs for labor events and at concerts, and took them into the studio for recordings. In addition, as early as 1927, Carl Sandburg included “The Preacher and the Slave” in his pioneering “folksong” collection, The American Songbag. Other collectors would follow suit and IWW songs became standard fare in anthologies of American folk music. As the folk revival gained momentum in the 1950s and 1960s, this trend continued unabated. A legion of young folk musicians with an activist streak could be heard strumming guitars and singing Wobbly songs everywhere from coffee houses to May Day celebrations. As recently as 2015 a group of musicians and Wobblies organized a nationwide tour to commemorate the 100th anniversary of Joe Hill’s execution. Around the country, musicians and audiences kept labor’s musical traditions alive and joined together to “fan the flames of discontent” as they sang rousing refrains of “Solidarity Forever,” “The Preacher and the Slave,” and other IWW classics.

Green, Archie, David Roediger, Franklin Rosemont, and Salvatore Salerno, eds. The Big Red Songbook. Chicago: Charles H. Kerr, 2007.

Green, Archie. Wobblies, Pile Butts, and Other Heroes. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1993.

Halker, Bucky. “Joe Hill Songs Around the World,” in Peter Cole, David Struthers, and Kenyon Zimmer, eds. Wobblies of the World: A Global History of the IWW. London: Pluto Press, 2017.

Halker, Bucky. Anywhere But Utah: Songs of Joe Hill. Chicago: Revolting Records, 2015.

I.W.W. Songs: Joe Hill Memorial Edition. 1917; reprint Chicago: IWW, 2015.

Kornbluh, Joyce L., ed. Rebel Voices: An IWW Anthology. Rev. ed. Chicago: Charles H. Kerr, 1998.

Songs of the Workers to Fan the Flames of Discontent, 32d edition, April, 1968. Internet Archive. https://archive.org/details/SongsOfTheWorkersToFanTheFlamesOfDiscontent/page/n1/mode/2up