Working Class History

On this day, 8 September 1931, an Australian rules football match between West Adelaide and Port Adelaide was boycotted by a number of Port players because West Adelaide had selected a police officer to play and he was known to have been involved in protecting scabs and breaking pickets in an earlier waterfront strike. The game still went ahead but West Adelaide were heckled and abused and at one point when the ball was kicked into the crowd it came back sliced in two.
More info in this radical history of Aussie rules football: https://libcom.org/history/1883-today-the-radical-history-of-aussie-rules-football https://www.facebook.com/workingclasshistory/photos/a.296224173896073/1522940267891118/?type=3

On this day, 8 September 1972, 60 Black sailors aboard the USS Constellation during the Vietnam war gathered in a secluded barbershop on board. They each shared stories of the endemic racism in the navy: being denied promotions, stuck in lower paid positions and subjected to harsher discipline than white sailors. They would later form an organisation called the Black Fraction, which would be responsible 56 days later for the first mass mutiny in the history of the US Navy.
This is our podcast about the Vietnam-era rebellion in the US Navy and Army: https://workingclasshistory.com/2018/08/06/e10-the-gi-resistance-in-vietnam-part-1/ https://www.facebook.com/workingclasshistory/photos/a.296224173896073/1522885084563303/?type=3

On this day, 8 September 1946, numerous empty properties were squatted by homeless ex-servicemen and their families in London in a wave of occupations across the country. 148 luxury flats in the Duchess of Bedford House in Kensington were squatted, as was a block in Weymouth Street, Marylebone, as well as houses in Campden Hill and Holland Park. In the coming days, more properties would be taken over around the city. Taken by surprise, police at the Duchess of Bedford House reportedly expressed sympathy for the families and arranged for a Women’s Voluntary Service than to bring them hot drinks. But in subsequent occupations this did not recur and police took action like preventing supplies being brought to families and dispersing supporters with violence. Meanwhile, the Labour health minister, Aneurin Bevan, instructed local authorities to cut off gas and electricity to squatted premises. On September 20, a High Court injunction was issued against all of the London squats, and the occupiers then voluntarily left. Most of them went to a “rest centre” organised by local authorities, from which they were eventually rehoused.
Pictured: 1946 squatters’ movement protest
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On this day, 7 September 2012, 700 longshore workers in the International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU) and their supporters blockaded a grain train from entering a non-ILWU terminal, facing down violent police attacks and pepper spraying. After a sustained, militant struggle which was often hindered by union leaders, they won concessions.
This is an interesting account and analysis of the dispute: https://libcom.org/library/ilwu-longshore-struggle-longview-beyond-class-struggle-critique https://www.facebook.com/workingclasshistory/photos/a.296224173896073/1522330521285426/?type=3

This Labor Day, we would be so grateful if you would share our Kickstarter where people can preorder our first book: Working Class History: Everyday Acts of Resistance & Rebellion, to be published in November 2020. Thanks to people’s support so far, this book will now definitely be published, so the more pre-orders we get, the bigger print run we can do and the more hands we can get this book into! https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/workingclasshistory/working-class-history-the-book https://www.facebook.com/workingclasshistory/photos/a.296224173896073/1522257241292754/?type=3

On this day, 7 September 1942, German American anti-Nazi resistance activist and writer Mildred Fish-Harnack was arrested in Preil with her husband Arvid. They were leading activists in the “Red Orchestra”, a socialist literary circle which became an underground anti-fascist organisation. Mildred helped recruit other resistance activists and helped Jewish people escape Germany. Mildred was sentenced to 6 years’ hard labour, while Arvid was sentenced to death. Hitler then ordered a retrial for Mildred, after which she was sentenced to death. She was the only woman executed on Hitler’s personal orders. https://www.facebook.com/workingclasshistory/photos/a.296224173896073/1522072324644579/?type=3

On this day, 7 September 1934, anti-fascists hung a banner atop the BBC headquarters advertising a demonstration against a rally by Oswald Mosley and his British Union of Fascists that weekend. While Mosley had been invited on the BBC to promote his Nazi views and advertise his demonstration, the BBC, like the rest of the British press, refused to give a platform to anti-fascists, or mention the counter-protest. Despite this, on the day, over 100,000 Londoners overwhelmed the fascists and their police guard and drove them out of Hyde Park.
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We write about this and hundreds of other stories of resistance in our forthcoming book: Working Class History: Everyday Acts of Resistance & Rebellion. Preorder yours here: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/workingclasshistory/working-class-history-the-book/description https://www.facebook.com/workingclasshistory/photos/a.296224173896073/1521737081344770/?type=3

On this day, 6 September 1966, Mozambican-Greek revolutionary Dimitri Tsafendas assassinated the architect of apartheid, South African Prime Minister Hendrik Verwoerd, by stabbing him during a parliamentary session. Tsafendas was at the time working in the Parliament building. Despite the bravery of his act, anti-apartheid leaders and his family distanced themselves from Tsafendas after the assassination. While in his statement to police he was clear about his motives, saying that he “did believe that with the disappearance of the South African prime minister a change of policy would take place… I was so disgusted with the racial policy that I went through with my plan to kill the prime minister.” But authorities decided to claim he was mentally ill so as to not admit their security had been beaten. And Tsafendas, under torture and facing the death penalty, eventually agreed to plead insanity. So he was subsequently found not guilty of murder by reason of insanity, and sent to a secure psychiatric hospital. He survived to see the end of the apartheid regime, but the new African National Congress government did not order his release. He died in custody in 1999.
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Tsafendas’ story is featured with hundreds of others in our forthcoming book, Working Class History: Everyday Acts of Resistance & Rebellion. You can preorder a copy through our Kickstarter: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/workingclasshistory/working-class-history-the-book/ https://www.facebook.com/workingclasshistory/photos/a.296224173896073/1521335078051637/?type=3

On this day, 6 September 1923, communist partisan hero Nada Dimić was born in the small village of Divoselo, in modern day Croatia. She was the only Croatian-Serb member of the country’s first anti-fascist unit in Sisak. She undertook raids and sabotage on railroads, and was arrested and tortured by the Ustaše (Croatian fascists). In prison she attempted suicide, but it was unsuccessful, however comrades then helped her escape, upon which she rejoined the struggle. Eventually she was re-arrested by Italian troops who handed over to the Ustaše who again tortured her but again she refused to reveal any information, and she was executed some months later.
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Facebook/Instagram recently announced a crackdown on anti-fascist content, deleting several popular pages. To ensure you can stay in touch with us, sign up to our occasional email list: https://workingclasshistory.com/sign-up/ https://www.facebook.com/workingclasshistory/photos/a.296224173896073/1520892654762546/?type=3

On this day, 5 September 1939, African-American nurse and civil rights activist Claudette Colvin was born in Montgomery, Alabama. When she was 15 she was arrested and convicted for refusing to give up her seat on a bus which she had been ordered to vacate for white passengers, several months before Rosa Parks (content note: sexual violence). However civil rights leaders decided not to make a cause célèbre of her case after she became pregnant from a statutory rape, fearing negative publicity. Some local activists also believe that Colvin’s dark skin was a factor in not choosing to take on her case.
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Colvin’s story is one of hundreds which will be appearing in our forthcoming book: Working Class History: Everyday Acts of Resistance & Rebellion. You can help us get it published by backing our crowdfunder: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/workingclasshistory/working-class-history-the-book https://www.facebook.com/workingclasshistory/photos/a.296224173896073/1520676508117494/?type=3

We are super excited to be launching today a crowdfunding campaign for our very first book: Working Class History: Everyday Acts of Resistance & Rebellion. It contains a curated selection of On This Day in History posts from our archive, with loads of photos and a foreword by Noam Chomsky. Published by PM Press, an independent, worker-controlled publisher.
Please help this book become a reality, to help us reach out to a new generation of activists in these dark times, to take inspiration and learn lessons from those who came before us. We’ve got a selection of great rewards available for our backers, so do check them out on the link, and if you can’t afford to back us right now please just share this appeal with your networks!
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/workingclasshistory/working-class-history-the-book https://www.facebook.com/workingclasshistory/photos/a.296224173896073/1520348611483617/?type=3

On this day, 5 September 1911, a UK-wdie strike wave of schoolchildren was sparked when pupils in Llanelli, Wales walked out in sympathy with a boy who was disciplined by a deputy headmaster. From this one school, walkouts spread across the country to at least 62 towns and cities, with pupils demanding an end to corporal punishment, and for shorter hours. The schoolchildren’s strikes followed a summer of workers’ industrial disputes.
This is a fantastic pamphlet about the walkouts: https://libcom.org/history/childrens-strikes-1911
Pictured: school strikers in Shoreditch, London https://www.facebook.com/workingclasshistory/photos/a.296224173896073/1519981118187033/?type=3

On this day, 4 September 2005, in the wake of hurricane Katrina the Danziger Bridge shootings took place, when several New Orleans police officers opened fire with assault weapons on an unarmed Black family. The Bartholomews were on their way to a grocery store when plainclothed police with machine guns shot six of them, killing two and then stomping on one of the victims. Some of the victims were shot up to 7 times and lost limbs. One man was shot five times in the back and a teenage girl was shot four times. The police then fabricated a story claiming they had been fired on by four suspects, an officer had been shot and had to return fire. They even arrested one of the survivors and charged him with eight counts of attempting to kill police. The officer in charge of investigating the shootings helped fabricate evidence to support the shooters’ lies. Guilty verdicts for the killers were handed down in 2011, 6 years after the crimes.
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To learn more about policing, the criminal system and the institutional racism of both, check out our collection of books: https://shop.workingclasshistory.com/collections/all/police https://www.facebook.com/workingclasshistory/photos/a.296224173896073/1519670988218046/?type=3

On this day, 4 September 1895, Xiang Jingyu, communist and one of the pioneers of the Chinese women’s movement, was born. She was an advocate for women’s rights, as part of the liberation of the working class, and criticised sexist practices in the Communist Party. She led a strike of thousands of women silk factory workers in 1924. She was involved in organising women’s support for the Canton-Hong Kong workers’ strike the following year. Later she was betrayed and arrested in 1928 by French police. The French handed her over to the nationalist Kuomintang movement, who then executed her, but before her death she refused to give up any names of her comrades. https://www.facebook.com/workingclasshistory/photos/a.296224173896073/1519347818250363/?type=3

On this day, 4 September 1917, legendary Australian anarchist and labour organiser Monty Miller was arrested at the age of 78 for being a member of an unlawful association: the Industrial Workers of the World union. He was subsequently sentenced to six months hard labour.
Learn more about Miller and the Australian IWW in our podcast: https://workingclasshistory.com/2019/01/28/e19-the-iww-in-australia/ https://www.facebook.com/workingclasshistory/photos/a.296224173896073/1519119274939884/?type=3