"Mother," said he, "I can't make myself scarce but my hearing and my eyesight ain't extra today."
That afternoon, up there on the mountain side, we organized a strong union.
The next day the man who gave me food—his name was Mike Harrington—went to the mines to go to work, but he was told to go to the office and get his pay. No man could work in the mines, the superintendent said, who entertained agitators in his home.
Mike said to him, "I didn't entertain her. She paid me for the tea and bread."
"It makes no difference," said he, "you had Mother Jones in your house and that is sufficient."
He went home and when he opened the door, his sick daughter said, "Father, you have lost your job." She started to sob. That brought on a coughing fit from which she fell back on the pillow exhausted—dead.
That afternoon he was ordered to leave his house as it was owned by the company. They buried the girl and moved to an old barn.
Mike was later made an organizer for the United Mine Workers and he made one of the most faithful workers I have ever known.
In February of 1903, I went to Stanford Mountain where the men were on strike. The court had issued an injunction forbidding the miners from going near the mines. A group of
