"
* * * * *
The storm broke at McIver's factory. It was as Jake Vodell had told the
Interpreter it would be--"easy to find a grievance."
McIver declared that before he would yield to the demands of his
workmen, his factory should stand idle until the buildings rotted to
the ground.
The agitator answered that before his men would yield they would make
Millsburgh as a city of the dead.
Two or three of the other smaller unions supported McIver's employees
with sympathetic strikes. But the success or failure of Jake Vodell's
campaign quickly turned on the action of the powerful Mill workers'
union. The commander-in-chief of the striking forces must win John
Ward's employees to his cause or suffer defeat. He bent every effort to
that end.
Sam Whaley and a few like him walked out. But that was expected by
everybody, for Sam Whaley had identified himself from the day of
Vodell's arrival in Millsburgh as the agitator's devoted follower and
right-hand man. But this unstable, whining weakling and his fellows
from the Flats carried little influence with the majority of the
sturdy, clearer-visioned workmen.
At a meeting of the Millsburgh Manufacturing Association, McIver
endeavored to pledge the organization to a concerted effort against the
various unions of their workmen.
Pages:
221
222
223
224
225
226
227
228
229
230
231
232
233
234
235
236
237
238
239
240
241
242
243
244
245