“Frank Little, a Union
organizer for the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) was born in 1879. He
was a metal miner who became active in the IWW. Frank helped organize
mineworkers, oilfield workers, and lumberjacks into labor unions. In 1913 he
was actively involved in the “free speech” campaigns in Fresno ,
Peoria , Spokane ,
and several other towns. By 1916, Frank Little was a member of the Industrial
Workers of the World General Executive Board.
Frank traveled to mining
towns, logging camps, and other places where workers put in long hours and
received little pay. He stood up to the company bosses and their hired thugs by
educating and organizing workers so that they could one day enjoy the good life
that only the bosses enjoyed. He was a man who actively put his principles into
action each and every day, knowing the company bosses could jail him on trumped
up charges or be shot by a Pinkerton thug at any time.
During the summer of 1917
Frank had been helping to organize copper workers in a strike against the
Anaconda Copper Company, near Butte
Montana . On August 1, 1917 Frank
Little was forcibly taken from the boarding house he was staying at in Butte and was lynched by
thugs employed by Anaconda Copper. No one was ever charged in his murder and
the state legislature responded to the lynching by outlawing militant unionism.