Eugene V. Debs Papers on Microfilm

Born and reared in Terre Haute, Indiana, Eugene Debs began work in a railroad enginehouse and then became a locomotive fireman, serving as an officer of the Brotherhood of Locomotive Firemen and Enginemen and as editor of the FIREMEN'S MAGAZINE. Resigning from his union offices in 1892, Debs organized the American Railway Union along industrial lines. The ARU was crushed in the Pullman Strike of 1894 and Debs was convicted of conspiracy and jailed for six months. In 1897, Debs helped to form the Social Democratic Party, which merged with a faction of the Socialist Labor Party to form the Socialist Party of America in 1901. One of the founders of the Industrial Workers of the World in 1905, Debs withdrew from that organization three years later. Debs ran for president of the United States on the Socialist ticket in five elections between 1900 and 1920. An opponent of American involvement in World War I, Debs was convicted of violating the Espionage Act in 1918 and was sentenced to a ten year prison term. Pardoned by President Warren G. Harding in 1921, Debs died in 1926.