Industrial Workers of the World Miscellany on Microfilm

The papers of the Industrial Workers of the World consist of publications by or about the union and its varied activities. The first reel is devoted to its labor periodicals. Included, among others, are The Industril Worker, January 1906-June 1907 (with frequent articles by Eugene Debs), Luber Workers Bulletins from various locals and The General Construction Workers Bulletin.

The second reel contains 69 publications, addressed primarily to immigrant and minority groups and written in English and various foreign languates; 62 publications dating from the 1920s and 1930s, produced by the General Defense Committee, which attended to the legal and financial needs of workers imprisoned on charges related to radical activities; 17 pamphlets produced by various trades unions within the IWW; and 31 pamphlets by Debs, DeLeon, Trautmann and others.

The third reel is devoted to pamphlets about the Centralia case. They deal with events and aftermath of Armistice Day, November 11, 1919, in Centralia, Washington, when an exchange of gunfire between enion members and a hostile crowd resulted in the death of Lt. Warren Grimm, the lynching of one worker, the eventual trial of eleven members of the IWW, and the conviction of eight for second degree murder.

There is no separate printed guide to the collection, but lists of the publications on reels two and three precede the texts on the film.