printed in the September 2 Oshkosh Northwestern
The last figures I'd seen reported from the city's industrial development arm, Chamco, is that manufacturing composes 36 percent of the work force in Oshkosh.
That's one of the highest in the nation for a community as large and with business interests as diversified as Oshkosh. Whether union or not, it's no accident that labor has a strong presence in Oshkosh, a presence in which its roots are buried deep in more than 100 years of history.
In preparation for Labor Day, this past week I finally cracked open Virginia Crane's "The Oshkosh Woodworkers' Strike of 1898: A Wisconsin Community in Crisis."
The 560-page book recounts the three-month-long strike by workers at Oshkosh's seven woodworking mills during the summer of 1898. Crane, a retired University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh professor who still lives in the community, chronicles a rich period of the city's history probably unparalleled in its social and economic development.
The strike and ensuing riots affected everyone, not just the 1,800 striking woodworkers or the wealthy owners of the mills along the Fox River.
Merchants lost $50,000 in business, according to estimates by one local newspaper, because families of striking workers lacked income to buy goods. While a number of middle-class citizens took out-of-town train excursions during the July 4 holiday, most were unable to do so in 1898 because they couldn't afford the ticket.
The city was under constant patrol from the military as well. Still, local law enforcement hired reinforcements during the strike, bringing the total number of deputies to nearly 300 and chalking up nearly $20,000 in expenses that taxpayers would offset.
The strike was a top storyline in every edition of the city's three newspapers, but it also captured the attention of newspapers around the nation. It attracted Thomas Kidd - a renowned Chicago labor organizer with the national woodworkers' union - to come to Oshkosh and rally striking woodworkers. An ensuing lawsuit against Kidd by lumber baron George Paine brought Clarence Darrow - now one of history's most famous lawyers - to Oshkosh as an attorney for Kidd.
When the strike ended in late August, the mills reopened at near-capacity and striking union members returned to work. But each side had suffered losses: The mills lost hundreds of thousands of dollars in business, and many of the workers became impoverished and accumulated debts beyond what they could afford to repay.
Looking back, Crane points out it was the strike that perhaps first blazed the trail for people of diverse backgrounds to not only tolerate each other, but support and encourage one another. She writes that "Bohemian Catholic male tavern keepers provided bail money for Prussian Lutheran female demonstrators...German and English-speaking workers shared a common goal and communicated across cultural lines."
The strike also brought together the middle class in support of the working class during its struggle, Crane wrote. Merchants offered what money they had, editors and ministers supported the cause, farmers donated food, and grocers and landlords allowed bills to run up.
The woodworkers' strike of 1898 broke new ground across Oshkosh and established social attitudes which progressed the city far beyond what it might have been otherwise.
Crane's book not only allowed me - as an outsider coming to Oshkosh - to better understand where Oshkosh had been, but also to better identify with its modern-day character.
SEAN FITZGERALD: (920)426-6678 OR SFITZGERAL@SMGPO.GANNETT.COM.