by Peter Davis
“Now we go where the strike is,” I said.
As I herded them back into the taxi, the driver did a double take. “Ma’am,” he said to Pammy. “If I didn’t know better I’d think you were Palmyra Millevoix.”
“People tell me that,” she said.
As we arrived at ILA union headquarters just off the waterfront, I caught a nervous glimpse of the alley where I’d almost been stabbed to death a few weeks earlier. No trucks or freight cars were operating on the holiday, but hundreds of pickets marched. I steered my charges toward a picket line of perhaps thirty men. They were standing guard around a pile of crates to make sure no scabs moved them to a warehouse or a ship.
“Hey, it’s Palmyra Millevoix,” said a man with a placard that read, WE WANT FULL RECOGNITION—ILA. “Are you slumming, ma’am, or are you with us?”
“I came to see for myself,” Pammy said. “No place with working men and women is a slum to me. My friends and I are here to support what you’re doing.” She and Teresa and Race were surrounded by strikers who were both curious and awed.
It quickly developed that Race and Teresa didn’t belong on this picket line. The strikers saw them merely as pretty girls with a movie star for a friend. I was accepted as a chaperone. A couple of pickets whistled at Race, and one asked Teresa if she’d like to come up to his place later and hear all about the strike. That drew a brief horselaugh. Out of their element, the two actresses saw they had no real role since the pickets only wanted to talk to the star. “I’d really like to see my brother,” Teresa said.
Teresa’s brother, Stubby Blackburn, had been sold by the Los Angeles Angels to the Sacramento Solons of the Pacific Coast League, which meant she seldom saw him, and the Solons were in town to play the San Francisco Seals in a holiday doubleheader. “Heartthrob’s gonna take good care of you, honey,” Race said to Pammy, “Me and Teresa’s gonna take care of each other.” They found a taxi and headed to the ballpark.
“How are your families doing?” Pammy asked the pickets nearest her. “The strike’s already two months old, isn’t it?”
“We’re on wartime rations like I had in France, ma’am,” a bearded longshoreman said, “but it’s worth it if we get our union recognized. Wife and kids say the same.”
“Trouble is, the employers have the full pockets,” a shy young picket said, “and they can last out so much longer than we can.”
“Yah, but they’re losing millions,” the bearded man said. “That’s the part I like. Lot of dead whales in the harbor.”
Completely misunderstanding him, I asked, “What’s killing them?”
“I’m talking about the commercial ships—they’re out there floating but they’re not moving, and their cargo’s going nowhere.”
“The bosses treat us like dirt,” another marcher said. “They set all the work rules, the penalties, enforcement, wages of course. Working men have no say at all.”
“Except they don’t call us men,” said a burly older man with graying hair. He was carrying the American flag. “All the men on the docks is called boys. End of every day, Miss Millevoix, we’re out of work. Have to hope we get picked the next day by the company’s little duke, a straw boss who does the hiring. You don’t bring a bottle to one of the little dukes, or kick back to him, you don’t get hired.”
“We ain’t Reds, ma’am, but the times is drastic,” said the man who had asked Pammy if she were slumming, “and people are looking for drastic solutions.”
“Some are Reds,” the burly man said, “but we don’t need them to tell us we’re working under desperate conditions for slave wages or that the owners are selfish.”
The bearded man again: “They’re hiring rich white boys and poor black men to scab and break the strike, and they’re using cops paid for by all of us to protect their side alone. The bosses want to destroy the union, and they don’t mind losing money to do it.”
“They’d bottle up the sun if they could,” the shy young picket said, stuttering a little, “and make us pay for it. The strike’s our only weapon to make them give an inch.”
“I wish I could help,” Pammy said.
“Cheer for us, Miss Millevoix,” said the young man, “and let your friends know.”
“Yah, can you sing us a song?” the bearded man asked.
“You know ‘Solidarity Forever’?” Pammy asked them.
“Sure,” said several of the strikers.
“Here’s a verse just for you. I’ll start and you join me after you’ve heard the verse.” She stood on a packing crate. “Let’s sing,” she said.
The longshoremen, the seamen and at last the teamsters too—
We are fighting for their rights and that means me and that means you;
We won’t stop till San Francisco sees the unions get their due,
And the bosses know that’s true.
Solidarity forever,
Solidarity forever,
Solidarity forever,
And the bosses know that’s true.
How the hell she came up with that I wasn’t going to ask, but they all joined her for two more repetitions of her riff on the old Wobbly song of solidarity taken from the even older Civil War “Battle Hymn of the Republic.” We spent the rest of the afternoon walking along the waterfront, talking to groups of picketers, Pammy singing when asked. Whenever I was alone with her my talk was stilted, like an inexperienced schoolteacher. I was grateful when the dockworkers invited us to dinner in their union hall.
As we climbed the stairs to the ILA headquarters I shivered at the memory of the knife attack by that big side of beef Widdelstaedt. If he recognized me he might want to finish the dark work he’d begun before. I looked around furtively, relieved not to see him or his buddy Cromartie. The person who did remember me was Nick Bordoise, the Greek chef. “If you’re back here,” he said, “it means we’ll have some action, yes?”
When I introduced him to Pammy, he didn’t recognize her but since the dockworkers did, he understood she must be special. Nick stammered an unnecessary apology. “The food here, I’m sorry, miss, it’s not what you’re used to.” Pammy said she was starved, and he brought us bowls of chili with cornbread and iced tea. “But this is delicious,” Pammy said. “Do you have enough for two friends of mine?”
While Pammy was on the phone to the hotel, Mike Quin showed up. Racing around town, he’d found out shipowners were planning a forcible opening of the port, and he’d heard businessmen in a club telling each other that machine gunning the strikers was the best way to preserve the sanctity of private property except for stringing up Harry Bridges on a lamppost. Quin had seen Bridges himself coming out of a meeting with federal officials, complaining that President Roosevelt gives with one hand and takes away with the other. The governor was threatening to call in the National Guard to patrol the docks for the shipowners. I told Quin I couldn’t believe the National Guard would protect only one side in a dispute. “Ah, Skinny, stick around,” Quin said. “The stage is set for a showdown between all the forces that have been aching to collide for two months, or maybe twenty years.”
Pammy returned to the long table where we sat with several dockworkers and said Teresa and Race wouldn’t be joining us. They’d gotten Teresa’s brother Stubby Blackburn to snag the Seals’ center fielder, who’d hit three homeruns in the doubleheader, for a fancy dinner at the Fairmont with the two actresses. “‘Let’s us little chickens have us a night off,’” Pammy mimicked Race’s southern accent when she described the call, “‘me and Teresa, we’re gonna fight over Mr. DiMaggio. Y’all win the strike.’”
Mike Quin was impressed to meet Pammy and immediately said, “Ah, now that you’re on location maybe we can get a picture going that Skinny here doesn’t seem to be able to pull off at your studio.” “Between the two of us,” Pammy corrected Quin, “I doubt we could get a pencil sharpened at Jubilee right now.”
Nick Bordoise’s wife, Julia, arrived to pick him up. Her hands were chapped and the color of beet
s. She saw me noticing them and explained she worked in a laundry. Nick brought her a bowl of chili and sat down with us. Pammy wanted to know if he was a member of the Greek Orthodox Church. Not anymore, he explained. He was a member of the Communist Party because they were fighting for what he believed in. Shyly, possibly trying to win support in a family argument, Julia Bordoise asked Pammy if she thought it was wrong for Nick to be a Communist. “In Russia maybe,” Pammy said, “not in America.”
One of the longshoreman began to strum a guitar and sing, almost to himself at first, “O Susanna.” By the time he was through, the room was listening, and another longshoreman asked Pammy if she’d sing something. I wouldn’t believe this except I was there—she had something of her own ready. She didn’t know she’d have an accompanist, and she went over to the guitar player and asked him for a couple of chords. While they were working this out, Harry Bridges came up the stairs.
He was thinner than when I’d seen him a month earlier, and haggard, his hawk’s nose more prominent, but his eyes were intense and everyone wanted to hear what he had to say. The Industrial Association was so hostile to him that some of their members were trying to have him deported back to Australia. He was polite to Pammy when Mike Quin introduced them, but I couldn’t tell if he had any idea who she was. “What’s the good word tonight, Harry?” one of the longshoremen asked. “Looks like you’re about to have some entertainment, mates,” Bridges said, the last word an Australian mites. “There isn’t much to tell you, so why don’t we have the music first.” He looked grim.
“Can we have harmony?” Pammy asked.
“Eventually,” Bridges said, smiling, “not yet. Right now we sing in unison.”
Pammy pursed her lips, but Quin nodded at her to go ahead. “It’s just a strike ditty,” Pammy said, “and please join me the second time through. Okay? Let’s sing.”
The guitarist gave her two chords, and then she sang:
When the bosses cut our losses
And be fair,
When the bosses cut our losses
Everywhere,
When the masses beat the classes
And we knock them on their asses,
When the workers take control
We will roll, roll, roll.
When they give back what they stole
We’ll be there,
When the workers reach their goal
We will share,
When the workers take control
Then we’ll make this country whole,
When the workers take control
We’ll be there, there, there.
The second time through, even Harry Bridges joined in with his high, reedy Down Under tones. So did Nick Bordoise in his Greek modulation, though his wife Julia was silent, nodding to herself. The room quieted uncertainly when the singing ended.
Quin asked if we outsiders should leave before Bridges addressed his troops.
“Mates,” Bridges said, “I wish I had something to tell everyone that everyone doesn’t already know. Basically, we’ve made no progress downtown, none at all. The ship owners have the city leaders and other businessmen on their side, nothing new, but now they’re bound and determined to open the port of San Francisco by force. Tomorrow.” Bridges sighed. “And they have the force in their pocket. All of it.”
“Where’s the federal government in this, where’s the president?” The man who asked this, standing with one foot on a bench, looked ready to chew nails.
“You’ll like this one, boys. While we’re busy closing down shipping here President Roosevelt is on the high seas, on a yacht having himself a holiday.”
Someone said he’d better not try docking in San Francisco. That raised a guffaw.
“Well, the president has a lot of things to think about,” Bridges said, “and the city fathers downtown hate him as much or more than they hate us. The point is, we don’t want any violence. They’re armed, and they’re ready to go for us at any provocation. We’re petitioning the powers, we send a message by our very presence along the Embarcadero. The more of us the louder the message, the more signatures on our petition. But anyone who doesn’t want to march in the picket line tomorrow, especially anyone with children, I understand. It could get ugly.”
“It’s been ugly for months, Harry,” said the man with the foot on the bench. “We’ll all be there in the morning.”
We left with Nick and Julia Bordoise. Downstairs, I asked if we could give them a ride in our taxi. I think Julia was about to tell us that would be very nice, but Nick said no, they lived nearby, and they headed up Mission Street.
At the hotel things were awkward. It was still early, but we both fumbled for anything to talk about. “What do you think is going to happen tomorrow?” “I wish I could tell you.” Pammy said Millie was waiting at home for her call, the perfect excuse to get away from me. I said I hoped Teresa and Race were having a good evening. “I’ve heard ballplayers are as bad as actors when it comes to mischief,” she said.
The telegram was under my door. YOU’RE ALL BEING FOOLISH STOP I WON’T SPEAK TO HER BUT YOU CAN STOP REMEMBER THAT EVEN WHEN THE DANCE IS OVER ITS NOT HARD TO TELL THE WALLFLOWERS FROM THOSE WHO WALTZED STOP WISE UP AZ
31
Bloody Thursday
Thursday, July 5. I saw dark skies, no rain. The sun started to rise, then seemed to change its mind; not the usual fog but a deep gray washed the city. Two men in suits—pleasant looking fellows who could have been second leads in a Jubilee picture—were conversing in the lobby. “This strike isn’t between management and labor,” one said. “It’s between American principles and un-American radicalism. We’ve reached a crisis.”
“It’s that simple,” the other said, gesturing with his briefcase. “Yesterday, for the first time in fifty years, not a single vessel sailed into the port of San Francisco. Any cargo waiting to be loaded is rotting on the docks.”
“Paper says the Archbishop wants to mediate and asks for more time.”
“Too much time and money are already down the drain. Time’s up, Your Grace.”
Mike Quin, his eyes as red as his hair from attending strike committee meetings all night and perhaps from what he’d lubricated himself with, greeted us with the same words the two men in suits had agreed on. “We’ve reached a crisis,” Quin said as he marched into the lobby to take us to the waterfront. It was just after seven. Pammy had her hair in a bun and wore a no-nonsense shift, buttoned from its hem to her neck. Quin explained to the three actresses, as a warning, that this was the day the shipowners vowed to open the port by force. The unions all vowed to keep the port closed.
The streets feeding the Embarcadero were already full of police and pickets. The police patrolled the dockside while the strikers moved along the land side, two armies, but only one was armed. Across from the Ferry Building, longshoremen paraded two abreast, with the American flag in front and the ILA flag carried behind it.
Four trucks, driven by strikebreakers, rumbled ominously down the Embarcadero. They drew shouts about scabs and finks. No one made a move to block the trucks. Vendors went around with candy, gum, cigarettes. A young boy made a dash from the lines of pickets across the Embarcadero to where the police were, ducking past them and leaping into the arms of a woman. Hundreds more strikers arrived on buses.
“The Longshoremen aren’t alone here,” Quin told us. “Seamen and Teamsters, the Sailors’ Union, Marine Firemen, Oilers, Watertenders and Wipers, Marine Cooks and Stewards have struck, then the Ferrymen’s Union, the Masters, Mates and Pilots and the Marine Engineers—all of them are out. The other side blames it all on Bridges.”
As the clock on the Ferry Building chimed eight—apparently a planned signal—the police charged the picket line, breaking its ranks, driving strikers up the streets that led away from the Embarcadero. The police were using clubs and tear gas. Led by Quin, we retreated up Rincon Hill with the strikers, who shouted at us to get out of the way. We did. Teresa yelled we were crazy to come here. Pa
mmy said no, it’s good to see what America’s face looks like today. Escape was impossible anyway.
We ducked into the same Chinese laundry where I’d been weeks earlier on my first trip. The proprietor, Wun Chew, recognized me as the stupid fellow he’d sheltered before. Obligingly, Wun Chew took us upstairs. His family spoke no English, and we joined them watching out the windows. “This is not real,” Teresa said, bowing as Mrs. Wun Chew poured tea for us. Down below was fighting, shouting, then a lull.
Mike Quin and I made a brief reconnoiter into the streets around the waterfront. The clashes were less chaotic and more tactical than those I’d seen weeks earlier. At first the police were simply trying to drive the pickets away from the waterfront, not to overwhelm them. The strikers had immobilized the railroad tracks that serviced the docks by parking cars across them. Trucks were harder to stop and some got through to the docks. Up from the Embarcadero, a few fires had started on a hillside covered with dry grass. Quin said these were caused by tear gas shells, but the strikers were also trying to slow the march of policemen up the hill and might have ignited the grass. The fire trucks that rolled up turned their hoses on both the flames and the picketing union members.
I had just rejoined my group at Wun Chew’s when we heard firing downstairs. Looking out the window, we saw pickets vomiting. Along with tear gas the police were now using nausea gas. When we looked down the street we saw several fallen and wretching strikers. We could see a few blocks in either direction, and the fighting seemed to be resolving itself not into a single battle but a dozen skirmishes. Charging in their gas masks, the police hurling the canisters looked like undersea monsters. Other police had riot guns and wooden cudgels they used to club strikers to the ground.
“Who actually is doing the rioting,” Pammy said, and it was not a question.