What does that actually mean? Socialism comprises a range of economic and social systems. The central ideas of socialism include social ownership, which places ownership of the means of production (facilities, machinery, tools, capital) with the public or with employees of a certain enterprise, and democratic control of the means of production, which places autonomy over working conditions, leadership in the workplace, and day-to-day operations back in the hands of the workers. Socialist political movements are primarily directed against the social and economic problems wrought by capitalism, problems that socialists such as Tateh would have felt on a regular basis.
Anarchism is a political philosophy that advocates self-governed societies organized into voluntary institutions. Anarchism believes the state, as well as other authority or hierarchical organization, to be unnecessary and harmful. Like socialism, there are many strains of anarchism, the most common being social anarchism (or socialist anarchism), which shares a strong belief in community and social equality with socialism.
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Evelyn Nesbit divorced Harry Thaw in 1912. A year later she married Jack Clifford, a ragtime dancer with whom she had a stage act. Unfortunately, Nesbit seemed to be tarnished by her ex-husband's past. The public could not disconnect her reputation of "lethal beauty" with the "playboy killer" Thaw and the murder of her lover. Clifford's own identity became "Mr. Evelyn Nesbit" which he resented, eventually leading to their separation in 1918. They were not legally divorced until 1924. See the article in the Chicago Tribune declaring their divorce here.
The rich lady may not be aware that young girls in the slums are stolen everyday from their parents and sold into slavery. This quote from Tateh answers Evelyn Nesbit's question as to why he chooses to keep Little Girl on a leash in the slums of the Lower East Side. Child labor and child slavery has sadly always been in high demand because children could be paid less, could fix the small parts of machines that adults might not be able to reach, rarely formed unions, and were less likely to strike. The problem with employing children, according to E.L. Doctorow, "had to do only with their endurance". In the later hours of the day, children tended to lose their efficiency and were more likely to injure themselves.
Two factors increased child labor in the late 1800s. One, the influx of immigrants from Ireland in the 1840s and later southern and eastern Europe after 1880 brought a new supply of children who often came from rural communities in which child labor was a necessity. Two, the Industrial Revolution expanded the demand and opportunities for immigrant children. In 1900, 18 percent of American laborers were under 16 years old. In the southern cotton industry, the number rose to 25 percent under 15 years old, with half of these children under 12 years old. The National Child Labor Committee, formed in 1904, used mass political action, including pamphlets, mass mailing, and photography of factory conditions to lobby for political change. Despite measures of success with these actions, it largely depended on the political climate of America at the time. For example, during the Great Depression, child labor saw a steep decline primarily because workers wanted the few available jobs to go to adults, not children. Mam'zelle Champagne was the show at which Harry K. Thaw shot architect Stanford White. It premiered on June 25, 1906 and closed on September 1, 1906 after sixty performances. The otherwise unremarkable show ran that long largely due to publicity from the murder. The shooting occurred during the song linked below, called "I Could Love a Million Girls". In Ragtime, Younger Brother has a drawing of Charles Dana Gibson's "Women: The Eternal Question" pinned up in his room. Gibson is credited with the invention of the "Gibson girl" in 1890, a new standard for women as depicted in his drawings. The Gibson girl was taller than most other women, bold and independent while still feminine, poised and well-bred while still mischevious. Gibson's drawings were a feature of Life magazine for thirty years.
There were not many profile shots of Nesbit at the time, but based on the comparisons above, we can safely assume Gibson used Robert Eickemeyer Jr.'s photograph as reference for his famous drawing. Scholar Paula Uruburu notes that Nesbit also sat as a model for Gibson in person at least once. Evelyn had become an artist's model as early as thirteen years old, but her idealization as Gibson girl revealed her beauty to a much wider audience and fanned the flame of her vaudeville career. As seen in the Ragtime novel when Evelyn Nesbit visits the poor, The I.W.W. was founded in Chicago in 1905. The goal of the organization was for all workers to be united as a class to abolish the wage system. The motto of the I.W.W. is "An Injury to One is an Injury to All". Leaders believed the most effective way to gain power was through strikes, propaganda, boycotts, and their controversial strategy of sabotage. Sabotage as defined by the I.W.W. does not mean the destruction of property or machinery. It is the collective withdrawal of efficiency by workers at the point of production, also called "direct action". When other leaders began to disagree with these strategies, the I.W.W. split in 1908. By 1912, the I.W.W. had over 50,000 members and was involved in over 150 strikes. They are sometimes known as the "singing union" because of their iconic Little Red Songbook. Another icon of the I.W.W. is a black cat called the "sabo-tabby" (from the word sabotage). This was one of many "silent agitator" graphics used as symbols for workers to communicate. Some have suggested that the adoption of the word "cat" by beat poets and jazz musicians comes from the I.W.W.'s use of the word. Members of the I.W.W. were called Wobblies. There are a few theories as to how they got their name:
Read a much more in depth history of the I.W.W. here. |
Dramaturgy for the Ragtime musical and novel.© Eliza Pillsbury, 2018. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this site’s owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Eliza Pillsbury with appropriate and specific direction to the original content. Categories
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