Jack Battuello Memoir #1 - University of Illinois Springfield

Jack Battuello 1.6
The negotiations didn't stop there. In a special meeting, we elected
a special committee, other than our regular officers and seat this
committee to the coal company to discuss and negotiate this problem
of the division of work for the Number One men at these other mines.
Again the company denied it. At the next regular meeting they reported
their failure. Well, you can understand our mood when we Lcft that
meeting. We thought, "Well, this is a hard-nosed attitude and its
purpose is to destroy somc kind of a condition." Perhaps this would
be the leverage to which they would proceed to undermine all of the
conditions subsequently. The next day we decided--the rank and file
decided--that we would negotiate with the company -in a different
manner. We decided to sit down and we sat down in the Number Four
Mine.
Q. Where was 4t located?
A. Wilsonville. We sat down in that particular mine, in that present
condition and present term. These was 544 miners at the Number Four
mine. We gathered the miners at the bottom of the shaft on this
particular day in April, 1937. We discussed and informed them about
thc conditions that was facing us and the attitude of the company.
After this explanation, the miners decided that we'd remain in the
mine. To my knowledge, this was the first sit-down in a coal mine
in the history of the United States. These four mines being connected
by entries, underground, enablcd us, later on, to ga from this mine
underground to the others, and we shut them all down. So we shut
a11 four mines down. For nine days we sat down in the mines and
waited for our officers--the local president, the Board member and
the state--to do something about it.
Q. Wcrr you an official of the union at that time?
A. No, I was not. Anyhow, for nine days there was some sort of
negotfations attempting to settle this dispute but the company
remained adamant. The president of the company, who was also the
president of the Chicago-Northwestern--the Superior Coal Company was
a subsidiary of the Nort'hweste-rn. Mr. Fiedler came down from Chicago
and he refuscd to settle it, refused to negatiate. We continued to
sit down, Finally the thing came to an end and we gat our division
of work. They had discharged--at least they publicly announced that
they were going to discharge all of the. leaders of the sit-down strike,
at least the local ones. The discharges didn't stick, they a11 went
bac-k to work and we goc over that hurdle pretty good. We had not
casualties whatsoever. We had full and complete control of the mines.
We furnished the coal to the botler rooms to keep the ventilation
goi.ng. We organized our underground sit-down strike which occurred
only--the men were only in control actually of the Number Four mine
on1.y. The other miners hadn't set down. They were out of the mines
when we sat down, so they closed the mines. Then we formed a real
civic community. We had our strike committee, we had our sick committee,
Jack Battuello Memoir -- Archives, University of Illinois at Springfield