On February 6, 1919, the city of Seattle called a general strike to support the already striking shipbuilders. For five days, the people of Seattle took over the city. They set up kitchens to feed people, they delivered milk to babies, they transported people to the hospital (which remained open), and had unarmed guards patrolling the streets. The government was so convinced this was a Bolshevik revolution, that they trucked in men and deputized citizens.
But the strike was completely incident free. There wasn’t a single arrest. One observer said later, “Nothing moved but the tide.”
The song Five Days is about strikes in general (four million workers go on strike in 1919), and then moves into the Seattle general strike. I was looking for a sort of Clash meets Billy Bragg vibe. Heavy with lots of spitting lyrics. Here’s a demo version of it.
Radical Seattle: The General Strike of 1919 by Cal Winslow
A great modern look at the Seattle General Strike in the context of all that was happening at the time.
Madison: The Illustrated Sesquicentennial History, Volume 1, 1856–1931 by Stuart D. Levitan
This excellent book about the history of Madison includes a section on strikes that happened in 1919 and the call for a general strike that never came to fruition.
Workers and Unions in Wisconsin: A Labor History Anthology by Darryl Holter
A collection of essays about labor in Wisconsin. I like this book, because it’s full of short reads. You can open to any page and learn some interesting tidbit about labor in Wisconsin.
The Labor Movement In Wisconsin: A History by Robert W. Ozanne
A well researched history of Wisconsin labor. Chapter 12: “The Fight for Union Recognition 1919-1923” in particular is relevant to this show.
Seattle 1919
A rock opera about the 1919 General Strike in Seattle! A rock opera! They only performed it once, but it’s immortalized on this album. Rob Rosenthal was also kind enough to listen to Five Days and give me some valuable feedback on it.
Written by: Ken Fitzsimmons
Ken Fitzsimmons has worked in music for 30 years, receiving a Bachelor of Music under the tutelage of jazz bass great Richard Davis, and an MBA from the Bolz Center of Arts Administration. He is the bassist in Milwaukee-based Little Blue Crunchy things and co-founder of the nationally touring Irish rock group The Kissers.
He has taught music privately for three decades and serves as the Education Director at Madison Music Foundry. In 2018 he was the Artistic Director for the multimedia “rock and roll history show” The Greatest War: World War One, Wisconsin, and Why It Still Matters produced in partnership with Four Seasons Theatre and Antishadows Theatrical Design.
