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Photos from a 2018 visit to the Ludlow Memorial, site of the Ludlow Massacre of 1914 when the Colorado National Guard & company heavies attacked a tent colony of striking coal miners & their families Bio of Mother Jones, who organized with the United Mine Workers: blogs.loc.gov/inside_adams...

Photo from June 2018. The Ludlow Memorial in Trinidad, Colorado (Las Animas County), the site of The Ludlow Massacre where striking miners and some of their families were killed. The monument is a tall die, base, and cap style with an inscription on one if the broad sides. Below the inscription are figures of a man standing slightly apart from a woman holding a young child on her lap.

Photograph of the side of a box(?) outside the fence surrounding the Ludlow Monument, which is covered with various union stickers both general and for local unions. June 2018.

June 2018 photograph of an interpretive/information sign at the Ludlow Memorial. Text (truncated): The Story History often neglects or omits the 1913-1914 Colorado coalfield strike and massacre. Looking onto this prairie, you see one of several places where coal miners lived during the strike. Miners demanded better wages, an eight-hour work day, a safe workplace, less company control over their lives, and the right to organize. After the United Mine Workers of America (UMWA) called the strike in September 1913, the coal companies evicted thousands of miners and their families from their homes in company towns. The UMWA leased the land, provided tents, and even issued a small allowance. Ludlow was the largest tent colony, with about 200 tents and 1,200 people. A culturally diverse group maintained solidarity during the strike. Local Hispanic people and European immigrants provided the majority of the labor force. People spoke at least twenty-four distinct languages. These different groups pulled together to form a community with a common goal. Violence on both sides plagued the strike. Governor Elias Ammons called out the Colorado National Guard to help keep the peace. By April 1914, membership in the local militia units consisted mostly of company employees, who sided against the miners. On April 20, 1914, hostilities came to a head, which resulted in the Ludlow Massacre. Throughout the day, the militia and miners exchanged gunfire . Lives were lost on both sides. Under suspicious circumstances, the tent colony burned. Two women and eleven children suffocated in a cellar dug beneath their tent, known as the Death Pit. The Death Pit and the monument serve as a memorial to those who lost their lives in the battle. While accounts differ, around 21 people died.

June 2018 photographs of a rectangular wooden sign: UNITED MINE WORKERS OF AMERICA DISTRICT 15. BE PROUD BE UNION.

sep 1, 2025, 2:42 pm • 26 4

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The story, in song, by Andy Irvine; The Monument (Lest We Forget) m.youtube.com/watch?v=6wtO...

sep 2, 2025, 1:24 am • 1 0 • view