History isn't made by kings and politicians, it's made by all of us

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    6 February 2006: Liberia Firestone strike

    Mini-podcast about the Liberia strike of Firestone/Bridgestone workers into thousand six.
    See more information, sources, and maps our Stories app: https://stories.workingclasshistory.com/article/7971/liberia-firestone-strike

    And see all of our anniversaries each day on the On This Day section of our Stories app: stories.workingclasshistory.com/date/today

    Our work is only possible because of support from you, our listeners on patreon. If you appreciate our work, please join us and access exclusive content and benefits at patreon.com/workingclasshistory.


    Acknowledgements

    • Written and edited by Working Class History.
    • Theme music by Ricardo Araya. Check out his YouTube channel at youtube.com/@peptoattack
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  1. On this day, 28 July 1915, the United States invaded Haiti, crushing opposition and setting up a dictatorship which governed the country for the next 19 years.
US Secretary of State Robert Lansing claimed the invasion was necessary to end “anarchy,...

    On this day, 28 July 1915, the United States invaded Haiti, crushing opposition and setting up a dictatorship which governed the country for the next 19 years.
    US Secretary of State Robert Lansing claimed the invasion was necessary to end “anarchy, savagery and oppression” in Haiti, and claimed that “the African race are devoid of any capacity for political organisation.” The government had been lobbied for some time by US banking interests to occupy Haiti to assert US financial dominance as opposed to dominance by the financial institutions of the French former colonial power.
    In the years of occupation, the US forcibly dissolved parliament, killed thousands of people – and posed for photographs with their corpses – as well as siphoning wealth from the country. They also tied people up with ropes and forced them to work for no pay, killing people who attempted to flee.
    US authorities installed a puppet leader, Louis Borno, who admired fascist dictator Benito Mussolini, and had him take out a loan from the National City Bank, the forerunner of Citigroup. Around a quarter of Haiti’s revenues then went towards paying for this loan. The measures left Haitian farmers “close to starvation level”, according to the United Nations.
    While formal US colonial occupation ended in 1934, US retained neocolonial financial control of the country through the remaining debt until 1947.
    Reflecting on his role in the events, US Major General Smedley Butler stated that he “helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues,” and described himself as a “racketeer for capitalism.”
    More information, sources and map: https://stories.workingclasshistory.com/article/10016/us-invasion-of-haiti https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=668997001940185&set=a.602588028581083&type=3

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  1. On this day, 28 July 1985, Anti-Fascist Action (AFA) was officially launched at a meeting in Conway Hall, London, attended by 250 people with representatives from Red Action, Class War, Jewish Socialists Group, Newham Monitoring Project, Workers’...

    On this day, 28 July 1985, Anti-Fascist Action (AFA) was officially launched at a meeting in Conway Hall, London, attended by 250 people with representatives from Red Action, Class War, Jewish Socialists Group, Newham Monitoring Project, Workers’ Power, Searchlight and various local anti-racist bodies from across the country. Its dedication to ‘physical and ideological opposition’ to the fascism would see it drive numerous far-right groups off the streets.
    For example, the fascist British National Party (BNP) had been growing in confidence in Liverpool, launching violent attacks on left-wingers, including trying to burn down a bookshop run by feminist collective. Within a year the BNP had been beaten from the streets, and later admitted they “were driven underground” by anti-fascists. And in London, after the neo-Nazi record label Blood and Honour tried to organise public events in the city, they too were smashed off the streets by AFA members who took over their redirection points for shows in Marble Arch in 1989 and Waterloo in 1992.
    AFA mostly wound down in the mid-1990s after the BNP had been forced to change its strategy from trying to control the streets to running in local elections.
    We have some anti-fascist books and merch available in our online store which you can check out, proceeds help fund our work: https://shop.workingclasshistory.com/collections/anti-fascist https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=668836361956249&set=a.602588028581083&type=3

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  1. On this day, 28 July 1932, the US government sent in the army to attack World War I veterans and their families with tanks, fixed bayonets, teargas and sabres, killing three, when vets marched demanding the wartime bonuses they were promised. The...

    On this day, 28 July 1932, the US government sent in the army to attack World War I veterans and their families with tanks, fixed bayonets, teargas and sabres, killing three, when vets marched demanding the wartime bonuses they were promised. The bonus payments were due to be paid in 1945 but when the great depression hit, leaving many veterans destitute, they decided to demand earlier payments. Up to 25,000 vets, Black and white, formed a “Bonus Army” and set up camp in Washington DC. Major Patton, whose life had been saved by one of the protesters, advised his troops to stab protesters with bayonets, and kill a large number of veterans as “an object lesson”. General MacArthur and Dwight Eisenhower were the other officers in charge of the operation which killed two veterans and an 11-week-old baby, partially blinded an 8-year-old boy, and injured a thousand others.
    Read this and hundreds of other stories in our book, Working Class History: Everyday Acts of Resistance & Rebellion, available here with global shipping: https://shop.workingclasshistory.com/products/working-class-history-everyday-acts-resistance-rebellion-book https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=668683575304861&set=a.602588028581083&type=3

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  1. On this day, 27 July 1933, bus drivers in Havana went on strike, and other drivers soon walked out in sympathy. This was the start of the unrest that culminated in a general strike of Cuban workers and students that effectively shut down the nation...

    On this day, 27 July 1933, bus drivers in Havana went on strike, and other drivers soon walked out in sympathy. This was the start of the unrest that culminated in a general strike of Cuban workers and students that effectively shut down the nation and forced the brutal dictator Gerardo Machado from power.
    Machado made a last-minute deal with trade union leaders and the central committee of the Cuban Communist Party, claiming that they would be legalised and given government support if they ended the strike, but the agreement was rejected by workers, and the strike continued, even after police killed twenty demonstrators. On August 9, the military decided to stop supporting Machado, and two days later his government collapsed.
    Read this and hundreds of other stories in our book, Working Class History: Everyday Acts of Resistance & Rebellion, available here with global shipping: https://shop.workingclasshistory.com/products/working-class-history-everyday-acts-resistance-rebellion-book https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=668662698640282&set=a.602588028581083&type=3

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  1. New! Bonus podcast episode as part of our series about the Italian resistance. In this episode we discuss numerous films about Italian fascism and the partisan resistance to it. In particular, we discuss Rome, Open City (1945), The Four Days of...

    New! Bonus podcast episode as part of our series about the Italian resistance. In this episode we discuss numerous films about Italian fascism and the partisan resistance to it. In particular, we discuss Rome, Open City (1945), The Four Days of Naples (1962), The Garden of the Finzi Continis (1970), The Conformist (1970), 1900 (1976), The Seven Cervi Brothers (1968) and Johnny the Partisan (2000). Listen to it, and the series so far and support our work at https://www.patreon.com/posts/e77-1-italian-86686191 https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=668474565325762&set=a.602588028581083&type=3

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  1. On this day, 27 July 2017, bus drivers in Brisbane, Australia launched a fare strike where they refused to charge passengers for journeys in a protest demanding better pay and safety. Further fare strikes, as well as all-out strikes, continued...

    On this day, 27 July 2017, bus drivers in Brisbane, Australia launched a fare strike where they refused to charge passengers for journeys in a protest demanding better pay and safety. Further fare strikes, as well as all-out strikes, continued intermittently over the coming weeks as workers pursued a 3.5% pay increase, rather than the 2.5% which had been offered over the following 3 years. The workers eventually agreed to a 2.5% increase plus a $500 bonus in September.
    More information, sources and map: https://stories.workingclasshistory.com/article/9915/brisbane-fare-strike https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=668335485339670&set=a.602588028581083&type=3

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  1. On this day, 26 July 1937, British colonial authorities in Barbados secretly deported Clement Payne, a worker who was trying to start a trade union, to Trinidad where police were waiting to arrest him for possessing prohibited literature. He was...

    On this day, 26 July 1937, British colonial authorities in Barbados secretly deported Clement Payne, a worker who was trying to start a trade union, to Trinidad where police were waiting to arrest him for possessing prohibited literature. He was originally charged with knowingly making a false declaration for stating he had been born in Barbados, whereas unknown to him he was actually born in Trinidad of Barbadian parents. He appealed his conviction on the 26th, and although his appeal was successful he was expelled from the island. In response, workers rioted, and strikes spread for several days.
    Our latest podcast episode is about the Trinidad general strike of 1937. Listen wherever you get your podcasts or go to our website: https://workingclasshistory.com/podcast/e75-76-trinidad-general-strike/ https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=668167482023137&set=a.602588028581083&type=3

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  1. On this day, 25 July 1972, the US government admitted its role in the Tuskegee syphilis experiment, a horrific 40-year study of poor Black agricultural workers in Alabama who had syphilis but were not informed.
Over the course of the study, 128...

    On this day, 25 July 1972, the US government admitted its role in the Tuskegee syphilis experiment, a horrific 40-year study of poor Black agricultural workers in Alabama who had syphilis but were not informed.
    Over the course of the study, 128 participants died of syphilis or related complications, 40 wives of participants were infected, and 19 children were born with congenital syphilis.
    The government owned up following leaks to the media about the programme. The resulting public outrage forced the introduction of federal regulation to protect human subjects in medical trials.
    More information, sources and map: https://stories.workingclasshistory.com/article/9751/tuskegee-experiment-revealed https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=667731932066692&set=a.602588028581083&type=3

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  1. On this day, 25 July 1898, the United States invaded the Caribbean island of Puerto Rico. The US government claimed that they were liberating Puerto Rico from Spanish colonial rule. The event took place amidst the so-called Spanish-American war which...

    On this day, 25 July 1898, the United States invaded the Caribbean island of Puerto Rico. The US government claimed that they were liberating Puerto Rico from Spanish colonial rule. The event took place amidst the so-called Spanish-American war which also affected Cuba and the Philippines.
    By December, the US force of over 15,000 troops was victorious. However, rather than liberating Puerto Rico, instead US troops became the new occupying power. Spanish colonists in Puerto Rico were then given US citizenship, and US troops began protecting Spanish landowners from attacks by landless rebels and independence activists.
    The new US colonial power focused on overseeing the takeover of land by large sugar corporations, harvested by workers paid in company chits rather than money. By 1910, sugar corporations controlled over 60% of arable land on the island.
    In 1917, the US eventually granted citizenship to all Puerto Ricans, but the ruthless exploitation of Puerto Rican workers continued. Working class and anti-colonial struggles broke out continuously, like the strike of sugar workers in 1934, and a wave of workers’ and land struggles in the 1960s.
    Public pressure forced concessions to be granted, like the introduction of an elected governor in 1948 and Commonwealth status granting partial autonomy in 1952. Over time the Puerto Rican economy also became more and more integrated with and dependent on the US. Meanwhile, the US Federal Bureau of Investigation attempted to infiltrate and disrupt pro-independence movements.
    In 1967 a plebiscite was held on the future status of the island given the options of a continuing Commonwealth, US statehood or independence. 60% of voters chose a continuation of Commonwealth status, with 39% backing statehood and only 0.6% voting for independence.
    Puerto Rico remains under US control to this day.
    More information, sources and map: https://stories.workingclasshistory.com/article/9748/us-invades-puerto-rico https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=667573708749181&set=a.602588028581083&type=3

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  1. On this day, 25 July 1934, Nestor Makhno, leader of the Revolutionary Insurrectionary Army of Ukraine during the Russian revolution of 1917, died from tuberculosis, aged 44, in exile in Paris. In the 1917 revolution his militia, dubbed the...

    On this day, 25 July 1934, Nestor Makhno, leader of the Revolutionary Insurrectionary Army of Ukraine during the Russian revolution of 1917, died from tuberculosis, aged 44, in exile in Paris. In the 1917 revolution his militia, dubbed the Makhnovists, defeated the counter-revolutionary White armies of generals Denikin and Wrangel, executed antisemites and redistributed land and power to the workers and peasants. The Makhnovists were allied with the Red Army, but after the defeat of the Whites, the Red Army attacked them in order to consolidate Bolshevik control of Ukraine. The Makhnovists then fought against their previous allies, until they were eventually overrun by overwhelming military force, and Makhno himself had to flee the country.
    Learn more about Makhno’s life and activism in this new biography, No Harmless Power: The Life And Times Of The Ukrainian Anarchist Nestor Makhno by Charlie Allison, available for preorder now, and due back from the printers next month: https://shop.workingclasshistory.com/products/no-harmless-power-the-life-and-times-of-the-ukrainian-anarchist-nestor-makhno-charlie-allison https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=667344355438783&set=a.602588028581083&type=3

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