Seeking work in the Canal Zone, a U.S. wobbly writes home of his immediate regrets.

‘On the Canal Zone’ from the Industrial Union Bulletin. Vol. 1 No. 2. March 8, 1907.

The following interesting letter received at this office is from an Industrial Worker employed at Gorgona, on the Panama Canal Zone:

“It is with pleasure that I read the announcement in the Daily People that the Bulletin would hereafter be issued weekly. Conditions on the zone are not the best for Revolutionists or revolutionary organizations. I endeavored to establish an I.W.W. club in Gorgona but after learning that secret service mien were abroad in this land, and knowing that the establishment of a revolutionary organization would only cause the expulsion from the Isthmus of its members, I gave it up, and like the rest of the suckers that came to the Isthmus ‘I won’t be here but a short time.’

“The conditions on the zone are anything but pleasant–for the most part only needs five letters G-r-a-f-t. From the time we left New Orleans until the present as long as we remain on the Isthmus, until we pull the cash from our jeans to fill the coffers of the steam ship company we are in the grasp of commercial pirates. Let me begin in the beginning and end when I get tired. We sailed from New Orleans Nov. 25 on Steamship Ellis of the United Fruit Co., 129 men with hopes in their breasts, soon to be crushed. The capacity of the old tub was 60, the other 69 went down in the hole where they carry freight. Enough. One who reads may surmise what kind of a time 129 men had, when we had only room for 60, and how we enjoyed our Thanksgiving, ‘swell indeed.’ We arrived in Colon Nov. 30th and were immediately transferred into this dark, dismal, damp, dungeon-like place, where the mountains roll about on each side and the Chagres river winds and twines hither and thither. God knows where. Gorgona is anything but pleasant. Upon our arrival in Gorgona we were quartered in what is known as the old Canteen, an old French building, 40 men to the room full of bugs, roaches and fleas, on bare cots and the stench from the choked-up closets was almost unbearable. We stayed there about a week, when we were transferred to new quarters, our beds and mattresses arriving about a week later. No pillows, blankets or sheets in the commissary to buy. We were strangers, in a strange land. The story from the quarter-master that the men came down in a rush gave us some satisfaction. The agent represented to me before I came that everything was lovely and the commission was doing everything in its power to make the ‘goose hang high.’

“When meal time came we were informed that hotel books consisted of 50 tickets to the book, at a price of $15. You must work long enough to have that amount coming to you before you can put in your application for one, and then wait another week before you get it. You cannot buy one for cash, they charge 50c per meal until you get one. The meals are poor, notwithstanding Teddy’s praise of same; flap-jacks and wagon grease, a plate of oat meal and an egg, cold storage, so old and hard they are unfit to eat, is breakfast. Any free lunch counter in the states puts up a better meal for 5c than is placed before the men in the Gorgona hotel. Gorgona has its full quota of booze fighters. Why shouldn’t it? The master mechanic, who by the way is the largest pebble on the Gorgona beach, owns the only saloon of any consequence in town. It is to his material interest to keep his customers at the zone. The result is fighting, thievery and all kinds of rowdyism. The mechanics use for water in the Gorgona shops condensed steam, at all times hot or luke-warm; all the men of all nationalities, white, black or brown flop their lips over the same one-inch pipe. no regards paid to health there. It is said the government pays for ice for the employees, but it never passes the American billiard saloon. The average life of a job here is considered 15 days. Thousands come and thousands go. Of the 120 men that came on the boat when I did not one dozen are on the zone today. There are three men to every job and boat loads arriving three and four times a week. Mostly from New York and the Eastern States.

“Mechanics of 15 and 20 years’ experience are fired, body and breeches, for the least mistake. Why is this thus? Why do they bring in men when they are not needed and so reckless in discharging them? One of the high officials of the commission is vice president of the most important steamship line plying between New York and Colen, the Panama Railroad Steamship Line. Probably this has no connection, but it is whispered out loud hereabouts that a rake off occurs at intervals on the transportation lines.

“I was told that I would get family quarters within six months. The few who have tried to stick it out gave up in disgust. There are quarters for officials and men with a political pull, as for myself I wouldn’t risk bringing mine to this graft-ridden country.

“Anent the health of this glorious country; the hospitals are all full and this in the healthy season. Malarial, intermittent, remittent and pernicious fevers are at all times common. Leprosy is known to exist on the zone. Yellow fever and smallpox never fail to appear each year, and. the season now drawing near. The deathly pallor of the faces you meet on the streets tells the tale of the poisonous country. It is perpetual summer here. Vegetation is of very rapid growth and very rapid decay. The result is the creation of an intense miasmatic poison. The ‘Pure Mountain Spring Water’ so extensively advertised by the commission agents, is pure before it leaves the spring, but after traveling for miles over decomposed vegetable matter, it is pure somewhat on the order of the pure jungle brand of beef canned for sale in our American factories. They have the ‘Pure Mountain Spring Water’ dammed up just above Gorgona. The dam causes it to spread out into a marsh, covered with green slime, very much like the swamps of Louisiana in the summer time. It is pumped from this marsh into a reservoir on top of a mountain and gravitates to the quarters, hot and nasty. It is said that the first two years is the hardest to stay, after that you can stay alright, if some meddlesome friend doesn’t ship your body back to the states. For the benefit of the members of the Industrial Workers of the World I give these few brief facts. I would advise no working man to come to the zone. I will soon be back in the States and in the movement for the emancipation of our class.”

The Industrial Union Bulletin, and the Industrial Worker were newspapers published by the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) from 1907 until 1913. First printed in Joliet, Illinois, IUB incorporated The Voice of Labor, the newspaper of the American Labor Union which had joined the IWW, and another IWW affiliate, International Metal Worker.The Trautmann-DeLeon faction issued its weekly from March 1907. Soon after, De Leon would be expelled and Trautmann would continue IUB until March 1909. It was edited by A. S. Edwards. 1909, production moved to Spokane, Washington and became The Industrial Worker, “the voice of revolutionary industrial unionism.”

PDF of full issue: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/industrialworker/iub/v1n02-mar-09-1907-iub.pdf