Those famously militantly feminist men of Omaha organize to defend women from depredations…or it was a racist mob attacking Greek immigrants.

‘South Omaha Race War’ from The Chicago Daily Socialist. Vol. 3 No. 100. February 22, 1909.

TORCH IS USED IN GREEK RACE MAR

South Omaha Mob Burns the Homes of Foreigners and Attacks Them

Omaha, Neb., Feb. 22. Three persons were shot, a score of others injured by heavy missiles, and many houses partly destroyed by fire and axes last night as the result of a race riot between hundreds of men of South Omaha and the members of the Greek colony there.

The attack on the Greeks followed a mass meeting where violence was urged by the speakers, among whom were two members of the State legislature and a former city attorney. The meeting was called after hundreds of men had signed a petition in which the Greeks were charged with serious crimes against girls and women.

Murder the Direct Cause

The speakers referred to the murder of Patrolman Edward Lowery, who was shot and killed on Friday by a Greek whom he had placed under arrest. The murderer had been arrested while in the room of an American girl.

When the meeting broke up with the intention of meeting again last night, a crowd of more than 1,000 men started toward the quarters of the foreigners In the neighborhood of Twenty-sixth and Q streets. They were determined to punish some of the leaders of the Greeks, but when two of the mob, Frank Sweeney and Joseph Gamble, both young boys, were injured in the attack on the first house by shots fired from the interior, some began to apply the torch.

Pillage Business Places

Two blocks east another crowd smashed the front of a saloon and attempted to pillage the Interior, when a squad of police charged the crowd and prevented the mob from securing the liquor.

A third crowd rushed to Twenty-Fourth and L streets and attacked confectionery store run by Demos Bros. The big plate glass windows were quickly smashed, the doors kicked in and the stock and showcases destroyed. Mrs. Mary Demos and her aged father were in the store and both narrowly escaped death at the hands of the mob.

Police Are Caught Unawares

The three attacks were made almost simultaneously and the destruction was complete before Chief of Police Briggs could get his scattered forces together and stop the depredations. Meantime Sheriff Bralley was notified and collected all the deputies possible and rushed them to South Omaha to aid the police. It took some time to get the force organized, and during the interval Greeks were attacked on every hand.

The members of the mob assaulted many Italians and Roumanians, who were mistaken for Greeks.

The lawlessness lasted for three hours before a semblance of quiet could be restored. The police gained control about 6 o’clock, but were unable to disperse the crowd which thronged the streets in the vicinity of where the trouble occurred.

The Chicago Socialist, sometimes daily sometimes weekly, was published from 1902 until 1912 as the paper of the Chicago Socialist Party. The roots of the paper lie with Workers Call, published from 1899 as a Socialist Labor Party publication, becoming a voice of the Springfield Social Democratic Party after splitting with De Leon in July, 1901. It became the Chicago Socialist Party paper with the SDP’s adherence and changed its name to the Chicago Socialist in March, 1902. In 1906 it became a daily and published until 1912 by Local Cook County of the Socialist Party and was edited by A.M. Simons if the International Socialist Review. A cornucopia of historical information on the Chicago workers movements lies within its pages.

PDF of full issue: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/chicago-daily-socialist/1909/090222-chicagodailysocialist-v03n100.pdf