Zinn Chapter 11 Essays - Industrial Workers Of The World

Zinn Chapter 11 Chapter 11 talks about how the railroad corporations took over for profit and made low income jobs. New machines were starting to be invented, no longer needing humans to do the work. This made a lot of people jobless and did not leave many jobs for people to do. Since the railroad corporations led to low wage jobs, it made the workers very upset. They had families to feed and necessities they needed to buy in order to support their families and what they were getting paid was not enough. So three thousand workers got together for strikes and the Knights of Labor was formed , wanting more pay. Even women joined to protest the wages and hours they were being given because they did not think it was fair . Pinkerton guards boarded their barges. When a Pinkerton man shoved a striker aside, he fired and wounded the detective, leading to gunfire from both sides. Strike leaders were charged with murder and the rest with other crimes. Texas and Pacific Railroad fired a leader of the Knights of Labor, leading to a strike which spread throughout the Southwest. Even though these strikes caused a lot of damage, they did end up working and making a change because the government and corporations granted them more favorable conditions. Life for immigrants was very difficult. Those who came to the Unites States to work ended up in worse conditions working for Railroad corporations then they were already in. Plus, many people disliked the immigrants and would riot against them . Farmers were again attacked through the Homestead Act, losing so much. In 1870, John D. Rockefeller set up the Standard Oil Company. He made secret agreements with railroads to ship his oil if they gave him discounts on their prices. Which was a good strategy for him because it led other oil competitors out of business. America was used as a company with millionaires running it with their riches. Whatever it was that the poor would do to try to improve didn't work at all. It was as if the rich would get richer and the poor got poorer. Famers that thought they were going to get rich would end up losing their lands and homes because they were left in debt, they couldn't afford to pay back the loans they took out to monopolize their products .