In 1913 and 1914, a series of events occured in Southern Colorado which ultimately had a major impact on Wyoming and, indeed, on mining throughout the Rocky Mountain West. Beginning in the 1890's, the United Mine Workers began to organize the mining camps of Southern Colorado and Northern New Mexico. Conditions in the mines owned by Colorado Fuel and Iron Company ("C. F. & I.") were abysmal. In Wyoming the C. F. & I owned the Sunrise iron ore mine near Hartville, not involved in the strike. The Company also at one time had industrial interests in Laramie and owned the Colorado and Southern Railroad used to bring iron ore from Wyoming to the Company's main smelter in Pueblo. C. F. & I. miners were paid by tonnage mined. The Company would cheat in the scales. Notwithstanding Colorado law making illegal payment of wages in Company scrip redeemable only at the Company Store, Colorado mines persisted in the practice. The rental of the company houses returned to the Company 6 to 8% on investment. Workers were not paid for time expended in shoring up the galleries or installing tram track ("Dead work"). The cost of black powder using in the mining of the face was deducted from their pay as was the cost of blacksmithing on the tools. A series of unsuccessful strikes hit the Colorado and New Mexico mines. Miners struck in Gallup, N. Mex. in 1900; and in Colorado in 1903, 1904, and 1910. On September 23, 1913, over 12,000 miners in sourthern Colorado went on strike. The demands were simple. Many of the demands were already required by Colorado law, but the law was ignored by C. F. & I. The union demands: :

Recognition of the U.M.W.;

A 10% increase in tonnage rates to equal those of miners in Wyoming;

Election of their own weighmen to weigh the tonnage;

Payment for "dead work;"

An eight-hour day;

The right to trade at other than the Company store and to reside where they chose;

Enforcement of Colorado mining laws (Colorado had twice the fatality rate as the rest of the Country) and abolishment of a system of private security utilized by the Company.

United Mine Workers monument to those killed at Ludlow, Colorado. Photo by Geoff Dobson, 2008.

In response, the miners were evicted from the Company-owned houses and C. F. & I. brought in a private security firm who utilized an armored car affixed with a machine gun. On October 17, 1913, the car, known as the "Death Special," was used at Forbes, Colorado, to spray with bullets a tent city in which the miners and their families were dwelling. One tent was found to have 148 bullet holes. One miner was killed and a child was shot. As if to prove the Union's concern about mine safety, on October 22 at 3:00 p.m., an explosion in a Phelps-Dodge Mine in Dawson, N. Mex. killed 261 miners. A tongue of flame shot out 100 feet from the mine mouth. The force of the explosion shook houses two miles away. Subsequent investigation revealed that dynamite used in violation of Bureau of Mines standards set off an explosion of coal dust. The Bureau also recommended that dust be kept down with a water spray and rock dust. Neither had been done. Ten years later another 120 were killed in Dawson. Again water sprays were not used. In 1950, Phelps Dodge closed the town and evicted all of the residents on 30 days notice. The town was razed and nothing remains except the cemetery.

The strike continued. The governor of Colorado, at the request of the Company, called out the Colorado National Guard. Company "guards" were sworn into the Colorado National Guard. Eighteen miles north of Trinidad at Ludlow, the Union established a tent town occupied by over 900. The miners constructed a school, a stage for emtertainment and a baseball field. On April 19, 1914, the miners played a baseball game. The game was interrupted by members of the National Guard riding onto the field. The next day, the town was attacked by the National Guard who burned the town down. In the smoldering ruins 23 miners, women and children were found dead. Some had taken refuge in a hole later known as the "death pit."

The bodies of three miners lay alongside the railroad tracks for passengers on the trains to view. For three days, the National Guard would not allow the bodies to be removed. One miner, Louis Tikas, had a fractured skull from having been clubbed by Lt. Karl E. Linderfelt with a Springfield rifle. Tikas was then shot as he lay dying on the ground.

Eighty-four year old, Mother Jones, Mary Harris Jones (1830-1930), the famous turn of the century reformist, traveled to Trinidad where she was arrested and held incommunicato by the Colorado Guard.

The Death Pit, Ludlow, Colorado, 1914.