If you'd been present at one of the many violent miners' strikes that erupted during the late 1800s, you probably would have seen Mother Jones at the head of the crowd shouting those exact words. It must have been an amazing sight-a small, grandmotherly woman suddenly coming alive to fire up the proceedings with an explosive mix of passion and eloquence. She was a glorious study in contrasts, Mother Jones, meaning that the little granny who seemed the picture of innocence was actually, for a time, branded "the most dangerous woman in America."

What fueled the fires of Mother Jones' passion? Her own rock-solid beliefs, certainly, and probably two tragedies that marked her earlier years. In 1867, while living in Memphis, she lost her entire family-her husband and four children-to an epidemic of yellow fever. She moved to Chicago, but when the Great Chicago Fire of 1871 swept the city, she lost everything. The Great Fire brought her to the union movement. She turned to the unions for aid and was attracted to their crusade to improve the life of the working classes. Mother Jones decided to join their fight.

And with that decision was born one of the most effective labor leaders of all time. It is said that she could single-handedly keep a strike alive with her rhetoric. This talent made her famous with the unions, and despised by the strike-breaking companies they were fighting. The authorities began to target her for arrest, and she was thrown in jail too many times to count-even when she was in her eighties.

Well into her nineties, Mother Jones was fighting for the rights of garment, steel, and streetcar workers. Today, she is considered a heroine of the working classes. If the poor or the disadvantaged have a protecting saint, she might very well be seen in the stormy face of Mother Jones.

Excerpted from the book Cool Women with permission of publisher, Girl Press.

Learn More About Mother Jones
Mother Jones Autobiography
http://www.angelfire.com/nj3/RonMBaseman/mojones.htm
You can read Mother Jones' autobiography online at this site.

Mother Jones Quotes
http://www.igc.org/laborquotes/mjones.html
This site includes a collection of quotes by Mother Jones.

Mother Jones Biography
http://www.execpc.com/~shepler/mojo.html
Find related books and movies, as well as a biography and links about Mother Jones.

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