Mary Harris Jones

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Mary Harris Jones, 1902

Mary Harris "Mother" Jones (* probably around August 1, 1837 , according to her own statements on May 1, 1830 in Cork , Ireland ; † November 30, 1930 in Silver Spring , Maryland ) was a prominent American leader of the labor force and union movement .

Life

The Harris family emigrated to America during the 1840s. Mary graduated from high school , worked as a teacher in a nunnery, as a seamstress in Chicago , then as a teacher in Memphis , Tennessee . There she married George E. Jones, a steel worker and union member, in 1861. Six years later she lost her husband and her four small children in a yellow fever - epidemic . She returned to Chicago to open a sewing shop. In the great Chicago fire of 1871, Jones lost everything she owned. She turned to the Knights of Labor , an American workers' association that also accepted and supported female and black workers, and from then on she devoted herself to the struggle for decent wages and working conditions.

Mary Harris Jones, known as "Mother Jones", co-founded the Industrial Workers of the World in 1905 and was later also with the United Mine Workers and the Socialist Party of America . The left American magazine Mother Jones is named after her. Songwriter Tom Russell memorialized her with the song The Most Dangerous Woman In America . Irish singer Andy Irvine does the same with the song The Spirit of Mother Jones on the album Abocurragh.

literature

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Jones, Mary Harris
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Jones, Mother (nickname)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American trade unionist and social revolutionary
DATE OF BIRTH August 1, 1837
PLACE OF BIRTH Cork
DATE OF DEATH November 30, 1930
Place of death Silver Spring