The following entries on this page provide details, subtext or background relating to dated entries cited in the Daily Bleed Calendar, linked from there to the date(s) cited here.

The Daily Bleed Calendar in full, & access to the pages for this month, are accessible at http://www.recollectionbooks.com/bleed/calmast.htm

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On Jan. 31, 1938, some 12,000 San Antonio pecan shellers—mostly Latino women—walked off their jobs.

A three-month strike followed, in which the pecan shellers confronted both management & San Antonio politics. The strike began because of a pay cut. The wages of shellers who had earned six or seven cents a pound (six cents for pieces, seven cents for halves) were reduced to five & six cents a pound. Wages for crackers were cut from 50 cents to 40 cents for each 100 pounds.

San Antonio officials strongly opposed the strike. More than 700 arrests were made. Owen Kilday, chief of police, stated under oath that the strike was part of a "Red plot" to gain control of the West Side of San Antonio. George Phillip Lambert, an activist in the strike, claimed that the political leaders feared the Mexican-Americans would become aware of their own power. Picketing of the 400 factories was complicated by police actions. Kilday claimed that there was no strike & dispersed demonstrators & arrested picketers. In one week in February, 90 male pecan shellers were arrested & imprisoned with 200 other prisoners in a county facility designed to hold 60.

The strike received national & international attention because of the mass arrests. Emma was eventually hounded out of Texass.

1898 -- [February 5] Pietro Gori, long-time lawyer for anarchists & workers, today defends the workers & peasants being tried for their involvement in popular agitations / difende assieme agli avv. Zerboglio e Dello Sbarba gli operai e i contadini di Campiglia Marittima che avevano partecipato alle agitazioni popolari d’inizio d’anno.

Short overview of this period in Pietro Gori's life, from Franco Bertolucci's chronology:

1898 Difende di fronte alla Corte d’Assise di Casale i compagni protagonisti delle rivolte di Carrara ed ad Ancona i compagni della redazione dell’“Agitazione” fra cui Malatesta.

1898 Collabora a diversi periodici anarchici fra cui l’«Agitazione» d’Ancona. A causa delle agitazioni e delle successive azioni repressive del governo è costretto ancora una volta ad emigrare. A Marsiglia si imbarca per il sud America, mentre le autorità italiane lo condannano a 12 anni di galera.

1898-1901 Nel suo soggiorno sud americano si farà conoscere oltre come agitatore e propagandista anche per le sue qualità di studioso.

Fonda a Buenos Aires la rivista scientifica “Criminalogia Moderna” che avrà decine di collaboratori in tutto il mondo.

1902 Rientra in Italia, agevolato da un’amnistia, sia per motivi familiari sia per quelli legati alla salute.

1903 Su invito di Luigi Fabbri fonda a Roma la rivista quindicinale “Il Pensiero”.

1903 (27 novembre) Muore a Rosignano Marittimo la madre.

1904 Effettua un viaggio in Egitto e in Palestina di cui diede una relazione in una brillante conferenza tenuta all’Associazione della Stampa in Roma.

1905 Continua a tenere conferenze di propaganda e la sua professione d’avvocato, difendendo molti compagni in numerosi processi penali. Partecipa al Congresso sindacalista di Bologna organizzato da O. Dinale tenendo una relazione sul tema dei rapporti fra sindacato e partiti politici.

1907 Partecipa alle agitazioni che si verificarono all’Isola d’Elba per la morte di tre operai ed il ferimento di molti altri per lo scoppio di un altoforno.

[Source: Chronology by Franco Bertolucci]

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Before this conference a preliminary meeting is held on the 12th. Present, apart from the Dielo Trouda Group, was a delegate from the French Anarchist Youth, Odeon; a Bulgarian, Pavel, in an individual capacity; a delegate of the Polish anarchist group, Ranko, & another Pole in an individual capacity; several Spanish militants, among them Orobon Fernandez, Carbo, & Gibanel; an Italian, Ugo Fedeli; a Chinese, Chen; & a Frenchman, Dauphlin-Meunier; all in individual capacities. This first meeting was held in the small backroom of a Parisian cafe.

A provisional Commission was set up, composed of Makhno, Chen & Ranko. A circular was sent out to all anarchist groups on 22 February. An international conference was called & took place on 20 April 1927, at Hay-les-Roses near Paris, in the cinema Les Roses.

As well as those who attended the first meeting was one Italian delegate who supported the 'Platform', Bifolchi, & another Italian delegation from the magazine 'Pensiero e Volonta', Luigi Fabbri, Camillo Berneri, & Ugo Fedeli. The French had two delegations, one of Odeon, favourable to the 'Platform' & another with Severin Ferandel.

The, publication of the 'Platform' was met with ferocity & indignation by many in the international anarchist movement. First to attack it was the Russian anarchist Voline, now also in France, & founder with Sébastien Faure of the 'Synthesis' which sought to justify a mish-mash of anarchist-communism, anarcho-syndicalism & individualist anarchism. Together with Molly Steimer, Senya Fleshin, & others, he wrote a reply stating that to "maintain that anarchism is only a theory of classes is to limit it to a single viewpoint".

http://anarchism.ws/platform.html

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The eldest son of an aristocratic family, Bakunin spent his youth on the family estate, which educated him to peasant ways through his association with the serfs. He renounced a military career to pursue philosophic studies at the Universities of Moscow & Berlin.

In 1843, in Switzerland, he befriended Weitling, whose imprisonment attracted the attention of the Russian authorities, & he was summoned to return. He refused & made his way to Paris where he learned greatly from Marx & Proudhon, although dislike of Marx prevented any closeness between them. 1849, in Dresden, he was arrested & returned to Russia as a fugitive, where he spent eight years in solitary confinement. After four more years in Siberia & a marriage to a young woman strangely distant from his political concerns, he made his way to London where he worked for a time with Herzen.

Making his way to Italy, Bakunin organized in 1864 a secret international brotherhood known later as the "International Alliance of Social Democracy." In 1868 he joined the First International, where his antiauthoritarian doctrines were strongly opposed by the Marxists. After the resulting split in 1872, the Bakuninists continued as a separate organization.

In ill health, Bakunin retired from the movement in 1874 after the abortive Bologna insurrection. He died & was buried in Rome.

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Temistocle Monticelli

Italy: Temistocle Monticelli, secretary of the Comitato di Azione Internazionalista Anarchica (Anarchist International Committee of Action), arrested, relegated. Other members arrested & confined at Lipari are Emilio Raimondo, Pasquale Binazzi & his partner Petroni Carlotta Zelmira. Organized during the war, among the committee's major activities was providing support for the victims of repression, for internees & for exiles. With their arrests, & that of Torquato Gobbi, & the death of Gregorio Benvenuti, the committee was broken up. http://www.fdca.it/fdcaen/press/pamphlets/sla-3/1.htm http://ytak.club.fr/fevrier1.html#6

Luce produced many drawings for anarchist newspapers such as "Le père Peinard," "La révolte," "L'en dehors."

In 1894, during the repression following the attacks of Ravachol, Vaillant & others, Luce was imprisoned — indicted as a "dangerous anarchist" whose drawings were judged "inciting people to revolt". Luce produced a series of lithographs based on this prison experience, accompanied with text by Jules Vallès. After his release he collaborated on the review "Les temps nouveaux". Became President of the Society of Independent Artists in 1934, & signed a petition calling for antifascist fighters. Luce left many thematic works involving the Paris Commune, the daily life of the common worker & peasant, etc.

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maximilien_Luce
  
• Luce Maximilien (1858-1941) (France): Prices upin 2005 for works before 1904, ranging from $80,000 & $450,000.

http://infoshop.org/page/Octave-Mirbeau

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22% of the 21,000 second-generation respondents will answer "no" or give no response. Known as Nisei [nih-say], these U.S.-born Japanese-Americans are not expressing disloyalty but their protest against the internment.

In January 1944, the Selective Service began reclassifying to 1-A the Nisei men who answered "yes" to the question & issuing draft notices.

After more than 300 Nisei refuse to be inducted, authorities arrest & indict Frank Emi & six others for conspiracy to violate the Selective Service Act. The seven are found guilty & sentenced to four years at Leavenworth Federal Penitentiary in Kansas.

http://www.janm.org/projects/clasc/resources.htm

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[February 6] France: Marcelino Massana arrested in Toulouse. Anti-Franco guerrilla

Massana's "tremendous prestige derives from his intense struggle against Franco in 1944-50, years when he carried out countless operations in the Catalan Pyrenees (blowing up electricity pylons, carrying out expropriations, making border crossings with documents, weapons & other fighters, etc.), frequently in the company of Vila Capdevila, Senzill, Antonio Sánchez, Puig Torres, Pons, Dot, Saborit, Saturnino Sanz, Pérez Pedrero, Adrover, Massip, Crespo, Benítez, F. Martínez, Arcos, M. Sabaté, Pepe Blanco, etc., especially in 1949 when he was frenetically active in the Manresa-San Vicente de Castellat-Rocafort comarca, enjoying considerable popular support. The work he did for the Libertarian Youth members involved in the publication of the clandestine "Ruta" likewise seems significant. Massana is one of the greatest of the anti-Franco guerrillas, on a par with Sabaté, Vila Capdevila & Facerías." Sources: Sabate: Guerrilla Extraordinary, Antonio Téllez (Cienfuegos Press, 1974) pp110-111; Miguel Iñiguez, A Historical Encyclopaedia of Spanish Anarchism http://www.christiebooks.com/html/history/archives3.html

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"La FEDERACIóN IGUALADINA"

Produced many anarchist publications: "Le libertaire" (1924), "L'éveil des jeunes libertaires" (Awakening of the Young Libertarians; 1925) "L'anarchie" (1925) "La revue anarchiste" (1925) "Controverse" (1932), "Ce qu'il faut dire" (1944). "Les nouvelles pacifistes" (1949), "Contre courant" (1951). Also a member of the drafting of "Monde Libertaire" (1957).

With his companion, Simone Larcher, Louvet organized "Les Causeries Populaires" (Popular Talks), continuing the action of Libertad. Participant in founding the AFA (Association of Anarchist Federations) in 1928, then in rebuilding of the anarchist federation in 1945, as well as with the CNT in 1946. Free thought, anticlericalism & neomalthusianism informed his activities until his death, March 15, 1971.

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US: On January 10th, martial law was again lifted, but the imposed calm did not last very long. On the morning of February 7th, Mucklow was again attacked by miners, & a bookkeeper was killed. In response, with an arrest warrant for "John Doe," the county sheriff & his deputies, as well as a mine operator & guards boarded the "Bull Moose Special" on the night of the 7th.

This armored train fitted with machine guns was ostensibly for defending against the miners, but it was used on this night to attack the miners' tent colony at Holly Grove. Under the direction of the mine operator, guards fired into the miners' tents; Cesco Estep was killed while getting his wife & child to safety. Miners attacked Mucklow two days later & on February 10th, martial law was again declared. Many mine guards resumed their former roles as militia members.

On February 12, 1913, Mother Jones was arrested in Charleston & sent back to Pratt. She recounted in her autobiography:

"The court had sent two lawyers to my bullpen to defend me, but I refused to let them defend me in that military court. I refused to recognize the jurisdiction of the court, to recognize the suspension of the civil courts. My arrest & trial were unconstitutional. I told the judge advocate that this was my position. I refused to enter a plea."

The offenses for which she was tried, according to her own account, included "stealing a cannon from the military, inciting to riot, putting dinimite [sic] under a track to blow up a C-O road." State Attorney General Lee recalled a conversation with Jones, in which she stated that her speech at Cabin Creek, made three months prior to the first martial law declaration, was the basis of her conviction. She was sentenced to twenty years in the state penitentiary.

http://www.rootsweb.com/~wvcoal/war2.html
http://www.nps.gov/history/nhl/DOE_dedesignations/Jones.htm
http://www.geocities.com/gbgwbel/miningwva.html

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The workers refused to be cowed by the government & the army. They win a favorable agreement in mid-March when the company agrees to reinstate all workers with wage increases & grants the 8 hours day; those imprisoned during the strike are also to be released. Over 20,000 people turn out to greet the release of the CNT leaders & hear them (including Salvador Segui) speak. The end of the strike is proclaimed, but in the face of the refusal of the army to release a score of still imprisoned militants, they will strike again in a beautiful show of solidarity on March 24, 1919.

http://ytak.club.fr/fevrier082.html

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Masson frequented the revolutionary milieu of socialists, anarchists & antimilitarists while a student of philosophy & English at the Sorbonne in Paris. He maintains a correspondence with Jean Grave & writes for numerous journals. Masson translates Elisee Reclus's "A mon frère le paysan", publishes "Rebelles", "Anarchico-Breton" tales, & diverse articles for "Temps Nouveaux", the Fédération Régionaliste Bretonne journal, etc.

Masson also publishes the bilingual monthly review, "Brug" (Breton-Français). The magazine involves François Le Levé, Monatte, Charles Péguy, Romain Rolland, André Spire, Marcel Martinet, Jean-Richard Bloch, Kropotkin, Jean Grave, Louise Michel, Gustave Hervé & many others. "Brug " ("Brug / Bruyère") publishes until the onset of the Great War That Ended all Wars.

Masson's last works are: "Le livre des Hommes et leurs paroles inouïes" (The Book of Men & Their Amazing Words; 1919) & "L'Utopie des îles bienheureuses dans le Pacifique en 1980" (Utopia of Happy Islands in the Pacific in 1980; 1921).

[Source: L'Ephéméride Anarchiste]
http://pagesperso-orange.fr/fanch.broudic/articles/Brug.revue.html
http://raforum.info/article.php3?id_article=731
http://br.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emil_Masson
http://www.breizh.net/identity/galleg/seconde-mort_emile-masson.htm

[February 9] France: First issue of the weekly magazine "Le Bandit du Nord" Organe Anarchiste.

A short-lived attempt, producing only two numbers. The principal writer would have been Anthelme Girier-Lorion.

“Renovating! … light the fire of the middle-class world. That all tyrannies, all iniquities, all the authorities are consumed in this immense blazing inferno & that the people come while singing to dance around this splendid bonfire, which lights the universal banquet where it has forks & spoons put there for all.”

http://ytak.club.fr/fevrier2.html#8

"El rebelde"

Italy: Virgilia d'Andrea (1890-1932) lives, Sulmona- Abruzzi. Virgilia d'Andrea [February 11]

Italian poet (« poétesse de l’anarchie »), teacher, writer. Met Armando Borghi while a teacher & from then on was a dedicated anarchist. Her anti-fascist activities forced her to leave Italy, & she continued the struggle in Germany, Holland, France & the US. Wrote Tormento, a volume of poetry published in 1922 in Italy; L’Ora di Marmaldo, a collection of prose published in France in 1928; & Torce nella Notte, a collection of articles & treatises published in NY a few days before her death. "Virgilia d'Andrea is a reminder of the passion that anarchism could (& should!) inspire. It is the ideal, the source of hope & beauty. Like Luigi Galleani she writes in emotive & powerful language- a far cry from the formulaic & cold prose that can be found in some areas of our movement. Anarchism is about life, about individual realization, about infinite possibility... "

Synthesist

A founder of the review "La conquête du pain", & participant in "Brochure mensuelle." Imprisoned the winter 1939-1940 for inciting soldiers to desert, then interned in Germany as a "subversive element." Helped rebuild the libertarian movement after the war, then moved to New Caledonia in 1950, where he opposed colonialism. Wrote Durolle au pays des couteliers, a biography of Louise Michel &, with Jean Delphy, a biography of Peter Kropotkin. http://ytak.club.fr/fevrier2.html#12

Platformists Present, apart from the Dielo Trouda group (founded by Nestor Makhno, Peter Arshinov & other exiled Russian & Ukrainian anarchists in Paris), was a delegate from the French Anarchist Youth, Odeon; a Bulgarian, Pavel, in an individual capacity; a delegate of the Polish anarchist group, Ranko, & another Pole in an individual capacity; several Spanish militants, among them Orobon Fernandez, Eusebio Carbó, & Gibanel; an Italian, Ugo Fedeli; a Chinese, Chen; & a Frenchman, Dauphlin-Meunier; all in individual capacities. Following publication of the Organizational Platform of the General Union of Anarchists by the Group of Russian Anarchists Abroad, a series of discussions were held in Paris to discuss the setting up of a new Anarchist Communist international. Italy was represented by several groups & individuals, the most prestigious of which was the group representing the journal "Pensiero e Volontà": Fabbri, Berneri & Fedeli. Fedeli, in fact, presided over a meeting held in Paris on 12th February 1927 which called an international conference to discuss the setting up of the international which, however, never came into being. The following letter was the group's reply to the invitation by the Provisional Secretariat of the International to join. See "Reply by the "Pensiero e Volontà" Group to an invitation to join the International Anarchist Communist Federation," by Luigi Fabbri, Camillo Berneri, Ugo Fedeli . http://www.nestormakhno.info/english/pensvol.htm Not to be deterred, the Dielo Trouda group issued, on 5 February 1927 an invitation to an 'international conference' before which a preliminary meeting was to be held on the 12th of the same month. Present at this meeting, apart from the Dielo Trouda group, was a delegate from the French Anarchist Youth, Odeon; a Bulgarian, Pavel, in an individual capacity; a delegate of the Polish anarchist group, Ranko, & another Pole in an individual capacity; several Spanish militants, among them Orobon Fernandez, Carbo, & Gibanel; an Italian, Ugo Fedeli; a Chinese, Chen; & a Frenchman, Dauphlin-Meunier; all in individual capacities. This first meeting was held in the small backroom of a Parisian cafe. A provisional Commission was set up, composed of Makhno, Chen & Ranko. A circular was sent out to all anarchist groups on 22 February. An international conference was called & took place on 20 April 1927, at Hay-les-Roses near Paris, in the cinema Les Roses. As well as those who attended the first meeting was one Italian delegate who supported the 'Platform', Bifolchi, & another Italian delegation from the magazine 'Pensiero e Volonta', Luigi Fabbri, Camillo Berneri, & Ugo Fedeli. The French had two delegations, one of Odeon, favourable to the 'Platform' & another with Severin Ferandel. http://libcom.org/library/platform-1

Christopher Caudwell [pen-name of Christopher St. John Sprigg] (1907-37)
British born Marxist, poet, theorist, critic, author of such books as The Airship: Its Design, History, Operation, & Future (1931), The Crisis in Physics (1939), Poems (1939), & Romance & Realism: A Study in English Bourgeois Literature (1970).

After leaving school at the age of 15, he worked as a reporter on The Yorkshire Observer before launching his own journal, Aircraft Engineering.

After reading the works of Marx & Engels in 1934, he joined the Communist Party. In 1936 he joined the International Brigades & fought for the Republicans in Spanish Civil War. Caudwell was killed, along with a third of the British Battalion, in the battle of Jarama.

He wrote reams of poetry, plays, short stories, detective novels, & aeronautics textbooks. He even edited a volume of ghost stories.

Many veterans interviewed referred to an abiding memory of the perfume of wild thyme on the Jarama battlefield...

Several books by Caudwell were published after his death. This included Illusion & Reality (1937), Studies in a Dying Culture (1938), The Crisis in Physics (1939) & Poems (1939).

CHRISTOPHER CAUDWELL:
SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY

1961 -- [February 12] Kenneth Rexroth's personalist approach to poetry & critique of impersonalism...

In Assays, the most important selection is "The New Poetry," an essay first published in the "New York Times Book Review", today.

In this essay, after reviewing the history of US poetry in the 20th century, Rexroth profiles over a dozen active poets whom he recommends. In a sense, Rexroth prepares a road map to Donald Allen's The New American Poetry (1960). For special praise he singles out Denise Levertov, Robert Creeley, Robert Duncan, Gary Snyder, & Philip Whalen. Facing the difficulty readers might have in obtaining books by these poets, Rexroth identifies two publishers specializing in the "avant-garde, Grove Press & New Directions." Examining these two books reaffirms the important role played by Rexroth's publisher, New Directions, in fashioning the emerging new taste. Perhaps not as well remembered is the part played by "The Nation" in the late 1950s & early 1960s in opening new poetic opportunities. 16 of the 38 pieces in these two books were published first in that magazine. With their spirit, breadth, learning, & strong outsider stance, the essays by Rexroth in these two collections played a significant role in developing the view of North American poetry in the 1960s. http://jacketmagazine.com/23/rex-garren.html

Max Nettlau wrote of this period:

In the interval before the trial the "La Questione Sociale" began to be published (end of December). It was interrupted after the seventh issue, when the printer, a republican, refused to continue ("Revolte," March 16); later on the responsible editor, P. Cecchi, was arrested & did 21 months in prison, which led to another interruption (June 8, 22, 1884).

Meanwhile the police court trial took place in Rome (February, 1884); no witnesses for the defense were admitted, only police information, & the sentences were: Merlino, four years prison; Malatesta & Pavani, three years; Biancani (absent), two-1/2 years; Pornier (absent) & Rombaldoni, 15 months; Trabalza & Venanzi, six months.

[Source: Max Nettlau, Errico Malatesta: The Biography of an Anarchist.]

1934 -- [February 13] A CNT call, on the 13th of February 1934, for the UGT to clearly & publicly state its revolutionary objectives, had met with no reply.

As Peirats argues, "[t]hat the absence of the CNT did not bother them [the UGT & Socialist Party] is clear from their silence in regards to the [CNT's] National Plenary's request." [Peirats, Anarchists in the Spanish Revolution, p. 96]

Rhetoric aside, the Socialist Party's main aim in October seems to have been to force new elections, so they could again form a (mildly reformist) coalition with the Republicans (their programme for the revolt was written by right-wing socialist Indalecio Prieto & seemed more like an election manifesto prepared by the Liberal Republicans than a program for revolutionary change). This was the viewpoint of the CNT, for example. Thus, the CNT, in effect, was to be used as cannon-fodder to help produce another government that would attack the CNT.

Source: "Marxists & Spanish Anarchism"
http://flag.blackened.net/intanark/faq/append32.html

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1951 -- [February 14] France: In February 1951, left in Paris the first number of the monthly books of social studies “Counter-current.”

“Contre-Courant”

In February 1951, left in Paris the first number of the monthly books of social studies “Counter-current” (after a preparatory number out of the ordinary published in December 1950). The principal person in charge for this publication which will be surrounded by many collaborators & who will appear until 1968, is Louis Louvet. “The political, philosophical, moral currents involve the company towards totalitarianism. While waiting for that the dictatorship of right-hand side or left, of which the methods are similar, opens its concentration camps or carries out the summary executions, the state control penetrates everywhere, the birthrate wants to be excessive, of party of the Church saps the public school, the tax department is omnipotent, the exterminating war prepares. In the circumstance, “Counter-current” does not need to justify its title. It is sufficed for itself. It will be the body of all those which aspire to peace & freedom, without ulterior motives.” In epigraph of the February 1952 issue of. Contre-Courant graphic, courtesy: Ephéméride Anarchiste // En février 1951, sortie à Paris du premier numéro des cahiers mensuels d'études sociales "Contre-Courant" (après un numéro préparatoire hors-série publié en décembre 1950). Le principal responsable de cette publication qui s'entourera de nombreux collaborateurs et qui paraîtra jusqu'en 1968, est Louis Louvet. "Les courants politiques, philosophiques, moraux entraînent la société vers le totalitarisme. En attendant que la dictature de droite ou de gauche, dont les méthodes sont similaires, ouvre ses camps de concentration ou procède aux exécutions sommaires, l'étatisme s'insinue partout, la natalité se veut excessive, de parti de l'Eglise sape l'école laïque, le fisc est omnipotent, la guerre exterminatrice se prépare. En la circonstance, "Contre-Courant" n'a pas besoin de justifier son titre. Il se suffit à lui-même. Ce sera l'organe de tous ceux qui aspirent à la paix et à la liberté, sans arrière-pensées." En épigraphe du numéro de février 1952. http://www.fdca.it/fdcaen/press/pamphlets/sla-3/1.htm

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1972 -- [Febrero 14] Spanish anarchist Valentina Sáez Izquierdo lives (d.1984).
http://www.alasbarricadas.org/ateneovirtual/index.php/14_de_febrero

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1977 -- [Febrero 14] Francisco Iglesias dies.
http://www.alasbarricadas.org/ateneovirtual/index.php/14_de_febrero

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1892 -- [February 15] Belgium: En 1892, sortie à Bruxelles (Belgique), du premier exemplaire de "L'Antipatriote" Plus de Frontières! -L'Humanité libre! Organe révolutionnaire annuel. Epigraphe "Le patriotisme est le dernier refuge des coquins" August Spies & "Notre ennemi, c'est notre maître" de La Fontaine.

L'Antipatriote

Un autre numéro sortira en 1894, mais des poursuites seront engagées "pour incitation à la désobéissance" contre l'anarchiste Henri Willems (auteur des articles publiés dans "L'Antipatriote" et "Le Libertaire" belge) et l'imprimeur Charles Herkelboeck. In 1892, left with Brussels (Belgium), first specimen of “Antipatriote” More Borders! - Free Humanity! Annual revolutionary body. Epigraph “patriotism is the last refuge of rascals” A. Spies & “Our enemy, it is our Master” of the Fountain. Another number will leave in 1894, but of the continuations will be committed “for incentive with disobedience” against the anarchist Henri Willems (author of the articles published in “Antipatriote” & “the Belgian Libertarian”) & the printer Charles Herkelboeck. http://ytak.club.fr/fevrier3.html#15

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1892 -- [February 15] Bulgaria: "Société Libre" premiers, founded at the initiative of Mikhael Guerdjikov. It is the first paper representing social anarchism published in the country.

Bulgaria: "Société Libre" premiers, first paper representing social anarchism published in the country. Intended as a semi-monthly, it is subject to repression. The second number which will leave clandestinely carries the dated March 1, 1907 one, then Guerdjikov will be stopped & the prohibited newspaper. The title will however arise on May 1, 1923 as a monthly review of the “F.A.C.B” & this until January 1925, then again into 1932 before being interdict after the fascistic coup d'etat of May 19, 1934. [Details / context] http://ytak.club.fr/fevrier3.html#15

Société Libre

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1894 -- [February 15] England: The Royal Observatory, in Greenwich, is the apparent target of the Martial Bourdin, a 26 year old French anarchist, who is armed with a bomb, which exploded in his hand.

 

Some believe Bourdin was duped into carrying the bomb or was on the way to France & wanted to dump it in the Park. His brother in law was widely believed to be a police informer & many writers argue that the whole episode was inspired by this agent provocateur.

 

Later today police raid the Club Autonomie in London, arresting all of those inside & find that Bourdin had been a member of this club which had attracted mainly foreign anarchists. Many were deported but no charges were made. The funeral of Martial Bourdin became a rallying point for anarchist sympathisers in London & attracted huge crowds.

 

The incident became famous due to Joseph Conrad's book The Secret Agent (1907). Conrad used this incident to weave a literary tale of conspiracy & tragedy which was all his own invention. The story further inspired Alfred Hitchcock in his film Sabotage (1936).

 

The echoes of this long gone incident continue to resonate: in July 1996 the FBI described how the 'Unabomber', Theodore Kaczynski, was inspired by Conrad in his 18 year bombing campaign against scientific institutions. Kaczynski had apparently often used the alias Conrad.

Propaganda by Deed - the Greenwich Bomb of 1894

Philip Taylor

 

Working life at the Royal Observatory, Greenwich in the 1890's must have been generally uneventful. An endless series of transit observations were done by duty observers at night, with a team of human 'computers' working through the day on data reduction & predictions. This routine existence was shattered one Thursday afternoon in February 1894 by a totally unexpected event which put the Observatory into the headlines for days afterwards.

 

In the last two decades of the 19th century, a series of anarchist inspired terrorist attacks hit many European countries. One of the earliest & most spectacular was the bomb assassination of the Russian Tsar Alexander in 1881 which inspired anarchists to many other similar attacks on the rulers & aristocracy. By late 1893 anarchist terrorists were particularly active in France, culminating in the bombing of the Chamber of Deputies in Paris in December. Auguste Vaillant was convicted & executed for this crime in early February 1894, with a particularly futile 'reprisal' for the execution following close after when a bomb exploded in a Paris Cafe on February 12, 1894. Up until then, Britain remained unaffected by the anarchist campaign, although Irish Fenian bomb attacks had occurred in England as early as the 1860's.

 

In Greenwich, on the afternoon of February 15th, 1894, two members of the Observatory staff were still in the building at 4.45 p.m. This they described as working 'late' - all the other staff had left by that time. Mr Thackeray & Mr Hollis were both in the Lower Computing Room when they were startled by a 'sharp & clear detonation, like a shell going through the air'. They looked out to see the door porter running across the courtyard & rapidly followed him so as to be able to look down the hillside North of the Observatory into Greenwich Park. They saw a park-warden & some school-boys running towards a figure that appeared to be crouched on the zig-zag path below the Observatory.

 

Racing down, their first thought was that the man had shot himself, but the scene they encountered was unexpected & horrific. The park-warden was holding a man who, despite massive injuries, was still alive & able to speak. The man's left hand was completely missing & he had a gaping hole in his stomach. Soon a doctor & stretcher were fetched from the nearby Seaman's Hospital, to where he was carried. The man died about 30 minutes later, having said nothing about who he was or what had happened.

 

Messrs Hollis & Thackeray searched the area between where the man was found & the Observatory wall & recovered numerous fragments of the man's hand, including a 2 inch piece of bone. A trail of blood & fragments were spread over a distance of nearly 60 yards towards the Observatory wall. As the two shocked Observatory staff went home that day, the identity of the man & the reason for the explosion was still a mystery to them.

 

Police investigators soon learned that his name was Martial Bourdin. That afternoon the 26 year old Frenchman left his room in Fitzroy Street, & took a tram from Westminster that took him all the way to Greenwich. On leaving the tram he was observed to be carrying a parcel as he made his way to Greenwich Park. What happened a few minutes later, no-one knows, but it appears that due to "some mischance or miscalculation or some clumsy bungling" the bomb exploded in his hand. He had a considerable amount of money on him, which led investigators to believe that he was intending to leave for France immediately.

 

Later on the day of the explosion, police raided the Club Autonomie in London, arrested all of those inside & discovered that Bourdin had been a member of this club which had attracted mainly foreign anarchists. Many were deported but no charges were made. The funeral of Martial Bourdin became a rallying point for anarchist sympathisers in London & attracted huge crowds.

 

A mystery remains - why did Bourdin pick such an unlikely target as the Observatory? The small bomb was unlikely to cause any serious damage there & it was a very different target from the crowded opera houses & cafes favoured by the terrorists in France. Some believe that Bourdin was duped into carrying the bomb or that he was on the way to France & wanted to dump it in the Park. The true reason will never be known. His brother in law was widely believed to be a police informer & anarchist writers in the years following the bombing always claimed that the whole episode had been inspired by this agent provocateur.

 

The French anarchist campaign reached a climax soon afterwards with the assassination of the French President, leading to a ruthless clampdown by the French authorities which effectively ended the terrorist campaign in France.

 

The incident remains as the only anarchist inspired attack in Britain during the period & it became famous due to the author Joseph Conrad in his 1907 book The Secret Agent. In this book the evil mastermind 'The Professor' plans an attack on the Greenwich Observatory which ends in a bomber being 'blown to pieces' by his own bomb when trips & falls in Greenwich Park. Conrad was inspired by the the reality of the Observatory attack but wove a literary tale of conspiracy & tragedy which was all his own invention. The story further inspired Alfred Hitchcock in his film Sabotage (1936). In this film the innocent dupe who carries the bomb dies when the bus that he is travelling in explodes on the Strand : a strange pre-figuring of the real event in early 1996 when an IRA bomber blew himself up in a bus just off The Strand.

 

The echoes of this long gone incident continue to resonate : in July 1996 the FBI described how the 'Unabomber', Theodore Kaczynski, was inspired by Conrad in his 18 year bombing campaign against scientific institutions. Kaczynski had apparently often

used the alias Conrad.

 

The final words on the Greenwich bomb are left to Conrad who wrote : "The attempt to blow up the Greenwich Observatory : a blood-stained inanity of so fatuous a kind that it is impossible to fathom its origin by any reasonable or even unreasonable process of thought, for perverse unreason has its own logical processes. But that outrage could not be laid hold of mentally in any sort of way, so that one remained faced by the fact of a man blown to pieces for nothing even most remotely resembling an idea, anarchistic or other. As to the outer wall of the Observatory, it did not show as much as the faintest crack".

 

Philip Taylor,

Royal Greenwich Observatory, Cambridge, 1994

http://www.speakeasy.org/~kirok/bookgroup/book_rgo.htm

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James Guillaume met Mikhail Bakunin in 1869 & adopted his collectivist-anarchist ideas.

On April 11, 1870 he became a writer for "Solidarity," for the French federation of the A.I.T.

Guillaume also founded the "Bulletin" for the Swiss craftsman of the Jurassic Federation, which first appeared February 15, 1872 in Sonvillier. Its libertarian federalism ran afoul the authoritarian centralism of the Marxists, & at the Congress of the Hague in 1872, he & Bakunin were both expelled from the First International in a well-orchestrated coup by Karl Marx, which also effectively destroyed the International. Marx preferred this to the continued & growing influence of the anarchists.

In Paris, 1878, Guillaume wrote for the "Teaching Review" & became a French citizen in 1889. He also became a supporter of Fernand Pelloutier & the revolutionary syndicalist movement.

Guillaume wrote a history of the International, the results of his meticulous research, which was published between 1905 & 1910.

http://dwardmac.pitzer.edu/Anarchist_Archives/firstinternat.html
http://ytak.club.fr/novembre3.html#guillaume

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Throughout the 32 years of his anarchist period, intensely antimilitarist & anticlerical. Among his other causes were feminism, the abolition of child labor, the fight against Russian Czarism & the repression of Japanese dissidents, abolition of capital punishment, defending the rights of working people & their unions, & the defense of libertarian education.

http://www.infoshop.org/mirbeau.html

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1939 -- [February 16, 1939] Jacques Vallet lives, Stenay (dép. de la Meuse). Journalist, poet, art critic & libertarian author.

Vallet's youthful passion for drama led him to join theatre companies in Avignon & Paris. In 1964 he published Les Chiens de la nuit (The Dogs of Night).

He traveled in the Near East & Japan & began collaborating on numerous journals, including "Libération." Critical of modern art, he wrote several monograms dedicated to his painter friends. In 1977, he began "Le Fou parle", a libertarian review of art & humor, which gathered, until 1984, hundreds of writers & artists. During this year he also participated in the "International Anarchist Meeting" in Venice, Italy.

From 1983 to 1986 Vallet & the painter Christian Zeimert provided an art show on Radio Libertaire. Since 1992, he has regularly participated in the broadcasts of "Les Décraqués" & "Les Papous dans la tête" on France-Culture.

In 1997, Vallet began attacking the "police procedural" genre while also writing his own novels in the "Octopus" mystery series (involving a character first created by Jean-Bernard Pouy): his first was "L'amour tarde à Dijon," followed by "Pas touche à Desdouches"(1997), "La Trace"(1998), "Une coquille dans le placard"(2000), "Monsieur Chrysanthème"(2001), "Sam Suffit"(Pierre de Gondol, 2001), "Ablibabli"(2003). Chez Zulma, published "Animaux de Furetière," 2 volumes (2003).

In June 2002 he became involved with the revue "Anartiste" with the group "La Vache folle" (The Mad Cow).

"Dois-je mettre le nez dans le cloaque du monde? La vie est trop vaste trop fuyante pour que je la comprenne. Alors, j'écoute les poètes."

— cited in "Libé" July 12, 2003

Source: [L'Ephéméride anarchiste]

http://dwardmac.pitzer.edu/Anarchist_Archives/firstinternat.html
http://ytak.club.fr/novembre20.html#guillaume

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1970 -- Pedro Vallina Martinez (June 29, 1879-February 16, 1970) dies, in Veracruz, Mexico.

Outstanding figure of Andalusian anarchism. Medical doctor, militant involved in the labor movement, in & out of prison & exile for his opposition to Spanish repression & fascism.

While a young medical student Pedro Vallina was a member of the Spanish F.T.R.E. During this period he condemned to eight years of forced labor in prison for spreading anarchist propaganda in Spain.

Vallina, however, escaped the jaws of "justice" & slipped into France.

In Paris in 1904 he was active in opposing Spanish oppression. In 1905 Vallina was implicated, with Charles Malato & others (an English anarchist named Harvey & another named Caussanel), with the attempt on the life of Spanish King Alphose XIII , (the night of May 31-June 1 in Paris). Charged with complicity in the attack, they were brought to trial on November 27, 1905, where the charges were dropped for lack of evidence.

Pedro Vallina was expelled, went to London to continue his medical studies, then various countries.

In 1907 he participated in the famed Amsterdam Antimilitarist Congress.

Manuel Peres Fernandes (who backed a proposal by Portuguese militant Manuel Joaquim de Sousa to form the FAI) had been deported from Brazil in 1919 by the Pessoa government & found refuge in Lisbon, Portugal in 1923-1924 with Doctor Pedro Vallina & his family.

In Spain, Vallina was active with the CNT for many years in Spain, & during the Spanish Revolution of 1936, as head of hospitals in Madrid & Barcelona, & organizing evacuation of the Massanet hospital as the fascists took over the country with the collapse of the revolution.

Interned in Perpignan, Pedro Vallina was able to embark to Mexico where he settled & established his medical practice & kept up his anarchist activities.

In 1943, he joined the "Consultorio médico quirúgico Ricardo Flores Magón" (medical & surgical dispensary) in Loma, Oaxaca, where he tended after the Indians.

Vallina died out in Veracruz , Mexico.

Along with many articles written for the anarchist press, Vallina wrote a biography of Fermín Salvochea, as well as a collection of his own recollections, Mis Memorias (1968).

Source: [L'Ephéméride anarchiste]

On the FAI, see Edgar Rodrigues,
"On The Origins Of The Iberian Anarchist Federation," http://struggle.ws/spain/birth_fai.html

Vallina is also mentioned in "El Anarquismo en la historia de Cuba,"
http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/MHEC/docu18.htm
http://dwardmac.pitzer.edu/Anarchist_Archives/firstinternat.html

See also:

• The San Antonio College LitWeb Ambrose Bierce Page http://www.accd.edu/sac/english/bailey/bierce.htm

• The Francisco Ferrer Collection contains a photo copy of the court proceedings from the Assize Court of the Seine regarding Pedro Vallina's plot to assassinate Alphonso XIII, http://orpheus.ucsd.edu/speccoll/testing/html/mss0248a.html

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2001 -- Giuliani On Art, Hitler On Art II

by Robert Lederman

NY City's #1 art critic is at it again. Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, the noted adulterer who married his cousin, dumped his second wife on live television, parades about town with his mistress at taxpayer expense & violates the US Constitution as if doing so was a form of yoga now wants to create a decency task force to police the Big Apple's art museums.

"A peeved Mayor Giuliani vowed yesterday to form a commission to set decency standards for taxpayer-funded cultural institutions after the Brooklyn Museum mounted another exhibit he deemed anti-Catholic. "I'm going to put together a group of people & call it a task force or a commission that can set decency standards for those institutions that are using your money - the taxpayers' money," the mayor said...Hizzoner called the photos "disgusting, outrageous."

ART-SICK RUDY WANTS 'DECENCY' TASK FORCE NY Post 2/16/2001

The latest piece of art to attract the Mayor's attention is called, Yo Mama's Last Supper, a photographic assemblage which depicts the disciples as robed Black men & Jesus as a nude Black woman. The work is clearly intended as a comment on race & gender rather than the Catholic Church since all Christians celebrate the Last Supper, an essentially Jewish event in which Jesus & his disciples celebrated Passover.

What's more, despite the nudity there's nothing either indecent or erotic about the piece. You can see almost as much flesh in the underwear ads in New York's mainstream newspapers & far more skin on HBO or in the average Hollywood movie. Need one mention that in thousands of works of art commissioned by the Catholic Church during the past 2,000 years Jesus, angels & various saints are depicted nude.

From his first days as NYC Mayor Giuliani has engaged in a relentless attack on artists & free speech. Street artists, protestors, topless dancers, political art that compared him to Hitler & even advertisements that gently poked fun at his reputation for taking credit for things he had little to do with have all felt the wrath of Giuliani. Having lost more than 23 Federal civil rights lawsuits over his novel interpretations of the First Amendment you might think he would have learned his lesson by now.

This Mayor's ideas on art have a striking similarity to those of another enemy of freedom, Adolf Hitler. Like Giuliani, Hitler was similarly obsessed with "decency".

Like Giuliani, Hitler went to great lengths to expose the public to the very art he was trying to censor. His 1937 Degenerate Art show of confiscated works of modern art, or Jewish Expressionism as Hitler called it, created a sensation exactly paralleled by Giuliani’s efforts to censor art in NYC. Claims to be protecting the Catholic Church were for both men a convenient means of censoring political statements by their opponents, fomenting anti-Semitism & eliminating artistic freedom generally.

In both instances the issue had little to do with the art itself. One need not like a particular work to understand the principle that it is protected expression. In Giuliani’s attempts to censor the Brooklyn Museum the irony is that he is attacking art made by Catholic artists under the premise that it is anti-Catholic.

The idea that it is outrageous to use public dollars to partly finance a museum that occasionally shows controversial art is comical coming from Mayor Giuliani. This is a married man whose mistress is protected by NYC detectives at a cost of hundreds of thousands of dollars a year.

Our Mayor proudly advertises the fact that he is spending billions of tax dollars to build baseball stadiums for billionaire friends like the Yankees George Steinbrenner. Nor is he shy about letting us know that he gave David Rockefeller 65 million dollars to renovate his families’ art collection at the Museum of Modern Art - which shows art the Nazis stole from Jews during the Holocaust. To be properly appreciated, these unjustified expenses have to be viewed alongside New York City's crumbling schools & hospitals, pothole ridden streets & widespread homelessness & hunger.

Based on the standards Giuliani hopes to set for art museums the works of Michelangelo, Rembrandt, Carravagio, & Shakespeare let alone countless modern artists would be considered indecent. The Bible itself, which contains descriptions of rape, incest, homosexuality & murder, would easily fall within the Mayor's concept of works that violate decency. Perhaps that's the idea after all.

As soon as he assumed power Hitler began attacking contemporary German art as morally decadent & as a misuse of public tax dollars. He seized art from both public museums & private art galleries, but rather than simply hiding the art he claimed to find so appalling, he went to great lengths to publicly display it, organizing huge art shows of Degenerate Art across Germany.

"The artist does not create for the artist: He creates for the people & we will see to it that henceforth the people will be called in to judge its art".

— Adolf Hitler

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2000 -- UNITARIAN CALL

FOR THE DEMONSTRATIONS TO BE HELD ON THE 4TH CENTENNIAL OF THE SACRIFICE OF GIORDANO BRUNO SUBMITTED TO TRIAL BY THE UNIVERSAL HOLY INQUISITION FOR THE FREE IDEAS ON PHILOSOPHY, ART & SCIENCE HE PROFESSED IN ITALY & EUROPE, BURNT ALIVE AT THE STAKE IN CAMPO DE' FIORI SQUARE IN ROME ON FEBRUARY 17TH, 1600, BY ORDER OF THE HOLY OFFICE IN THE HOLY YEAR OF JUBILEE, UNDER THE REIGN OF CLEMENT THE 8TH, PONTIFF OF THE HOLY ROMAN CHURCH.

Campo de' Fiori is a square where, during the dominion of temporal power by the Church, the Pope-King had the heretics put to stake, men & women that didn't bend to the Inquisition & to clerical absolutism.

Here, in 1889, the heart of popular Rome erected the memorial dedicated to Giordano Bruno, celebrating it every year with public demonstrations that were forbidden only during the fascist period.

With the Holy Year 2000, the Church is self-glorifying before the world, sanctifying its own mission, absolving itself for all misdeeds committed, reaching unsurpassed cheek with the canonization of the last Pope-King, Pious the 9th, who repressed the Roman Republic of 1849 in a bloodbath. He excommunicated the leagues of craftsmen, workers & peasants at birth.

2000's Jubilee for Vatican funds represents one more lavish endowment of the Italian State, jointly managed by the Catholic hierarchies, Rome's town Council, & the governments of Prodi & D'Alema - a gift to the Church of 3 billion US$, used for self-celebrating triumphs, cleaning-up churches, convents transformed in hotels, & to militarize Rome with the purpose of boycotting protests or social, unionist, political & cultural activities, in order to hide-up old & new poverty, harassing the homeless & immigrants, & leaving the desolation of the outskirts undisturbed.

Jubilee's liturgical pretentious display demonstrates that this event is not at all a path of penitence & reconciliation. Cries of "my fault" about some past crimes do not hinder reiteration of modern crimes. No request of pardon has indeed been addressed:

? to the whole world while setting out for new, bloody crusades; for violation & destruction of cultures; for the practice of slavery; for tortures caused; for death-sentence systematically inflicted; ? to the population of Third World kept in hunger while hampering all project of rational demographic development or birth-control; ? to the women, vexed by papal anathema, in particular about abortion;

? to the homosexuals pursued & denigrated for being different; ? to the victims, to the "desaparecidos" kins, to the resisters to bishops & generals of Argentina, Chili, Croatia & catholic dictators in the whole world; ? to free minds & lovers, because they persist living in "sin"; ? to the roman citizens, for the devastating environmental impact imposed to their city, reduced into "Holy City," destination of pervasive & obsessive tourism.

Aware of different feelings & identities actually existing in the secular & libertarian archipelago, we have thought best to scatter the program over three days, from February 17th to 19th, 2000, with different peculiarities each day.

On February 17th, memorial celebrations, to be realized with a mass-demonstration in Campo de' Fiori square, following the secular & militant tradition that for 400 years has handed down to us Giordano Bruno's example of coherence & courage in defense of free thought, facing the oppression & obscurantism of his slaughterers.

On February 18th, the aspect of analysis will prevail, with speeches & testimonials on the theme "Artists against Jubilee," in a theater or University hall. On February 19th, a social, great demonstration will be held in the same square, with international participation in order to remind in the Holy Year 2000, that the Roman Catholic Church remains the same.

Heretics ever since, we are not interested in the martyr for freedom's commemoration of institutional liturgies, more so if celebrated by institutions subdued to vested interests. For this reason, political support & presence are not welcomed.

To honor the figure of Giordano Bruno we acknowledge & point out its being up-to-date. We call to intellectuals, students, workers, anticlerical, freethinkers, active opponents, atheists to mobilize during the three days of celebration.

Secular & Libertarian Committee - Rome, Italy

International participation & support is welcomed.

SITO INTERNET: http://www.abanet.it/papini/index.htm

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1887 -- Juan Peiro, Spanish anarcho-syndicalist theorist & militant in the CNT. An assiduous contributor to the libertarian press with his many reviews & newspapers.

November 4, 1936, Juan Peiro became Minister of Industry in the government of Caballero Largo (three other anarchists — Pajaros Carpinteros ('woodpeckers')— also took major posts). His participation, of short duration, is heresy to libertarians of principle who argue that despite the justification of being in a state of war, it will not prevent defeat, nor the treason of the Stalinist participants. Following the victory by the Fascists in Spain Peiro took refuge in France in 1939, but was extradited to Spain by Pétain. Juan Peiro was shot when he refused to collaborate with Franco's government, in Valencia, July 24, 1942. (José Peiro, his son, devoted a book to him.) "Objetivos y accion del sindicalismo" http://dftuz.unizar.es/a/files/anarq-ph/95002.htm Fragmentos de "Ideas sobre sindicalismo y anarquismo" http://dftuz.unizar.es/a/files/anarq-th/95001.htm "Revision de las tacticas de lucha" http://dftuz.unizar.es/a/files/anarq-th/95002.htm Ephéméride Anarchiste http://ytak.club.fr/fevrier18.html

Juan Peiro Belis (1887-1942) lives, February 18, Barcelona.

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1903 -- [February 19] Kay Boyle lives. Novelist, short story writer, anti-war activist. Journalist for The New Yorker in the 1940s documenting the fall of France. Founder of the San Francisco chapter of Amnesty International in the 1980s. Imprisoned for protesting the Vietnam War. Wrote Plagued by Nightingales.

Loved Dubonnet, Paul Robeson, razor clams, & sang "Miss Otis Regrets" like no one else. In Paris in the 20's, NY in the 40's & in jail in the 60's. Close friends included James Joyce, Man Ray, Picasso, Joan Baez, & Katherine Anne Porter. S. I. Hayakawa labeled her the most dangerous woman in America.

In 1967 at the height of the Vietnam War protests, Hayakawa, president of SF State University, (& later US Senator), publicly fired Boyle for her active role in the student protests. She was 65 years old.

As an American expatriate writing in Paris in the 20's & 30's, a journalist documenting the fall of France in the 40's for The New Yorker, a blacklisted writer in the 50's, an anti-war activist & essayist in the 60's & 70's, & founder of the San Francisco chapter of Amnesty International in the 80's, Kay Boyle's literary & political career is a chronicle of the events & concerns of the 20th century.

Kay Boyle wrote 18 novels, 60 short stories, numerous children's books, & six collections of essays. She received many awards including two Guggenheim's & a Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Endowment for the Arts.

Throughout all of this, she had three husbands & six children.

Considered herself a citizen of the world, & for over thirty of her 90 years, lived in Europe. Her books are being reissued in Germany & are still available in France.

Beginning in 1923, when she issued, along with 16 other expatriate writers, a proclamation calling for "The Revolution of the Word," which mirrored the decadence & self-involvement of the era by declaring that "the writer expresses, he does not communicate," to the 1985 publication of Words That Somehow Must Be Said, a collection of her poetic & searing essays composed primarily while she was imprisoned for protesting the Vietnam War, Kay Boyle utilized & transformed the political & social realities of her times into art. &, as she has admitted, it cost her dearly.

Cited in 1928 by Katherine Anne Porter as the next James Joyce or Gertrude Stein, Kay Boyle nevertheless remains one of the most unsung women writers of the century, repeatedly overshadowed by many of her less accomplished contemporaries. Perhaps because Boyle chose to pursue the path of "a moralist in the highest sense of the word, speaking briefly & clearly of the dignity & integrity of individual man." Perhaps because early in her career she made a conscious decision that politics were as important as art. Perhaps it is because, as Studs Terkel suggested, just when her work was beginning to reach a wider audience she was blacklisted.

"I met Samuel Beckett at a party in Paris in 1927. I can't really remember the party ... I can't really remember who else was there. I do remember we spent the entire evening talking about madness."

http://www.english.uiuc.edu/maps/poets/a_f/boyle/boyle.htm

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1932 --

Spain: Cover of this review of free-culture, anarchist-naturist “Luz,” published in Barcelona since 1931.
http://ytak.club.fr/fevrier19.html#luz2

1962 -- [February 19] Émile Armand (1872-1962), dies.

"J’expose, je propose, je n’impose pas".
"Il vécut, il se donna, il mourut inassouvi".

Émile Armand (pseudonym of Ernest-Lucien Juin)

Individualist anarchist. Wrote Poésies composées en prison, l'Initiation individualiste anarchiste" (1923) & La révolution sexuelle et la camaraderie amoureuse (1934). A founder of "Ligue Antimilitariste" with George Mathias Paraf-Javal, another intransigent individualist.

Armand translated Emma Goldman, John Henry Mackay, Max Stirner, etc. Started out in the Salvation Army, but became an anarchist after reading Jean Grave's "Temps nouveaux". Joined the christian Tolstoyan anarchist group, L'Ere nouvelle, then moved to an individualist position.

Fluent in numerous languages (self-taught), he published a number of newspapers & wrote thousands of articles for the libertarian press. Jailed numerous times, including during WWI for advocating desertion, & sent to internment camps during WWII.

ARMAND (Émile)

Juin, dit Ernest Armand, né à Paris le 26 mars 1872; mort à Rouen le 19 février 1962. son pére, combattant de la Commune l'éleva laïquement, mais, vers l'âge de seize ans, la lecture du Nouveau Testament l'impressionna fortement et consacra toute son activité à l'Armée du Salut.

En 1895-1896, cependant, il est séduit par les idées anarchistes à la lecture des Temps Nouveaux de Jean Grave et en avril 1901, il fonde un organe de tendance tolstoïenne ou anarchists chrétienne, L'Ere nouvelle. Il devint ensuite individualiste anarchiste et dirigea quelques temps L'Anarchie. Il a publié un grand nombre d' écrits où il défend ses conceptions et où il accorde une grande importance au problème de la libération sexuelle: "La camaraderie amoureuse qui n'inclut pas les manifestations amoureuses est une camaraderie tronquée; l'hospitalité d'où est absente le sexualisme est mutilée; un abonné de L'En-Dehors qui m'invite n'a pas à s'étonner que je le prie d'exercer à mon égard une hospitalité complète ou alors il ne comprend pas ce qu'il lit.î Joint un volume imprimé (E. Armand, Ainsi chantait un en dehors, 1925) dans lequel sont repris quelques-uns des soixante-quatorze poèmes manuscrits.

Source: http://www.livre-rare-book.com/Matieres/hd/1526h.html

L’Anarchie from April 4th, 1912 to September of this year. See Armand's article, "A Visit to L'Anarchie," at the Stan Iverson Memorial Archives,
http://recollectionbooks.com/siml/library/
http://anarchie.joueb.com/news/ernest-lucien-juin-dit-e-armand-1872-1962
http://raforum.info/article.php3?id_article=2427&lang=en

E. Armand et «la camaraderie amoureuse», Le sexualisme révolutionnaire et la lutte contre la jalousie (pdf file, 10 pages; Gaetano Manfredonia & Francis Ronsin; Written for the workshop ‘Free Love & the Labour Movement’ in the series ‘Socialism & Sexuality’, International Institute of Social History, Amsterdam, 6 October 2000):
http://www.iisg.nl/~womhist/manfredo.pdf
"E. Armand As I Knew Him+, by Mauricius:
http://raforum.info/mot.php3?id_mot=205&lang=en
http://tmh.floonet.net/articles/revintro.html

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1964 -- [February 19] France: Five Spanish libertarians begin a hunger strike at the infamous Fresnes prison to draw attention to their plight. Still imprisoned (out of 21 originally arrested in September 1963), they are all released a few days from now.

Their release coincides with an anti-Francoist campaign launched by the Committee for a Free Spain, founded in December by Louis Lecoin, an old hand in solidarity campaigns. An appeal publicizing the plight of these youths, appeared in "Action Libertaire" (organ of the French section of the International Federation of Libertarian Youth):

"The editorial group of "Action Libertaire" appeals to the militants of all countries to draw attention & to request their moral & material assistance to support the activity of the Federación Ibérica de Juventudes Libertarias (FIJL), which, despite the heavy repression it has been subjected to recently, continues its struggle in Spain against fascism & for the defence of anarchist ideas (...)."

http://ytak.club.fr/fevrier3.html#15

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1839 -- [February 20] US: Congress prohibits dueling in District of Columbia. Population of politicians explodes, rivalling sewer rats.

Sewer rats

Because of the popularity of dueling in the military & the great number of military men in the District; dueling was outlawed relatively early compared to other states & territories. Enter the "Bladensburg Dueling Grounds" aka "Valley of Chance" aka "Washington's Dark & Bloody Grounds" in nearby Bladensburg, Maryland. Famed as the location of more than fifty duels, the area was adjacent to the District line so that residents of Virginia & the District of Columbia could evade the laws of and observation by the constables of their own territories. Most notably, Commodore Stephen Decatur, naval hero of the War of 1812 & conqueror of the Barbary Pirates was killed there on March 20, 1820. Congressman Jonathan Cilley of Maine became the first & only member of the House of Representatives killed in a duel when Representative William J. Graves of Kentucky shot him there. Young Daniel Key, son of Francis Scott Key also died there at the hand of a fellow midshipman, John Sherburne, to settle an argument over the speed of two steamboats. Bleedster Scott W. Langill, 2006

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1882 -- [February 20] Margarethe Faas-Hardegger lives (1882-1963).

Married the legal scholar August Faas, who left her & their two daughters to pursue a career as an opera singer.

Studied law, & was in contact with Munich bohemian & Berlin anarchist circles. She was the first secretary for women workers of the Swiss association of trades unions. She was active against fascism & she fought for peace. For many decades she lived in Tessin in the shadow of Monte Verita & had international contacts. She was faithful to her friends & for this reason was imprisoned.

She preached & practiced free love & was lovers with the anarchist writers Gustav Landauer & Erich Mühsam. She was the friend of the workers' doctor Fritz Brupbacher as well as the chemist & pacifist Gertrud Woker.

From about 1870, the Locarno region became a centre of concentrated cultural & artistic development & output: a large number of intellectuals gathered together in Locarno, Ascona & Minusio, as if seeking refuge from the industrial culture dominating Northern Europe.

The anarchist medical doctor Raphael Friedeberg settles in Ascona. Thanks to him, many anarchists come to Ascona: Prince Peter Kropotkin, the doctor of the poor, Frtiz Brupbacher from Zurich, Ernst Frick, Max Nettlau & also ex-members of the Social Democratic Party, Karl Kautsky, August Bebel & Otto Braun.

Margarethe Faas-Hardegger, a follower of the socialist ideas of Gustav Landauer, establishes an anarchist-communist agricultural community in Minusio.

The German anarchist Erich Mühsam hoped to see Ascona become "The Republic of the homeless, the exiled & the destitute". The psychoanalyst from Graz, Otto Gross, plans a university in Ascona for the emancipation of mankind, which will lead to a return to the communist paradise.

On Monte Verità a commune with anarchic characteristics was established. This school of thought was then continued, from 1904, by Erich Mühsam & Johannes Nahl. Mühsam dreamt of founding a republic for the victims of capitalism & society, for the persecuted & the underclass. With the arrival of Raphael Friedeberg in 1904, socio-ethical tendencies began to filter into this anarchic current.

From 1900, the hill above Ascona became a theatre tor the reformation of lifestyles & this continued into the 1920s.

http://www.casettibooks.com/lalinoranza.html

"Hardegger wrote, edited, & organized the distribution of "Der Sozialist" in Switzerland (a Swiss edition appeared in Bern from 1909 onward) & opened a chapter of the Sozialistische Bund. She worked with members of Erich Muhsam's Munich group TAT on projects involving residential & living communes (a few members founded the Ascona Commune). Ultimately, however, everyday problems, including World War I, led the group to disband.

By 1914 Hardegger & Landauer were no longer close, although Hardegger continued to subscribe to his ideas. Despite serious difficulties, in part financial, she continued to work as a translator, struggled for residential & living communes, & later founded the Comitato Pestalozzi for children whose parents had fought in the Spanish Civil war."

--- "On the Waterfront", Newletter #8 of the International Institute of Social History
http://www.iisg.nl/friends/newsletter-8.pdf

Harald Szeemann writes:

"She was an skilled telegraphist, had studied law, was secretary of the Swiss Trades Union Congress from 1905-1909, encouraged the anarchist views of Landauer & Mühsam, led the 'Hammer Group' in Berne, & must have gone to Ascona for her health. In 1912 she was imprisoned because of false evidence given in a legal action against Ernst Frick. She lived with Hans Brunner [1887-1960], initially in a socialist commune in Herrliberg, then from 1919 onwards at Monte Verità in the Villa Graciella [previously the residence of Karl Vesters]."

http://user.cyberlink.ch/~koenig/consider.htm

Margarethe Faas-Hardegger died September 23, 1963.

See Margarethe Faas-Hardegger, L'Exploitée : organe des femmes travaillant dans les usines, les ateliers et les ménages 1907-1908 / Margarethe Faas [et al.] ; intro. [Marianne Enckell] ; reprint. Genève : Ed. Noir, 1977. 88 p.
Ina Boesch: Gegenleben, Die Sozialistin Margarethe Hardegger und ihre politischen Bühnen (Chronos Verlag, 2003). http://www.hls-dhs-dss.ch/index.php
http://www.antjeschrupp.de/margarethe_hardegger.htm
http://www.margarethe-hardegger.ch/q5.html
In Spanish, http://www.alasbarricadas.org/ateneovirtual/index.php/Margarethe_Faas_Hardegger
See also the "Highlights in the history of Monte Verità,"
http://www.csf.ethz.ch/about/history

Source: http://ytak.club.fr/fevrier3.html

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1924 -- [February 20] France: Ernesto Bonomini (aka Dick Perry) kills Nicola Bonservizi, a personal friend of Mussolini's, a writer for Mussolini's fascist newspaper, "Popolo d' Italia" & the journal "L'Italie Nouvelle," & secretary of the Parisian "Faisceau." Faced with a possible death penalty, Bonomini received eight years hard labor (later commuted to prison time) when the the murder of Giacomo Matteotti, an Italian antifascist politician, by Mussolini's henchmen, on June 10, 1924, reveals the true face of fascism & creates a sympathetic atmosphere during his sentencing in October.

Born in 1903 in Italy, Ernesto BONOMINI emigrates in France in 1922 following the beating to death of his friend & teacher friend by fascist thugs in Italy, from which he had escaped from four months ago. In 1936, he goes to Spain & takes an active part in the Revolution & the fight against Francoism.

At the beginning of 1939, he is forced to return to France with the Spanish Republicans, & is interned in the camps of the south of France. Bonomini manages to escape to the United States, where he finds work as tapestry maker in the studios of Hollywood.

Bonomini continues his activism, & also writes in the libertarian press under the pseudonym of "Dick Perry."

Sources: http://libertaire.org/article132.html
In Italian, see http://www.humanite.fr/journal/2004-07-05/2004-07-05-396658

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1968 -- [February 20] US: The Fugs exorcise the grave of Beloved & Respected Comrade Leader Senator Joe "I have here in my hand..." McCarthy. [Due to the Daily Bleed's High Family Decency Standards, we cannot speculate on what part of his anataomy was in hand.]

Grave Matters

From The Fugs website: [.....] 1968 I told Newfield that the Fugs were going to give a concert in a few weeks in Appleton, Wisconsin, the hometown of Senator Joseph McCarthy, the famous right wing redbaiting politician who had wrecked careers through falsehoods. He was buried there. Jack Newfield suggested that we exorcise McCarthy's grave. We thought it was a great idea & made preparations. Our friend Allen Ginsberg was also going to perform in Appleton & he agreed to help in the Exorcism. So, on February 19, 1968 we performed at the Cindarella (sic) Ballroom in Appleton, & the next morning the Fugs, Allen Ginsberg & about 75 friends gathered at McCarthy's headstone and performed a witty ceremony, which we have included for your listening pleasure. We asked those present at the Exorcism to place a gift on Mr. McCarthy's stone. I looked back as we left & saw a very interesting visual gestalt atop the granite: a bottle of Midol, a ticket to the movie The War Game, a Spring Mobilization Against the War leaflet, a stick of English Leather cologne, one stuffed parrot, one candy bar, a chap stick, one dozen red roses, one dozen white geraniums, one dozen yellow geraniums, one "Get Fugged" button, some coins, sugar wafers, coat buttons & two seeds of marijuana. "So long, Joe," Tuli said as we walked down the hill. Bleedster Scott W. Langill, 2006 http://www.thefugs.com/history3.html

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2003 -- [February 22] Arthur Moyse

The anarchist, artist & bus conductor Arthur Moyse, who
has died aged 88, seems to have attended every street
protest in London from the 1930s onwards. He was also
involved in the London scene of the 1960s, especially the
literary part around Soho's Better Books shop. It was along
the way that Arthur became a self-taught artist, a
cartoonist & an art critic.

He poured out a torrent of drawings, paintings & collages
for almost any alternative publication, in any country that
asked his help. His most consistent input was for Freedom,
the Whitechapel-based anarchist newspaper for which he was
art critic & cartoonist from the late 1960s to the early
1980s.

A day out with Arthur was an event. He had built up a
circuit of the London art scene, which he constantly
criticised. He would have a bundle of invitations to
openings, & present me as his agent.

Arthur was born in County Wexford to Irish working-class
parents, & moved to London about the same time as his
father, a merchant seaman, was lost at sea. He often used to
recount — Arthur often used to recount many things — that on
his father's death, the authorities sent a =A35 note & gave
his mother a job as a cleaner. The family moved to
Shepherd's Bush in west London, where he lived for the rest
of his life.

He spent his youth involved in leftwing activities. He was
at the battle of Cable Street in 1936, when the British
Union of Fascists were prevented from marching into the East
End. His time as a factory worker ended in 1939, when he was
conscripted into the army. He fought in various actions,
including the airborne landings at Arnhem in 1944. He was
court-martialled twice for insubordination.

It was almost by accident that, after the war, he ended up
as a bus conductor — always refusing promotion to driver.
Proud of his working-class roots & slightly condescending
to "middle-class" anarchists, he defined working class as
getting up at five in the morning in Bradford to go to work
in the rain. He was constantly involved in union activity
and local politics, & took up with the anarchist movement
through visits to Speakers Corner in Hyde Park. He got to
know several of the speakers & became involved with
Freedom Press.

In the late 1970s Arthur set up his own occasional magazine
called ZeroOne, which consisted of a front cover. The
British Museum used to send letters demanding copies. He
also had his ZeroOne gallery, which comprised the toilet in
Freedom Press.

Arthur had a long relationship with the Flowers art
galleries. There was a personal exhibition at the old
D'Arblay Street site in 1977, & Arthur contributed to many
other events organised by the Flowers group. A special one
was the exhibition of the letters & postcards he had sent
over the years to Rachel Flowers, the daughter of the
family. He would not have liked the term "godfather," but he
had more or less that role.

Arthur was known for his succession of small dogs. He took
them on marches, demonstrations, everywhere, & included
them in most of his drawings & paintings. The loss of the
last one, Vicki, coinciding with his physical decline, meant
that he had no particular reason to go out any more. He
spent the last couple of years in his Shepherd's Bush flat
surrounded by dust, his accumulated collections of comics,
first editions of everything & enough small magazines with
his illustrations to fill a museum.

· Arthur Moyse, anarchist & artist, born June 21 1914; died February 22 2003

— David Peers, Thursday March 13, 2003, The Guardian

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1849 -- [February 24] Nicolas Thomassin lives (1849-1919) French weaver, socialist, anarchist, participant in "Sans patrie" (formed October 18, 1891) with Gustave Bouillard, Pierre Leroux, Paulin Mailfait, etc..

Supported Jean Baptiste Clement for legislative election in 1884, lost his job & became a news vendor for "Le père Peinard" & "La révolte." Started the anarchist groups "Les sans Patrie" & "Les deshérités de Nouzon" in 1891 — which resulted in police harassment & numerous arrests. In 1916, Thomassin was still listed as a subscriber to "Cubilot," published by the libertarian colony of Aiglemont.

http://ytak.club.fr/octobre.html#thomassin

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1888 -- [February 24] "Australian ballot"

Today the phrase "Australian ballot" is used to distinguish voting by a secret ballot as opposed to a face-to-face town meeting, but that is not what the term actually means. Prior to 1892, ballots listing only favored candidates were provided by candidates, parties & newspapers. The Australian innovation adopted by some was the use of government-printed ballots that listed all qualifying candidates.

Ironically, at the same time that some US states started using the "Australian" ballot, Australia was beginning the process of abandoning it, in favor of the modern Australian ballot, which is a preference ballot used for IRV & PR elections.

In some elections using this new system, there was some protest of the new voting procedure.

Formerly, voters could prepare ballots at home or simply pick up party ballots on their way to the polls. Voters had no need to mark ballots, they simply had to deposit them in the ballot box.

Now the voters had to go into a voting booth & find the names of their preferred candidates & mark the right number of boxes depending on how many seats were being filled for each office. There were long lines waiting for ballots & spaces in polling booths, accompanied by many complaints.

The use of the Australian ballot also had implications for independent candidates & smaller parties. How was it to be decided which candidates to list on the official ballot?

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1889 -- [February 24]

Manifestations en faveur de la réduction de la journée de travail à huit heures. Premier numéro du Père Peinard de l'anarchiste Émile Pouget.

Emile Pouget's "Le Pere Peinard" begins publishing. A signatory to the "Charter of Amiens" (1906), endorsed by the CGT, Pouget also wrote numerous books & pamphlets, including "Direct Action" (1910), & "Sabotage."

"Since the day a man had the criminal ability to profit by another man's labor, since that very same day the exploited toiler has instinctively tried to give to his master less than was demanded from him. In this wise the worker was unconsciously doing SABOTAGE, demonstrating in an indirect way the irrepressible antagonism that arrays Capital & Labor one against the other."

— Emile Pouget, Sabotage

See Arturo Giovannitti's introduction,
http://www.eclipse.net/~basket42/agsab1.html

See Howard Lay, Reflecs d'un Gnaiff: Images of Insurrection in Emile Pouget's Le Pere Peinard Also see Elizabeth Gurley Flynn's Sabotage & Martin Sprouse, Sabotage in the American Workplace at http://www.eclipse.net/~basket42/
http://www.disgruntled.com/
http://www.human-nature.com/rmyoung/papers/paper74h.html
http://pagesperso-orange.fr/christian.domec/pouget01.html

"Cactus Ed is dead, but Hayduke Lives!"

http://biosoc.univ-paris1.fr/histoire/chrono/chrono3.htm

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1909 -- [February 24] Scotland: Ethel MacDonald lives.

SCOTS "SCARLET PIMPERNAL"

Glasgow-based anarchist activist &, during the Spanish Revolution, a prisoner aid militant, propagandist on Barcelona Loyalist radio, captured by the fascists.

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1912 -- Lawrence Textile Strike ("Bread & Roses Strike")

Many strikers are sending their kids to safe homes with friendly families in other cities. The exodus has generated so much publicity that Lawrence authorities have resolved to crush it.

Today they force 35 women & their children into patrol wagons. After charging the women with neglect & handing jail sentences & fines to the organizers, the town fathers send 10 of the kids to the Lawrence poor farm. This prompts only more publicity, forcing Congress to investigate the strike. Sixteen children will testify, describing the poverty that led them to leave school & take jobs in the mill.

The American Woolen Company will have no choice but to yield to the strikers' demands.

The poem "Bread & Roses" by John Oppenheim, which emerged from this strike, has been put to music & recorded by many musicians; for example: # Mimi Fariña; # Judy Collins: Bread & Roses. 1976. This was also a promo single: "Bread & Roses" (mono)/"Bread & Roses" (stereo) (E-45355) # Bobbie McGee: Bread & Raises. 1981. # John Berquist: Fire In The Jackpine. Half Moon (1002) 1981. # Pete Seeger, Jane Sapp, & Si Kahn: Carry it On: Songs of America's Working People. 1986. # John Denver: Higher Ground. 1988. [credited to Oppenheim] # Gerri Gribi: The Womansong Collection. 1996. # Ani DiFranco: on the various artist compilation Fellow Workers. 1999. [credited to Oppenheim/Utah Phillips]* # Dan Barker: Friendly Neighborhood Atheist. # Pat Humphries: Hands. Appleseed, 2001. # New York City Labor Chorus: Workers Rise. Orchard (801536) 2001. # Bluesteins: * Shut Up & Sing! Greenhays (70720). * Travelin' Blues. Swallow (LP-2003) 1983. # Judy Gorman: The Rising of Us All. 2003.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bread_and_Roses/a>
http://www.geocities.com/CapitolHill/5202/rebelgirl.html
http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/45b/index-a.html
http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/USAlawrence.htm

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1982 --

May 19, 1928 Tronchet, Pignat & Vuattolo instigated a wildcat strike which lasted 15 days, resulting in a reduction of working hours, minimum wages, etc.

In the '30s Lucien Tronchet was in charge of the L.A.B. (League of Action of the Building Industry), implementing direct action against the owners. He went to Spain in 1936, with Luigi Bertoni, joing the anarchist forces fighting Franco.

In 1940 Tronchet was condemned to 8 months of prison for his antifascist activities. Following WWII, in addition to his militant union activities, he fought for abortion rights, antimilitarism, & creation of co-operatives.

In the 1970s he supported the Geneva squatters movement & wrote a biography of his friend, Clovis Pignat, une vocation syndicale internationale (Lausanne, 1971).

There are perhaps more archivists at heart among the Anarchists than in the great institutions. The New York Public Library, having put on microfilm the collection of posters from the Spanish Revolution, which it received, threw away the originals. At the Royal Library of Belgium, these same posters coming from the collections of Hem Day were rolled up & stored in a corridor, & ended up as waste paper.

Of the dozens of posters that Hem Day brought from Spain, only six remain in small format at the Mundaneum de Mons. At the Centre internationale de recherches sur l'Anarchisme (CIRA; International Research Center on Anarchy) we have about 50 of them, brought by the union leader Lucien Tronchet, carefully mounted onto sturdy cardboard to circulate & to serve at solidarity tournaments with Spain around 1936 or 1937. They are in impeccable condition; the colors are as vibrant as they were on the walls of Barcelona or Valencia. In Spain itself, the collection & inventory of Republican posters has not ceased to this day.

http://libr.org/pl/16_Enckell.html
http://www.anarca-bolo.ch/baronata/libri/tronchet.htm

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1923 -- [February 26] The Mohegan Colony Association, based on anarchist principles.

Mohegan Colony was established at the South end of Mohegan Lake in 1930 as a utopian attempt to provide an egalitarian way of living & raising one’s family.

Part of the Modern School movement, Mohegan Colony was a hotbed of new thinking. The Colony established its own school, & had some 300 families. A number of publications were issued by the Mohegan Modern School in Peekskill. The homeowner association survives, & strives to retain some of the history...

http://www.yorktownhistory.org/homepages/may00.htm

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2001 -- [February 26] US: Seattle ACORN workers strike. Seattle area office shut down after employer refuses to recognize Public Interest Workers IU 670 union of the IWW.

ACORN (Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now) workers organized a union in the IWW, in response to unpaid overtime, late or short paychecks, no breaks, & a lack of safety & sexual harassment policies.

"Everyday as organizers we go out into neighborhoods & get people to organize to demand better living & working conditions, & when we tried to do that in our own office we were denied that right," said Alexa Gilbert, one of the striking workers.

Workers saw the need to strike, walked out with 25 supporters, & began their picket line.

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1905 -- [February 27] US: Aparece Regeneración en San Luis Missouri ...

Segunda época de Regeneración. Aparece el primer número en San Antonio Texas, con Ricardo Flores Magón como director, Juan Sarabia en la redacción y Enrique Flores Magón en la administración Se publica el libro Los Grandes Problemas Nacionales de Andrés Molina Enríquez.

1905 Suspensión temporal de Regeneración, para salir de San Antonio, Texas ( Enero ) Huelga en el Ferrocarril Mexicano. Los trabajadores de esta rama se unifican en un sindicato nacional

1905 ( Febrero 27) Aparece Regeneración en San Luis Missouri Los magonistas desarrollan tareas organizativas clandestinas en diversas partes del país

1905 ( Octubre 12 ) Represión a Regeneración; destrucción de la imprenta. Se interrumpe su publicación

1906 Se reanuda la publicación de Regeneración en otro taller ( Febrero ) Huelga nacional en los ferrocarriles

1906 ( Marzo ) Ricardo y Enrique Flores Magón salen al Canadá junto con Juan Sarabia. Se hacen cargo de Regeneración Librado Rivera y Manuel Sarabia. Huelga y represión en Cananea. Aparece el Programa y manifiesto del Partido Liberal Mexicano

1906 ( Sept. 15 a Oct. 1 ) Fin de la segunda época de Regeneración. Represión general ala Junta Organizadora del Partido Liberal, con motivo de las insurrecciones frustradas de 1906 Insurrecciones del Partido Liberal Mexicano en Jiménez, Coahuila; Acayucan, Veracruz y Camargo, Tamaulipas. Lucha de los obreros textiles.

http://www.prodigyweb.net.mx/laboetie/cronologia.html
http://www.waste.org/~roadrunner/writing/magon/ENArticles/main.htm
http://struggle.ws/mexico/history.html
http://mati.eas.asu.edu:8421/~getty/html_pages/koyok7.html

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1861 -- [February 28] Antoine Cyvoct lives (1861-1930). French anarchist, Lyons militant. Wrongly accused of being the author of the bombing of the Bellecour Theatre restaurant in Lyon on October 22, 1882.

Antoine Cyvoct was also a defendant in the "Trial of the 66," (see 28 January 1883) & was sentenced to five years in prison.

Cyvoct had taken refuge in Switzerland & Belgium but was extradited to France in 1883, tried for the October 22 attack, & sentenced to death, despite the court's failure to prove he was responsible. His sentence was commuted to forced labor.

Despite a massive campaign by the anarchists in 1895 to gain his release, Cyvoct was not amnestied until March 1898. This same year, Cyvoct was nominated for the legislative elections, "To draw attention to the cases of the anarchists remaining in prison."

Cyvoct then worked in the bookstore business, & gave talks in the anarchist circles on living conditions in the prisons.

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1887 -- [February 28] Clément Duval, has his death sentence commuted

"Theft exists only through the exploitation of man by man...when Society refuses you the right to exist, you must take it...the policeman arrested me in the name of the Law, I struck him in the name of Liberty..."

Clément Duval attempted escape 20 times, & after finally succeeding, reached New York, where he lived until age 85, surrounded by Italian anarchist comrades.

See his book, Moi, Clément Duval, bagnard et anarchiste (Introduction by Marianne Enckell; Les Editions ouvrières, Paris, 1991)

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1913 -- [February 28] After 25 days (Feb. 5-27th) of deliberations, the Paris trial of the Bonnot Gang ("Bande à Bonnot") ends & sentencing follows:

• Raymond Callemin, Eugene Dieudonne, Andre Soudy (see the following entry for details), & Antoine Monier, are condemned to death;
• Paul Metge & Edouard Carouy get life without parole (Carouy commits suicide tomorrow, in his cell).
• Their accused accomplices: Jean de Boe: 10 years forced labor; Gauzy: 18 months prison; Kibaltchiche (aka, Victor Serge, editor of "L'Anarchie"): five years prison.
• Rirette Maitrejean is freed. Louis Rimbault, sentenced to prison, fakes mental illness & gains his release.
• Eugene Dieudonne's death sentence was commuted to life, thanks to efforts on his behalf by Callemin prior to his own execution. After several escapes, & following a campaign for his release headed by Albert London, he was pardoned in 1925.

See Richard Parry, The Bonnot Gang (London: Rebel Press).

CLAVE, Godard. Viel Blut für teures Geld: Das kurze, aber dramatische Leben des Jules Bonnot und seiner Komplizen. Aus dem Franz. von Manfred Showa. Berlin: Karin Kramer Verlag, 1990. 44 p.: tout en ill., bibl.

Richard Parry's The Bonnot Gang, (Rebel Press) punctures the romanticism of "illegality" & individual armed struggle. He sees the Bonnot Gang as a temporary coalition of individualist anarchists drawn together by the anarchist individualist weekly "L'anarchie" & criminals who donned the cloak of anarchism in their search for a convenient philosophical excuse for their actions — without support of the populace or the rest of the anarchist movement.

See also Doug Imrie's article, "The Illegalists" in the Stan Iverson Archives, & background material on the Bonnot Gang, online,
http://recollectionbooks.com/bleed/Encyclopedia/BonnotGang/calleminWhy.htm
http://www.mindspring.com/~acheslow/AuntMary/bonnot/bonnot.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bonnot_gang

http://ytak.club.fr/avril4.html#28 http://www.chez.com/durru/bonnot/bonnot.htm

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1913 -- [February 28] Andre Soudy (1892-1913), French anarchist illegalist, member of the Bonnot Gang, is sentenced to death.

Soudy first met Jules Bonnot & other gang members at the anarchist Romainville colony (where "L'anarchie," edited by Victor Serge, was published).

On March 25, 1912, Soudy took part in an attack in which two people were killed.

He was captured March 30, 1912 & guillotined with Raymond Callemin & Antoine Monier on April 21, 1913.

See background details & links in the previous entry above. http://ytak.club.fr/fevrier4.html#25

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1940 --

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Kenneth Rexroth & the San Francisco Libertarian Circle

The most lively literary salon in the Bay Area in those days was a circle that met on Friday nights in poet Kenneth Rexroth's apartment over Jack's Record Cellar, at Page & Divisadero.

Rexroth grew up in Chicago, where he owned a tearoom called the Green Mask, featuring jazz & poetry, with a whorehouse on the floor above. Moving to San Francisco in the '30s, the young Rexroth exhorted dockworkers to unionize in a mimeo sheet called The Waterfront Worker, & applied his efforts in the League of Struggle for Negro Rights & the Fellowship of Reconciliation, ladling out pea soup to young Catholics held in detention camps as Conscientious Objectors to the Second World War.

Rexroth loved jazz & knew the guys who played it, & translated poetry & drama from several languages, including classical Greek, Provençal French, & Japanese. He prided himself on reading the Encyclopedia Brittanica cover to cover each year, & published more than a dozen books in his lifetime, including an autobiographical novel, & books of criticism on subjects ranging from contemporary poetry, to Hasidism, to Anarchism, to Zen.

Rexroth's earliest poems sound remarkably like the work of the '80s "Language Poetry" school, abandoning photographic realism in an attempt to shed cliché & sentimentality. His mature poems, however, speak in language that is colloquial, sensual without being sentimental, calling forth the High Sierra granitescapes that Rexroth liked to make love in, with a crispness of image, a classical sense of balance, & elegiac gravity.

Rexroth's apartment on Page Street was a library, its shelves lined with the heartwood of the classical literatures of East & West; & Rexroth had a caustic wit, & an ego, to match his erudition.

One of the young poets who attended these salons was Philip Whalen, who would appear in Kerouac's novels as Warren Coughlin & Ben Fagin — "a quiet, bespectacled booboo, smiling over books." Whalen had been invited down from his job as a firewatch on Sourdough Mountain in the North Cascades by Gary Snyder, with whom Whalen had shared rooms at Reed College. For over a decade, Rexroth's weekly "at-homes" brought together geniuses in diverse forms — from Helen Adam's contemporary ballads, to James Broughton's bawdy nursery rhymes & experimental films. Whalen (who now teaches Zen at the Hartford Street Zen Center in the Castro) recalled the atmosphere at these Friday night conclaves:

"It was always very interesting, because there were young poets there, & older ones, visiting luminaries from different professions & arts. People said it was boring because Kenneth talked all the time. But Kenneth was a marvelous talker, so I didn't mind if there was anybody else famous there or not."

It was at one of these salons that Ginsberg first heard Rexroth read his scathing blast, "Thou Shalt Not Kill":

You,
The hyena with polished face & bow tie,
In the office of a billion dollar
Corporation devoted to service;
The vulture dripping with carrion,
Carefully & carelessly robed in imported tweeds,
Lecturing on the Age of Abundance;
The jackal in the double-breasted gabardine,
Barking by remote control,
In the United Nations...
The Superego in a thousand uniforms,
You, the finger man of the behemoth,
The murderer of the young men...

Through Rexroth, Ginsberg met Robert Duncan, whose essay "The Homosexual in Society" brought dialogue about homosexuality in America into the open. Duncan was a master poet & teacher in his own right, & a generative influence on many contemporary Bay Area poets, like Thom Gunn & Aaron Shurin.

Though one prevalent myth is that the Beats were a lone wake-up call in '50s America, that summons did not come from nowhere. Laying the intellectual foundation for the Beat breakthrough, the Rexroth circle was a ground of opposition: well-read & international, homosexual & heterosexual, poets & artists from several generations of revolt.

This reference excerpted from "How Beat Happened" by Steve Silberman; in full see:
http://ezone.org/ez/e2/articles/digaman.html

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1996 -- [February 28] Maximilien Rubel

Maximilien Rubel dies in Paris at the age of 82 in late February. He had originally arrived in Paris in 1931 to finish his studies in philosophy, sociology & law that he had started in his home town of Czerlowitz, which had been first ruled by the Austro-Hungarians, then by the Romanians, & is now in the Ukraine. He began to frequent radical circles & to express solidarity with the struggle for social emancipation., particularly from 1936 when he gave support to the efforts of the Spanish Anarchists. This activity put him in contact with unorthodox Marxists, Anarchists & revolutionary syndicalists. His militant activity began in earnest during the Second World War when he wrote a number of leaflets in German (his mother tongue) distributed among the German forces of occupation by the tiny Revolutionary Proletarian Group in which he was active alongside Roger Bossiere, still a militant today! The leaflets denounced both Nazism & the Western imperialist powers. He took the double risk in this very dangerous work of being both a Jew & a revolutionary.

A supporter of council communism, he participated in the late forties & the fifties in the activities & the debates of that current, scattered to the four corners of the world by Stalinism, in particular his published correspondence with Anton Pannekoek. He began a critical examination of the work of Marx, & indeed began to produce a Complete Works of Marx. He ferociously denounced both capitalism & what he saw as the false socialism of Leninism. His essay Marx-Theoretician of Anarchism horrified both orthodox Marxists & anarchists. His critique of the Soviet Union & its satellites directed the fire of the Stalinists of the French Communist Party upon him. Unlike others who started out as anti-authoritarian critics of Stalinism, he did not change into a defender of capitalism & Cold War 'anticommunism'. He had contacts with the libertarian socialists of Socialisme ou Barbarie (who in their turn had a great influence on the British group Solidarity) and the anarchist communists of the excellent magazine Noir et Rouge. He was closely allied to Rene Lefeuvre whose Spartacus publishing house brought out a vast series of anarchist, council communist & critical Marxist books & pamphlets. He remained a convinced anti-capitalist & anti-statist right up to his death.

http://flag.blackened.net/af/org/issue44/obit.html
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3780/is_199707/ai_n8763405
http://www.plusloin.org/rubel/

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