Today we hear from two workers whose stories span generations and industry. Bill Ros of Ros's Rod and Real Repair Shop in Baton Rouge shares how his family's business grew out of a 1940s era gas station where his father sold fishing gear. nowadays they got thousand of parts to, to one reel. You know, they might have 10 or 11, uh, bearings. The reels, you know, it's like a puzzle, you know, you gotta try to figure it out.
And one Salcito Sanchez, a second generation racetrack groom and caretaker reflects on his behind the scenes work with elite racehorses at tracks across the country. I like this, this thing, uh, this interview, I'm, I'm, I'm. Excited because nobody asking me nothing about the horses before. Both oral histories come from the America Works podcast part of the Library of Congress's Occupational Folk Life Project. Also, on today's show, we mark two somber moments in labor history.
In 1917, a deadly fire in Montana's Granite Mountain and Speculator Mines claimed 168 lives. And in 1904, union Miner, John Carley was gunned down during a strike in Colorado's Cripple Creek gold mining region. Our music this week is from the Elders with the Minors. I'm Chris Garlock, and this is Labor History Today. I'm Rick Smith, and this is labor History. In two on this day in labor history, the year was 1917.
That was the day the Granite Mountain and Speculator mines in Butte, Montana caught fire killing 168 miners. It is considered the worst underground, hard rock mining disaster in the nation's history. Just weeks after the US had entered World War I. The demand for copper had surged Granite Mountain, like many of the nation's mines, operated around the clock to meet war production needs.
In his book, fire and Brimstone, the North Butte Mining Disaster of 1917, Michael Puke notes the irony of the disaster, which began. As an effort to improve safety, a sprinkler system had just been installed. The final task was the relocation of an electrical cable. The cable was insulated with oil soaked cloth sheathed in lead workers lost control of the three ton cable as they lowered it into the mine, and it fell to the bottom of the shaft carrying a commonly used carbide burning lamp.
The night shift foreman accidentally ignited the cable as he planned its removal. The conflagration was virtually immediate. And burned for more than three days. At the time, 415 miners were at work on the overnight shift. Smoke and gases quickly filled both mines. With no alarm system in place. Those that could not escape succumbed to carbon monoxide poisoning. In 1996, a Memorial Plaza was dedicated to those who lost their lives.
It details a slice of buttes mining and labor history that culminated in tragedy, the labor history society. The Rick Smith show. Welcome to America Works, interviews with contemporary workers throughout the United States, collected by the library's American Folk Life Center as part of its occupational folk life. Project. This is a FC staff Folklores Nancy Gross.
And this episode features excerpts from a longer interview with Bill Ros, who with his brother is the owner and operator of Ros Rod and Real Repair Shop in Baton Rouge, Louisiana during the 1940s. Mr. Ros's father sold fishing rods and other fishing related items from his, so gas station. Customers would buy parts for their fishing reels and then ask for help in attaching, setting up and fixing their gear as he tells Folklores. Doug Manger in an interview for the Occupational Folklife Project.
Baton Rouge Small Business and Trades the family business now in its ninth decade. Just developed from that. Yeah, caught my first thing, which was an eel, uh, when I was about six years old at Pier Park near, uh, Bayou Corn. And, uh. I had an old steel rod with an old pfluger reel, and, uh, I, uh, hooked something out there. I thought it was a snake. And I pulled it up and I ran down the, ran down the pier. And, uh, I said, daddy, I caught a snake. He said, no, this a knee.
And they cut it up and they, they caught about three bushels of, uh, of crab. All the filling stations and, uh, uh, used to sell parts to, to the fishermen for the ribs and all. And, uh, daddy had some and, uh, uh, we used to sell Exxon, uh, so, or standard oil products. And, and that's how he. Got the, uh, you know, as a fe station type business. Uh, and uh, people used to ask them, could you put the, the nut on the rail or put a new uh, p And that's a little line God pin.
And uh, it just developed from that, you know, put, could you put a tip on the rod from it? You know, and it just. They, uh, he was doing it as a hobby and know to start off with, uh, and just developed into a business. They used to have a, uh, Steinberg Sports Center downtown, and there was a man in there that used to bring, uh, to Rios that they collected to, to repair it.
And then, uh, some charter boat, uh, captains would, would come by with their big pin rails and we would clean and, uh, and do take care of those. Daddy started me out with, with, uh, some basic Rios Shakespeare, uh, presidents, Fluer Springs, uh, flu Supreme was the Cadillac of the, of the Rios in those days. And, uh, they only had a few parts, maybe a dozen parts to 'em, but nowadays they got thousand of parts to, to one reel. You know, they might have 10 or 11, uh, bearings.
The reels, you know, it's like a puzzle, you know, you gotta try to figure it out. What's wrong with 'em? Um, you know, now you also obviously sell lures and, and the like. Yeah. You gotta keep. Keep the, uh, fishermen happy and, uh, we ought to, uh, different, uh, lus you can't find anywhere else like the other day, uh, Joe Klein, uh, one of our old customers who grew up around here wanted a, uh, special bait of bands, jelly worm, and, uh, none of the, uh.
Places around here, even Bass Pro and, uh, Cabela's didn't have, so I ordered it for him. He uses that jelly worm, which has a scent to it, a grape scent to it. And uh, uh, years ago used to be, uh, uh, what they call a flag worm. And, uh, a lot of people had good luck with those. The old fiberglass action rods, we sold many of those, those, those were in casting rods and fly rods and spinning rods in those days. And they had various colors. They had, uh, red, green, blue, black.
And then they had some, uh, carrot stick rods, which are orange. And now they come out with a fluorescent green, which is well putrid. Call it. Daddy used to make a lot of Fenwick. Blanks, which are yellow and then he would put uh, purple wrapping on 'em. So they would be tiger rides like for LSU. We're still here today, I think. 'cause we don't, uh, we treat people fairly. You've been listening to Bill Ros, owner of Fros Rod and Real Chop in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.
To hear the complete interview with Mr. Vero, as well as interviews with hundreds of other contemporary workers, please visit www.do gov slash folklife or just search online for the Occupational Folklife project. This is a FC staff Folklores. Nancy Gross. On behalf of the American Folk Life Center and with special thanks to a FC intern Hannah Salmon, for help with this episode. Thank you for listening to America Works. This has been a presentation of the Library of Congress.
Visit [email protected]. I'm Rick Smith, and this is Labor History. In two on this day in labor history, the year was 1904. That was the day that John Carly, a union minor, was shot down in Dunville, Colorado. Carly was part of a strike in the Cripple Creek gold mining region. The miners had gone out on strike in support of workers at the standard mill in Colorado City. Which processed the mind, or Colorado. Governor Peabody was determined to break the strike.
He called in the state militia who joined forces with company Army Gun Thugs with 1000 rifles and 60,000 rounds of ammunition to back them up. General Sherman Bell, a veteran of Teddy Roosevelt's Rough Rider Squad in the Spanish American War led the National Guard during the strike. One of General Bell's deputies is said to have declared to hell with the Constitution, we aren't going by the Constitution. This pretty much summed up General Bell's approach to the conflict.
The militia began to round up union minors. More than 1500 minors were captured and given a so-called trial by the militia. 238 of these miners were then deported from the region. They were shipped by train to Denver, Kansas, and New Mexico, and warned not to return the militia learned of a group of pro-union workers at a small encampment known as Dunville. General Bell loaded up more than 100 militiamen and company deputies on a train and headed for the camp there.
They exchanged gunfire with the minor. 65 miners armed with just 10 guns among them. Had little chance against the well armed company men. John Carly was killed and 14 miners were arrested. The union was crushed in the sites of a thousand guns. For more information, go to labor history in two.com. Like us on Facebook, follow us on Twitter at labor history in two. From the Library of Congress in Washington, DC. Welcome to America Works.
Interviews with contemporary workers throughout the United States. Collected the library's American Folk Life Center as part of its occupational folk folklife project. This is a FC staff Folklores Nancy Gross. And this episode features an interview with Juan Salcido Sanchez, who like his father before him, works behind the scenes at leading racetracks throughout the United States as a groom and caretaker for elite racehorses.
Born in Mexico. Mr. Sanchez was interviewed at the Palm Meadows training facility. In Boynton Beach, Florida by Folklorist Ellen McHale as part of our occupational folk life project, stable Views, voices, and stories from the Thoroughbred Race Track. It is a very exciting job. You know, it's, it's very nice, um, to see our two year olds come and teach him, you know, um, how to do the things around the track and, you know, make him ready to the races and things like that is very, very exciting.
We growing up with horses, you know. In Mexico, uh, we always around the horses. I'm from a little town, so like 20 years ago, the horses was the main way to translation from one place to another place. Mm-hmm. The horses were the main, main way. So I, I've been around the horses all the life. I was a worker like, uh, four or five days. Then some guys going to Mexico and and just get lucky. Yeah. When those guys got to Mexico, nobody else was there to do the job.
And the foreman and the assistant trainer was very friend with my father. So they say, okay, Jo Bo's ready to do the job. And he say he can start to do it, and I get lucky. Basically, we have to keep the horses in good shape. Like clean the stalls, give a bath to the horses, you know, dreaming, take care about the leg. And, you know, make the horses looks good.
And this month sometimes we, we got a horse like a full year, you know, all the year, but sometimes we got the horse like a two or three months and they change to New York. But usually, uh, like I got with this field I got like at six months. And so it's just depends. Mm-hmm. The condition of the horses or the condition of the races. Yeah, but when one horse stay sound and stay drawn and good, you know, sometimes the horses stay, uh, three or four years. It's not easy.
When one horse is like the blood is more pure, it's like more wild. I'm usually growing just Phyllis Uhhuh in this. But usually just Felix all the, all the time. Mostly Felix, but yeah, and always has like, this is my favorite. I got four, but this is my favorite when I start to be a groom. Uh, one of my friend's father, he told me, you gonna be a nice groom when you know the horses like one or two kids, because it's just the same thing.
You get the horse like a little kid, like a child, and then he's go grow growing up with you. The things that do teach to the horse, that's the thing that he's gonna do later. The first day. Then I start to work with the horses. My father, he never told me nothing. He got a bad, bad horse. He was. Uh, a top horse to work with now. He was very wild. My father, he don't tell me nothing. He just told me, Hey, go inside the stall, and took the bandage off to that horse. So, I don't know the horse.
I, I don't feel afraid and go straight to the stall and took off the es. The horses don't do anything to me. He was very quiet. Then when I came out, my father told me. That horse is the baddest horse in the barn. He buy a couple of guys, he kick a, a couple of guys. You was scared? No. Why? Because you don't know. Yeah. So that's the way that you guys to do the. Things. Don't be scared. I'm happy, I'm happy to be here and, and I'm happy to do this job.
Sometimes when I get off, uh, when I get the day off, I get up on, you know, usually I get up at four 30 in the morning, so I get up at five or five 30 and I go to the track and see the horses training, you know, because that's what I like. I like this, this thing, uh, this interview, I'm, I'm, I'm. Excited because nobody asking me nothing about the horses before. And nobody knows the real job with the horses, the mostly all the people, they just came to watch the horses on the races.
The races is the Maurice things because it's just two minutes and that's all. And always say when somebody ask me, oh, how you feel the horse for the race, you gonna win? And I always say, the only thing that I need. To win the race is two minutes of lucky in first got Uhhuh. That's all I need, but to get there, it's many things behind. You've been listening to Juan Lacto Sanchez. A groom and behind the scenes stable worker at racetracks throughout the United States.
To hear the complete interview with Mr. Sanchez, as well as interviews with hundreds of other contemporary American workers, please visit www.llc.gov/folklife or just search online for America Works. This is a FC staff Folklores, Nancy Gross. On behalf of the American Folklife Center and with special thanks to a FC intern Hannah Salmon, for help with this episode. Thank you for listening to America Works. This has been a presentation of the Library of Congress. Visit [email protected].
Hey, that's it for this week's edition of Labor History Today. We heard stories from the America Works podcast, part of the Library of Congress's Occupational Folk Life Project, and we remember two tragic moments in labor history, the 1917 Butte Mine Fire and the 1904 Killing of Union Minor, John Carly in Colorado. Labor history today is produced by the Labor Heritage Foundation, and the cowmen of its initiative for labor and the working poor. Our music this week was The Miners by the Elders.
you can subscribe to Labor history today, wherever you get your podcast. Thanks so much for listening and keep making history.