Ultimately, anti-syndicalist laws were put in place to thwart the growing influence of organizations that sought to represent immigrant workers. Burnquist, whose strike-busting was undertaken in the interests of billion dollar corporations. Meanwhile, documents from mining company officials provide a strong argument for corruption reaching as far as the state's then governor, Joseph A.

A look at the media of the time reveals how the three main contenders for working-class allegiances-mine owners, Progressive reformers, and a revolutionary union-communicated with their mostly immigrant audience. At the same time, it shows how the region's South Slavic immigrants went from 'scabs' during a 1907 strike to full-fledged striking members of the labor revolt of 1916. Against the background of the physical and cultural landscape of Minnesota's Iron Range, Kaunonen's history brings the lives of working-class Finnish immigrants into sharp relief, documenting the conditions and circumstances behind the emergence of leftist politics and union organization in their ranks. In depth and in dramatic detail, his book describes the events leading up to the strike, and the violence that made it one of the most contentious in Minnesota history. Drawing on previously untapped accounts from immigrant press newspapers, company letters, personal journals, and oral histories, historian Gary Kaunonen gives voice to the strike's organizers and working-class participants. Flames of Discontent tells the story of this pivotal moment and what it meant for workers and immigrants, mining and labor relations in Minnesota and beyond. This seemingly small labor disturbance would mushroom into one of the region's, if not the nation's, most contentious and significant battles between organized labor and management in the early twentieth century. James Mine in Aurora, Minnesota, walked off the job.

On June 2, 1916, forty mostly immigrant mineworkers at the St.

Flames of Discontent by Gary Kaunonen