On This Date In Labor History

July 24, 1903 – Labor organizer Mary Harris "Mother" Jones led the "March of the Mill Children" over 100 miles from Philadelphia to Pres. Theodore Roosevelt's Long Island summer home in Oyster Bay, New York, to publicize the harsh conditions of child labor and to demand a 55-hour work week. It is during this march, on about the 24th, she delivered her famed "The Wail of the Children" speech. Roosevelt refused to see them.

July 24, 1925 – John T. Scopes was convicted in Tennessee of teaching evolution and fined $100 & costs.

July 24, 1934 -- Nestor Makhno, Russian anarchist and military leader died in exile in Paris, age 44, from tuberculosis.

July 24, 1943 – The Camp Van Dorn massacre occurred in Mississippi. As many as 1,000 black soldiers were slaughtered by white soldiers on orders from their commanding officers.