333 S. Main Street - DLA1 #24

Home of Bob Bigelow

This was once the residence of Bob Bigelow, a member of the IWW. Bigelow joined the IWW in 1923 as part of the Building Construction Union. He joined shortly after his mother and sister began visiting Wobblies who were standing trial for Criminal Syndicalism.

In April of 1924, while visiting an ill member of the IWW in the county jail, Bigelow was arrested and was also charged with criminal syndicalism. He was in prison for one month before his case was dismissed.

Less than three weeks later, on June 14, 1924, several dozen sailors, Klansmen and loyal citizens raided the IWW hall in San Pedro. They attacked the occupants, including women and children. Seven children were intentionally pushed or dipped into scolding hot coffee. Seven IWW members, including Bob Bigelow, were loaded on trucks by Klansmen and taken to Santa Ana Canyon where they were beaten, tarred and feathered. Undeterred, the men returned to San Pedro by the next day.

LAT/LON 34.049063,-118.246309

239 N. Grand Avenue - DLA1 #7

Home of John "Juan" Creaghe

Dr. John O’Dwyer Creaghe (1841 – February 19, 1920) was an Irish-born international anarchist whose name is most often associated with anarchism in England and Argentina, where he helped pioneer a movement of critical importance to Argentina and South American Labor history.

Creaghe became an anarchist after emigrating to Buenos Aires. It is believed he became an anarchist under the tutelage of Errico Malatesta. He published several anarchist journals and helped to form the Federacion Obrera Regional Argentina (FORA), the mighty anarcho-syndicalist union that took park in the events of the Tragic Week of January 1919, when the army fired into a crowd on strike killing about 1,000 persons in eight days. He was also involved in the Free School movement in Buenos Aires and was the director of the Rationalist School in Lujan.

He came to the US in Los Angeles and became active in Anarchist circles including supporting the Magonistas. He helped to produce Regeneracion and participated in the revolution in Baja Mexico. While the PLM occupied the house on Alpine and Yale, he set up a doctor’s office to assist working people with inexpensive medical assistance. He even was the attending doctor for the birth of Enrique Flores Magon’s child. Creaghe eventually moved to Washington where he died in utter poverty in February 1920. It is rumored that he died under a streetlamp with a gun in one hand and anarchist propaganda in the other.

LAT/LON 34.057871,-118.246758

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With The Poor People Of The Earth: A Biography Of Doctor John Creaghe of Sheffield & Buenos Aires by Alan O’Toole. Kate Sharpley Library: 2005, 36 pages

1st Street & Los Angeles Street – DLA1 #1

Lucy Parsons - 1920

Arrest of Lucy Parsons

During the height of the Free Speech fight in San Diego, the I.W.W. held daily meetings at this corner.
In April 13, 1913, Lucy Parsons – the anarchist hellraiser and wife of Haymarket Martyr, Albert Parsons – was arrested with partner George Merkstall for selling anarchist literature without a license. They were held incommunicado for 24 hours. The jail matron stripped Lucy and forcibly removed the ring from her finger, despite the fact the couple as only charged with a misdemeanor. The city objected less to the violation of the peddling ordinance than they did to the content of the pamphlets. A court date was set for April 24; the judge took the case under advisement until April 30th and dismissed the case and released the defendants on their own recognizance on May 9, 1913.

LAT/LON 34.051346,-118.242344

Mortimer Downing, Los Angeles IWW & 'Silent Defendant'

Mortimer Downing (1862-1949) was an early IWW member and was one of those who were tried in the "Silent Defenders" trial of the IWW*.

Money raised from the Saturday July 21, 2012 Downtown Los Angeles - Part 1 Anarchist Historical tour will go to purchasing a grave marker for Mortimer Downing.

For more than 5 decades the Downing grave has been unmarked in a LA cemetery. The Black Rose Society is determined to correct this matter.

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* The Silent Defenders, Courts and Capitalism in California: A Brief History of the Up Hill Struggle of the Industrial  Workers of the World in California and Expose  of the Sacramento Frame-Up and Conviction 
PDF of IWW pamphlet by Harvey Duff, 1920 (5.6 MB)

Resendo Dorame: Wobbly & Magonista Revolutionary

This is the resting place of Rosendo Dorame – an amazing member of both the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) and the Partido Liberal Mexicano (PLM). It is men like this that we must always remember.

Rosendo A. Dorame (1879-1932) was a Mexican Wobbly as well as a member of the Mexican Liberal Party (PLM.) His family originated from Sonora, Mexico but later moved to Florence, Arizona. He worked in several various occupations – barber, miner, carpenter and even briefly as a sheriff in Arizona. He joined the Western Federation of Miners and participated in the Colorado Cripple Creek miner’s strike, which lasted from 1903 to 1905.

Dorame actually helped form the Phoenix IWW local 272 in 1906. Three years later he assisted in the creation of the La Union Industrial, the only Spanish paper in the U.S. advocating industrial unionism.

In 1911, he recruited Mexican men from mining camps in Arizona and led one of the arms of the PLM invasion into Mexico. He was arrested and convicted on violating the neutrality law and spent one year in prison. After his release he organized a smelter strike in El Paso with another IWW-PLM member, Fernando Palomares. He also took part in the 1917 Bisbee, Arizona copper strike where he was a victim of the great deportation.

Sometime before 1920, he moved to Southern California and continued to raise his family until 1932, when he passed. His gravesite can be found at Evergreen Cemetery.

The Plaza - Black Rose Society Tour, April 7, 2012

Jang Lee's short video from the April 7, 2012 Black Rose Society Anarchist historical tour centered on the Plaza.

Why the Black Rose?

Throughout the world, the black rose has come to symbolize many things. To some, it has symbolized death, sorrow and mourning. In the same vein, it has also symbolized hatred and revenge. In what seems to be somewhat of a contradiction, the black rose has also become a symbol of the rebirth of beauty or of the mind. And of course, it has also become a symbol for anarchism or libertarian socialism.

The Black Rose Society accepts all implications of this symbol. We embrace the hatred and the desire for revenge against all institutions that have oppressed and exploited humanity. We feel sorrow and mourn over the lives lost and suffering felt by those who have been trampled on in the name of profit and capital. With that, we call for a rebirth of society, free from abuse and suffering. We cry out for a society where a person does not need to sell their arms in order to put food in their mouth. In order for this to happen a rebirth of our minds needs to take place.

The city of Los Angeles once possessed a rich and vibrant anarchist movement. These groups played a critical role in revolutionary and class struggles throughout the world. In response, organizations and individuals became the targets of governments and business leaders. Despite the repression, the movement remained steadfast in its commitment to anarchism and revolutionary change.

Today, the rich history of the Los Angeles anarchist movement has been lost. Due to a disconnect of today’s anarchists with their past, combined with never ending redevelopment of the city’s landscape, anarchists in the city constantly walk past important landmarks for our movement unaware of their existence.

Our ignorance of the past has left our movement rootless, wandering aimlessly without any connection to our history or culture that once existed. We sit uninspired, blind to the beauty that surrounds us.

The Black Rose Society is determined to generate a rebirth of our movement into the vital community and culture that once existed. The first step in this endeavor is to reconnect our current community with its roots, to reintroduce us to our past. The beauty of our history, now covered up and ignored, can be given a rebirth. Once we are reconnected with our roots, our movement can grow and bloom.