John S. Gambs

A curious book, remembered, if at-all, only because for decades it was the only serious study since Brissenden's work THE LAUNCHING OF THE IWW. Finally, with publication of Dowell's work on CS persecution, then Chaplin's memoirs WOBBLY, shortly thereafter the IWW's own half-century survey, and at-last Joyce Kornbluh's REBEL VOICES, the vacuum began to be filled. Still, this book is not without interest, particularly for its account of the disastrous split between the so-called "Four-Treys" and the "EPs", with some inexplicable bias toward the latter. There are also interesting bits about Wobbly hangers-on like Keene Wallis (yes, he who translated Huysmans), but overall the work seems, to the well-informed reader, ironically less than the sum of its parts. For the record, while raw membership-statistics might justify the word "decline", the reality is that the IWW was entering a period of tremendous influence in the labor movement, both in its organizational right, and through the efforts of "double-headerss" (IWW members who carried Wobblt rec cards but organized or bargained through another union, for one reason or another.… (mer)