- H/T to internet friend and RevGal Ellen, who posted on Facebook: This is in honor of all working people everywhere, and in memory of the many generations of peasants, artisans, domestics and factory workers in my own family whose labor helped build both Europe and the United States.
- I think of my great-great grandfather, Henry Meadows Butler, who was a miller, and his wife Louisa, who was the daughter of a miller. Henry's father was Richard Butler, a tallow chandler. Louisa and her second husband, William Davy emigrated to Chicago in 1879 and they started a company burning clay ballast for railroad cars. My Butler grandfather was still engaged in this family business when he married my grandmother in 1912 and they moved to Texas.
- Later the family owned a dry cleaner's, and after a financial reverse, my grandmother and great grandmother did ironing at home.
- I think of my Gramma Beth's grandfather, John Dawson, who left England for America to avoid debtor's prison. He took his wife and daughter with him (my great-grandmother, Gramma Etta). My Gramma Etta invented a thread cutter that pinned to the blouse of the seamstress for easy access. It was patented.
I'll be working this Labor Day, about which I have moaned somewhat. Looking at it, I don't have much to complain about. I am part of the "knowledge economy;" my tools are words and images, my workplace a computer station. My office is cool and warm in approximately the right degrees at about the right times. In fact, I "suffer" from pain in my arm brought on by sitting still and using a computer for hours at a time.
I am grateful for those who've gone before me.
- To read about the history of the song
- Here are the lyrics:
- As we go marching, marching, in the beauty of the day,
- A million darkened kitchens, a thousand mill lofts gray,
- Are touched with all the radiance that a sudden sun discloses,
- For the people hear us singing: Bread and Roses! Bread and Roses!
- As we go marching, marching, we battle too for men,
- For they are women's children, and we mother them again.
- Our lives shall not be sweated from birth until life closes;
- Hearts starve as well as bodies; give us bread, but give us roses.
- As we go marching, marching, unnumbered women dead
- Go crying through our singing their ancient call for bread.
- Small art and love and beauty their drudging spirits knew.
- Yes, it is bread we fight for, but we fight for roses too.
- As we go marching, marching, we bring the greater days,
- The rising of the women means the rising of the race.
- No more the drudge and idler, ten that toil where one reposes,
- But a sharing of life's glories: Bread and roses, bread and roses.
- Our lives shall not be sweated from birth until life closes;
- Hearts starve as well as bodies; bread and roses, bread and roses.
