VLVL2 (Chapter 6) - part 5

[Mike Weaver]

76.16 "bindlestiff life"    Hobolike. Bindle = bundle, usually a hobo's 
clothes and stuff, rolled up in bedroll. Hence, "Bindlestiff" = hobo, a 
stiff with a bindle, but sometimes a thief who will stiff you of your 
bindle. (BoW)

76.17 "Joe Hill" (1882 - 1915) was a Swedish emigrant who arrived in the US 
in 1901, and fought in the Mexican revolution before becoming an IWW 
organizer in California in 1912. A songwriter as well as a soldier of 
fortune, he is credited as the author of many labor union songs, including 
Casey Jones (The Union Scab), The Preacher and the Slave, Rebel Girl, and 
many others. In 1915, Hill was framed on a murder charge, and executed by 
firing squad, in Utah. Whether in spite of, or because of, his murder, he 
went on to become a legendary labor hero, inspiring countless thousands of 
working men and women. Hill's life fully justifies his legend. (BoW)

THE PREACHER AND THE SLAVE
  By Joe Hill
(Tune: "Sweet Bye and Bye")

  Long-haired preachers come out every night,
Try to tell you what's wrong and what's right;
But when asked how 'bout something to eat
They will answer with voices so sweet

CHORUS
You will eat, bye and bye,
In that glorious land above the sky;
Work and pray, live on hay,
You'll get pie in the sky when you die.

And the starvation army they play,
And they sing and they clap and they pray,
Till they get all your coin on the drum,
Then they tell you when you're on the bum:

Holy Rollers and Jumpers come out,
And they holler, they jump and they shout
"Give your money to Jesus," they say,
"He will cure all diseases today."

If you fight hard for children and wife
Try to get something good in this life
You're a sinner and bad man, they tell,
When you die you will sure go to hell.
	
  Workingmen of all countries, unite,
Side by side we for freedom will fight:
When the world and its wealth we have gained
To the grafters we'll sing this refrain:

LAST CHORUS

You will eat, bye and bye,
When you've learned how to cook and to fry; 	
Chop some wood, 'twill do you good,
And you'll eat in the sweet bye and bye.

76.32 "piss on through"    As opposed to "pass on through." Nice bit of 
local/period usage -- unless it's a typo. (BoW)

76.37 "the City"    There's only one: San Francisco. Pynchon's flawless 
idiomatic usage reveals him to have spent at least some time in the Bay 
Area. (BoW)

77.1 "a rip-roaring union town..."    Excellent details of pre-war labor 
history in San Francisco. (BoW)

77.2 "the General strike of '34"    The surprisingly successful San 
Francisco General Strike of July, 1934, was initiated by Harry Bridges' 
Longshoremen's Union, along with a number of other unionized maritime 
workers. Jack London wrote about it in his story, "South O' the Slot." 
Although the authorities eventually succeeded in putting it down, some of 
the strikers' demands were actually met. As a result, "strike fever" spread 
throughout the US, especially in the coal mining, and textile industries, 
and among agricultural workers. Pynchon lists some of the west coast 
agricultural strikes. (BoW)
Burhan lists this excellent site covering the history of San Francisco
http://www.shapingsf.org/tour.html
For more on the General Strike see:
http://www.shapingsf.org/ezine/labor/genstrike/index.html

77.7 "Inland March"
The inland march (or the march inland) was an effort by the progressive
International Longshoremen's Association to organize industrial
workers--across industries.  This was a manifestation of broad-based,
militant "industrial unionism" associated with the CIO (before the left
purges) v. the narrow, craft-oriented, often accommodationist AFL
approach.
I could not find much of anything on this chapter of labor history on the
web, but I did locate something from the ILWU's site.  This, from a an
entry about Harry Bridges, founder of the ILA and principal figure in the
march inland, in a 1937 book _The Men Who Made Labor
"With the docks solidly organized, with not a single member of the San
Francisco ILA local on relief in the fall of 1935, with unemployment
practically abolished on the Pacific waterfronts, the rank and file
demanded the spread of unionization to all categories of workers. Early
in 1936, the maritime unions' "march inland" commenced in earnest. The 
slogan of the
Maritime Federation, "An Injury to One Is an Injury to All!" was not
merely an insistence on solidarity among affiliated unions; it was
likewise an acknowledgment that an advance achieved by one sector of the
working class could be preserved only if all other sectors were organized. 
(David Casseres)