Chapter 18 - So That's How You'll Start?
For several days, my mother and her coworkers went in and out of the police station and various worker support organizations.
With the dead boss's fraud exposed, their goal was to reclaim ownership of the sewing machines—but, as we feared, things weren't so simple.
Even with the boss's schemes revealed, ownership of the sewing machines was another issue altogether.
Not only the loan sharks, but even the late boss's surviving family jumped into the fight over who owned them.
To take these people to court would require enormous legal fees—far more than poor workers could ever afford.
It was a pretty depressing situation all around.
But late in the afternoon, when my mother returned home, she brought a glimmer of hope.
"The ILGWU has decided to stand with us!"
"What's that?
" "The International Ladies Garment Workers Union."
ILGWU—the International Ladies Garment Workers Union. It was founded in 1900 by seven different local unions in New York City, made up primarily of workers in the women's clothing industry.
"Then what about the WTUL, the Women's Trade Union League? Weren't they the first to show interest in our case?"
"They're still watching how things unfold. I think they'll step in a bit later."
WTUL and ILGWU.
Both organizations share the goal of protecting the rights of women workers, but there are differences between them.
The ILGWU is limited to workers in the women's garment manufacturing industry, while the WTUL targets women workers in all industries.
There's also a difference in the makeup of their leadership.
The ILGWU's leadership is made up mainly of former workers, whereas the WTUL consists largely of upper-class women activists practicing noblesse oblige.
The classic example of both organizations' activism is from 1909:
The "Uprising of 20,000," a milestone strike in US labor history.
At that time, the ILGWU led the charge at the forefront of the strike, while the WTUL forged an alliance with them and provided essential funds from behind the scenes.
"In four days, there's going to be a street protest at Union Square on the Lower East Side. We need to get the word out about our situation!"
As soon as there was a clear reason to protest, the ILGWU jumped on the case.
What made this even more meaningful was that Union Square—the site of the protest—was also where the Uprising of 20,000 strike took place, shocking the entire country.
"How many people are supposed to take part in the protest?"
"I'm not sure. We might have to start off just by ourselves."
"Won't it be dangerous if there aren't many people?"
"But we can't just sit back and do nothing, can we?"
Even though eight bodies were found at the abandoned warehouse, it hardly drew any attention.
It was only mentioned as a "shootout caused by gang infighting."
The same went for articles about the owner. There wasn't a single article in the newspapers covering the owner's scam. No one seemed interested in why these frauds kept happening, or in the suffering of the workers because of them. Maybe they were just deliberately ignoring it.
In the end, the only way for the workers to publicize the harm they'd suffered at the hands of a corrupt boss was to make their voices heard through protest.
Once the ILGWU got involved, the case surrounding the stolen sewing machines entered a new phase.
Manhattan's Midtown Garment District accounts for 70% of all clothing production in America.
Clothing factory owners would often hold unofficial gatherings at the 'Manhattan Club' on 26th Street.
But today, someone distinctly out of place showed up.
"Johnny Spanish is here to see you."
"Johnny? That Johnny we all know?"
"That's right."
The owners had mixed reactions to Johnny Spanish's visit.
"I heard he got out of prison. So, why has he suddenly decided to come here?"
"He's definitely not here for anything good."
"Still, we have to at least meet him. If we refuse and he decides to make trouble later, could we really handle it?"
Johnny Spanish, formerly of a gang.
Drug dealer, armed robber, assault and murder, and slugger for crushing labor strikes.
Johnny was someone these garment manufacturers had all used at least once to break up strikes.
"Some of you may not be comfortable with him, so I'll meet Johnny as our representative. It'd look silly if we all went charging in together."
"That's probably for the best."
Assuming the role of the group's representative, the factory owner moved into a private room to have a one-on-one meeting with Johnny.
A man of short stature, cropped hair, and sharp, piercing eyes.
Johnny Spanish, son of an Italian father and a Spanish mother, downed his whiskey in one gulp before speaking up.
"Seems like the world turned upside down while I was in prison. There are so many fancy cars on the streets—everyone must be living pretty well these days."
"Seven years is definitely long enough for things to change."
"Well, just looking at you, boss, I can tell. I've heard business is booming for you lately."
Thriving didn't even begin to cover it.
These days, it felt like he could buy up all of Manhattan before long.
As the 20th century began, lifestyles changed rapidly.
A wide variety of clothing was being released, and countless products were being manufactured and sold.
The biggest change was the Great War in Europe.
With European manufacturing centers destroyed, orders for mass military supplies like uniforms, tents, and blankets were all directed to America.
On top of that, as raw material prices soared, clothing companies seized the opportunity to make huge price hikes, raking in unprecedented profits.
The apparel industry was enjoying a boom like never before.
"If it weren't for a few obstacles, this place would be heaven."
At Johnny's words, the factory owner stroked his chin. The devil visits paradise, only to suddenly bring up obstacles?
"So there's something going on?"
"It's not a huge deal, but it's definitely a headache."
"Well, it's not like there's ever just one or two of those."
"But there must be one thing that worries you the most, right?"
If there was one worry shared by all factory owners—not just those in garment manufacturing—it was this:
A labor union strike.
Johnny brought up a recent story about a sweatshop owner on Eldridge Street.
"We're not looking to protect a scammer like Blank either. What happened was the result of a shady relationship, and really, it was just a personal lapse." "There are quite a lot of scammers like that in the garment industry. Because of people like them, even honest owners like yourself end up being criticized. Isn't that unfair?"
Instead of answering, the owner took a sip of whiskey.
As Johnny said, he had to admit there were plenty of trash like Blank among clothing manufacturers.
And whenever those scumbags caused trouble, the riled-up public would lump all the decent owners in with them and attack indiscriminately.
Pressuring newspapers to downplay related articles was just a way to avoid the ignorant public's outrage.
The recent incident with the scammer Blank had been handled that way, too.
"But this time, the situation might get bigger. The workers are plotting something."
"With just fifty people? That's too few to pull off anything serious."
The owner sounded unimpressed, but Johnny flashed him a knowing smile.
"That small number could easily grow into tens of thousands. The IGLWU is involved."
Whack!
The owner slammed his whiskey glass down hard.
Most clothing factory owners would have a fit at just the mention of the IGLWU.
It was a perfectly natural reaction.
Seven years ago, when garment industry workers led the "Uprising of 20,000," the ILGWU was behind it.
The truly shocking part wasn't just the twenty thousand—it was that they drew in another sixty thousand cloakmakers and sparked the largest strike in history.
It really was a damned organization.
"The ILGWU's meddling in something like this? Are you sure about your info?"
"You still don't really know me. I've got connections everywhere."
That's what made Johnny so dangerous and frightening.
A man who was always ready to turn his gun on you from the opposite side if things didn't go his way.
Sometimes for the union, sometimes for the company.
This "bat with guns and knives" would smash his opponents, no matter what side they were on, if there was money to be made.
"Are the protesters demanding compensation?"
"They're after unpaid wages. And just as it happens, the owner colluded with loan sharks to siphon off goods, but after both sides got raided, he's out in the open with nothing to stand on."
"I heard about that. But the issue with the sewing machines should be settled in court, not something for the ILGWU to get involved in."
Johnny shook his head with a sly grin.
"The bankruptcy, the wage delays, and the asset sell-offs were all just part of the scam. For the ILGWU, which is always looking for a good cause, this is the perfect excuse to step in."
Right now, women in America didn't have the right to vote.
But the times were changing.
With more and more women participating in society, calls for suffrage were growing louder every day.
Recently, women's labor organizations—once careful to avoid political activity—had started taking a more active role, for the very same reason.
They'd realized that the right to vote was the bare minimum needed to protect their rights.
"In a few days, conscription will become full-scale. When men get pulled away, who's going to fill the empty jobs? Women's voices are going to get even louder—and that's what makes these protests dangerous."
The clothing manufacturers had no intention of defending the fraudster.
However, if the ILGWU got involved in the protests, it was obvious they would use every trick in the book to stoke agitation.
They'd turn capitalists into villains, spread the protests, and drag down their reputations.
What they feared most was that if production was disrupted, they'd suffer financial losses.
Then they'd have to breathe through yet another suffocating deal with the workers.
They couldn't bear to go through that again.
Compounding historical circumstances only heightened the sense of crisis. Leaving Johnny without an immediate answer, the owner returned to the meeting place to gather opinions.
"I agree we need to stop the protests, but couldn't going after the ILGWU backfire and make things even worse?"
"That's why we need Johnny. He says he'll crush it before it even starts."
The plan was to threaten each individual protester—that is, the sweatshop workers—so they wouldn't dare leave their homes.
If the ILGWU wanted to help, they'd be powerless to do so.
Because the number of protesters was small, it was possible.
"That's just like Johnny. And what's he asking for?"
"A hundred dollars a week. Not an outrageous amount, is it?"
"Putting money aside, after rotting in prison for seven years, can Johnny really still do what he used to?"
The owner who took it upon himself to act as their representative gave a meaningful smile.
"He's already brought in a pretty notorious gang from that area. You know how Johnny is."
He was a man infamous as a brutal labor slugger.
And all it took to hire someone like that was one hundred dollars.
If that money would ward off trouble, there was no reason to refuse.
"Let's move forward with it."
That day, Johnny took a fifty-dollar advance and began gathering his crew.
The labor slugger wars were still ongoing.
Once again, he was ready to stir up chaos in the world of protests and strikes.
"I'm back, you sons of bitches!" Johnny shouted.
Leading his men, Johnny marched to the Tenement House to break up the protest.
Two days before the protest.
While my mother and her coworkers made picket signs down in the basement workshop, I was shut up in my room working.
I was in the middle of sketching brassiere designs.
Suddenly, there was a commotion outside my window.
Shrill screams and curses mingled together.
"Voi, chi siete per portarvelo via! L'abbiamo fatto noi! (Hey, who are you to take that? We made it!)"
"Zitto e sparisci. Se intralci, non te la farò passare liscia! (Shut up and get lost. If you get in the way, you're going to regret it!)"
Something was happening again.
There's never a quiet day in this damn Tenement House.
When I reached the first floor, chaos greeted me.
Men carrying armloads of picket signs up from the basement were fighting with women trying to stop them.
Where's my mother?
Scanning the area, my eyes met those of a man who looked me up and down as if he were some sort of race inspector.
"Is he mixed-race?"
"Yes, I am."
"So, what's the name of your crazy mother?"
The bastard glanced at the paper he was holding as he asked for my mother's name.
"Why do you want to know that?"
"Did you just talk back to me, you little shit? Answer before I smack you."
I clamped my mouth shut and stood my ground.
The man with a furrowed brow strode over toward me.
Just then, I heard frantic footsteps coming up from the basement. It was my mother, rushing up after hearing my voice.
"Ciaran!"
Startled, my mother grabbed my arm and started pulling me up the stairs.
"That's your son? Fuck, what kind of bitch would screw a Coolie and give birth to a bastard like that…"
More than filthy curses trailed behind us.
In essence, he was saying something along the lines of, "How desperate for a man do you have to be to hook up with a Coolie and have a kid like him?"
Ignoring them, my mother dragged me all the way home.
"Ciaran, you have to endure it. They're doing it on purpose."
"I think they took your picket sign."
My mother nodded, biting her lip.
"They even had a list of the employees. They threatened to kill our families if we participated in the protest…"
"Sounds like some new trash has turned up."
"No matter how angry you get, you need to hold it in. Now is not the time."
"I'm not that reckless, Mom. What am I supposed to do out in broad daylight, anyway?"
Satisfied but still wary, my mother refused to leave my side.
She'd been through a couple of incidents already and didn't even flinch when screams echoed from downstairs.
"But, Mom. The owner's dead—so who's trying to stop the protest now?"
"It's got to be the Garment Manufacturers Association…"
The association formed by factory owners; in other words, the capitalists.
And they were on high alert, wary of the protest spreading on a large scale.
The reason they mobilized gangs—labor sluggers—to crush the protest right at the start was exactly that.
This problem also stemmed from having too few protestors.
Even counting my mother and her coworkers, there were fewer than fifty people.
The company that had led a massive strike in the past had over five hundred workers.
This was barely a tenth of that.
Smaller companies simply didn't have the resources to lead protests, which made them easy prey for scammers.
The garment manufacturers used violence to impose their will, and this vicious cycle played out across countless workplaces.
What I couldn't understand was the attitude of my mother's coworkers.
Especially the Italian women, who withdrew from the protest and kept silent.
When my mother asked them why, they cautiously mentioned two words.
Black Hand, Omertà.
Neither word was unfamiliar.
They were etched in books and films I'd seen in my previous life, and in both my memories and Ciaran's.
The Black Hand was an Italian criminal organization that, in the late 19th century in America, engaged in extortion, assassination, child kidnapping, and bombings.
Most members were from Naples—criminals who had blended in among the immigrants.
The group got its name because, when sending threatening letters to announce their crimes, they would stamp the letter with a black handprint as a symbol.
Someone once said:
"The Black Hand ruled Italian immigrants through a terror that rose up from deep within—a fear so overwhelming it numbed the mind"
What's surprising is that, while they spread like poisonous mushrooms across the US and expanded their turf, hardly anyone even knew they existed.
Their true nature only began to be revealed in the 1900s.
This was thanks to Omertà—
The "code of silence" that Italians had upheld since the old country.
All problems were to be handled internally.
Even if you witnessed a crime, you never testified to outsiders—especially law enforcement.
If you broke this rule, the penalty was death.
This code of silence—Omertà—would later become the very foundation of the Italian Mafia's code of conduct.
But for now, the Black Hand is still a shadowy and indistinct presence.
In 1909, the Black Hand became Public Enemy Number One after assassinating Joseph Petrosino, an Italian-American NYPD officer who was hunting them. Afterward, they began scrubbing away any trace of themselves.
They would re-emerge during the Prohibition era.
Only next time, the Black Hand would resurface as the more sophisticated and cunning criminal syndicate known as the Mafia.
In any case, the important thing is that the guys who snatched the pickets weren't the Black Hand.
They were just hired sluggers.
They pretended to be the Black Hand, stoking fear among the Italian women to enforce Omertà.
At the same time, they intimidated the Jewish women, who made up an even larger part of the workforce.
And the day after the pickets were stolen the sluggers' threats produced grim results.
"We've decided to leave this place in three days, Nora. I'm sorry we can't stay and stand with you..."
"Where are you suddenly planning to go, Imelda?"
"Sacramento Valley."
"That... that far away?"
The far West in California, the complete opposite of New York.
The climate is similar to Italy's, and they grow familiar crops like grapes and olives, making it an easy place for Italians to adapt.
Her husband lost his job after getting caught up in the harbor strike, and she found herself in the same situation. With nowhere left to turn, their family chose not a big city, but a farm.
There were a few others besides Imelda's family, too.
Their decision hadn't come out of nowhere.
Women who had been thinking about leaving ever since the boss died.
After the loan sharks were killed, they briefly hoped they could get their sewing machines back, but the violence and threats finally forced them to make up their minds.
"Everyone's scared. At this rate, there'll be hardly anyone left willing to stand up and protest... Even fifty people are struggling like this."
"Still, if we've started, we have to see it through."
The rich bosses hire sluggers, and the poor workers, with their frail bodies, are shaken by violence.
Killing one or two people won't change this.
To really change things, we need to use even stronger force to crush their organizations, their groups.
We have to take from them before they take from us. I am justice itself.
That's how I accept this era.
And now, I've found my starting point—
The path to becoming a Vigilante.
After comforting my mother, I headed for the harbor.
I went to find Tanner Smith.
"You want us to protect a protest with barely a dozen people? Since when are gangs some kind of social activists? Or charitable organizations? And besides, nothing in this world is free…"
"How much do you want?"
"One dollar a head!"
Tanner sneered as he continued.
"If the protest drags on, the price goes up. Can those sweatshop workers even afford that? With ten people, that's ten dollars a day."
The reason companies almost always win—
It's all about the power of money.
Tanner scoffed at me, treating me like a rookie who didn't know any better.
So I pulled out some money.
"Here. This is one day's wages up front."
"Wow, you're always so prepared, aren't you?"
Tanner licked his lips, eyeing the cash.
Then, suddenly, something seemed off—he glared at me.
"This is only nine dollars. That's not the right number of people. Make it ten—one dollar short…"
"One of them is me."
"…What?"
"You told me to start from the ground up."
His eyes flickered, mouth slightly open in surprise.
Then, a sly grin spread across Tanner's face.
"So, that's how you want to begin?"