August Spies broadside print

$10.00

Out of stock

On the evening of May 4, 1886, a meeting was called for Haymarket Square in Chicago to protest the killing of four strikers at the McCormick Harvester Works the day before. It was a peaceful meeting, and had dwindled from several thousand to a few hundred when a detachment of 180 policemen asked the crowd to disperse. The speaker said that the meeting was almost over and then a bomb exploded in the midst of the police, wounding sixty-six policemen, of whom seven later died. The police fired into the crowd, killing several people, wounding two hundred. Although there was no evidence of who threw the bomb, eight Chicago anarchists were arrested, tried, and sentenced to death. This became known worldwide as the Haymarket Affair. Four of the eight were executed, among them August Spies, who here addresses the court in his own defense1. Just before his execution Spies said: “There will be a time when our silence will be more powerful than the voices you strangle today.”

From Voices of A People’s History, edited by Zinn and Arnove

 

Letterpress print on recycled paper

Weight 9 oz
Dimensions 11 × 17 in