On 3 June, Joe Green realized the first fruits of his campaign the miners in St. James went on strike, and the strike spread with amazing speed from Aurora to Hibbing, with the word being spread by an ever-growing march of miners, sometimes joined by women and children, carrying the word "Strike" from mine to mine. And this time the main body of strikers were Italians and Hungarians and Croats, many of them the strikebreakers of nine years earlier.

This strike, begun so spontaneously, gradually assumed organized form. The IWW took over direction, with Sam Scarlet, Carlo Tresca, Elizabeth Gurley Finn and other IWW leaders arriving on the scene from Chicago to take charge and give advice. The Western Federation of Miners, which belonged to the AFL, played no role in this strike, but the State Federation of Labor, which was associated indirectly with the AFL, was favorably inclined.

The demands made by the miners were for a $2.75 minimum pay in open mines : $3.00 in deep mines; $3.50 in deep mines under wet conditions; an 8-hour day; abolishment of the piecework system; pay days twice a month. Management, however, countered that these demands had not come from the miners themselves but had been urged upon them from the outside. They pointed out that all negotiations for settlement had broken down because the other party was not that of the workers but of the IWW representatives, with whom management refused to negotiate. The lines were clearly drawn once more, and once more there was no certainty of the outcome.

The strike, naturally, was interpreted by the Finns, too, as the beginning of a power struggle. On 7 June the Työmies suggested the line to be followed by stating : "Without organization we cannot win this strike. It has been said that we ought to get all the miners to join this strike, for then we would be certain of our victory." Although the Työmies continued to report on the progress of the strike, it was possible to read between the lines and realize that control of it lay in the hands of the `competition', the IWW. The following reports all stem from the Työmies

9 June 1916: "A big strike meeting discussed the situation at the Finnish
Workers' Hall. With 500 present, the meeting lasted from 7 to 10. Arthur Boose
took part and made a short speech opening the meeting. A Finnish leader, F.
Jaakkola, urged the workers to unite into organized groups for their own
advantage. A strike committee was elected, with two members from each
nationality group, and the committees met to discuss common strike demands."
"Every evening the strikers will assemble at the Finnish hall, from where
they will parade once through the city and then return to the hall to hold their

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