Mother Jones

""Pray for the dead but fight like hell for the living"" was the rallying cry that made Mother Jones (n e Mary Harris) one of the most famous union organizers and rabble-rousers. This highly engaging biography (the first since 1974) charts the life and work of one of the U.S.'s most important and captivating political figures. Born into an impoverished Irish family in County Cork in 1837, she immigrated to North America at age 15. After working as a seamstress and teacher, Harris married George Jones, a member of the International Iron Molders Union. At 30 she was widowed when her husband and four young children died in a yellow fever epidemic. Caught up in the mid-century's roiling labor and social upheavals, Jones threw herself into the political fray. Speaking tirelessly and effectively for the rights of workers and unionists--often using bold, flagrantly rhetorical and poetic metaphors--""Mother"" Jones reached the height of her fame and influence by 1913 when, in her 70s, she campaigned for the United Mine Workers in West Virginia, where she was arrested for conspiracy to commit murder (she had urged striking minors to protect their families against the military brought in to break the strike). Gorn, professor of history at Purdue University, has successfully separated fact from myth (some of it promoted by Jones in her Autobiography), situating Jones's story within a wider cultural frame. Exploring issues from the complicated role of women in union organizing to the relationship of the Catholic Church to the working class and labor movements, he has produced a new and needed addition to contemporary labor and feminist literature. (Mar.)