The City of Bogalusa was the brainchild of the Jekyll Island Club that helped Frank Goodyear conceptualized every last detail of the formation of Bogalusa as a community. It is apparent that the group hoped Bogalusa would become a shining example of the benefits of what they believed was their ability to create a better society for America. Frank Goodyear combined the roles of industrial leader, labor leader and government leader into one job. Any attempts to assert leadership roles over these functions were perceived by the Great Southern Lumber Company(Company) as a challenge to their authority to be the center of society.
It is important to know that several "independent" social functions such as the media and merchant class of Bogalusa was dominated and controlled by the Company. The company made it a point to assert that such entities as local merchants were free to operate without constrant from the Company and that local housing was being converted to individual ownership in newspaper accounts of the mid 1920's. The real question is why would the Company feel compelled to point this out in a Newspaper they controlled? Attracting labor was the reason. The Company had developed a reputation as being a heavy handed employer who controlled all aspects of their employee's lives. This account of the Goodyear Massacre indicates the reputation was earned by the behavior of the Company and not jealous rumors started by competing employers in the lumber industry.
The following is an account of the Goodyear Massacre, which is vastly different than the one Charles Goodyear, tells in his history of Bogalusa---
((In 1917 they put in a very large pulp and paper mill at the Bogalusa plant, and about that time the workmen at Bogalusa began to try to organize. They asked for organizers, and several attempts were made to help the people there. About this tune a young man named Rodgers, an organizer for the carpenters and joiners, went to Bogalusa and while there was arrested as a suspicious character. He was released after getting the news to some of his friends in New Orleans; however, they claimed that he was a dangerous character and filed charges against him in the federal court and while he was in jail at Bogalusa, the Bogalusa officers had put dynamite caps and fusein his grip. This grip was produced in the federal court as evidence, but their case was so flimsy and so crude that the federal authorities dismissed it without trial.
Later James Leonard, at that time vice-president of the State Federation of Labor and an organizer of the A. F. of L., went to Bogalusa and was told by the authorities there that they would not permit any organizer to come there and organize the men. Mr. Leonard left Bogalusa and returned to New Orleans; however, this did not stop the desire of the workers at Bogalusa, who were in touch with the state federation; and later on W. M. Donnells was sent there as an organizer for the carpenters, and organized the carpenters of the place. Then, in rapid succession, the organization of all lines followed until we had seventeen local unions at the place with a splendid central union.
Seeing that the men had organized in spite of their efforts to thwart it, the company became furious and tried to intimidate the members of the locals; finding that this would not work they then started systematic system of discharging all white union men and putting non-union Negroes to work in their places and at the same time making a great deal of noise and trying to work up a spirit of antagonism to the organization of Negroes, even telling the farmers and planters that we were trying to organize the Negro farm laborers. This forced the hand of labor and a campaign of organization was then begun to organize the Negroes in the employ of the Great Southern Lumber Company. This brought on quite a little feeling. The company called a mass-meeting of the citizens, where several public men, among them a Congressman, made speeches opposing the organization of Negroes. Donnells spoke at that meeting and defended the right of labor to organize. Seeing that the defended the right of labor to organize.
Seeing that the men were determined the company then entered into an agreement to the effect that they would stop discharging the union men if they would cease organizing Negroes. This arrangement was made with the understanding that no union man should be discriminated against or prejudiced in any way because of his membership in a union. This arrangement had not been made thirty days when the company immediately started discharging both white and colored union men, and issued an ultimatum from Mr. W. S. Sullivan, the vice-president and general manager of the plant, that he would not recognize any union man and that he would not meet nor confer with any one representing union labor and instructed his office to so inform Donnells and others.
This agreement was made in April of 1919, and from that time on things happened fast at Bogalusa. Mr. Sullivan, who was vice-president of the Great Southern Lumber Company, was also mayor of the town of Bogalusa. He then placed about thirteen of his henchmen that had not joined labor on the police force of the town. They were augmented by a number of deputies appointed by the sheriff of the parish, and then began a reign of terror in the town.
They tried to get rid of all the leaders by terrorizing them and by offering them bribes to leave the place. Finding this would not work, they sent their employment man to Chicago and other cities to secure three thousand Negroes, with the intent of placing nonunion Negroes in the industries there and forcing the union men to leave. They failed to get any men in Chicago; they did not offer sufficient wages and the men were informed that no labor trouble existed. However, the men knew that they were wanted as strike-breakers and would not go. On failing to get men, they immediately began arresting men, both black and white, on all kinds of trumped-up charges and taking them to the county seat about twelve miles away.
The automobiles furnished the police and deputy sheriffs were used for the purpose of taking the men to the county seat, but the men when discharged for lack of evidence had to get back to Bogalusa any way they could. In addition to this, several men were beaten by these same gunmen; others were ordered to leave, while some of them were offered bribes to leave.
They were continually arresting Negroes for vagrancy and placing them in the city jail. It seemed that a raid is made each night in the section of the town where the Negroes live and all that can be found are rounded up and placed in jail charged with vagrancy. In the morning the employment manager of the Great Southern Lumber Company goes to the jail and takes them before the city court where they are fined as vagrants and turned over to the lumber company under the guard of the gunmen where they were made to work out this fine. ))Link to source.
Here is a fresh perspective on the actual murder of several union organizers which occured during this dark period of our history---
“This episode of ‘Chronicles’ brings to life an exciting era of north shore history where the creation of Bogalusa as a mill town with a close-knit, family atmosphere and its sudden, dramatic growth to a bustling city of 16,000 made it one of the most attractive places to work in the South,” Settoon said.
“On the flip side, it shows how even rural Louisiana wasn’t immune to the union labor disputes that ripped cities in the North at that time,” he said. “And of course, the violent labor event which brought whites and blacks together in this region was unprecedented.”
The critical event was the Nov. 22, 1919 murder of four white laborers who gave their lives to protect Sol Dacus, a black member of Timber Workers Local who organized the African-American labor force.
“This episode reveals that race relations in the Deep South were not always as dire as typically depicted,” said the show’s host, Southeastern history professor Sam Hyde, Ford Chair for Regional Studies and director of the Center for Southeast Louisiana Studies. “It is a story of four white men giving up their lives to protect one black man. Even more, it is a story of Louisianians coming together in a unity of purpose seldom seen in other regions with dramatic and devastating consequences.”)) Link to source.
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