Year: 2017

fiction

Lizzie M. Holmes, “Only an Industrial Outcast” (1901)

July 24, 2017 Shawn P. Wilbur
ONLY AN INDUSTRIAL OUTCAST. A homelike cottage, low, rambling, vine-clad and well shaded, faced toward the hills in the south, with the long, low, green valley and its winding stream in the center lying between, and the towers, steeples and chimneys of a village peeping above the trees at the western end. Behind the cottage rolled away broad fields, now nearly stripped of their harvests, and nearer stood well-filled barns and granaries, while on either side orchards and gardens showed the thrift and plenty of the owners. On the broad porch of the house sat two middle-aged men, lazily smoking […]
The Sex Question

Lizzie M. Holmes, “Woman’s Future Position in the World” (1898)

July 24, 2017 Shawn P. Wilbur
WOMAN’S FUTURE POSITION IN THE WORLD. To be strictly logical one should not treat of woman apart from the rest of the human race, for this is in a manner to admit that women are a distinct class, not affected by conditions, environment, etc., as men are. But we find a “woman question” actually existing. A great deal of discussion has been going on as to what is proper for woman, what her real nature is, and how many of the duties and privileges of man she should be admitted to. Women do not occupy the same position, socially, politically, […]
fiction

Lizzie M. Holmes, “World’s Exposition in the Year 2,000” (1896)

July 24, 2017 Shawn P. Wilbur
WORLD’S EXPOSITION IN THE YEAR 2,000. (A sketch which did not win the prize in the late Times-Herald competition.) The sun rose and sent a burst of glory over the sparkling lake, and glittering, smokeless city, that seemed to spring out of the water itself and stretch far away toward the western sky. At the same instant, music rich, soft, all-pervading, swelled out upon the still, sweet air, strains that could be heard in all parts of the city, and whose source could not be determined by the sound; a grand succession of rich harmonies in new and inspiring modulations, […]
fiction

May Huntley (Lizzie M. Holmes), “A Common Story Seldom Told” (1895)

July 24, 2017 Shawn P. Wilbur
A COMMON STORY SELDOM TOLD. Two women sat in the dusk of a summer evening, where the glow from a western window fell on their faces, and the one star showing in the purplish radiance, looked in upon them sympathetically. Their voices were low and even—as voices grow in the hush of twilight when one revels in the “sweetness of doing nothing and confidences are so easy.” “There is something incongruous in hearing such words from your lips,” said the younger, a dark-eyed, stately woman whom others called haughty, but who was sweetness itself to the quiet, gentle lady at […]
The Sex Question

Lizzie M. Holmes, “Woman in Economics” (1892)

July 24, 2017 Shawn P. Wilbur
WOMAN IN ECONOMICS. Women have now entered nearly every profession and every trade that man ever followed. In the last hundred years a great change has come over both the industrial and social phases of society. The discovery of steam revolutionized the industrial world. Production and producers turned about in kaleidoscopic variance. That vague, restless rebellion against the narrow confines of her sphere, which other influences had been slowly creating in the hearts of women, was stimulated—forced into activity by the change. Simultaneously with the growth of a longing to escape from dependence and consequent bondage, came the necessity for […]
The Sex Question

Lizzie M. Holmes, “Woman’s Emancipation” (1891)

July 24, 2017 Shawn P. Wilbur
WOMAN’S EMANCIPATION. While it is certain emancipation would speedily follow economic freedom, it is not true that such emancipation is a part of or would come simultaneously with economic freedom. Heinzen said: “In the man the human being alone can be oppressed or liberated; in the woman the sex as well.” Woman is doubly, enslaved. She wears the chains her poor laboring brother wears, and, besides, the bonds he in his ignorance placed on her ages ago when he first began to take note of her periodical weakness. Naturally, it would not take long for an economically free woman to […]
The Sex Question

Lizzie M. Holmes, “Women in the Conflict” (1891)

July 24, 2017 Shawn P. Wilbur
WOMEN IN THE CONFLICT. In numerous ways outside of the labor of hands, women are helping to guide the course of progress, molding the very forms of civilization. There are hosts of all classes of women in the busy West, who are making history, without whose records the annals of this country would be dark and incomplete. There are in Chicago alone over 300 women’s societies, all organized for some object of usefulness, mutual benefit or self improvement. From these societies the young, but already celebrated Woman’s Alliance was formed. Delegates, according to numbers of members, are sent from each […]
Contr'un

Antinomies of Democracy

July 21, 2017 Shawn P. Wilbur
  [This post originally appeared at the Center for a Stateless Society, as part of the Mutual Exchange on Anarchy and Democracy.] Antinomies of Democracy [Including responses to Nathan Goodman, Kevin Carson and Wayne Price, 
with thoughts on a neo-Proudhonian recuperation of “democratic practices”] I thought I had pretty well had my say on the subject of democracy and anarchy, but comparing the material I’ve written to the contributions I’ve submitted, I see a couple of responses languishing among the drafts. I also find that the real impasse in my exchanges with Wayne Price leaves me considerably less than satisfied. […]
Anarchist Beginnings

Josiah Warren, “Reduction in the Cost of Printing Apparatus” (1830)

July 20, 2017 Shawn P. Wilbur
COMMUNICATIONS. PRINTING IN PRIVATE FAMILIES. (I have received the following from my friend, Mr. Warren, for insertion in the Free Enquirer. The sheet from which it is copied, and which affords a specimen of the results obtained, is very tolerably printed, and seems go confirm the anticipation of the writer.) REDUCTION IN THE COST OF PRINTING APPARATUS. It is well known, by those who have considered the subject, that printing is a power that governs the destinies of mankind: and therefore, those who can control the Printing Press can control their fellow creatures. While men continue the practice of interfering […]
Anarchist Beginnings

Josiah Warren, “From ‘The March of Mind'” (1828)

July 20, 2017 Shawn P. Wilbur
The acquisition of any new fact, always produces in my mind a feeling of pleasure, especially when I perceive that it will in any manner promote my future happiness; and the more does it increase my happiness if I can make it subservient to the happiness of others. This will be sufficient apology to the reader for my observations, when it is considered that they are not obtruded upon him as rules for his own conduct, but that they are here placed for his consideration, to be accepted or rejected as his own judgment shall determine. It is now about […]