The Ballad of Frank Little

The sun rose over Homestake in the early morning fog And a man got off a train bound straight for glory With a red card in his pocket and a fire in his eye Frank Little was his name and this his story To the town of Butte, Montana where they work down in the mines Trading waking hours for blood and sweat and sorrow Digging copper for the bosses while they throw us not but dimes And praying that we see the sun tomorrow Just two weeks ago, a thousand feet beneath the ground Two hundred men burned alongside their brothers Against the doorless bulkheads of the Speculator Mine They probably died calling for their mothers Frank Little walked into the town and made his reason known He's a Wobbly that has been sent from Chicago He's organized the workers from the mountains to the sea And he's here to fight for you and fight for me The lumber camps out in Missoula to the quarries of Spokane To the oil fields and the dock boys of Wisconsin Even the migrant workers on the California farms He organized and inspired his fellow man We're gonna' strike We're gonna' strike We're gonna' strike boys like you never struck before From the mines up to the shops we're gonna' pull out all the stops And we'll never stand alone forevermore You're a worker of the world forevermore He stood with us through the beatings from The Company's hired men 'Till the picket line stretched on a hundred thousand Side by side we made a promise, we would not be slaves again Deafening the bosses with our howling The workers, Little told, are worth a thousand years in gold We were never meant to bleed for bread and roses You can't give up this fight Hold the picket line tonight Workers of the World Unite Unite In the early August morning they kicked in Franky's door And drug him naked out into the street Those yellow bastards tortured him Company men and Pinkertons They tied him up and knocked him off his feet The sun rose over Homestake in the early morning fog And a mountain wind went whistling through the trees Frank Little swung there gently from the Milwaukee bridge A noose 'round his neck and blood running down his knees Well, they thought they'd break the strike if they took Frank Little's life But The Company was gravely mistaken From Haymarket to Montana is a sea of red bandanas And the breath of revolution can't be taken We're gonna' strike We're gonna' strike We're gonna' strike boys like you've never struck before We fought a thousand years alone We stared down death all on our own But we'll never stand alone forevermore We're The Workers of the World forevermore [RADIO] The governor asked me what I would do if The Company did not yield to our demands I told him we would call every man out of the mines I laughed at him and told him we would call out every worker in the country Agricultural workers, lumbermen, munitions workers, miners, mechanics, and all classes of working men He said, "Why, you wouldn't do that! You know the country is at war!" I said, "I don't care what country your country is fighting. I am fighting for the solidarity of labor."