Talk:United Mine Workers of America/Archive 1

Corrected "Mine Riot" link
Corrected the reference to the Virden Mine Riot of 1898. It's external, but at least it's correct. It replaces a link to nowhere (and so, a red link). A reference to the samiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiie event in Mother Jones was also corrected. Also changed the description of that event (the event was one reason Mother Jones was buried at Mt. Olive, not the only reason). Also Wikified Mt. Olive. 24.178.228.14 (talk) 22:40, 11 February 2008 (UTC)
 * It also fails WP:EL. One Night In Hackney  303  04:43, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Hello One Night In Hackney, your revert was incorrect according to the justification that you used in reverting. Specifically:
 * Regarding WP:EL - quoting the style guide of EL, "As the occasional exception may arise, it should be approached with common sense." Quoting the page-in-a-nutshell just below the style guide, "Adding external links can be a service to our readers, but they should be kept to a minimum of those that are meritable, accessible and appropriate to the article."
 * Application to the article: the pre-modified article contained a link-to-nowhere or a link to an inappropriate location, and it described a historical event with an apparently made-up name, whereas the event is known by an accepted name.
 * The article modifications more than satisfied the criteria in the EL style guide and nutshell summary. The article improvement was quantifiable, providing useful information where none had existed before, and using the accepted name of a historical event where a made-up name had been used before.
 * This was all explained on the talk page, in a compact but understandable form. Patrollers who attempt to improve Wikipedia are a good thing, and mistakes are understandable. Regards, 24.178.228.14 (talk) 17:27, 12 February 2008 (UTC)


 * We don't link to self-published unreliable sources. One Night In Hackney  303  17:38, 12 February 2008 (UTC)


 * And to clarify. We avoid links to Any site that misleads the reader by use of factually inaccurate material or unverifiable research. See Reliable sources for explanations of the terms "factually inaccurate material" or "unverifiable research". What you're linking to is no better than a blog in terms of reliability. The person hosting it can publish anything he likes, there's no proven fact checking. One Night In Hackney  303  17:12, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Organization problems
I've been watching the development of this article. It seems to suffer from some basic organization problems, and surmounting those might help make the next steps on the article seem clearer.
 * Conditions for miners
 * there needs to be a section on the condition of mine-workers before the establishment of the union. How did mine workers live? What were wages, what were working conditions.


 * History
 * Problems of establishing the union. Opposition from mine owners. Fear by the miners. Nation-wide anti-unionism.  The problems immigrants faced in joining unions?
 * Early Union activities. How was the union initially organized?  What did it accomplish in its first years?  When were the big break throughs on organization?


 * Union Organization
 * how is the union organized? How are elections held (when who votes, whovotes for what?


 * Evolution of the Union
 * how has the union changed over time? What are some of the big controversies?


 * Strikes
 * we'll have to talk about how to include those.

See if this helps? I'll go into the article and move a few things around for you, too. Auntieruth55 (talk) 00:09, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

Origin of the union
The article states, One of the groups in the forefront of the fight for collective bargaining in the early 20th century, the UMW was founded in Columbus, Ohio, on January 22, 1890, by the merger of two earlier groups, the Knights of Labor Trade Assembly No. 135 and the National Progressive Union of Miners and Mine Laborers

I wonder if the National Progressive Union of Miners and Mine Laborers is the same organization as the National Federation of Miners and Mine Laborers? That organization's name is single sourced in this article: Coal mining in Colorado, from Dwight La Vern Smith, The American and Canadian West: a bibliography. Richard Myers (talk) 12:56, 21 February 2010 (UTC)

Compare with this reference (verbatim from the source):

William Wilson demonstrated his leadership abilities at a young age. In 1873 at age eleven, he joined the Miners" and Laborers" Benevolent Association and led a strike of trappers, boys who opened and closed doors for ventilation in the mines. He called off the strike after the mine foreman beat him, but he later stated, "Ever since that day I have not believed in the use of force to settle labor disputes. Instead of the use of force, what we need is the spirit of justice, of fair play, that will result in a permanent industrial peace." He believed strongly that workers must join together and bargain collectively in the face of employers who banded together. He became an official in the National Federation of Miners and Mine Laborers, and in the Knights of Labor. The two unions fought with each other to organize miners during the late 1880s, to the detriment of workers" interests. In 1890 Wilson helped convince the two unions to join in forming one national miners" union, the UMWA. (emphasis added)

http://explorepahistory.com/hmarker.php?markerId=937

Clarification invited. Richard Myers (talk) 21:37, 21 February 2010 (UTC)

Decline in labor unionism in mining
This article is generally very badly written and very poorly documented. Much of it reads like a 5th grade school assignment badly cribbed from the UMW website, although recent cleanups by EoGuy and Eritain have helped greatly. That such an important organization has an article like this reflects very poorly on Wikipedia. The section Decline in labor unionism in mining is particularly muddled, and jumps randomly from the 1920s, 1930s, and post-WWII eras, leaving the reader completely confused as to when the decline supposedly occurred. Can anyone clarify this section?. Plazak (talk) 17:06, 21 March 2010 (UTC)