THE RACIAL HIERARCHY OF LABOR IN BISBEE, ARIZONA

FROM 1880-1917

_______________

A SENIOR PAPER

Presented to

The Department of Anthropology

The Colorado College

April 2011

_______________

By

Anna E. Schneider

December 2011

Approved:____________________ Date:____________________

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Table of Contents Table of Contents…….........……………………………..………………………………………..iv List of Figures….…………………………………………………………………………………..v Abstract……..……………………………………………………………………………………..vi Chapter Introduction………………………………………………………………………………..1 Bisbee History: Foundation Through Deportation………………………………………..3 Race in Bisbee: The Hierarchy of Scientific Racism and the Dual-Wage System………12 The Bisbee Deportation: Race, War and Labor Strife…………………………………...25 Analysis of Bisbee’s Racial Hierarchy: Racism in a Melting Pot……………………….34 Modern Implications: Bisbee and the Border Today…………………………………….41 Conclusions, Larger Implications and Future Research…………………………………45 References Cited………………………………………………………………………………….49

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List of Figures

Figure 1: A Faro game at Bisbee’s Orient Saloon, circa 1900……………………….……………4 Figure 2: The aftermath of a fire that ravaged upper Main Street in 1908………………………...5 Figure 3: Deportees and vigilantes gather around the train that would later be used to deport over 1,000 men……………………………………………………………………………………..8 Figure 4: A member of the sheriff’s posse (note his white arm band) prods a deportee with a rifle as men are loaded onto boxcars……………………………………………………………..9 Figure 5: Picketers in Clifton, Arizona during the Clifton-Morenci Strike of 1915-1916. Their sign reads “No room for outsiders; This job belongs to us.”……………………………………..16 Figure 6: Main Street circa 1903. The library on the left was paid for by the mining companies in order to provide wholesome entertainment for their employees…......………………………..19 Figure 7: Looking up Chilinalcua Hill, circa 1910……………...……………………………….20

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Abstract

Bisbee, Arizona is a historic mining town that produced copper and other minerals

between 1877 and the 1970’s. Throughout its history, Bisbee was shaped by a unique set of

social, political and economic circumstances due to both its proximity to the Mexican American

border as well as the influx of immigrants seeking jobs in the mines. Bisbee’s diversity and the

desire of white miners to remain the dominant group was the impetus for the creation,

perpetuation and reinforcement of a rigid racial hierarchy that determined an individuals social

prestige, what neighborhood they lived in, what jobs were available to them in the mines and,

perhaps most markedly, the wages that they would receive. This study of Bisbee’s racial

hierarchy culminates in an examination of the deportation of 1917- a controversial demonstration

of mining company power that has been traditionally treated as a labor conflict, although there is

evidence that the ideas about race which structured Bisbee’s racial hierarchy may have influenced

these events. This examination of Bisbee’s racial history from its founding in 1877 to the

deportation in 1917 as well as modern implications for the borderlands of southern Arizona is

done through the lens of Eduardo Bonilla-Silva’s theories of racialized social systems and

Michael Omi and Howard Winant’s work on racial formation.

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Introduction Bisbee, Arizona is a small copper mining town located approximately 6 miles from the

Mexican-American border in the southeastern corner of the state. Today, it is a tourist town,

surrounded by the typicalities of rural Arizona- ranches, empty desert and border towns like

nearby Naco. However, Bisbee has a unique history colored by its roots as a mining town and its

location in Cochise County, home to infamous events of the Wild West like the surrender of

Geronimo and the OK Corral shoot out. With the colorful southwest as its background, Bisbee

grew from a small mining camp into an unusually metropolitan destination with a surprisingly

diverse population all in a short period of time. Bisbee’s mining history is also infamous for an

event now regarded as one of the greatest labor upheavals in the southwest: The Bisbee

Deportation.

These combined factors of Bisbee’s proximity to Mexico, its dramatic growth in both

population and diversity and its pivotal role in American labor history all make it a prime subject

for study. This paper will address the issue of race relations in Bisbee between 1880 and1917,

focusing on how American, Hispanic and European immigrant residents of Bisbee fit into a

culturally imposed racial hierarchy, how that hierarchy fit into the structure of the copper mining

industry, and what cultural mores enforced this racial hierarchy in the daily lives of Bisbee

residents. With analysis of documentary and testimonial evidence, Bisbee’s history can reveal

how both mining companies and the local community understood and justified these racial

hierarchies. Building on this analysis of race in Bisbee, another key objective is to deconstruct the

motivations behind the deportation and the relationship of this event to Bisbee’s racial history.

Through these routes this paper will attempt to answer several questions. What racial constructs

were imposed onto Bisbee residents and how were they reinforced? What was the structure of the

racial hierarchy and how did residents explain and justify it? How was this racial hierarchy

related to the labor movement and did World War I nationalism have any influence on the 1917

deportation? By performing an exploratory analysis of Bisbee history, as relayed by historic

documents as well as the works of other scholars, I hope to begin to answer these questions

within the framework provided by cultural anthropology.

In this discussion of race, the issue of how to define racial categories will come up

repeatedly. I will adopt Katherine Benton-Cohen’s approach that while, in a biological sense, race

is not “real,” it certainly functions as something real (2009:15). Therefore, this paper will include

terms like Mexican, American, and White American as they were used by the mining companies

and residents of Bisbee, although no firm definition or consistent historical precedent for usage

could be determined. Additionally, I will be referring to Europeans, and while this group has the

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same or similar origins as White Americans, by Europeans I mean recent immigrants. Lines of

demarcation were blurry, and the informal rules of mining communities often included the

stipulation that a committee of white men would be responsible for deciding “who are and are not

Mexicans” (Benton-Cohen 2009:82). Thus, the nuance of racial categories will often be lost due

to the simple need to use the same historic language as this papers subjects once did. The lines

between racial categories in Cochise County, as in the rest of the country, were undefined and

inconsistent, so the historically wonton usage of racial language will be reflected in this paper and

should be recognized as unfortunately, and unavoidably, imprecise.

Bisbee History: Foundation through Deportation

Bisbee was born in 1877 when army scouts searching the Mule Mountains for Apache

Indians came across a vein of cerussite, a mineral that often acts as an indicator for copper. The

first claim was staked that summer and, later that fall, silver was discovered in the nearby

Tombstone hills, adding to the draw of prospectors to Cochise County (Bailey 1983:12-14).

Within the next two years over 100 claims were made, and the first buildings and tents of a young

mining camp that would eventually become Bisbee’s Main Street were built (Bailey 1983:16).

These early years seem to be a remarkable convergence of good luck and timing: just as

prospectors were discovering the incredible mineral wealth of the Mule Mountains, copper prices

jumped from twelve cents a pound to twenty (Bailey 1983:51). By the late 1880’s the rapidly

growing copper camp had a population of 500, a post office, its first general election and a name:

Bisbee, named for a judge who helped to finance the Copper Queen Mine (Bailey 1983:48-52).

In 1884 Bisbee gained the attention of major mining companies when Phelps Dodge purchased

the Copper Queen Mine, just in time for copper demand to soar again in the early 1890s as

electricity and indoor plumbing were becoming more common (Benton-Cohen 2009:85). In 1899

the Calumet & Arizona Mining Company was formed, entering into both financial competition

with Phelps Dodge as well as a partnership in wage setting and, later, the swift action against

union organizing (Benton-Cohen 2009:95). With the addition of the Shattuck Arizona Company,

Bisbee’s mining industry was complete, and the economic structure as defined by these three

main companies would last until the Great Depression.

One aspect of Bisbee’s history that is often overlooked is the prominence the town

reached around the turn of the century. It’s current state as a struggling tourist town with a

population of 6,000 makes it easy to forget that it was once hailed as a cosmopolitan destination

in the Wild West. By 1917, the city itself had over 8,000 residents and was the seat of Cochise

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County as well as the surrounding Warren mining district, which had a total population of over

20,000 (Taft 1972:4). The Warren district was essentially born from the overflow of settlers as

Bisbee’s step canyons began to fill up with homes. These satellite communities contributed to the

mining industry in their own ways- the largest of these was Douglas, twenty-five miles from

Bisbee and incorporated in 1904 when a smelter was built there to process ore from Bisbee

(Benton-Cohen 2009:109). Bisbee was also well known for its nightlife, where gamblers like

those playing Faro in figure 1 had wild nights in Brewery Gulch, earning the small town the

moniker of “the hottest spot between El Paso and San Francisco” (Bailey 1983:51). Conversely,

Bisbee was also regarded as a more wholesome, family friendly place than nearby Tombstone.

While Bisbee had its fair share of brothels and saloons, it was also promoted as a camp for

“domesticated miners” (Benton-Cohen 2003:35). Not only did many men have wives and

children, but also in Bisbee it was possible to be a homeowner and send your children to school.

In Bisbee’s more established years, this reputation was very much encouraged by the mining

companies who hoped to reduce turnover by attracting family men as opposed to single, transient

miners (Benton-Cohen 2003:34).

Fig. 1. A Faro game at Bisbee’s Orient Saloon, circa 1900. Photo courtesy of the Bisbee Mining & Historical Museum.

Bisbee’s success as a mining town as well as a destination point, despite its speed and

persistence, did not come easily. Every year the mining camp had to contend with disastrous fires

during the dry months (see figure 2) and floods during the rainy monsoon season, forcing

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constant rebuilding. The Bisbee you can see today is roughly representative of what the city has

looked like since 1912- most earlier structures have been destroyed (Bailey 1983:65.) Further

contributing to the impressiveness of Bisbee’s unlikely success story was its remoteness: in the

early years, Bisbee’s mines were miles away from the nearest railroad. Apache Indians were also

a constant threat around the time of Bisbee’s founding- drills where women and children

practiced running and hiding in mine shafts served to keep the town folk prepared for the

possibility of an Indian raid (Benton-Cohen 2009:81). A March 10th, 1901 article from the Los

Angeles Times captures the early character of Bisbee well: “The camp is not pretty, nor are its

odors those on the breezes from blest Araby, but it does more business to the square foot and has

more capital than any other point in the Southwest.”

Fig. 2. The aftermath of a fire that ravaged upper Main Street in 1908. Photo courtesy of the Bisbee Mining & Historical Museum.

After years of steady growth and an increasing hold over the town by the dominant

mining companies, Bisbee’s history reached a boiling point for which it is still infamous on July

12th of 1917, just 40 years after the city’s founding and a mere three months after the United

States entered World War I (Benton-Cohen 2003:30). Bisbee’s labor history was never

particularly contentious. There were occasional strikes, but work stoppages never lasted long and

violence was not a major feature of these events. In 1904 an industry journal reported that:

“…this camp is one of a very few in the West that has never witnessed a strike, or any serious disagreement between the company and the miners- a record equally creditable to both parties… it is not unionized and cannot be persuaded into joining the union” (Benton-Cohen 2009:85-86).

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However, when a strike began in June of 1917, it would change the local labor history and

become a cautionary tale of vigilante action, political controversy and perhaps even nativism. The

Industrial Workers of the World, known also as the IWW or “Wobblies,” were responsible for

calling the strike on several local copper mines, including the Copper Queen owned by Phelps

Dodge (Benton-Cohen 2003:30). The issues raised in the strike included a call for a slight wage

increase and an end to the practice of blacklisting, but it was also treated as a solidarity strike for

copper miners in Butte, Montana and, for some Mexican workers, a chance to demand the

dismantling of the racist dual-wage system used by the mining companies (Benton-Cohen

2003:36).

However, despite the contentious policies addressed by the strike, locals did not regard

this event as anything unusual or even particularly dramatic. It has been largely confirmed that

the strike was seen as peaceful and even naturally dying out- several residents even claimed that

the city was more orderly than usual, due to the strikers request that bootleggers not sell any

liquor during the strike (Taft 1972:11). According to a local judge,

“the strikers were exerting themselves to be peaceful. They were peaceful. There were no violent acts or anything like that… This strike was dying a natural death… I would say it was unpopular among the men… They were getting the highest wages ever paid and the conditions were very good” (Taft 1972:10-11). The President of the A.F.L. Painters Union confirmed the tone during the strike: “the district was

very orderly, more so than any other time” (Taft 1972:11). If anything, it seemed to locals that the

strikers were more effective enforcers than the police- the Legal Rights Committee of the Arizona

State Federation of Labor made a statement regarding the strike where they attested that picket

lines

“were conducted in a peaceable and orderly manner and in strict observance of the laws of the State. An investigation of the police records will show that acts of violence, unfortunately common to strikes, were very rare and it is admitted that the voluntary action of the strikers in suppressing the illicit traffic in liquor was much more effective than that of the regular peace officers” (Taft 1972:11). These testimonies paint a picture of the strike that make the deportation and the events

leading up to it all the more shocking. In a joint meeting of the Citizens Protective League and the

Workers Loyalty League on July 11th, the head of the Calumet and Arizona mines was reported to

have suggested that they “get a train and run the strikers to Columbus (New Mexico), where

Uncle Sam would take care of them” (Taft 1972:13). On the morning of July 12th Cochise

County’s Sheriff Harry Wheeler released a proclamation warning women and children to stay off

the streets and notifying residents that a Sheriff’s Posse of 1,200 men had been formed for the

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purpose of arresting strikers “on charges of vagrancy, treason and being disturbers of the peace of

Cochise County” (Taft 1972:14). Not long afterward, telegraph and telephone communications

were cut off and the deportation began, carried out by 2,000 armed men who wore white

armbands for identification. They scoured the town, seizing any man without such an armband

and asking if he was working or willing to work. Whoever answered “no” was marched to the

local baseball park, which had been transformed into a point of detention and interrogation (Taft

1972:15). This baseball park was located near the Warren railroad station, where a train of

boxcars was waiting for them (see figure 3).

Fig. 3. Deportees and vigilantes gather around the train that would later be used to deport over 1,000 men, 1917 . Photo courtesy of the Bisbee Mining & Historical Museum.

By the end of the day, 1,186 men who refused to either return to work or take up arms

and help with the deportation were loaded onto a train, pictured in figure 4, that had been

provided by Walter Douglas, the head of Phelps Dodge and a vice president of the railroad. The

train, accompanied by gunmen and reportedly a mounted machine gun, carried the captives

through Douglas, then Naco, then into the empty desert. 17 miles from Columbus, New Mexico

they were abandoned without adequate food or water (Taft 1972:16). The deportee’s scraped

together food and water over the next two days, and by July 14th they had been taken to

Columbus by military guards who provided them with provisions and tents in which to sleep as

well as permission to remain in Columbus or depart (Taft 1972:22). At this makeshift refugee

camp, these men, considered too dangerous to be allowed to remain in Bisbee, were guarded by a

sheriff and five deputies, who apparently had no difficulty keeping order (Lindquist and Fraser

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1968:405). Remarkably, only two men- one on each side- died during the events of the

deportation.

Fig. 4. A member of the sheriff’s posse (note his white arm band) prods a deportee with a rifle as men are loaded onto boxcars. Photo courtesy of the Bisbee Mining & Historical Museum.

While the deportation was the climax of the vigilante reaction to the strikers, the actions

against the men did not stop there. Between July 12th and July 18th the Loyalty League deported

30 additional men who had been missed by the general deportation (Lindquist and Fraser

1968:406). Sheriff Wheeler established guards around Bisbee and its satellite communities and

passports were issued by the Chamber of Commerce; without a passport, you could not enter the

district without great difficulty. Any deportees who attempted to return from Columbus were

arrested and “encouraged” to leave town or face being jailed for vagrancy (Taft 1972:23).

However, the actions of Wheeler and his supporters were not without consequences.

After investigators from the Arizona State Federation of Labor were barred from the city, the

governor opened a formal investigation and made the following statement:

“In the Warren District since July 12th, the constitutional rights of citizens and others have been ignored, by processes not provided by law: viz., by deputy sheriffs, who refused persons admittance into the district, and passing of judgment by a tribunal without legal jurisdiction, resulting in further deportations” (Taft 1972:24). By this time, a Presidential Mediation Commission had also been formed and the Secretary of

Labor, William B. Wilson, responded in kind when the major mining companies complained that

Bisbee’s reputation was being damaged and asked them to proclaim Bisbee as “safe.” Wilson

responded that he saw no proof that Bisbee could be considered such and that

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“the evidence indicates that these twelve hundred men were deported and…men are stopped on the highways coming in here and that they are questioned, that men are still being arrested for vagrancy although they are not vagrants” (Taft 1972:25). The political wrath raised by what was perceived as a gross abuse of power by Harry

Wheeler and the powerful mining company executives included not just such condemnations, but

also vain attempts at healing the wounds left by the deportation. The Presidents Mediation

Commission advised that a system for handling grievances was necessary, but they did not

require it. They also called for the mining companies to re-employ all of the strikers, but a loosely

worded exemption for any men “whose employment for any reason is contrary to the best

interests of the operations” made the return to work difficult for many former strikers. Taft

concludes that “the dispute machinery had broken down, mediation was not being accepted by

either side, and the bitterness and militancy of both miners and operators made settlements

difficult” (1972:28). Few legal attempts at restitutions were made, and when civil and criminal

suits on behalf of the deportees were made by the State and Federal Governments, the cases were

stopped from going to trial by a compromise agreement in which the mining companies awarded

deportees anywhere from $500 to $1,250 based on their marital status. A federal case in which

Sheriff Wheeler and 24 other prominent Bisbee men involved in the deportation were indicted

and charged with violating the constitutional rights of the deported men failed when it was

determined that such charges were better addressed on a state rather than a federal level (Taft

1972:30). And finally, in a last attempt at justice where members of the Sheriffs’ posse were

arrested and charged with kidnapping, the defenses use of the right to self defense and the law of

necessity resulted in a verdict of not guilty.

This contentious period in Bisbee history has become an important part of the saga of

labor struggles in American history. However, there is evidence that the deportation was more

than just the unfortunate consequence of the mining industries short fuse and frustration with

unions, as well as the perceived threat of the often-radical IWW. Many factors that contributed to

the events of July 12th, 1917 suggest that the deportation is very much related to Bisbee’s

hierarchy of race, and may very well be its culmination. To examine how the racial history of

Bisbee led the city to the events of 1917, I will begin with an overview of race in Bisbee.

Race in Bisbee: the Hierarchy of Scientific Racism and the Dual-Wage System

Long before the drama of the deportation, Bisbee was quickly becoming emblematic of

the great American melting pot. An 1880 census just three years after the discovery of copper

revealed the presence of not only Whites Americans and Mexicans, but a German and an

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Irishman as well. Welsh-born brothers were responsible for building Bisbee’s first smelter, and

the Mexican wife of a Portuguese immigrant ran Bisbee’s first restaurant. It was soon met with

competition from a Greek fruit stand. In 1881 foreign-born residents were in the majority, and as

high as two-thirds of Bisbee’s residents are believed to have been Mexican (Benton-Cohen

2009:81). Many of the increasingly wealthy proprietors and businessmen of the town were

European immigrants, and as they established businesses the town took on a remarkably

European appearance in its architecture and layout.

An influx of foreigners led to rapidly inflating numbers throughout Bisbee’s history and

the towns demographics changed continuously, reflecting current trends in immigration. From

1900 to 1920, census figures (which often underreported minorities) show that Cochise County’s

Mexican population grew from 1,500 to 6,000. Newcomers also came from farther away than just

across the border. In the decades during Bisbee’s formation, European immigration to the United

States was accelerating. In 1882, 650,000 people arrived from Europe, only 13% of whom were

from southern and eastern Europe. By 1907 the number of immigrants doubled to 1.2 million,

81% of whom were from eastern and southern Europe (Benton-Cohen 2009:97). Thousands of

these people ultimately made their way to the Southwest and Bisbee.

However, despite their large numbers and great diversity, newcomers to Bisbee faced

attitudes about race that were complicated and often baffling. Even as Bisbee grew increasingly

diverse, locals were fostering a reputation as a “white man’s camp.” The acceptance of this

identity is evidence of how racial labels of the time were constantly shifting, changing racial

categories both in Cochise County and Nationwide. Historically and perhaps in other regions,

such a term could have implied a lack of African-American labor, but in the border region of

Bisbee its meaning was fluid.

From its early days, Bisbee operated through unanimous, through unofficial and

unwritten, consensus on a number of camp rules that were based on both the existing prejudices

of the men as well as common policies in other southwestern mining camps. Two of the biggest

rules placed limitations on the roles that those of Chinese or Mexican descent could play in the

community. The first rule, that the Chinese were barred from either residing or owning a place of

business in Bisbee, was a result in part of the fear in California over the cheap railroad labor that

Chinese immigrants provided, threatening the economic structure that white workers depended

on. Lest the mining companies become tempted to hire Asian immigrants willing to work for

lower wages, the Chinese were only allowed to enter town during daylight hours to sell their

wares, but they could not set up a permanent place of business and they were required to be out of

town by sun down. The anti-Chinese sentiment was so great that when a Chinese man tried to

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open a laundry in Bisbee, he was burned in effigy (Benton-Cohen 2009:83). As far as scholars

know, the first time a person of Asian descent spent the night in Bisbee was in 1935, when a

visiting baseball team had a Chinese player.

With the Chinese threat seemingly taken care of, the next concern of white miners was

the large and potentially cheap source of labor that existed beyond the border in Mexico. During

this era, illegal immigrants as we know them today did not exist, and the actual international line

included few physical markers and was often disputed. Migrants were not required to register at

border crossing stations until 1919, and even then any regulations were inconsistently enforced

(Benton-Cohen 2009:91). Thus, there was little stopping Mexicans from seeking work in the

north, contributing to a long history of racial tensions. A March 23rd, 1913 Los Angeles Times

article captures attitudes towards these immigrants:

“One evil effect of the Mexican troubles has been the filling up of the southern counties of Arizona with Mexican refugees of the lower classes. Hundreds of Mexicans have crossed the international line by stealth during the past few weeks, it having been out of the power of the customs or immigration service officials to make their patrol effective.” Thus, the second rule was created to ensure that Mexican workers were barred from working

underground, where the most lucrative jobs were found (Bailey 1973:54). Many of them were

limited to the less respected position of woodcutting, where they were responsible for providing

the 3,500 cords of wood required each month to keep the smelter fires burning. While jobs

appropriate for Mexicans were strictly defined, the actual racial category of Mexican was not- it

included immigrant Mexicans, U.S. born individuals of Hispanic ancestry, and immigrant

Spaniards (Mellinger 1992:329). Local newspapers even commonly employed mysterious and ill-

defined terms like “Mexican negro” (Los Angeles Times, March 23rd, 1913).

These rules were a major part of the social compacts of the camp, as well as a point of

pride: in a promotional issue of the Bisbee Daily Review written for the 1904 St. Louis Worlds

Fair, readers were assured that Bisbee “is strictly a White Man’s Camp… Mexicans are only

employed in the common or rough labor” (Benton-Cohen 2009:85). As Bisbee entered the era of

Phelps Dodge, Calumet & Arizona and the Shattuck Arizona Company, the mining companies

simply choose to adopt these existing policies as a way to keep their white employees happy and

forestall union organizing (Benton-Cohen 2009:85).

While these two major rules were enough to assure white miners of their job security in

the early years of Bisbee, a new threat was soon on the horizon. As European immigration rates

picked up, residents were once again faced with the competition of a new labor pool, and this one

could not be so easily written off as a racial other. Bisbee’s miners struggled with how to define

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what made a person white and, while the conclusion seemed obvious for those of Western

European origins, the whiteness of the slightly darker Italians and Eastern Europeans drew much

debate. For a time, the general consensus was that a White American man was any family

breadwinner who was not Mexican (Benton-Cohen 2009:8). With a definition that treated White

Americans and Mexicans as opposites, European immigrants came to constitute an in-between

category. Treated as less of a threat due to their relative whiteness, they were still received with

reservations about their foreignness. Due to their already ambiguous position in Bisbee, the racial

category of European immigrants came to include it’s own self contained racial hierarchy- if you

were English, Welsh or Cornish, you could likely work aside white Americans in the most

desirable jobs. However, if you were an Eastern or Southern European, you would probably not

be so lucky (Bailey 1973:54).

As immigration rates continued to rise, so did the contention over how to handle new

arrivals. Other mining towns that also self identified as white man’s camps, like Cripple Creek,

Colorado, excluded Italians and Slavs entirely. However, Bisbee had families of these

nationalities who had been there for years and were well respected in the community- families

with names like Caretto and Medigovich (Benton-Cohen 2009:96). Faced with dilemmas like

this, Bisbee’s miners focused their scrutiny on new immigrants who had no particular connections

to Cochise County, no American citizenship, and spoke little to no English. To help weed out

such immigrants, new rules requiring employees to speak English ensured that the desirable men

of Cornish or English birth could stay, while Italians or Slavs had a new roadblock to

employment (Benton-Cohen 2009:99). An article in the Los Angeles Times on October 29th, 1910

confesses that

“the real reason for the proposed action is that the Slavonian and Italian miners aimed at are considered locally unpatriotic in the largest degree. They herd in small rooms, spend very little of their wages and send the greater part back to Europe.” Even as the city developed new ways of preserving their racial hierarchy in the face of foreign

immigration, White American miners like those in figure 5 continued to express their fears, as

demonstrated in an issue of the Bisbee Daily Review from 1903:

“A question of great moment is agitating the miners – that is, the American miners of Bisbee: the employment of Italian and Slavonic workmen in some of the mines and the readiness with which they are employed by some of the foremen... The American miners contend that Bisbee has always been a ‘White Man’s Camp,’ and much feeling is being manifested by the men who are, as they say, unable to secure employment by the influx of foreign labor.” (Benton-Cohen 2009:95)

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Fig. 5. Picketers in Clifton, Arizona during the Clifton-Morenci Strike of 1915-1916. Their sign reads “No room for outsiders; This job belongs to us.” Photo courtesy of the Arizona Collection, Arizona State

University.

Interestingly, some European groups that were alienated in other parts of the country

during this era were well received in Bisbee. The Irish had a fairly privileged racial status and

many opportunities were open to them. For example, an Irish immigrant named William Brophy

rose from his job as a clerk in a general store to the manager of the Copper Queen Mercantile,

Phelps Dodge’s company store. He eventually ran an entire chain of Phelps Dodge mercantiles,

which employed more than five hundred and grossed over $8 million. After becoming incredibly

wealthy, Brophy served as president of the Bank of Bisbee and later as vice president of the Bank

of Douglas (Benton-Cohen 2009: 94). Further east, such great success would have been unlikely

for an Irishman. Jews too were welcome in Bisbee, and Sam Levy, who was raised in Bisbee,

recalled that he “never knew anti-Semitism as a youngster” (Benton-Cohen 2009:94).

While racial categories like “Mexican” and “White American” were fluid and hard to

define, the hierarchy that they formed was not, and it was tightly incorporated into the pay scale.

The complicated beliefs about race, mining company policy, and standards of living that were

typical of Bisbee are most quantitatively represented in what was called the dual wage system.

While there were certainly differences between the wages of Europeans and Americans as well as

Europeans and Mexicans, the most marked differences were between the wages of Americans and

Mexicans. In Arizona’s mines as a whole, those of Mexican descent made, on average, one-half

to two-thirds of what a non-Mexican employee performing the same job would be paid (Benton-

Cohen 2003:33). However, in Bisbee’s mines in 1891, the situation was far worse than elsewhere

in Arizona: the average Mexican wage was less than half the average white one. For example, the

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low-skill position of wheeling adobe bricks would earn a white worker $2.25 a day and a

Mexican worker $1.50 (Benton-Cohen 2009:84). These low paying positions were often reserved

for Mexicans alone and no matter how skilled a Hispanic worker might be, he was often forced

into positions where he was only considered a “helper” or an “assistant.” Benton-Cohen quotes an

American mechanic who observed to a federal labor investigator in 1909 that

“They will never pay a Mexican what he’s really worth compared with a white man. I know a Mexican that’s the best blacksmith I ever knew…but they pay him $1.50 a day as a helper, working under an American blacksmith who gets $7 a day” (2009:83). Mexican was also the only racial category often separated out completely in the pay

scales. Many scales list wages for “Mexican” and “White,” with European immigrants occupying

the lower-end of the “white” category. On a Calumet and Arizona nationality report, Mexicans

were separated completely. The report listed sections for “Native Born Citizens,” “Naturalized

Citizens”, and “Foreigners,” followed by a completely separate section labeled “Mexicans (Not

Included Above)”- never mind the fact that a Mexican could technically belong to any of those

categories (Benton Cohen 2003:33). These documents exemplify the complexity, both

linguistically and culturally, of how Hispanic residents fit into the racial hierarchy of Bisbee. The

word “Mexican” seemed to all at once serve as a racial label, job category and general term for

someone who may or may not have even been born in Mexico or to Hispanic parents. As implied

by the separation of Mexicans in the Calumet and Arizona nationality report, it did not matter

whether an individual was born in the United States or had lived there for many years- you could

still be seen as more Mexican than American. Despite being the two hardest to define groups out

of Bisbee’s three predominant racial categories (Americans, Mexicans and European

immigrants), Mexicans and Americans were considered to be racial, social and linguistic

opposites. Therefore, since Americans sat at the top of the dual wage system, it seemed only

natural that Mexicans should be at the bottom.

Ideas about standards of living also contributed to the construction of the dual wage

system and a racial hierarchy where Americans and Mexicans represented opposite ends of a

spectrum. Bisbee’s identity not only as a white mans camp, but also as a camp of domesticated

miners meant that to both the mining companies and community members, being a white

American and being a family man went hand in hand. This close association is demonstrated in

the 1904 Worlds Fair Edition of the Bisbee Daily Review:

“…Many [men] have been employees…for ten and fifteen years…This is borne out by the fact that fully two-thirds of the men employed in the mines are married men and than two-thirds of these own their own homes. It is strictly a ‘white

  14  

man’s’ camp, notwithstanding the contiguity of the city to the international line” (Benton-Cohen 2009:91). The higher wages given to White American workers was justified as a family wage,

intended to serve as an incentive for the white husband and father who was idealized as the most

desirable employee. However, absurdly enough, it was possible to make the family wage as a

single White American man, but impossible as a Mexican man even with a wife and children.

Debate about family wages invoked ideas about an “American standard of living,” which the

general consensus determined to mean the ability to not only support a wife and several children,

but to own a family home. Phelps Dodge in particular used the family wage to further develop

their reputation as a paternalist corporation, building schools, playgrounds, a hospital and a

library, seen in figure 6, to help encourage the wholesome family life that their company image

endorsed. In the case of lay-offs, they even showed a preference for keeping on married men. One

Calumet & Arizona official in 1907 discussed how “the robust American with a growing family

and home ties is a better man for us than a man without those things.” (Benton-Cohen 2003:34).

Those who were considered to be white enough certainly did benefit from these ideas- one Welsh

woman who grew up in one of the wealthier neighborhoods of Bisbee is quoted as saying that “to

live in Bisbee was to love our Copper Queen Company, the source of every good and perfect gift”

(Benton-Cohen 2009:104).

Fig. 6. Main Street circa 1903. The library on the left was paid for by the mining companies to provide wholesome entertainment for their employees. Photo courtesy of the Bisbee Mining & Historical Museum.

While the ideals behind these concepts led to the mining companies providing many

positive things for their employees, the combination of these ideas about standards of living and

the premise for the dual wage system further enlarged the gulf between White American and

Mexican residents. If White Americans were considered to be family men who deserved the best

  15  

wages and the best standards of living and Mexicans were considered to be the opposite of White

Americans, it was only natural that the low wages provided to Mexican workers would be

accompanied by assumptions about the standards of living that they required. It was widely

believed that Mexicans simply did not mind a lower standard of living and that they would be

content with “an adobe hut with an earth floor, or even a shelter of branches against the wind, a

few pieces of pottery, a serape or a sheepskin to lie on at night,” according to federal labor

investigator Victor Clark (Benton Cohen 2003:86). One government report concluded, “the wants

of the Mexican peon are hardly more complex than those of the Indian from whom he is

descended” (Benton-Cohen 2003:36).

Further supporting ideas about the lower standards of living of Mexicans and foreigners

in general was the fact that diseases and infant mortality affected these groups disproportionately.

Locals concluded that the infant mortality rates were the result of “a foreign population that is

ignorant of the care and attention that infants require” but few ever acknowledged the simple lack

of resources that these people had to contend with (Benton-Cohen 2009:106). Bisbee’s

neighborhoods were racially and economically divided, reflecting the “local geography of power”

and “physically representing the local political, class, racial and ethnic stratification systems”

(Martinelli 2009:118). By 1908 most of Bisbee had been outfitted with sewer lines, with the

exception of the Mexican neighborhoods of Chilinalcua Hill (figure 7) Tintown, Zacatecas

Canyon and Chihuahua Hill as well as the African American neighborhood of Youngblood Hill.

Water service, which began in 1902, could cost as much as $11 dollars per month: an impossibly

high amount, as it was about a quarter of the average Mexican salary at the time (Benton-Cohen

2009:108). These neighborhoods also suffered from their proximity to Brewery Gulch, home to

dozens of brothels and hundreds of prostitutes. The wealthy and white moral leaders of the town

used the presence of prostitution to link the neighborhoods residents to immorality, despite the

fact that visitors to the brothels came from all parts of the city (Benton-Cohen 2009:113).

Fig. 7. Looking up Chilinalcua Hill, circa 1910. Photo courtesy of the Bisbee Mining & Historical Museum.

  16  

It is important to note here that these ideas about what was an appropriate standard of

living for Mexican workers were not necessarily born out of pure racial hate: it was the result of

beliefs about supposedly natural racial differences. This was an era of scientific racism, where it

was believed that racial hierarchies were the result of inherent biological differences, rather than

society. Darwinian ideas about competition and survival of the fittest reinforced the ideologies of

the white man’s camp, legitimizing their racism (Benton-Cohen 2009:88). The common

conclusion was that Mexicans did not truly need or even particularly want improved conditions,

and thus their lower standards of living became a reason for their decreased wages, rather than

their decreased wages being seen as a reason for their adobe huts with earth floors. Thus, the

placement of the Mexican racial category at the bottom of the racial hierarchy seemed to be, to

the residents of Bisbee, a purely natural thing.

Building upon these ideas about the American standard of living and the duty of a good,

white working man to his family, gender roles became a justification for racism in a two fold

way: the protection of white women, and the feminization of non-white men. In Bisbee’s early

years, the barring of foreigners was often treated as necessary for the well being of local white

women, guarding them from both from physical as well as economic harm. The rule preventing

anyone of Chinese descent from settling down in Bisbee was, according to a white female

pioneer, “made for the protection of the widows from foreign countries” who often made a living

doing laundry for other Bisbee residents (Benton Cohen 2009: 83). In this statement it goes

unsaid what racial category these widows belonged to, but it can be presumed that they were

considered to be more white than the Chinese launderers whom they needed economic protection

from.

In feminizing non-white men, Bisbee’s racial hierarchy further denied power or respect to

Mexican workers by denying them their manhood. The gender hierarchy already assumed the

superiority of men over women and children, so by imbuing working class Mexican men with

traits classically considered to be feminine, White Americans were further solidifying the low

place of Mexicans in the community. By speaking of them as docile, lazy and dependent on their

white superiors, they not only emasculated them, but perhaps even imbued them with traits that

the white dominator wished were more typical of Hispanics. One article written in the Mexican

camp of Clifton in 1904 discussed the need for Mexican workers to have White American bosses

as role models, because they “show little initiative and have no sense of responsibility, although

they are capable of doing good work under competent direction.” This myth of the docile,

infantile Mexican was absurd and obviously wishful thinking, as Mexican workers in Clifton had

successfully executed a major strike just one year before this statement was made (Benton-Cohen

  17  

2009:88-89). Further evidence of how Mexican men were equated with white women came when

Phelps Dodge began hiring female office workers at the turn of the century- the two groups

received essentially the same pay (Benton Cohen 2009:90). Just as women’s wages suffered from

the assumption that they were not the primary breadwinner of their family, so did those of a

Mexican man who likely was.

Besides the abused and scorned Mexican population, Italians seem to have constituted the

next lowest category in the racial hierarchy. Interestingly, they faced many of the same criticisms

and accusations as Hispanics did, and as a result they often banded together. Like Mexicans,

Italians also developed a reputation for their supposedly low standard of living. One man

complained in 1903 that

“the foreign element can live on a mere pittance to what a white man can… All that is necessary [to prove it] is for a man to go up north of the Catholic Church and in an oblong building he will find a bunch of Italians living as no white man can.” (Benton-Cohen 2009:100) Here, Benton-Cohen points out the dehumanizing choice of language- from a contemporary

perspective, it seems clear that the “oblong building” he spoke of was either a home or a boarding

house, and the “bunch of Italians” it contained was likely a family, or perhaps renters (2009:100).

Additionally, it is once again assumed that this particular racial category’s low wages are, like

those of Mexicans, due to their low standard of living and not the reverse. The complainant states

disparagingly that the foreigners he speaks of can live on low wages, choosing not to

acknowledge that they are forced to.

Unlike Mexicans who were considered a lesser people from the beginning, Italians

seemed to experience a loss of status throughout the years, perhaps corresponding with the

increase in immigration and the rise of nativism. In the 1880’s, when the Copper Queen Mine was

bought by Phelps Dodge, Italians received the same wages as White American workers, earning

twice what Mexicans did. However, just thirty years later, 89% of Italians (compared to 99% of

Mexicans) working in Bisbee or Clifton earned less than $3.00 a day while the lowliest

underground (and therefore white) worker earned $4.00 per day (Benton-Cohen 2009:100).

Italians and Mexicans were also confined to the same ethnically defined neighborhoods

in Bisbee on Chihuahua Hill and in Brewery Gulch and, in the face of such similar

discrimination, the two groups formed a fascinating bond that is worthy of its own study. Italian

and Mexican musicians played together, some Italian children were encouraged to learn Spanish,

and the two racial categories even occasionally intermarried. In the 1920’s Brewery Gulch was

home to an Italian-Mexican Club and a local Italian baker was known for his pan de huevo, a

traditional Mexican pastry (Benton-Cohen 2009:99). Katherine Benton-Cohen has dubbed

  18  

Italians during this period “honorary Mexicans,” a title that acknowledges the unfortunate

discrimination both groups faced as well as the comradery and cultural diffusion that resulted

from it.

This overview of race in Bisbee is not complete without acknowledging the treatment of

the small population of African Americans in Bisbee. While they too had disadvantages

associated with being a minority, few, if any, of Bisbee’s seventy African American residents in

1910 worked in the mines, and therefore they existed largely outside of the racial hierarchy that

revolved around the mining industry (Benton-Cohen 2009:103). They were limited to jobs as

porters, barbers, and janitors, but, compared to the situation of African Americans in rest of the

country at this time, there was astonishingly little racial animosity directed towards them. Like

Irishmen and Jews, their lives in Bisbee were dramatically better than they would have been in

other parts of the country during this era. They were even able to attend high school in Bisbee

(Benton-Cohen 2009:104). Katherine Benton Cohen attributes this in part to their “unthreatening

numbers and unquestioned American citizenship” (2009:103). Another possible explanation that

has potential for further research is the proximity of Bisbee to Fort Huachuca, home of the

African American Buffalo Soldiers. One report dating to the Mexican Revolution, when these

Buffalo Soldiers were stationed along the border, tells the story of a Mexican man in El Paso who

was chased by a racist mob and began to yell “I’m a nigger! I’m a nigger!” in an attempt to

discourage them from hurting him. It has also been noted that in the southwest during the 1920’s

the Ku Klux Klan expressed more hatred for Mexicans than African Americans (Benton-Cohen

2009:104). It is clear that while African Americans certainly did not occupy a high spot on

Bisbee’s racial hierarchy, they were often seen as preferable to their Mexican counterparts.

Ultimately, the construction of the racial hierarchy is, once again, best described by

Katherine Benton-Cohen (2009). With White Americans on top and dubiously defined Mexicans

at the bottom, European immigrants existed in between in two categories that she dubs safely

white (those of Cornish, English, Irish, German, Scottish and Welsh descent) and questionably

white (Italians, Slavs and Finns). The few African Americans present in Bisbee existed somewhat

outside of this hierarchy, due to their small numbers and lack of involvement in the mining

industry. In Bisbee, the towns identity as a mining camp reigned supreme and the mining

companies dominated daily life. Therefore the hierarchy that they helped perpetuate became an

inexorable part of almost every element of Bisbee life.

  19  

The Bisbee Deportation: Race, War and Labor Strife

With the major role that race relations played in Bisbee’s mining industry and

community, it seems impossible that the Bisbee Deportation would have played out as a purely

labor-oriented event. Many scholars have concluded that the deportation essentially served as a

removal of undesirables in an attempt to stop the I.W.W. or any other union movement in its

tracks. With the United States three months into World War I copper was in demand and there

was money to be made, so any work stoppages were absolutely unacceptable to those who stood

to profit. However, there is evidence that those who were deported were deemed undesirable for

more than just their involvement in the labor movement.

On the day of the deportation, Sheriff Harry Wheeler reportedly used a particular

question to determine who was to be marked for forced removal: “Are you an American, or are

you not?” (Benton-Cohen 2009:1). For many victims of the deportation, this was the first sign

that they were being targeted for reasons other than their labor affiliation. The men loaded onto

the train that day included those who had nothing to do with the strike- including local business

owners, a lawyer, a physician and others (Lindquist and Fraser 1968:403). However, there were

several factors that the majority of them had in common- factors that excluded them from the

common definition of Americanness that included being both white and a family man. According

to Katherine Benton-Cohen’s research, the majority of the deported men did not fit this ideal,

whether it was because of their marital status, nationality or the color of their skin. As high as

ninety percent were immigrants, including men of thirty-four different nationalities, but the two

most largely represented groups were those from Mexico or the Slavic countries of Eastern

Europe (Benton-Cohen 2009:3).

By using the issue of both what colors and qualities could constitute an American, those

behind the deportation not only raised questions about who counts as an American, but made

obvious their own conclusions. Benton-Cohen, in her extensive works about Cochise County,

came to the conclusion that

“The men deported from Bisbee on that hot morning were borderline Americans, because most were U.S. residents but not citizens, but also because, to many local residents, men like the deportees had at best a tenuous claim on whiteness” (2009:7). Colleen O’Neill attributes the climax of the deportation to three factors: the rise (and

reputation) of the I.W.W. in Bisbee, the pending development of open-pit mining, and, of course,

the recent involvement of the U.S. in World War I (1993:258). The war meant high copper prices,

which made the mining companies all the more threatened by work stoppages cause by strikers;

the possibility of an open-pit mine meant more Mexicans being hired as surface workers, which

  20  

made the White American miners all the more threatened by their Mexican co-workers and,

finally, the I.W.W. and their radical ideas meant that both mining companies and the white

workers that benefited from their system might have to face a changing mining culture. Thus,

many groups stood to benefit from a removal of “undesirables” from Bisbee: with no more

strikers to slow the flow of profits, no more minorities to sully Bisbee’s reputation as a town for

wholesome, white domesticated miners, and no Mexicans to take even more jobs at a new open

pit mine, the town structure could remain as it always had.

The I.W.W. was particularly threatening for a number of reasons. They were known for

organizing across class, race and gender and their ultimate goal was one universal union that

could unite all workers, regardless of the status symbols like racial category and trade that Bisbee

took so seriously (Benton-Cohen 2003:31). The ideals they operated on were also very much at

odds with traditional American values- they preached the destruction of property, refused to sign

contracts, promoted working-class solidarity over nationalism and even rejected the United States

Constitution as a “bourgeoisie fraud which deluded workers into thinking they had influence in

government” (Lindquist and Fraser 1968:421). Naturally, these ideas became all the more

threatening as the nation entered wartime, and the I.W.W. was increasingly vulnerable to

accusations of being unpatriotic or un-American. Two weeks after the Bisbee Deportation, an

I.W.W. organizer was lynched in Butte, Montana. Other Wobblies were tarred and feathered.

Remarkably, just two days before July 12th, Jerome, Arizona, had their own deportation. However

it received far less attention as only a few dozen workers were removed (Benton-Cohen 2003:31).

The I.W.W. was quite badly received in Bisbee and, in a single nine-day period leading up to the

deportation from July 1st through July 11th, 1917, the Bisbee Daily Review printed a remarkable

twenty editorials criticizing the I.W.W. (Lindquist and Fraser 1968:420).

Two connections in particular, one far more loosely drawn than the other, made the

public particularly nervous about the I.W.W. First, they supported and were even involved in

causes important to the Mexican people. The I.W.W. had previously assisted an anarcho-

syndicalist organization called the Partido Liberal Mexicano with a strike in the Mexican copper

mining town of Cananea, where they had been protesting the same dual-wage system that

Mexican strikers in Bisbee also wanted to put an end to. During this period, law enforcement men

in Bisbee often referred to the “Mexican I.W.W.”, as if the two organizations and causes were

one and the same (Benton-Cohen 2003:38-39).

The I.W.W. certainly did work to get Mexican miners involved in the strike. Some

scholars have described this relationship as a manipulative one, where while I.W.W. leaders were

mostly concerned about the Bisbee strike as a show of solidarity with Montana’s strikers, the

  21  

Mexican strikers were under the impression that their goal of raising the wages of surface

laborers was the main priority of the I.W.W. (Benton-Cohen 2003:38). Strike leaders may have

been more concerned with their national political agenda, but by proposing to raise the wages of

surface laborers from $2.50 to $5.50 per day and wages of underground miners from $5.75 to

$6.00, the Mexican strikers were threatening the system Bisbee had been built on. With only a

$.50 difference between surface (Mexican) and underground (white) miners, the dual wage

system would have ceased to exist (Benton-Cohen 2003:38). Perhaps because of this promise,

Mexican workers participated in the strike disproportionately. By 1917, just 13% of Bisbee’s

miners were Mexican. However, 27% of the men deported that year were Mexican. One mine

even had 300 of its 350 Hispanic employees stop work to join the picket line on the first day of

the strike (Benton-Cohen 2003:38). It seems clear that Mexican miners had much more hope

invested into this particular strike than other workers, whose conditions were already good.

However, in another twist that reveals just how insufficient government attempts at healing the

wounds of the Bisbee Deportation were, the Presidential Mediation Commission failed to

interview a single Mexican about the events of that summer, so scholars will likely never fully

understand the Hispanic perspective of the strike and deportation (Benton-Cohen 2003:37).

However, the I.W.W. had developed another reputation besides that of Mexican

sympathizers. The fears and prejudices that lead to the rise of nativism during World War I were

clearly very much in play here, and paranoid conspiracy theories added to the perceived threat of

the I.W.W.’s presence in Bisbee. The manager of the Shattuck Arizona Mining Company

expressed concern that the I.W.W.’s demands were “plans of a nationwide conspiracy by enemies

of the United States government to restrict or cut off the copper output required to prosecute the

war “(Taft 1972:8). The local manager of Phelps Dodge and the same man who would later help

secure a train for the deportation was of the same opinion:

‘There will be no compromise because you cannot compromise with a rattlesnake. That goes for both the International Union and the IWW… This is part of a nationwide propaganda and the alleged grievances are only talking points for that propaganda… I believe the government will be able to show that there is German influence behind the movement…” (Taft 1972:12). William Brophy, the Irish businessman who rose to incredible prominence in Bisbee, shared

similar concerns in a letter to a relative:

“This movement of the I.W.W. seems to be not alone state wide, but nationwide and is intended by the foreigners promoting it and the disloyal Americans supporting it to hamper our government in the prosecution of the war.”” (O’Neill 1993:262)

  22  

Even the Governor contributed to these fears, stating that one of his prime objectives in

investigating the deportation was to make sure that there were no German spies among the men

deported- not surprisingly, he concluded that there were none (O’Neill 1993:262). A careful

search also failed to turn up more than a few weapons in possession of these deportees who were

said to be capable of extreme violence (Lindquist and Fraser 1968:412).

Initially, Sheriff Wheeler was slightly less explicit about his suspicions that the strike was

in part the result of outside influence, but his insistence to federal investigators that “This is no

labor disturbance. We are sure of that.” made it clear that he sided with the mining companies

(Benton-Cohen 2003:40). Wheeler also sent a very telling telegram to the Governor that was

made public after the deportation:

“The whole thing appears pro-German and Anti-American. I earnestly request you use your influence to have US troops sent here to take charge of the situation and prevent bloodshed and the closing of this great copper industry now so valuable to the United States Government.” (O’Neill 1993:263) After the deportation, investigators recorded several statements from Wheeler that revealed more

about his feelings towards the strikers:

“I honestly believe today that 80 or 85 per cent of these men were foreigners, some of them Austrians and Germans and Mexicans, and none of them loved the country I love… I would repeat the operation any time I find my own people endangered by a mob composed of 80 per cent aliens and enemies of my government.” (Benton-Cohen 2003:42) The famous proclamation issued by Wheeler on the day of the strike, warning women and Children to stay off the street, further confirms his intentions: “…for the purpose of arresting on charges of vagrancy, treason and being disturbers of the peace of Cochise County all those strange men who have congregated here from other parts and sections for the purpose of harassing and intimidating all men who desire to pursue their daily toil. We cannot longer stand or tolerate such conditions. There is no labor trouble- we are sure of that- but a direct attempt to embarrass and injure the government of the United States.” (Taft 1972:14). Even the former President Theodore Roosevelt, a good friend of the general manager

(and the man who initially proposed the deportation) of Calumet & Arizona, contributed to this

fear mongering. Upon reading the official report of the Mediation Commission, which

condemned the deportation and insisted that the strike had been peaceful, Roosevelt was

disgusted. He found it to be

“as thoroughly misleading a document as could be written on the subject…No officials, writing on behalf of the President, is to be excused for failure to know,

  23  

and clearly set forth, that the IWW is a criminal organization... No human being in his senses doubts that the men deported from Bisbee were bent on destruction and murder.” (Taft 1972:28).

It is debatable just how sincere this fear, at least on the part of the mining company

executives, was or whether such outlandish accusations of German sabotage were simply a means

to the end of removing less desirable workers. However, there is no doubt that the tensions of

World War I played some sort of role in the deportation. The Southwest was already tense due to

the Zimmermann telegraph, a document captured just five months earlier, in which the Germans

sought Mexico as an ally, promising the return of Arizona, New Mexico and Texas in the case of

an American defeat. This made Mexicans all the more suspect in Bisbee, as they could now be

seen as potential allies of American enemies overseas. Harry Wheeler was reportedly especially

paranoid about this possibility, and despite a lack of evidence he was said to be convinced that

Mexican workers had a cache of rifles stored just over the border (Benton-Cohen 2003:42). He

reportedly grew impatient with reporters and investigators who questioned his theories, and he

once tried to explain that “You eastern people haven’t had much experience with Mexicans,

but… we figured they might do anything” (Benton-Cohen 2003:43). A reporter further captured

Wheelers concerns that:

“the Mexicans in Bisbee and along the border would take advantage of the disturbed conditions of the strike and start an uprising, destroying the mines, and murder American women and children… What would you have said…if, knowing as I do how all Mexicans hate Americans, I had waited until some American citizens- American women and children- had been murdered” (O’Neill 1993:263). The anti-foreigner vitriol during this period can be blamed on Bisbee’s long, racially

contentious history, the nativism and paranoia of WWI, or both, but it is clear that race played a

part in who was selected for deportation. Witnesses testified that anyone with a foreign

appearance was rounded up indiscriminately during the deportation, regardless of whether or not

they were associated with the I.W.W. or even on strike (Benton-Cohen 2003:37). After the

deportees received assistance from the United States Army in Columbus, a survey was conducted

which showed that those men forcibly removed from Bisbee were not the I.W.W. supporting,

anti-American and un-patriotic dangers that they were made out to be. 520 of the men owned

property in Bisbee and 433 were married with families. 205 had purchased liberty bonds, 63 had

served in the United States armed forces and 472 were registered for the draft- incredibly enough,

the first man drafted from the Warren district had his number called while he was in the refugee

camp in Columbus (Lindquist and Fraser 1968:410). Remarkably, only 426 men out of 1,186 had

  24  

been involved in the I.W.W. (Taft 1972:22). However, despite this evidence of their willing and

even patriotic integration into American society, they were undeniably foreign: only 18% were

listed as having been born in the U.S. (O’Neill 1993:270).

After it became clear that there were no German spies or secret caches of guns and that

the men deported were simply seeking better lives for themselves and their families by striking,

the proponents of the strike changed their tone. Sheriff Wheeler made emotional statements

conjuring up images of riots and bloodshed, casting himself as the unsung hero who had

prevented great violence against the innocent people of Bisbee. He claimed that “If I hadn’t done

it, and these people had been murdered and killed, as well as my own, you would still have asked

me, ‘why did you permit it?’” (Taft 1972:23).

Since the mining companies defended themselves by calling upon their own ideas about

the importance of family, claiming that the deportation was to protect the good white women and

children of Bisbee, it is only fitting that the effect of the deportation and its aftermath on women

should be addressed as well. Soon after the deportation, the mining companies announced their

intentions to take care of the dependents of the men who had been deported, assuring the press

that their families would not go hungry while their breadwinners were away (O’Neill 1993:264).

However, when the Citizens Protective League, which had been involved in executing the

deportation, was charged with administering relief to the wives and children of the men they had

deported their intentions were not so pure. Women were “encouraged” to go stay with relatives

elsewhere, and one woman who had given birth the day after her husband was deported was

given a one-way train ticket to Los Angeles marked “charity” (O’Neill 1993:264). Another

woman who sympathized with the strikers lost her successful business after the owner of the

facilities she leased raised her rent by 100% (O’Neill 1993:265). No matter how much the mining

companies clung to the premise that they were protecting white women and children, it is clear

that these very women felt that they had more to fear from the companies than the strikers

themselves. One woman, a proprietor of a boarding house with several miners as residents, was

beaten when she tried to stop members of the Sheriffs posse from entering her home (O’Neill

1993:267). Another woman attempted to wire the Governor with a message during the

deportation: “I ask for protection for the women and children of the Warren District before we are

burned up like the women and children were at Ludlow” (O’Neill 1993:266). This reference to

the massacre only three years earlier where a clash between striking coal miners and the Colorado

National Guard left two women and eleven children dead is a potent example of the fear some

Bisbee residents felt during the deportation (Larkin and McGuire 2009:3). The vigilante actions

taken in the name of protecting these women were obviously not received as such.

  25  

In addressing the role of Mexican women in and after the deportation, the lack of their

testimonies again becomes a problem. According to the survey of the deportees taken in

Columbus, at least half of the Mexican deportees were married and had children. It can only be

imagined that these women suffered the same loss of income as the others did, but likely received

less aid. O’Neill concludes that

“The white working class women could feel entitled to protection since their welfare seemed pivotal to the outcome of the conflict. But how could Mexican women participate in a conversation where the focal point was the protection of white womanhood?” (O’Neill 1993:269). Similarly, Mexican men did not seem to seek justice after the deportation. While the

mining companies and Sheriff Wheeler ultimately won the legal battles following the deportation

by convincing the jury that Bisbee was in danger and that the actions of the deportation were in

earnest self defense, many white men still made a valiant attempt to get compensation they felt

entitled to. 968 men filed civil suits against Phelps Dodge: only 10 of these men had Spanish

surnames. According to O’Neill this disparity speaks loudly, and Mexicans affected by the

deportation clearly “did not think their interests would be served if they sought remedies in the

white dominated justice system” (O’Neill 1993:272).

The Bisbee Deportation was a complex and multifaceted event resulting from the

interests and agendas of many different groups, some more powerful than others. While the

agendas of Phelps Dodge, Calumet & Arizona and Shattuck Arizona were more overt than most,

World War I created a prime atmosphere for change that is very much reflected in this attempt to

remove undesirables and create a renewed, improved society. A May 1917 editorial from the

Tucson Citizen entitled “The War A Blessing in Disguise” captures this widespread attitude

towards the war and its potential impacts:

“It will combine the discordant elements of our population into a more homogeneous people, eliminating from our councils the utterly irreconcilable among us, and create out of a disorganized multitude a real and purposeful nation.” (Lindquist and Fraser 1968:421) While the motivations behind the Bisbee deportation are complex, it seems obvious that this

event was the result of more than just labor trouble. From the short fuse of mining companies, to

Bisbee’s long history of racism, to the potential for profits and the nativist paranoia brought by

WWI, it was clearly the result of a perfect storm of tensions.

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Analysis of Bisbee’s Racial Hierarchy: Racism in a Melting Pot

Through construction of a racial hierarchy, Bisbee’s residents attempted to answer

difficult, and even unanswerable questions. How does one define race? Where should the line be

drawn between different races? Where do different groups stand in relation to each other? In

1917, Bisbee’s long struggle with race culminated with Harry Wheelers question of “Are you an

American, or are you not?” In a part of the nation that is former Apache country, home to an

international border, the destination of immigrants from all over the world, and during a world

war with the Mexican Revolution happening mere miles away, Harry Wheelers question seems

like an absurdly simplistic way of looking at things. However, the White Americans of Bisbee

placed great value on that distinction and managed to answer these questions in a way that would

come to define nearly every aspect of Bisbee’s economic and social structure.

Bisbee’s racial history is consistent with Eduardo Bonilla-Silva’s theories of racialized

social systems: societies in which the placement of actors in racial categories contributes to the

creation of economic, political, social, and ideological structures (2007). These racial categories

are partially defined by their biological phenotype, but any number of human traits that are

socially rather than biologically based are also used to designate race (i.e. “docile” Mexicans).

Racialized social systems always involve the formation of a hierarchy that creates and enforces

social relations between different races where the race in the superior position inevitably receives

economic, occupational, political and social benefits. Those belonging to the superior position

posses the ability to draw physical and social boundaries between themselves and other races, and

receive what W.E.B. Du Bois called the “psychological wage” of whiteness (Bonilla-Silva

2007:46).

In Bisbee, Bonilla-Silva’s characteristics of a racialized social system are demonstrated

most dramatically in the structure of the mining companies, where wages, occupation and respect

were all determined by your race. Those in the dominant category of White American readily

exercised their power to create boundaries separating themselves from other groups, and, when

these boundaries were threatened by the strike, they turned to violence to preserve them. Bonilla-

Silva’s racial theories differ from many classic theories of racism in that he acknowledges the

structural aspects of the processes seen in Bisbee. He writes that “although processes of

racialization are always embedded in other structurations, they acquire autonomy and have

pertinent effects in the social system” (Bonilla-Silva 1997:469). Thus, while Bisbee’s racialized

social system was born from the early rules of the mining camp and later from company policy,

the racial hierarchy became greater than the structures that created it and became a part of the

social system itself. Bonilla-Silva is careful to emphasize that racial ideologies are not just

  27  

superstructural phenomena, but “become the organizational map that guides actions of racial

actors in society” (Bonilla-Silva 1997:474).

In the racialized social system of Bisbee, another notable aspect is how the racial

hierarchy was self-sustaining, reproducing itself from generation to generation and adapting to fit

the changes brought by each new wave of immigration. Bonilla Silva observes that while all

racialized social systems are hierarchical, the “particular character” of each hierarchy and racial

structure is highly variable, forming an ideology that can change and adapt to different historical

circumstances (Bonilla-Silva 1997:470). According to Katherine Benton-Cohen, the rules of the

white man’s camp reinforced the hierarchy and

“… constituted a kind of ideology. They did much more than create a list of job categories… The rules helped some people and harmed others, yet implied neutrality by invoking explanations that they reflected the natural order of things. As theorists Trevor Purvis and Alan Hunt have observed, an ideology ‘always works to favor some and disadvantage others,’ and makes this disparity seem ‘natural’” (Benton-Cohen 2009: 86). The hierarchy created by this ideology was remarkable in its ability to survive despite Bisbee’s

diversity and location along an international border. While the racial hierarchy began as casual

consensus among the first miners to arrive in Bisbee, it became institutionalized with the arrival

of the big three mining companies, forming “a structure as well as a culture” (Bonilla-Silva

2007:49). The notable persistence and longevity of Bisbee’s racial hierarchy is testament to the

fact that residents must have found a way to explain and justify its existence and integration into

their lives, framing it in a way that made it morally and intellectually acceptable. In order to do

so, a number of ideas were promoted to ensure its survival: scientific racism, presumed neutrality

and naturalness and adherence to racial etiquette.

Michael Omi and Howard Winant’s work on racial formations sheds much light on

Bisbee’s racial hierarchy (2007). Bonilla-Silva describes their writings as “the most recent

theoretical alternative to mainstream idealist approaches” and uses their definition of racial

formation: “the sociohistorical process by which racial categories are created, inhabited,

transformed, and destroyed” (Bonilla-Silva 1997:466). From the perspective of Omi and Winant,

race is best described as an “organizing principle of social relationships that shapes the identity of

individual actors at the micro level and shapes all spheres of social life at the macro level”

(Bonilla-Silva 1997:466). According to their works as well as those of Katherine Benton-Cohen

(2009), the prevalence of scientific racism accompanied by the desire to create categories in the

nineteenth and early twentieth centuries is a key player in the construction of racial hierarchies.

Omi and Winant cite the classificatory scheme created by Carolus Linnaeus with inspiring

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scholars and later regular people in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries to study and rank

different ethnic groups and their variations (Omi and Winant 2007:22). Continuing in this

tradition of categorizing and ranking people and treating it as a natural and unavoidable system,

Bisbee’s White American residents and the mining companies created a hierarchy that they stood

to benefit from, both socially and economically. Omi and Winant give Marvin Harris’s concept of

hypo-descent credit for keeping biological reality from infringing on the delicate balance of

scientific racism in the racial hierarchy:

“By what ingenious computation is the genetic tracery of a million years of evolution unraveled and each man assigned his proper social box? In the United States, the mechanism employed is the rule of hypo-descent. Hypo-descent means affiliation with the subordinate rather than the subordinate group in order to avoid the ambiguity of intermediate identity… The rule of hypo-descent is, therefore, an invention, which we in the United States have made in order to keep biological facts from intruding into our collective racist fantasies” (Omi and Winant 2007:23). It is by this logic that, in Bisbee, you could be considered a Mexican no matter how far removed

you were from your Hispanic heritage. White was emblematic of a pure category, and even the

smallest amount of racial intermixture immediately and unarguably qualified an individual as

nonwhite (Omi and Winant 2007:23). However, because race is socially constructed, both the

meaning and status assigned to particular racial categories were open to be constantly contested.

Bonilla-Silva concludes that how races are defined both “reflects and affects the social, political,

ideological and economic struggles among these races” (2007:47). Thus, global and local

struggles can change and transform racial categories and their position in a hierarchy, as we’ve

seen in Bisbee’s fluctuating status of various groups in reaction to changing immigration patterns

and evolving ideas of scientific racism.

In order to become self-perpetuating, a racial hierarchy must also be as impervious to

examination as possible. In order to achieve this, an appearance of being natural is highly

beneficial. According to Omi and Winant,

“The seemingly obvious, ‘natural’ and ‘common sense’ qualities which the existing racial order exhibits themselves testify to the effectiveness of the racial formation in constructing racial meanings and racial identities (Omi and Winant 2007: 24).” The racial hierarchy’s dependence on being perceived as natural was very much assisted by the

practice of scientific racism. If discriminatory practices are treated as science rather than racism,

they are much easier to accept. This is evident in how Bisbee’s low Mexican wages were justified

by their unfortunate living conditions- it was widely accepted that it wasn’t a matter of them not

deserving more, it was that something inherent in their character made it so that they didn’t need

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more. The cultural mores that reinforced Bisbee’s racial hierarchy were integrated so thoroughly

into every part of community life that it is easy to see how they could have been perceived as the

natural facts of life that Benton-Cohen (2009) and Omi and Winant (2007) described. Subtle acts

of dehumanizing non-White Americans worked themselves into the public consciousness: for

example a 1904 headline typical of the Bisbee Daily Review read “J.H. Goodman and a Mexican

Killed at the Pittsburg & Hecla Mine” (Benton-Cohen 2009: 92). While a headline like this is not

overtly racist, the subtle act of denying a Mexican man his name, and therefore his importance

and even his humanity, contributes to the perceived naturalness of his station in Bisbee life. Such

an omission both indicated and reinforced the social distance between different racial groups in

Bisbee (Martinelli 2009:127). In the days before the deportation, similar language served to

dehumanize the strikers. One Los Angeles Times article from April 1st of 1920 quoted members of

Sheriff Wheelers posse in calling strikers “Roughnecks, hard-boiled guys, and bohunks”- or dog

eaters- and claiming that they appeared “black, as if they had the devil himself in them.” Thus,

their deportation could be treated as natural, understandable and even inevitable. By providing

the rules for how the other is perceived and dealt with in a racialized social system, racism made

the standards for how actors in the social system operate into “common sense” (Bonilla-Silva

1997:474).

Finally, Omi and Winant cite their concept of racial etiquette in the construction of racial

formations. They describe racial etiquette as

“…a set of interpretative codes and racial meanings which operate in the interactions of daily life. Rules shaped by our perception of race in a comprehensively racial society determine the ‘presentation of self,’ distinctions of status, and appropriate modes of conduct. ‘Etiquette’ is not mere universal adherence to the dominant group’s rules, but a more dynamic combination of these rules with the values and beliefs of subordinated groupings. This racial ‘subjection’ is quintessentially ideological. Race becomes ‘common sense’- a way of comprehending, explaining and acting in the world” (Omi and Winant 2007:24). If racial etiquette determines how one comprehends, explains and acts in their world, this idea

could serve as an explanation for many aspects of Bisbee life. For example, Mexican deportees

not seeking justice on the same scale that other deportees did could be explained as them acting

out of common sense, recognizing the limitations that racial etiquette placed on how they may act

in the world and respond to the injustices against them. All the subtleties of the racial hierarchy,

like racially divided neighborhoods, how individuals were addressed in the local newspaper and

how members of different racial categories responded to the deportation could be attributed to

adherence to racial etiquette. Bonilla-Silva claims that after a society becomes racialized, “a set of

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social relations and practices based on racial distinctions develops at all societal levels”

(2007:51). Thus, in a racialized society, racialization develops a life of its own, providing the

“rationalizations for social, political and economic interactions between the races” (Bonilla-Silva

1997:474).

The strength of the racial hierarchy cannot be discussed without addressing the powerful

hold of the mining companies. Because copper was an industrial commodity, the industry

depended on Eastern venture capitalists and investments of millions of dollars in mines, smelters

and railroads (Sheridan 1998:177). Thus, despite the rural locales and humble populations of

copper camps, the corporate element cannot be ignored. In her ethnography of nearby Douglas,

Anne Goldberg captures the almost colonialist power of Phelps Dodge in Cochise County:

“[In] Bisbee, named for a mining magnate’s attorney, the name obscures any reference to a past that included Apache, Spanish and Mexican occupation. The name is consistent with the colonialist practice of renaming the landscape… Thus, the stamp of U.S. copper mining remains long after the mines and smelter have closed… Even more surprising, their [Phelps Dodges] public statement on their history mentions neither Douglas nor Bisbee. Phelps Dodge has been able to shed its relationship with the area, while Bisbee and Douglas retain a connection to the industrial power through their names, architecture, and the life histories of residents” (Goldberg 2006:278). On some levels, the role of the mining companies was almost hegemonic, as their control

over Bisbee was so complete that, if one were to work or live there, you would have no choice

but to consent. However, they also exercised their power through coercion. They were direct

economic beneficiaries of the racial hierarchy, as racial conflict weakened working-class

solidarity, lowered wages, and forestalled labor organization (Sheridan 1998:176). Sheridan goes

so far as to call what the mining companies created a “neocolonial social order,” an observation

that offers great insight into Bisbee’s racial hierarchy and the purposes it served for the

companies (1998:176). Bonilla-Silva confirms that the organization of people into racial

categories often stems from the interests of powerful actors within the social system- in this case,

the mining companies- and, after social relations become organized, race becomes an

“independent element of the operation of the social system,” taking on a life of its own (Bonilla-

Silva 1997:473). As long as locals were preoccupied with racial tensions, labor issues would be

secondary, making it easier for the mining companies to turn an unquestioned and uninterrupted

profit. Sheridan beautifully captures the capitalist backbone of the racial hierarchy:

“Preindustrial patterns became industrial. Prospectors became proletarians. And, as Arizona mining shifted from precious metals such as gold and silver to industrial metals such as copper because of technological advances, rising worldwide demand, and denser and more extensive railroad networks, Arizona’s

  31  

isolated mining communities became bound by copper collars and iron rails to global commodity production and capital flows” (1998:175). Thus, despite its immense power and stability, Bisbee’s racial hierarchy depended on

many things. Between the justification of scientific racism, the illusion of being natural and

pressure to adhere to racial etiquette paired with the corporate motivations of the mining

companies it is no surprise that the added nativism of World War I pushed Bisbee’s racial

tensions over the edge. As unlikely as such a degree of racism seems in a place so diverse, it

permeated every aspect of Bisbee life and reflected its ever-changing identity. Bound by both the

racial hierarchy and the copper collars of the mining industry, Bisbee’s residents, whether they

benefited or suffered from it, were part of a nearly inescapable social structure.

Modern Implications: Bisbee and the Border Today

One of the factors that makes Cochise County so fascinating, both historically and today,

is how the global intersects the local. Despite being rural and relatively unimportant on the world

stage, the proximity of the US-Mexico border has made Bisbee and its surrounding towns the

scene of many international dramas. An examination of race in Bisbee from 1880-1917 may be

complete in and of itself, but with contemporary border controversies receiving an increasing

amount of political attention it seems prudent to briefly address the issues already discussed

alongside the border situation of today.

Sadly, much in Cochise County hasn’t changed since the period from 1880 to 1917. If

anything, its issues have increased with the growing political firestorm over illegal immigration.

Well-funded and largely successful efforts to stop illegal immigration in other border states like

California, New Mexico and Texas have increased the traffic of migrants through the often-

dangerous Arizona desert. As of 2006, 50% of Border Patrol apprehensions made nationwide are

in the Tucson sector, which includes Bisbee and Douglas.

Just as the Presidents Mediation Commission failed to include Mexican perspectives on

the deportation, today there is a general lack of ethnographies of rural border communities

(Goldberg 2006:276). However, in Goldberg’s own ethnography of Douglas she captures many

attitudes that are strikingly similar to those uncovered in my analysis of race in Bisbee around the

turn of the century. For example, the idea that the historically impoverished residents of Bisbee

and Douglas were in such a situation because of their own standards of living and characteristics

rather than the other way around seems to have survived in regards to the contemporary residents

of this area. Goldberg encountered numerous residents of the opinion that those who remained in

town after the mines closed were unmotivated and uninterested in bettering themselves through

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education, regardless of their race. This attitude seemed to justify the struggles of modern life in

Bisbee and Douglas, blaming locals rather than the industry that abandoned them, and treating

them as “the authors of their own hardships” (Goldberg 2006:282).

The reaction to newcomers in the community has also been fairly consistent in Cochise

County of years past and of today. In her ethnography Goldberg observed that locals highly

valued stability and being invested in the community (Goldberg 2006:301). Thus, newcomers

who have yet to become integrated are often blamed for the community’s problems. Just as

European immigrants were once criticized for sending most of their wages home and not

spending money in the community, local figures like school teachers and border patrol agents

who choose to commute to Douglas from Sierra Vista, the largest city in Cochise County, are

often criticized. New arrivals from Mexico are also frequent targets. As illegal immigration and

the migration northward has accelerated in recent years, residents of border towns often attribute

the issues of crime, poverty and degeneracy to new arrivals from the southern parts of Mexico-

contrasting their own border culture with that of those from the interior of the country.

Alternatively, newcomers and those living across the border are blamed for corrupting long-time

residents with their “lesser morals” (Goldberg 2006:288-289).

Attitudes of those in power towards minorities also seem largely unchanged. The great

power exercised by Sheriff Wheeler, his posse and the mining company executives has been

replaced by that of the United States Border Patrol as well as several vigilante organizations

remarkably similar to the Sheriffs posse that orchestrated the Bisbee Deportation. These groups,

who believe the government is not doing enough to enforce the immigration policty, patrol the

border with guns in search of migrants, whom they hold until the border patrol arrives (Goldberg

2006:293). Members of the groups vary in the degree of their radical beliefs, but one of

Goldberg’s interviews in particular proves that conspiracy theories along the border are alive and

well. An anti-immigration resident of Douglas she spoke with believed vehemently that the

Mexican government was attempting to regain control of the United States Southwest by forcing

indigenous Mexican people off of their lands, leaving them no choice but to join the flow of

illegal immigrants northward: “…early on I realized that these people are being used by powers

much bigger than any of us, as pawns. They’re just useful idiots as far as the people who are

driving this thing are concerned” (Goldberg 2006:295). Official forces like the Border Patrol

often have members that display similar prejudices. A Mexican American Border Patrol agent

interviewed by Goldberg expressed sympathy for migrants, but also revealed his racist

assumptions: “We don’t know who is here to work and who’s here to commit crimes… We’re

here to filter out the bad people. There’s a reason people cross illegally, whether they have AIDS,

  33  

TB, or they have committed a crime” (Goldberg 2006:293). The agent went on to suggest that

people could go through legal avenues to come to the United States, but that something in their

character prevented them from doing so. (Goldberg 2006:293).

This border patrol agent is not alone in associating illegal immigrants with crime and

disease. On Jan 25th, 1903, the Los Angeles Times published an article revealing similar

associations around the turn of the century:

“The supervisors of Pima, Santa Cruz and Cochise counties are complaining of the influx from Sonora of indigent and sick Mexicans, who arrive only to become a burden upon the community… It is specifically charged as well, however, that Mexicans with incurable disorders are deliberately carted across the border and brought direct to the county hospitals. In addition to this, not a week passes in which some consumptive is not dumped upon the county almost immediately after leaving the train.”

This article mirrors the contemporary controversy over illegal immigrants receiving health care in

the United States. In Douglas and in other border towns, hospitals are in a financial crisis often

attributed to illegal immigrants who cannot pay for the medical care they receive (Goldberg

2006:2936).

Overall, it is clear that associations of degeneracy, dependency and an influx of crime and

disease have followed immigrant peoples into America for decades. A quote from a 1889 article

in one of Tucson’s Spanish-language newspapers reveals the desperation of a new immigrant:

“…it is hard at present to make even enough to live. Work for Mexicans is very scarce and pay is low. Some mining companies only allow Mexicans in the most distressing and low paid jobs, such as woodcutting… What hope do we have living in a country where we are looked at with such prejudice, where justice isn’t for us, and where we are treated as the lowest of the human race?” (Benton- Cohen 2009:87) While the racism that greets new arrivals to Cochise County in the twenty-first century is less

overt than the discrimination that this man faced, it still persists. The borderlands are undeniably

a place of contention and this has helped shape the region and its people. Throughout the years,

theorists have proposed that the identities of borderlanders both transcend boundaries and defy

any unified concept of self, narrating ones own identity by emphasizing the difference between

oneself and other groups and places (Goldberg 2006:275-276). As a place whose inherent

function is to separate one thing from another, borderlands are a place of constant racial discourse

and conflict.

In examining the intricate implications of Bisbee’s racial hierarchy alongside the historic

and contemporary tensions of the borderlands, it becomes clear that while Bisbee is in many ways

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typical of turn of the century mining towns, it was also shaped by unique factors of time and

place. In studying Cochise County, the border itself becomes a character vital to this narrative.

Conclusions, Larger Implications and Future Research

While Bisbee is an excellent and fascinating example of a mining community with

historical and racial strife, this story of literal and symbolic violence in the Warren district is not

all that unusual in the greater history of mining. Historically, the quest for metals has contributed

to the conquest, subordination and control of indigenous peoples and workers the world over. In

addressing why it is important for researchers to study communities like Bisbee, David Killick

observes that mining deserves the attention of historical, sociological and anthropological

research because of not only the contributions that metals and fossil fuels have made

economically and technologically but also because of the millions of people over thousands of

years who “have lived, labored (often involuntarily) and died in mining settlements, while the

quest for new sources of metals and minerals has been a major motive for exploration, conquest,

and colonialism since at least the Egyptian Middle Kingdom” (1998:179).

This issue of displacement and colonialist control over groups who inhabited mineral-rich

lands long before the mining companies is an issue inherent to the industry itself- A. Bernard

Knapp notes that mining expeditions very rarely discover mineral wealth in an area without an

indigenous population, thus “the earliest camps set up in a given region therefore often function

as a type of colonial outpost” (1998:11). However, despite the enormous number of people and

cultures affected by mining, social scientists have spent far less time studying the lives of these

people than those of factory employees, farmers, or fisher folk (Killick 1998:179).

Admittedly, the study of mining camps presents problems for social scientists. William A.

Douglass observed that mining camps often fail to be consistent with traditional anthropological

ideas about what constitutes a community (1998). To Douglass, the very phrase mining camp

invokes ideas of impermanence- the rush of transient men towards mineral wealth, the boom of

settlement and then the inevitable bust when resources run out and the money and men move on

to the next town. It is difficult to study transient communities that often had sudden and brief

golden years, leaving behind little evidence today. Thus, “as a disparate collection of human

beings they fail to pass the implicit anthropological means tests for community. That is there is

seemingly a dearth of the kinship, friendship, religious and neighborhood ties that form the

substantive definition of human community” (Douglass 1998:98).

With these issues inherent to the study of mining towns, an argument must be made as to

why it’s still important beyond its role in the creation of modern society and the number of people

  35  

who were a part of, or affected by, the mining industry. Mining towns are in many ways a

microcosm with a unique and distinctive character forged by their relationship with the larger

industry. Even though mining camps are widely recognized as belonging to a people who are

“heterogeneous in character, of diverse origins, and drawn together by the need to work,” they are

united by the unique circumstances of a geographic place that exists for one sole purpose (Knapp

1998:4). A. Bernard Knapp describes this distinctive character as a “collective behavior resulting

from the dynamic between working and living in settlements structured around a single

commodity,” and thus we are given the opportunity to study the actions of an incredibly diverse

people with a single factor which they all live and work under (Knapp 1998:3-4). This uniting

factor of the mining industry gives us a fascinating framework with which to examine mining

camp residents, how they structured their lives and how their lives were structured for them.

In acknowledging both the value and difficulties of studying historic mining camps, I have

observed several factors that make Bisbee different and thus a valuable opportunity to perform

research that would be far more difficult in other towns. Bisbee’s reputation as a domesticated,

home owning town has already been addressed, and these unique characteristics that mark Bisbee

as a less transient mining town defy the common misconception that mining camps cannot be true

communities. Bisbee was and still is a community, with a wealth of evidence and resources still

remaining today, rather than scattered across the southwest with the constant departure of

transient miners. Additionally, unlike many mining camps where the profits stopped flowing,

Bisbee is not a ghost town. The town struggled when mining was halted in the 1970’s and its

character changed drastically, but Bisbee has survived as a tourist town with many residents who

have lived there since the mining days, a small but dedicated local history museum, and a

population interested in preserving and sharing their past.

Bisbee holds much potential for future research, particularly in the fields of historical and

industrial archaeology with an emphasis on community based practices. Thomas Sheridan notes

that while we currently only have a photographic and documentary record through which to study

Bisbee, the segregation of the racial hierarchy “undoubtedly was reflected in the material culture

of the mining communities” and that ethnic boundaries were likely reinforced by “differences of

diet, house construction, household spatial organization and house wares” (Sheridan 1998:179).

Unfortunately, little archaeology has been done in Bisbee, and until then we cannot be sure how

material culture correlates to the racial and class boundaries discussed here. However, with a

wide variety of historic sites and structures that remain either perfectly intact or survive as ruins

on the outskirts of town, there is no shortage of archaeological material in Bisbee and the

possibility should be thoroughly examined.

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In its potential for the practice of for historical archaeology, Bisbee has both problems and

opportunity. Since Bisbee was both better established and more long-lived that most mining

towns, the traditional archaeological sites of long abandoned ruins are less available. While the

surviving foundations of dilapidated miners shacks exist in the hundreds high in Bisbee’s

canyons, important sites for study like Main Street or the ethnic enclaves of Brewery Gulch are in

use today, now filled with art galleries and restaurants. Historic homes are now primarily in the

hands of private owners performing their own renovations. However, these factors present an

opportunity for the exploration of how less-traditional, community-based archaeology can be

applied in the examination of sites like Bisbee. As I witnessed in my personal experiences

working with collections at the Bisbee Mining & Historical Museum, locals renovating a home or

perhaps going through a relative’s possessions constantly discover artifacts of value to

researchers. From a Ku Klux Klan membership card found hidden in a door jamb to a collection

of correspondence found by the new owner of a boarded up hotel, a community based historical

archaeology project has the potential to compliment the local museums historical perspective with

an anthropological one and help channel such discoveries into actual research.

In this paper it has been made clear that Bisbee’s racial hierarchy was socially constructed

and perpetuated. The mining companies further enforced this already rigid framework and

whether you were a White American, Mexican or a European immigrant, your economic, social

and political status were largely defined by your race. By 1917 this culture of justified racism

came to a head in the form of the Bisbee Deportation, a culmination of racial and economic

tensions behind the façade of a labor conflict. This brief but tumultuous period of Bisbee history

is evidence of how combined factors of racial diversity, mining culture, neocolonialist

corporations and proximity to a contentious international line drove Bisbee’s melting pot to its

boiling point.

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