Joe Naylor, Podcast Ep.1
Joe Naylor: miner, socialist, pacifist, and comrade to Ginger Goodwin. In this episode of our On the Line podcast we shine a light on a remarkable yet overlooked figure in BC’s labour history. Less well-known than Goodwin, it was Naylor’s mentorship that helped shape Goodwin into the leader he was to become.
Our episode brings Naylor’s story to life with:
Expert storytelling
Readings from historical primary sources
Featured music, including a 1962 recording of “Are You From Bevan?”
Publication date: September 3, 2020
Podcast length: 31:07
Hosted by: Rod Mickleburgh
Research and writing by: Patricia Wejr and Rod Mickleburgh
Production by: John Mabbott
Joe Naylor was born in the bleak coal mining town of Wigan, Lancashire in 1872. He, along with hundreds of thousands of other British coal miners, set out for what they hoped would be a better life in North America. He first settled in Butte, Montana, home to one of North America’s toughest unions, and moved on to Cumberland BC where he set about organizing.
Naylor played a central role in the epic Vancouver Island Coal Strike of 1912-1914, the longest and most bitter mine dispute in BC history. The strike started out as a health and safety protest, but turned into a war for union recognition. Unusual for the time, Naylor championed the rights of Chinese and Japanese miners to union protection, holding to his principled stance that “there are no foreigners in the working class.”
Despite arrests, blacklisting, and surveillance, Naylor never wavered. He served as president of the BC Federation of Labour and became a leading figure in the One Big Union movement. He took young Ginger Goodwin under his wing and when Goodwin was killed for his labour and anti-war activism, Naylor spoke at his funeral.
In 1924, mine owners finally felt secure enough to let Joe Naylor resume his old coal mining job in Cumberland, but it was not until 1937 that the United Mine Workers were able to organize and sign a contract covering the Cumberland mines. At the age of 65, Naylor had a union job at last. Joe Naylor retired in 1943 and died in 1946.