RIDING ON THE BACKS OF THE PROLETARIAT
PHOTOS BY RODENT  

‘Round About 1842 the rock for this bench that Jackson Curtin is skating was mined from a quarry in Joliet Indiana. The rock was called Joliet Limestone or Athens Marble. Quarry workers, like many American workers in the late nineteenth century, protested low pay and long hours in increasingly violent strikes. A month into their strike, the quarry owners threatened to replace striking workers with new workers. Some of them, fearful of having their jobs replaced returned to the quarries. Angry strikers turned on them. The state militia was called out, armed with machine guns and bayonets. The militia charged into the crowd with bayonets, and the strikers met them with stones and clubs. Dozens of men and women were injured, and several died. One hundred and sixty years later Jackson Curtin, oblivious to the workers plight breaks off a crooked grind and a backside 5-0 up and over the skate stoppers.