Tag Archives: reading

Did they really read Marx?

Posted on November 11, 2013 by Tobias Higbie

Over the weekend I attended an excellent new book panel on Jonathan Sperber’s Karl Marx: a 19th Century Life organized by the Labor History Seminar at the Newberry Library here in Chicago.  The general thrust of Sperber’s book is to … Continue reading →

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Transfixed by Distant Power

Posted on October 30, 2013 by Tobias Higbie

Workers gazing upward and into the distance was a key motif of sight in the art and photography of self-education. In this post, I follow this gaze to see what lies in the distance. Later I will move on to … Continue reading →

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Joe Worker Arrives Online

Posted on August 7, 2009 by Tobias Higbie

In the last days of my tenure at the University of Illinois, I spent several hours digging through vertical files in the library of the Institute of Labor and Industrial Relations.  Because of changes in professors’ interests–generally away from collective … Continue reading →

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An awakening as sudden as it was violent

Posted on September 11, 2008 by Tobias Higbie

From James Maurer, It Can Be Done (New York:  The Rand School, 1938). Learning to Read Working beside me in the machine shop was a journeyman named Thomas King.  I learned later that he was one of the original organizers … Continue reading →

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What the Hobo Reads, c. 1922

Posted on July 21, 2008 by Tobias Higbie

Daniel Horsley, “What the Hobo Reads” When I write of the “hobo” I wish to define what I mean by the term.  I don’t consider a man a hobo who is down in the rut because of his own licentiousness, … Continue reading →

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By sharing our experiences, we see our problems more clearly

Posted on May 27, 2008 by Tobias Higbie

RELATIONS WITHIN THE CLASS We come here with equal rights. All of us have a right to take part in the discussion. We are all workers, but we do not all do the same kind of work. We come here … Continue reading →

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Cheap pulp tales enlarged my knowledge of the world

Posted on May 22, 2008 by Tobias Higbie

In my class was a tall, black, rebellious boy who was bright in his studies and yet utterly fearless in his assertion of himself; he could break the morale of the class at any moment with his clowning and the … Continue reading →

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Two points of view struggled for supremacy in me

Posted on May 21, 2008 by Tobias Higbie

I did not only like to read novels and tales; I had begun, as I have already mentioned, to read the classics and other good books. I also began to take an interest in public events. I was barely fifteen … Continue reading →

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I was continually with my thoughts in quite another world

Posted on May 12, 2008 by Tobias Higbie

“I loved to read. I read without choice whatever came into my hands, whatever acquaintances lent me–they did not distinguish between what was suitable and unsuitable for me–and whatever I could borrow at a second-hand bookshop in our suburb by … Continue reading →

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What does reading do?

Posted on April 25, 2008 by Tobias Higbie

“She whispered to me the story of Bluebeard and His Seven Wives and I ceased to see the porch, the sunshine, her face, everything. As her words fell upon my new ears, I endowed them with a reality that welled … Continue reading →

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How I Became a Rebel: James Maurer

Posted on February 7, 2008 by Tobias Higbie

James Maurer Originally uploaded by Tobias Higbie How I Became a Rebel. A Symposium. Part 2. The Labor Herald, July 1922, p. 24. By James H. Maurer I AM asked to tell how I became a rebel. This, I fear, … Continue reading →

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