When I first started The Burning Bride, I had no idea that Emma Goldman was publishing a magazine for anarchists called Mother Earth or that a 21-year-old man was leading an army of hungry unemployed men into churches demanding that they adhere to the teachings of Jesus and house and feed the hungry. Some of the churches responded with kindness. Others did not!

(Random church photo in New York by me)

The young man in question was Frank Tannenbaum. When he led a group of a couple hundred protestors to St. Alphonsus Church to demand food and shelter, he and his group were met by an overwhelming force of police.

Here is how I described the event in my book, using primary sources:

According to the reporter, the priest ordered them to leave, but the men refused, standing on the pews, yelling. A few frightened congregants were quoted in the paper. One woman had insisted that the fellow standing in her pew take off his cap out of respect. Which he did. Frank had asked the priest to let the men sleep in the church that night.

Ellen read the story, outrage building a fire in her mind.

“You’ll do nothing of the kind,” Father Adrian replied. “The Catholic church is no place for you to sleep, and I strongly object to the way you entered here.”

“Well, will you give us money to buy food?”

“No.”

“Will you give us work?” Frank asked.

Again Father Adrian refused.

“But I tell you we’re starving,” Frank implored.

Of course, starving men and women were not Father Adrian’s problem.

According to the account, Frank had finally given up but it was too late. The police were bound and determined to end the threat of Frank Tannenbaum.

Frank Tannenbaum spent a year in jail and was fined the exorbitant sum of five hundred dollars all because he demanded food and shelter for hungry, out-of-work people. That’s where Frank’s story ends in the book, but he later went on to attend Columbia University, earn a Ph.D. in economics and eventually become an expert on Mexico and Latin America.

 (Public Domain. This image is available from the United States Library of Congress’s Prints and Photographs division under the digital ID ggbain.19596.)

Another historical figure from that era whom I found fascinating was Becky Edelsohn. She was a feisty anarchist who stood up to authority any chance she got. One time, she opened the door of a limosine and spit in a plutocrat’s face. She was famous for her signature red stockings, for her fiery speeches, and for being one of the first hunger strikers in the U.S.

 (Picture of Becky Edelsohn under arrest, public domain)

Anarchists get a bad rap these days, and even then, they would sometimes use violence to call attention to their cause. But remember that in the early 20th century, there was no such thing as “unemployment insurance” or “workmen’s comp” and children often worked 15-hour days in dangerous factories while the wealthy lived extravagant lives of conspicuous consumption. It’s understandable that the poor, and the activists who advocated for them, were so outraged.

I got a lot of information about this era from a terrific book titled More Powerful Than Dynamite by Thai Jones, and both Emma Goldman and her first husband, Alexander Berkman (who went to prison for trying to kill Henry Frick) wrote memoirs. I was even able to find copies of Mother Earth online.

I’m lucky that my brother lives in Manhattan and so I’ve been able to do so much research in the area. On one trip I took a tour with the Bowery Boys — I highly recommend their podcast series!! — and got to see the Greenwich Village apartment building where Emma Goldman, once labeled the “most dangerous woman in America,” lived.

(Emma Goldman’s apt, photo by me)

And just in case you’ve been wondering who’s been keeping me company while I’ve been writing these stories, here’s my little guy, Franco:

This post was originally a guest blog on “Let Us Talk of Many Things.”