Dishing with Mark n Carrie 9-11-19 | MCFilm.co MCFilmFest.com

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Tampa PRIDE Tickets NOW ON SALE

EARLY TICKET DISCOUNTS

https://tampapride.org/product-category/ticket/

Mark Bingham

This Thursday

TIGLFF Launch Party

9-12-19 7PM – 9:30Pm

Rialto Theatre – Tampa

https://www.facebook.com/events/646845375827755/

https://www.facebook.com/TIGLFF/

Empire Hardware Re Opening

The hardware store for Ybor City for may many years has moved. The new location ia just a couple blocks to the east at 4000 E 7^th Ave. Joi n us this Friday to congratulate them on the new location and FANTASTIC new store.

https://www.facebook.com/events/735923726864158/

SUNday FUNday

Men of TFR 2020 Calendar Launch Party!

Friday, September 20, 2019 at 7 PM – 11 PM

@ The Bad Monkey

1717 E 7th Ave, Tampa, Florida 33605

https://www.facebook.com/events/530492101054638/

Mis Amy DeMilo Need we say more.

LOVE YOU

The Skyway Bridge Diaster 2019

SPECIAL CHARITY BENEFIT SNEAK PREVIEW

On May 9, 1980, America witnessed one of the most stunning tragedies in maritime history when the M/V Summit Venture, a massive 608’ bulk freighter, collided with one of the Sunshine Skyway Bridge’s support columns. More than 1,200 feet of the bridge crumbled into the Bay, and 35 people plunged to their deaths in the turbulent and unforgiving waters below.

Captain John Lerro was the 37-year old harbor pilot responsible for guiding the Summit Venture along one of the longest and most treacherous shipping channels in the world. The Bay’s narrow and restrictive channels required a turn less than a mile from the mammoth bridge. A rogue storm racing across the Gulf that morning brought with it driving horizontal rain, hurricane force winds, and near zero-visibility. Wind gusts in excess of 80 miles per hour engulfed first the ship and then the bridge as well, resulting in a deadly combination.

From that day forward, the journey of Captain Lerro and Steve Yerrid, the young trial lawyer who came to represent him, was one of courtroom drama, heartbreaking struggle, hard-earned redemption, and the extraordinary bond of friendship that developed between a condemned client and his devoted lawyer.

More than 39 years later, the new documentary The Skyway Bridge Disaster relives that unforgettable day and its aftermath, taking viewers onto the bridge, inside the ship and into the courtroom through the experiences of survivors, local leaders, and Yerrid himself.

Proceeds from the screenings will benefit pediatric cancer treatment and research, including the National Pediatric Cancer Foundation, 1-Voice Foundation, Children’s Cancer Center and Moffitt Cancer Center.

SECOND SHOW ADDED ON SUNDAY, SEPT. 15! The Saturday screening is SOLD OUT. Tampa Theatre Members: click the tickets link to access your exclusive presale. Tickets for the added show will go on sale to the general public on Friday, July 19 at 10:00 am.

1h 10m / Not Rated / Documentary https://www.facebook.com/events/360051544658382/

The Castle Ybor – Did You Know?

1500 9th Avenue, corner of 16th St.

https://www.facebook.com/thecastleybor/

Cooperative El Primero Progresso, the “Labor Temple”

This building was the meeting place for Tampa’s labor force in the early 1900s. This photo was not dated, but I suspect by the vehicles, it was mid to late 1930s.

In addition to its Latin clubs, Ybor City had numerous labor and other fraternal organizations as well. The most important preserved building associated with labor and unionism in general is the Labor Temple at the corner of 9th Avenue and 16th Street. Ybor City’s cigar worker and restaurant unions jointly occupied this building, although it was originally constructed for the Order of the Golden Eagle. It is an eastward-facing 2-story yellow brick edifice erected in 1930.

With cast-iron grillwork, round arched stone window and door surrounds, white stone balconies, oriel windows, and square-shaped tower capped with a crenellated parapet, this edifice bears a striking resemblance to a Spanish castle.

In “Alerta Tabaqueros!” by Geroge E. Pozetta, regarding a particularly violent strike in 1910, he writes (excerpts from article):

As economic dislocations resulting from the strike became more acute, native Tampans reacted angrily. Most local leaders believed that the majority of workers were anxious to return to work, but were prevented from doing so by labor radicals. In reaction to the alleged influence of socialist and anarchist “agitators,” business and professional elites formed another citizens’ committee.

Membership in this organization swelled as confrontations became commonplace and the sound of gunshots rang through the city. On September 14, Tampa’s attention was galvanized by the news that James F. Easterling, an American bookkeeper employed at Bustillo and Diaz Company, had been seriously wounded. The shot which struck Easterling came from a crowd of Italian and Cuban strikers gathered at the factory.

On October 4, Balbin Brothers’ factory was burned to the ground by arsonists, and the Tribune building narrowly missed the same fate. The next morning, papers decried the “presence in this community of an anarchistic law-defying element who stop at nothing to accomplish their hellish purposes.”

Induced by pledges of protection, thirty-six of Tampa’s largest factories reopened on October 17. Tampa Mayor D. B. McKay recruited several hundred special police from areas surrounding the city to aid the citizens’ committee in keeping order. The new additions were organized into a force of fifty patrol cars, each carrying from three to five heavily armed men, and given the mission of patrolling West Tampa and Ybor City. By providing “absolute protection” to willing workers and intimidating the strike leadership, the patrols hoped to break the strike soon. Arbitrary arrests, illegal searches, routine physical beatings, and flagrant violations of civil rights characterized the actions of the patrols. These excesses were excused as necessary measures by the local citizenry. As the Tribune phrased it, “It will be a mere technicality if any of the actions of the squads of citizen deputies are declared illegal.”

Branded by socialists as the “Cossacks of Tampa” these patrols remained active even after three of the arrested strike leaders were convicted and received sentences of a year on the chain gang. The patrols were particularly vigilant in their efforts to disperse union meetings. On one occasion they entered the Labor Temple in Ybor City, broke up a meeting in progress, smashed furniture, confiscated records, and nailed the door shut with a sign overhead reading, “This place is closed for all time.” When the union newspaper El Internacional continued to print articles critical of the citizens’ committee, a delegation raided its office, destroyed its presses and intimidated employees found on the premises. On December 22, Tampa’s police further attempted to silence the labor press by arresting El Internacional’s editor, J. M. Gil, on two counts of conspiracy to prevent cigar workers from working,

This entire article can be found at: http://digital.lib.usf.edu:8080/…/usfldc:T06-v03n…/DOCUMENT…

Regarding a later strike:

Nov. 26, 1916 TAMPA’S STRIKE IS CALLED OFF

Cigarmakers Accept Compromise by Close Margin on a Referendum Vote.

Occasions Joy Across Bay

Expected Agreement Will Be Signed Up at Once and 5,000 Men Are to Resume Work.

By a vote of 1,384 to 1,266 the striking cigarmakers of Tampa yesterday decided to accept the compromise suggested by Mayor McKay to the joint meeting of strikers and manufacturers recently. The compromise is for an increase of $1 per thousand on all sizes of cigars and 50 cents on cheroots beginning Jan. 1. The sum the strikers asked originally was $3 per thousand. Canvass of the vote was completed at 1 o’clock this morning.

All yesterday cigarmakers in Ybor City voted at the Labor Temple and those in West Tampa at the union headquarters in that city. The West Tampa vote was canvassed first, and was in favor of refusing the offer and continuing with the strike. The vote in West Tampa was 520 to continue the strike and 286 in favor of accepting the compromise. The Ybor City vote swung the balance in the other direction, the vote there being 1,098 in favor of going back to work on the compromise, and 746 in favor of continuing the strike.

Until late into the night it was feared that the cigarmakers had rejected the compromise and Tampans who learned of the way the vote was going feared that the city was in for a long continued strike. Late last night it began to be apparent that the Ybor City vote might overcome West Tampa’s odds in favor of continuing the strike. The announcement that the compromise had been accepted was joyfully received among those who heard it last night.

It is expected that the strikers’ committee will meet with the manufacturers’ committee some time today to sign up an agreement. It is probable that the cigarmakers will return to work Monday. Between 5,000 and 6,000 cigarmakers have been out of employment and their ceasing to be earning and spending factors has made itself somewhat felt on business conditions.

Several articles and photos can be found regarding the Labor Temple and striking workers by going to USF digital archives and doing a simple search for “Labor Temple”. See http://digital.lib.usf.edu/SFS0023905/00001/1x

Coming Soon to TEQUILA’S