Boomer Rebellion Postscript

We haven’t been able to find the names of most of the Boomer Rebellion leaders, much less those of the four hundred reported participants.  Most of the striking miners were from the Calabria region of Italy–the toe of the boot for all of us non Italians.

We do know that eleven year old Sam Yockaway (also spelled Yackaway Yachaway or Iaquinta) was among the group of thirteen to fifteen that were arrested as leaders.  James (Giacomo) Diana is also a known Italian miner in Boomer from the time period, and an Italian miner named Giacomo was identified as a militant labor leader in Boomer during the Paint and Cabin Creek War a few years later.  There isn’t any particular indication that two references to a Boomer miner named Giacomo are the same person, but in picking names for the story–we chose names of people we know were in the area and involved in miner militancy.   

We could have started this portion of the story with the 1902 strikes & massacres or perhaps the Morewood PA massacre of 1891, as they are precursors to this struggle as well, but we have to pick a narrative starting point somewhere or we’ll end up starting with something like ‘In the beginning was the Word’.  The 1909 strikes are arguably more directly tied to subsequent struggles–so that’s what we went with.

On the upside, there’s always more history to learn!

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