http://www.dailybulletin.com/ourpast/ci_3764730

Immigrant labor agitation high in 1905 Inland Valley (San Bernardino County, Calif.)
By Joe Blackstock, Our Past
Article Launched:04/29/2006 12:00:00 AM PDT


Angry residents demand an employer stop hiring foreign workers and taking jobs away from Americans. The employer says he can't find enough laborers to do the work.
Sound familiar?

Actually this describes a couple of incidents in the Inland Valley nearly 101 years ago, demonstrating that the fervor over immigration and foreign labor is hardly anything new.

On the evening of May 13, 1905, a group of 75 to 80 men descended on two citrus ranches in Upland, demanding that growers remove Japanese workers hired to pick fruit.

In one case, the mob backed down, but at a second ranch Japanese workers were actually herded onto a lumber wagon, taken to Pomona and told never to return.

This was a time when agitation against immigrant laborers was high, though then it was mostly targeted at the Japanese and Chinese. Despite that, though, the actions of the 1905 mob shocked many in the community.

The Ontario Record wrote on May 20, 1905, that it ``is by no means the friend of Japanese labor (and would) rather we would see all foreign labor barred out of this country.''

However, the paper said mob action by ``hot headed fools, notoriety seekers, men of low intellect and men who


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have no respect for law and order'' was no way to achieve this.
``Mobs only create public sympathy for those attacked by the mob. Cowards can not win battles.''

In the first incident, the mob marched to the ranch of Joseph Dundas only to find him sitting defiantly in the door of the tent housing the Japanese workers.

Dundas, whose ranch was just south of 10th Street (today's Arrow Highway) near Euclid Avenue, threatened the men if they came forward.

``Tear the tent down,'' he said resolutely to the mob, ``but do so at your peril.''

The crowd threw some rocks and yelled ``vile epithets'' at Dundas, but withdrew into the darkness.

Later at the labor camp on the ranch of H.E. Bartlett at Eighth Street and Mountain Avenue, ``the Asiatics readily acquiesced to the demands made by the mob,'' noted the Record.

``The 28 Japanese ... were taken bag and baggage to (Pomona) and told never to return to this colony.''

A week later, a trial was held on the mob's actions, but ``for some unaccountable reason, Justice miscarried,'' said the newspaper.

Just two members of the mob were charged, and only a boy was found guilty and fined $15.

``The ringleader was not even arrested although he was in the courtroom, stinking of rot gut whiskey when the ... boy was arraigned,'' wrote the Record.

The newspaper obviously held no regard for those in the mob -- ``the dope fiends, the cheap rounders, the hoboes and the riff-raff of the community.'' It noted both Dundas and Bartlett had to bring in Japanese workers from Los Angeles because they couldn't find enough laborers locally.

``The gentlemen offered as high as $2 per day and board, but the hoboes and idlers of the community would not go to work. It was too hot weather, presumably,'' the Record wrote sarcastically.

``The bums and hoboes hereabouts ... will only work at such jobs as picking the flowers of a century plant or some such employment.''


On May 15, Upland celebrates its centennial. We'll have a series of five columns daily beginning May 11 leading up to the 100th birthday.

As an aside: My hometown seems to be taking its 100th birthday with no pomp and little circumstance.

In 1956, the city noted its 50th anniversary with a huge picnic in the park where the personality of the first half century was selected by a vote in the Upland News.

In 1981, on its diamond anniversary, there was a 75th birthday parade and lots of celebration.

This year, there are special banners on light poles in the city, and a few events scattered throughout the year. On the 15th a time capsule ceremony and a Chamber of Commerce mixer are planned.

Centennial coins are being sold at this weekend's Lemon Festival. There's a coloring contest this month, an Upland Idol contest which ends today and next weekend's centennial-themed Upland Heritage Home tour. But there's just not much excitement for a once-in-a-lifetime event.

Happy birthday, Upland.