Ralph was the manager and part owner of his father's hop ranch in 1913, when the IWW (Industrial Workers of the World) rioted on a blistering hot Sunday in August. The Durst Ranch was chosen as the site of the labor strike leading to the riot because it employed the largest number of migrant farm workers in California, not just because its abysmal treatment of the workers was particularly unusual.
The Durst Brothers had advertised for twice a many workers as needed to harvest their hops. The four hop drying kilns on the ranch could not care for the picking of more than 1500 pickers, so that half of the campers hung around the camp or the offices waiting for field tickets. Two dry years meant that wells that the workers used were pumped dry by dawn, and the workers including women and children were not provided water in the fields.
A grievance committee was formed and 300 to 400 pickers marched half a mile to the Durst Ranch headquarters. When Ralph Durst came out of his office and the grievance was read to him, he asked for an hour to think it over. After thinking it over, Ralph Durst agreed to provide fresh ice water in the fields three times a day, sanitary toilets, and garbage collection, and to rehire the athletic men to resume performing their previous specialized tasks. However, he refused to raise the workers' pay...... When leader Richard 'Blackie' Ford replied that in that case, the workers would strike, Ralph Durst slapped him across the face with a heavy work glove and ordered him and the other marchers off his property. When they refused to leave Ralph went to the Wheatland Police Dept, and the office of his attorney, who was also the district attorney of Yuba County. When Ralph returned to his ranch, he was accompanied by the Yuba County Sheriff and four constables, three of whom were deputized just before they drove to the ranch. *
It became known as "Bloody Sunday" the end of a clash between a powerful Yuba County family and radical labor organizers that left the District Attorney, a deputy sheriff and two other men dead.**
* Yuba Sutter Wiki http://yubasutter.wikispot.org/Ralph_Haines_Durst
** Blood on the hops http://www.plumaslakelife.com/articles/sunday-85087-marysville-became-blood.html
From Find A Grave contributor, Valerie Vine:
In the October 14, 1905 edition of the San Francisco Call the headline read in large letters: DREAM OF LOVE SUDDENLY ENDS - Married 4 months - Wealthy Yuba County Pair Whose Wedding a Brilliant Affair Divorced. Ralph Haines Durst and Vivian Roddan had married four months earlier in an elaborate wedding. It appeared they had everything, a beautiful home, automobile, and plans for a European vacation, but it all abruptly ended after 4 months.
A photo of the "Durst Brothers" is incorrectly identified in the book "The Wheatland Hop Riot" and the article in the Sacramento Bee, Tuesday July 30, 2013, D1. The photograph is of Ralph's father and his brothers. The Wheatland Historical Society and The Sacramento Bee have been notified. I am hoping for a correction in the online version of the Bee article. A photograph taken at the same time can be seen on Naomi Brandham Durst's memorial.
The Durst Brothers had advertised for twice a many workers as needed to harvest their hops. The four hop drying kilns on the ranch could not care for the picking of more than 1500 pickers, so that half of the campers hung around the camp or the offices waiting for field tickets. Two dry years meant that wells that the workers used were pumped dry by dawn, and the workers including women and children were not provided water in the fields.
A grievance committee was formed and 300 to 400 pickers marched half a mile to the Durst Ranch headquarters. When Ralph Durst came out of his office and the grievance was read to him, he asked for an hour to think it over. After thinking it over, Ralph Durst agreed to provide fresh ice water in the fields three times a day, sanitary toilets, and garbage collection, and to rehire the athletic men to resume performing their previous specialized tasks. However, he refused to raise the workers' pay...... When leader Richard 'Blackie' Ford replied that in that case, the workers would strike, Ralph Durst slapped him across the face with a heavy work glove and ordered him and the other marchers off his property. When they refused to leave Ralph went to the Wheatland Police Dept, and the office of his attorney, who was also the district attorney of Yuba County. When Ralph returned to his ranch, he was accompanied by the Yuba County Sheriff and four constables, three of whom were deputized just before they drove to the ranch. *
It became known as "Bloody Sunday" the end of a clash between a powerful Yuba County family and radical labor organizers that left the District Attorney, a deputy sheriff and two other men dead.**
* Yuba Sutter Wiki http://yubasutter.wikispot.org/Ralph_Haines_Durst
** Blood on the hops http://www.plumaslakelife.com/articles/sunday-85087-marysville-became-blood.html
From Find A Grave contributor, Valerie Vine:
In the October 14, 1905 edition of the San Francisco Call the headline read in large letters: DREAM OF LOVE SUDDENLY ENDS - Married 4 months - Wealthy Yuba County Pair Whose Wedding a Brilliant Affair Divorced. Ralph Haines Durst and Vivian Roddan had married four months earlier in an elaborate wedding. It appeared they had everything, a beautiful home, automobile, and plans for a European vacation, but it all abruptly ended after 4 months.
A photo of the "Durst Brothers" is incorrectly identified in the book "The Wheatland Hop Riot" and the article in the Sacramento Bee, Tuesday July 30, 2013, D1. The photograph is of Ralph's father and his brothers. The Wheatland Historical Society and The Sacramento Bee have been notified. I am hoping for a correction in the online version of the Bee article. A photograph taken at the same time can be seen on Naomi Brandham Durst's memorial.
Ralph was the manager and part owner of his father's hop ranch in 1913, when the IWW (Industrial Workers of the World) rioted on a blistering hot Sunday in August. The Durst Ranch was chosen as the site of the labor strike leading to the riot because it employed the largest number of migrant farm workers in California, not just because its abysmal treatment of the workers was particularly unusual.
The Durst Brothers had advertised for twice a many workers as needed to harvest their hops. The four hop drying kilns on the ranch could not care for the picking of more than 1500 pickers, so that half of the campers hung around the camp or the offices waiting for field tickets. Two dry years meant that wells that the workers used were pumped dry by dawn, and the workers including women and children were not provided water in the fields.
A grievance committee was formed and 300 to 400 pickers marched half a mile to the Durst Ranch headquarters. When Ralph Durst came out of his office and the grievance was read to him, he asked for an hour to think it over. After thinking it over, Ralph Durst agreed to provide fresh ice water in the fields three times a day, sanitary toilets, and garbage collection, and to rehire the athletic men to resume performing their previous specialized tasks. However, he refused to raise the workers' pay...... When leader Richard 'Blackie' Ford replied that in that case, the workers would strike, Ralph Durst slapped him across the face with a heavy work glove and ordered him and the other marchers off his property. When they refused to leave Ralph went to the Wheatland Police Dept, and the office of his attorney, who was also the district attorney of Yuba County. When Ralph returned to his ranch, he was accompanied by the Yuba County Sheriff and four constables, three of whom were deputized just before they drove to the ranch. *
It became known as "Bloody Sunday" the end of a clash between a powerful Yuba County family and radical labor organizers that left the District Attorney, a deputy sheriff and two other men dead.**
* Yuba Sutter Wiki http://yubasutter.wikispot.org/Ralph_Haines_Durst
** Blood on the hops http://www.plumaslakelife.com/articles/sunday-85087-marysville-became-blood.html
From Find A Grave contributor, Valerie Vine:
In the October 14, 1905 edition of the San Francisco Call the headline read in large letters: DREAM OF LOVE SUDDENLY ENDS - Married 4 months - Wealthy Yuba County Pair Whose Wedding a Brilliant Affair Divorced. Ralph Haines Durst and Vivian Roddan had married four months earlier in an elaborate wedding. It appeared they had everything, a beautiful home, automobile, and plans for a European vacation, but it all abruptly ended after 4 months.
A photo of the "Durst Brothers" is incorrectly identified in the book "The Wheatland Hop Riot" and the article in the Sacramento Bee, Tuesday July 30, 2013, D1. The photograph is of Ralph's father and his brothers. The Wheatland Historical Society and The Sacramento Bee have been notified. I am hoping for a correction in the online version of the Bee article. A photograph taken at the same time can be seen on Naomi Brandham Durst's memorial.
The Durst Brothers had advertised for twice a many workers as needed to harvest their hops. The four hop drying kilns on the ranch could not care for the picking of more than 1500 pickers, so that half of the campers hung around the camp or the offices waiting for field tickets. Two dry years meant that wells that the workers used were pumped dry by dawn, and the workers including women and children were not provided water in the fields.
A grievance committee was formed and 300 to 400 pickers marched half a mile to the Durst Ranch headquarters. When Ralph Durst came out of his office and the grievance was read to him, he asked for an hour to think it over. After thinking it over, Ralph Durst agreed to provide fresh ice water in the fields three times a day, sanitary toilets, and garbage collection, and to rehire the athletic men to resume performing their previous specialized tasks. However, he refused to raise the workers' pay...... When leader Richard 'Blackie' Ford replied that in that case, the workers would strike, Ralph Durst slapped him across the face with a heavy work glove and ordered him and the other marchers off his property. When they refused to leave Ralph went to the Wheatland Police Dept, and the office of his attorney, who was also the district attorney of Yuba County. When Ralph returned to his ranch, he was accompanied by the Yuba County Sheriff and four constables, three of whom were deputized just before they drove to the ranch. *
It became known as "Bloody Sunday" the end of a clash between a powerful Yuba County family and radical labor organizers that left the District Attorney, a deputy sheriff and two other men dead.**
* Yuba Sutter Wiki http://yubasutter.wikispot.org/Ralph_Haines_Durst
** Blood on the hops http://www.plumaslakelife.com/articles/sunday-85087-marysville-became-blood.html
From Find A Grave contributor, Valerie Vine:
In the October 14, 1905 edition of the San Francisco Call the headline read in large letters: DREAM OF LOVE SUDDENLY ENDS - Married 4 months - Wealthy Yuba County Pair Whose Wedding a Brilliant Affair Divorced. Ralph Haines Durst and Vivian Roddan had married four months earlier in an elaborate wedding. It appeared they had everything, a beautiful home, automobile, and plans for a European vacation, but it all abruptly ended after 4 months.
A photo of the "Durst Brothers" is incorrectly identified in the book "The Wheatland Hop Riot" and the article in the Sacramento Bee, Tuesday July 30, 2013, D1. The photograph is of Ralph's father and his brothers. The Wheatland Historical Society and The Sacramento Bee have been notified. I am hoping for a correction in the online version of the Bee article. A photograph taken at the same time can be seen on Naomi Brandham Durst's memorial.
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