While trade unions ignored the unskilled itinerants, the Industrial Workers of the World attempted to overcome the problems of their ethnic diversity and migratory habits and to organize them into an effective union. For this reason, the Wobblies were feared and hated by contractors. A vice-president of the giant Canadian Northern Construction Company told the federal government, "We [are] having a lot of trouble with the I.W.W.'s (I might call them the scruff of God's Creation). I think if you will take this matter up, it will stop what is going to be the biggest curse to railroad construction in this western country."
Courtesy: Industrial Worker, April 23,1910, from Joyce Kornbluh ,ed. Rebel Voices
