Biography
Ella Reeve Bloor was the tireless organizer whose career ran from the Socialist Party's founding through decades of communist and labor campaigning. Ella Reeve Bloor was arrested at the Boston death-watch pickets for Sacco and Vanzetti in August 1927, jailed at the Joy Street station, and convicted of "inciting to riot" — one of some 160 pickets convicted in those final days. It was one of dozens of arrests across her half-century of organizing; she remained a beloved figure of the movement into her eighties. (Recorded as Ella Reeve "Mother" Bloor)
The Daily Worker of January 15, 1930, page 2, reports that Mother Bloor witnessed the beating of National Textile Workers Union organizer Elbert Totherow inside the Lumberton courthouse and helped workers save him from being killed. It describes her traveling west under International Labor Defense auspices to support the Imperial Valley agricultural strike, with planned speaking stops across the South and Southwest. The article supports her defense work and eyewitness role; its future itinerary does not establish that every scheduled appearance occurred. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1930/v06-n268-NY-jan-15-1930-DW-LOC.pdf
Daily Worker, September 11, 1925, page 6: A September 9 Buffalo report describes police interrupting her Shelton Square outdoor talk and demanding a religious subject. She continued by using a biblical text before returning to the world labor movement; officers left. The account documents interference without an arrest, and adds no custody period. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1925/1925-ny/v02b-n206-NYE-sep-11-1925-DW-LOC.pdf
Daily Worker, September 10, 1926, page 2, 5: September 9 reports describe her ongoing organization of Passaic textile-strike relief, including securing delegates for the Rochester conference and an announced Buffalo street demonstration. Rochester notices differ on the conference hall; neither supplies a new arrest. Planned later Canadian visits are not treated as completed movements. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1926/1926-nat/v03-n203-NAT-sep-10-1926-DW-RIAZ-op.pdf
In her first-person report published September 12, 1931, Bloor describes the September 5 United Farmers League meeting at Frederick, South Dakota. Farmers’ sons blocked an attempt to break up the meeting with a fire hose, and she continued speaking on mortgage and eviction struggles. This is documented organizing activity without an arrest; the proposed next meeting is not treated as accomplished. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1931/v08-n220-NY-sep-12-1931-DW-LOC.pdf#page=4
Speaking at the April 1934 convention as a seventy-two-year-old veteran organizer, Bloor pressed for women’s leadership in strikes, closer work with farmers and greater organization of young workers. She emphasized that an industrial workers’ movement needed allies among working farmers. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1934/v11-n085-apr-09-1934-DW-LOC.pdf#page=2
Page 4 carries her signed account of the August 4–6 Paris Women’s World Congress Against War and Fascism, describing the American delegation, working women’s organizing and future antiwar activity. This documents her political writing and international organizing, without a new US imprisonment episode. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1934/v11-n204-aug-25-1934-DW-LOC.pdf
Jean Doolittle's February 20, 1935 review of Ann Barton's Mother Bloor pamphlet describes Bloor's Kensington women-weavers organizing, work inspecting rust-spotted meat tins in Chicago after The Jungle, travel among coal camps and wartime antiwar organizing. It identifies her as an early 1919 Communist Party member and a current League Against War and Fascism activist. The review also attributes direct participation in relief work at Calumet and Ludlow to her; these historical-presence claims are preserved as the review's account. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1935/v12-n044-Nat-feb-20-1935-DW-LOC.pdf#page=5
The July 7 birthday article describes Mother Bloor as seventy-two and currently out on bail while appealing a six-month riot sentence arising from the Loup City chicken-pickers’ strike. It also recalls her Boston Sacco-Vanzetti protest imprisonment, already separately recorded. The six-month sentence is not entered as six months actually served, and the article supplies no exact new physical custody endpoint. Daily Worker, July 7, 1934, page 3. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1934/v11-n162-jul-07-1934-DW-LOC.pdf#page=3
A July 13 Chicago banquet announcement describes Mother Bloor as recently released from the Grand Island jail. It corroborates release before the later appearance, without replacing the already recorded June 25 release day or creating another Nebraska imprisonment. Daily Worker, July 14, 1934, page 8. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1934/v11-n168-jul-14-1934-DW-LOC.pdf#page=8
Page 3 discusses the Nebraska Supreme Court appeal heard June 5 concerning the June 14, 1934 Loup City confrontation. It names Bloor, Harry MacDonald, Portius Sell, John Squires, Carl Wicklund and Floyd Booth, and separately confirms Booth’s wife was arrested. The account says the lower-court prosecution shifted from riot to unlawful assembly when evidence showed deputies initiated violence; no new Supreme Court result is reported. It identifies Sell, the wounded son on crutches, separately from his hospitalized father Bert Sell. The newspaper criticizes the Booths’ later political loyalty, but this editorial judgment does not undo the fact of their arrests or create another prosecution. No exact jail term served is inferred from the appeal campaign. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1935/v12-n153-NAT-jun-27-DW-Q.pdf
Page 6 prints Philadelphia Communist Party Unit 107’s five-dollar donation and appeal for her defense. It identifies Mother Bloor as a member of that unit, credits her guidance to younger members, and urges aid for her and fellow defendants. This supplements the established Loup City defense campaign without claiming a new arrest, completed sentence or precise release. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1935/v12-n190-NAT-aug-09-1935-DW-Q.pdf
The prison-defense report places Bloor in Omaha and appeals for payment of defendants’ fines and costs. Its co-defendant list prints Carl Wiklund, John Bails, Horten Sells and Raymond Bloor; the October 7 issue instead names Floyd Booth, Hortens Selles, Carl Wiklund and John Squires. These inconsistent names are preserved as source variants, not new identities or proof that each spelling denotes a separate prisoner. Daily Worker, October 1, 1935, original PDF page 2. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1935/v12-n235-NAT-oct-01-1935-DW-Q.pdf#page=2
In her first-person prison account Bloor says she spent twenty-one days in Douglas County jail and was freed after fines and costs were paid. She describes restrictions on flowers and reading matter. The twenty-one days is documented service in that jail, not the imposed thirty-day penalty or a proven complete total including any earlier local custody. Labor Defender, December 1935, original PDF page 28. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/labordefender/1935/v11n12-dec-1935-orig-LD.pdf#page=28
Labor Defender, June 1934: In her first-person recollection, Bloor says she was arrested twice in Boston on the day of the Sacco-Vanzetti execution: once earlier and again when seven policemen seized her while she spoke from a window to the crowd, charging incitement to riot. She says seven defendants were tried before a Boston jury the following winter and acquitted after a week in court. This explicit later acquittal account is retained alongside the existing biography’s conviction wording; the article does not provide exact intake or discharge days. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/labordefender/1934/v10n06-jun-1934-orig-LD.pdf#page=13
Page 1's June 28 Loup City dispatch reports she collapsed in court the previous afternoon after ten days in Hall County Jail at Grand Island. She had refused to leave until the Booths were released, despite a farmer posting bail for her. She was back in court June 28, facing incitement-to-riot and unlawful-assembly charges with six others after the poultry-workers solidarity demonstration. The reported ten days is a contemporary phase of confinement, not a lifetime total or an exact new admission date. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1934/v11-n155-jun-29-1934-DW-LOC.pdf
Page 2's September 20 Loup City dispatch reports the seven defendants' district-court appeal hearing had begun the previous day, following their June 29 convictions arising from a poultry-strike solidarity meeting. The newspaper lists unlawful assembly, inciting to riot, resisting an officer, disturbing the peace, and assault and battery as the prosecution's charges collectively, without assigning every count to each person. Defense attorneys challenged the jury selection; the appeal result was still pending. It calls Booth's wife Loretta, a contemporary spelling retained here without changing the profile's identity or treating her as a separate person. This article dates the initial meeting June 13, differing from other accounts' June 14; no existing exact date is overwritten. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1934/v11-n227-sep-21-1934-DW-LOC.pdf
Page 7 announces her participation in a December 21 Labor Temple meeting about Southern repression, describing her as recently released from a Nebraska prison following farm-labor organizing. This is a retrospective release corroboration for the established Nebraska case; no new imprisonment or exact release day is inferred. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1935/v12-n306-NY-dec-20-DW-Q.pdf
In a letter written on her tenth day in Grand Island jail, reprinted July 3, 1934, Bloor describes sharing an attic room with the wife of a Black unemployed-youth organizer held downstairs. She recalls creamery workers describing wages below board costs, a mob attacking the Loup City solidarity meeting with pipes, brass knuckles and blackjacks, and officials at her arraignment condemning the farmers’ demand to cancel farm debts. The editorial introduction reports her release on bail by press time. The tenth-day letter is a custody-to-date observation, not a completed ten-day total; no exact admission or release day is inferred and the existing Nebraska case is retained. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/new-masses/1934/v12n01-jul-03-1934-NM.pdf#page=66
Page 4's Mother Bloor biography identifies Ella Reeve Bloor, recalls her seventy-first birthday celebration in July 1933 and a forty-year labor career beginning with textile-worker organizing in 1893. It says she was frequently arrested and that her children were occasionally jailed with her, without naming those children or dating individual episodes. It describes Socialist and antiwar work, founding Communist activity, research for Upton Sinclair and later farm organizing. These general statements do not supply precise jail terms or separate dated cases. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1934/v11-n039-feb-14-1934-DW-LOC.pdf
Pages 1–2 report Bloor and Philadelphia Tribune editor William Jones leading a December 6 City Hall delegation protesting William Heaterly's police killing and Sam's detention and demanding an anti-eviction ordinance. Police clubbed the delegation and arrested six unnamed workers; the article explicitly says workers prevented Bloor's arrest. This is actual political police violence, without a new Bloor jail episode or invented names for the six. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1934/v11-n292-Nat-dec-07-DW-LOC.pdf
PDF page 3 reports Bloor and five other Nebraska farm leaders sentenced to thirty days and $100 fines for assisting creamery strikers in 1934. The unnamed five are not assigned identities. This corroborates the existing organizing prosecution without proving the entire term was served. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/labordefender/1935/v11n01-jan-1935-orig-LD.pdf
The June 30 Grand Island dispatch in the July 9 Western Worker says Bloor was73 and had been sentenced the previous day to ninety days and100 dollars for speaking at a Loup City striking chicken-pickers demonstration with five other leaders receiving lesser sentences. June 29 is a sentencing date derived directly from the dated dispatch; ninety days is not a completed service total. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/westernworker/1934/v3-n27-31-jul-1934.pdf#page=5
Rowley cites a June 16, 1934 warrant and June 26 court appearance, not proof of a June 14 physical arrest. He reports initial county punishment of 90 days and $100, September district-court revision to 30 days and $100, February 1935 Supreme Court rejection, and actual 30-day service in the Omaha city jail women’s section. July 8, 1934 public speaking while free on appeal bond is documented. Existing dated custody remains independently sourced. Pages 28-36. Source: https://history.nebraska.gov/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/doc_publications_NH1966LoupCity.pdf
Separate Nebraska imprisonment documented in 1935
A contemporary October 1, 1935 report says Ella Reeve Bloor had been taken to the county jail in Omaha, Nebraska. It quotes her first letter from that jail, describing a visit to four co-defendants at Loup City before she surrendered. The named farmers were Carl Wiklund, John Squires, Portens Sells (as printed), and Floyd Booth; the report says they were confined in a small Loup City cell. This is a separate episode from Bloor's 1927 Boston detention. The article supplies no exact surrender day, physical release day or actual completed duration. Its appeal for release and payment of fines and costs is not evidence that release had already occurred.
Daily Worker, October 1, 1935, original PDF page 2, Mother Bloor's Release To Be Asked of Governor.
Nebraska surrender and jail transfer
A September 29 Omaha report says Ella Reeve Bloor was confined in Douglas County jail after being transferred from Grand Island one day after surrender there. It also says she left New York on September 23 to serve the Nebraska sentence. A separate September 30 feature describes her speaking at a Nebraska station the previous Thursday while on her way to surrender. Together these establish the September 1935 episode and a transfer between jails, not an exact surrender day or release. Thursday, September 26 is the station appearance, not an independently confirmed jail-admission date. This episode must remain separate from the 1927 Boston case.
The feature prints co-defendant Portens Sells as age 21, son of the farmer injured at the meeting, and names Carl Wiklund and John Squires. Portens is not automatically identified as the existing Bert Sells. Thirty days plus a possible hundred days for unpaid fine are sentencing terms, not demonstrated completed custody.
Daily Worker, September 30, 1935, original PDF pages 3 and 5.
Separate 1935 custody case and date precision
The Nebraska sentence-service episode is recorded separately from the 1927 Boston case. September 1935 is the supported admission month, not a September 1 admission day: the September 29 report says Bloor left New York on September 23 to serve the sentence; the feature describes her speaking at a Nebraska station the previous Thursday while still on her way to surrender. By the September 29 report she had surrendered at Grand Island and been transferred to Douglas County jail a day later. These before-and-after statements bound the start within September rather than merely observing her in jail that month. The exact surrender day, release date and actual completed duration remain unknown. No continuous present custody or completed thirty-day term is inferred.
A June 26, 1934 Loup City dispatch, printed in the following day’s Daily Worker, reported that Mother Bloor had left jail on bond the previous night, June 25. She had refused to leave until Floyd and Loretta Booth were released. This is a separate custody episode from her later 1935 sentence; the report does not supply her original arrest or jail-admission day.
Daily Worker, September 11, 1925; relevant page stated in the accompanying profile note.
Daily Worker, September 10, 1926; relevant page stated in the accompanying profile note.
Daily Worker, August 25, 1934; relevant page stated in the accompanying profile note.
In her signed October 17, 1934 Daily Worker article, Ella Reeve Bloor recounts the Loup City creamery-strike solidarity meeting in June, the beating of farmer Bert Sell, jailing of herself, Black unemployed organizer Floyd Booth and his wife, and rifle attacks on Booth's home. She reports a district-court appeal conviction for inciting to riot, thirty days and a $100 fine each for herself and Booth, the release of Booth's wife, and reduction of appeal bail to $300 after notice of appeal to the state Supreme Court. These are imposed penalties and appeal arrangements, not verified completed service or an exact release for Bloor or Booth. The account is explicitly Bloor's and political/violence allegations remain attributed.
Daily Worker, June 27, 1935; relevant page stated in the accompanying profile note.
Page 3 announces a California campaign tour for September 4–13 in support of Browder and Ford, including Los Angeles, San Diego, San Bernardino, Fresno, Oakland, San Francisco and Sacramento. These are prospective speaking engagements, not evidence that the tour had already occurred or a new custody event.
The March 26 Detroit dispatch reports Judge White granting the prosecution’s request to revive the 1922 Bridgman criminal-syndicalism prosecution and set aside a previous separate-trials order. The ILD statement individually names Foster, Browder, Bedacht, William F. Dunne, Bloor, Minor and Rose Pastor Stokes among the indicted leaders. The suggested ten-year exposure is prospective, not a sentence imposed in 1931. The report supplies no new physical arrest, completed trial outcome or complete custody total.
Daily Worker, August 9, 1935; relevant page stated in the accompanying profile note.
Daily Worker, June 29, 1934; relevant page stated in the accompanying profile note.
Daily Worker, September 21, 1934; relevant page stated in the accompanying profile note.
Daily Worker, December 20, 1935; relevant page stated in the accompanying profile note.
Daily Worker, February 14, 1934; relevant page stated in the accompanying profile note.
Daily Worker, December 7, 1934; relevant page stated in the accompanying profile note.
Labor Defender, January 1935; relevant page stated in the accompanying profile note.
Named among the ten Communist defendants who surrendered at St. Joseph, Michigan, in the 1922 Bridgman convention prosecution. A companion report says four had furnished bail and the remaining six were temporarily free on recognizance, without identifying which individual had which status. No individual continuous jail interval, conviction or sentence is inferred.
