Biography
Meldon was an organizer for the Metal Workers Industrial League during the May 1931 strike at Empire Steel in Mansfield, Ohio. The Daily Worker of May 18, 1931, page 1, reports that local authorities, police, American Legion members and AFL agents kidnapped Meldon and Cush and drove them in automobiles to the adjoining county. This was coercive removal during their organizing activity, not a documented judicial conviction or prison term. The source supplies surnames only, with no exact seizure day or duration.
George E. Powers’s page 4 strike account prints Pat Cush and John Meldon as Metal Workers Industrial League organizers seized by local anti-strike forces, taken before Mayor Moore, then driven out of Mansfield and threatened with violence if they returned. Nearby railway workers reportedly prevented a further attack. The coercive removal belongs to the May 1931 strike, not an imposed prison sentence; no complete detention duration is given.
