A paraphrased quote from Dave Simmons, leader of the strike, from his rally speech. “ 10% girls, beggars, physically disabled, old women, black people, and such “
Paraphrased due to ableist and racist language, full Quote here
My sincerest apologies, but I apparently can’t do fractions. The quote is “one-fifth” and that is twenty percent, not ten percent. That still would not affect the roughly 3-5% number that I stated again. -mod Syd
This is not a headcanon, and may be considered a controversial idea, but rather than looking at a piece of fictionalized media as a factual reference source, we as a fandom need to separate the source material (aka the strike) from the fictionalized media (the movie and stage production). If you would like to include more women in your fanfiction or productions, you do you, go right ahead, but don’t claim historic accuracy. If you are looking to romanticize the poverty and hardship the boys went through by reducing them all down to children, this blog is not going to give you the basis for that.
When wanting women and girls to be included among the historic newsboy strike or among fandom spaces, we need to acknowledge that our labor laws we have today in the US were created based on the abuse and the deaths of millions of lower class, primarily immigrant women who worked in factories and sweatshops. Women were the ones to effect change in strikes, to hold the picket lines, to bring attention to the injustices that were faced.
Just one example, the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory tragedy, of the 146 deaths, 123 of those were women. They were literally locked inside a burning building, and forced to jump out of a 12-14 story building or be suffocated or burned to death. This history is horrifying. It makes my stomach hurt just to think about it, because at the end of the day, realistically, many of us on this website would have historically been there, working 14-18 hour days for pennies.
As for divorcing the source material from the show or movie, the newsboys lost their strike. No matter what the musical may say. They only got one of their demands, and at the end of the day, it took adults to make the changes. This is a much more depressive view of the events than the musical portrays. When studying history, it is important to keep in mind that even if you do not like how something turned out, you can not deny it. You can not change something just because it does not fit how you would like it.
The newsboys should not be romanticized. Hundreds, close to a thousand, of CHILDREN, CHILDREN died each year as newsboys. And that is not counting those that fell sick or were injured in other jobs. Boys living in the lodging houses who passed were placed into blank pine boxes, without their names attached, without anyone there to mourn them and their small pine boxes were stacked in wagons just high enough to not tip on their way to mass burials. Here is the source for those of you who want to read, unfortunately, it’s behind a paywall that I get access to through my work. https://www.jstor.org/stable/3790564?seq=1
This stuff is depressing as F&%#. And I’m sorry for this long post but it needed to be said. Though Newsies is a musical, it is not a Disney-perfect story.
A paraphrased quote from Dave Simmons, leader of the strike, from his rally speech. “ 10% girls, beggars, physically disabled, old women, black people, and such “
Paraphrased due to ableist and racist language, full Quote here
Mr. Jacobs Job: $12.00 Weekly Mrs. Jacobs Laundry: $3.50 Weekly Sarah’s Lace Making: $0.50 Weekly Davey Attending School Les Attending School
Yearly family budget: ~$800 a year
Rent would be about $10-$13 a month => $120-$156 a year Yearly cost for food about $320 Davey Schooling if private school $75 a semester (most likely helped with philanthropic efforts) $150 a year [I found lists of private secondary schools and averaged the lower price ones together]
Between Food, Housing, and Davey’s schooling alone, the Jacobs after a year would have to spend a minimum of $600 on necessities I have not included other necessities like fuel such as coal, or oil for lighting. That would leave $16 a month for anything that was not a bare necessity, any new clothes, possible healthcare needs, donations for their shul or other charitable organizations, extra sugar for a baked treat, money enough to take a trolley rather than walking, etc.
The Bureau of Labor listed a yearly budget of $718 in 1908 for a family of five that were mill workers as having a “fair” Living condition. NYC even back in the late 1800s had higher prices for almost everything, so I would equate the Jacobs’ living situation to be fair.
It is also understandable why the Jacobs were so panicked when Mr. Jacobs was unable to work. His rather large economic contribution to the family kept them in a comfortable position.
I hope this provided some good and useful information! And as always, if you have any questions, feel free to ask!
Santa Fe Dance Break (1992) for jlinternational (who has me blocked, so if someone could let them know I filled their prompt that would be great) for the anniversary @newsiesgiftexchange:-)
Also btw I’m not bashing on anyone’s newsies farm AU it is just that livesies jack is DEFINITELY a farmer as they took away him being a cowboy so what else is there in Santa Fe?? Farmers. Livesies jack kelly is a farmer.
An improvised musical on Broadway (my friends are working on making this happen, IDK if FLS counts because I never got to see it and I don’t know if they do a full narrative)
Spamalot revival with Bonnie Milligan as Lady of the Lake
Legally Blonde revival with Stephanie Styles and Dan DeLuca
Jacob Kemp as a lead in literally anything except the things he’s too white for (I’d even see his Evan Hansen although he’s 33 and a half)
Waitress revived AGAIN. Jenna Ushkowitz back as Dawn (after she has her baby). Kevin McHale as Ogie. Amber Riley as Becky. Ben Fankhauser as Pomatter. Ally Bonino as Jenna.
Fun Home revival but the small Alisons are the medium Alisons this time
Hairspray 2: Tracy’s In Her Mid Thirties And Can’t Dance Anymore Because She Fucked Up Her Achilles But Still Fights Racism
Brandon Uranowitz as Seymour in Little Shop
A “10 Things I Hate About You” with SJB as the guidance counselor
Andrew Garfield was asked recently what his favorite movie musicals were, and there was someone in the comments in the tweet about it dragging him for not including Newsies “like he wouldn’t have been a perfect Davey” and, like, the Daveys we had were pretty perfect but if we have these photos from Doctor Who to go by, the person who tweeted that comment was not wrong.
lmao i know all i talk about is mexican jack kelly but jack would be one of those annoying bitches to sing the whole mariachi de las mañanitas on birthdays instead of the shortened version
MY GRANDMA DOSE THIS SHIT AND ITS AO BAD
Jack would be the tío when saying grace has to bless everyone by name
