Did you know that in Utah socialists have held public office? This is just one of the juicy tidbits that history professor and historian John McCormick Ph.D., shared in his fascinating presentation at the March meeting of Humanists of Utah.

History is not only a study of the past; McCormick began, but is a selective history since not everything can be included. War, diplomacy, politics, and stories of great people, that usually means men, usually white men, are the exclusive subjects.

A fun way to illustrate how narrow history is to ask students to list who they remember from their history classes. Typically the list is 90% male, mostly white, many of them presidents, generals, and inventors. Few women and non-whites are mentioned.

So McCormick has worked toward being more inclusive and expansive in his teaching and writing, particularly in showing how history is about many peoples, ideas, experiences, and cultural traditions.

Thus in looking at any event in history, he will explore a range of individuals and groups that might have been involved and affected an event. A group usually left out that McCormick has learned to appreciate centers on the ordinary person in everyday life--history isn't limited only to influential, great, and important people. For instance, what was the experience of women in the Civil War? What was the experience of an ordinary soldier or person at the battlefront or home front?

McCormick recounted a lecture he gave earlier that day. Given the current economic downturn, the subject chosen for him was the Great Depression. How did the Depression affect ordinary people in their everyday lives?

Nationwide the unemployment rate was about 25%. Utah had an average 26%, but in 1933, it soared to 36%. In1940, ten years into the Depression, Utah still had 18%. There was widespread, growing unemployment and underemployment with lost homes and apartments.

Showing how the Depression affected ordinary people, McCormick shared the story of his family. In 1930, his grandfather at age 46 lost his job, never again to obtain a full-time, permanent job. He died thirteen years later.

Born and raised on a farm near Price, his mother, youngest of seven children and the first of her siblings to graduate from high school entered the University of Utah in 1929 intending to be a teacher. A month later, the stock market crashed, and she managed to stay at school for the rest of the year, but was financially unable to complete her degree. So she returned to Price where at least there was food and a place to live rent-free. That is, until her parents lost the farm because they couldn't pay the mortgage.

What was the impact of these circumstances for McCormick's parents? They delayed getting married until eight years after they'd met, which meant fewer children--only two--his sister and himself: money and age the determinants. Wanting security, his father stayed in a job he hated. Since it didn't pay well, his mother who had wanted to stay home and raise her family had to work. These events exacerbated the challenges in their marriage.

Noteworthy from the Depression is that our government under Roosevelt changed in unprecedented ways that remains to this day.

In addition to exploring how ordinary people affect history, McCormick also explores the radical tradition, radical people, radical movements. After all, this country originated from an act of revolution.

McCormick defines radicalism as a fundamental restructuring or changes in the way society is arranged or organized--not mere adjustments. He is particularly interested in radical changes that involve inclusion rather than exclusion: inclusion expands rights and opportunities. E.g. Ku Klux Klan is a radical group, and is interested in fundamental changes, but they restrict opportunities and rights.

Here McCormick referred to a relevant book: The Radical Reader: A Documentary History Of The American Radical Tradition. It is a collection of 155 primary sources of those people who changed history through what then was considered radical. It includes notables like Jefferson, Paine, Thoreau, Friedan, Ginsberg, Carson, etc.

Referring back to Utah's 36% unemployment, McCormick related an incident of radicalism--possibly Salt Lake City's first protest--how ordinary people in everyday life reacted.

In February 1933, a number of houses and farms were o be auctioned off at Salt Lake City and County Building. A group of 200-300 Salt Lake City citizens disrupted the auction, saying that people shouldn't lose their homes through no fault of their own (sound familiar?). They refused to allow this sale to go on. In desperation, the sheriff called the Fire Department, which turned hoses onto the group, flooding the basement of the County Building; police turned tear gas onto the crowd. Fifteen were actually convicted of unlawful behavior and served time in jail. After the crowd dispersed, most of them reassembled and marched up State Street to the Capitol where the State Legislature was in session. There they held a rally with signs e.g. organizers starve, we want milk for our children, moratorium on mortgages.

What was going on here? McCormick wondered. Why and how is it that in Salt Lake City where the majority is conservative that such an event took place?

Interestingly McCormick discovered that a communist candidate in Utah got 15% of votes who ran 4th out of 7--another radical act.

He also discovered that in 1911, Murray City voted in a Socialist mayor and city council, and re-elected them in 1913 so that for four years, Murray had a Socialist administration. What happened here, he wondered. How could that have happened?

Of course, he knew that during this period, the US had its only significant socialist movement, which was a viable part of American history. Between 1900 and 1912, two Socialists were elected to Congress, there were over 1500 Socialist mayors and city commissioners, they had a significant presence in the labor movement, and there were 300-400 socialist publications then, one with a circulation of 750,000.

With further study, McCormick discovered that between 1900 and 1923, Utah had over 100 Socialists in public office with Eureka electing the most: 35. For three years, the Utah State Federation of Labor officially endorsed the Socialist Party.

McCormick said he finds these historical events extremely interesting, partly because some of it is relatively unknown, but more importantly, history of this type is critical because of its potential to fundamentally change our way of thinking about the past, since the way we think about our past affects the way we think about the present and about the future. There is not just one way to think about our past.

Concluding with a quote from one of his books, The Gathering Place: an Illustrated History Of Salt Lake City, he asserted that we need to look at the study of history in a new way because the old way is inadequate. Rather than exclusionary and narrow as it has been, we need to move toward a history that is more inclusive, more expansive, more accurately taking into account the diverse society that Utah really is and has been. We need to resist rather than uphold monolithic, one-dimensional, stereotypical representation. A new way of looking at our past could help us overcome longstanding, narrow, restrictive, crippling definitions of ourselves and of our society.

--Sarah Smith