The history of the Union Miners Cemetery is told in historian John Keiser’s article “A Spirit-Thread of Labor History. The Union Miners Cemetery at Mt. Olive, IL” (Journal of the Illinois State Historical Society, Autumn 1969). Indeed, one can walk among the graves and note the number of them that make reference to union membership. Here we refer to the three memorials honoring heroes of the coal mining labor movement: the memorial honoring martyrs of the Battle of Virden; the General Alexander Bradley gravesite memorial; the Mother Jones Monument.

(1) The Virden Massacre memorial marker (below). An interesting article is available: CLICK.

(2) Near the Virden Massacre Memorial is the tombstone of General Alexander Bradley, the great leader in the Battle of Virden and unionization of the Illinois coalfields.

(3) The monument to Mother Jones was sponsored by the Progressive Miners of America. It was inaugurated in 1936 with great fanfare. The final gravesite of Mother Jones (foreground) is at its base.