Part 2

In spite of language barriers, of course, the Croatians were well aware of the growing bitterness among union leaders, who were angered because immigrant stone workers had been hired for an increasing number of town building projects. On April 24, 1902, in the columns of the Lewistown Democrat, four union business agents, J. W. Hughes, J. H. Bailey, John McGinn and A. H. Van Iderstein, gave vent to their feelings.

"The laboring man of Lewistown only asks a fair show in this his own country," the statement read. "We, the members of the Lewistown Labor Union, spend our money freely among the business men of this city, but if the latter have any work to do they lose no time if ferreting out some new arrival from the European continent….Does the businessman gain more from the Austrian colony of Lewistown than from the Union Laborer? If so we would advise the business man of the city to stay with the Austrians."

A year later, the "Austrians" were caught up in a full-blown strike. On April 18, 1903, Fergus County voters had approved a bond issue for a free public high school, and on June 20 the commissioners awarded the building contract to T. J. Tubb for $28,070.00. It was not long before trouble began, and within several weeks, as the Argus reported on September 2, "for the first time in her history Lewistown is experiencing the rather unpleasant novelty of a genuine strike."

Local labor union leaders had been grumbling for some time because they contended that Tubb was hiring workers regardless of union status. On August 27 they decided that only a strike at the high school project could force the contractor to alter his policies. The union’s specific complaint was that Tubb hired non-union carpenters, but to dramatize their protest they called for a general strike. The Croatians were union members who resisted walking off the job, but feared violence if they ignored the union demand.

Pete Tuss, in fact, filed an affidavit charging that certain union agitators had threatened him, and told a reporter for the Argus that when the crowd came up he and his men were told to quite work and walk off the job or they would all be "strung up".

Since none of the local union men could speak Croatian, they brought an interpreter, J. J. Sladich, from Anaconda to help persuade Tuss and his men to walk out. Fearfully, the Croatians laid down their chisels, but the Argus and the Lewistown Democrat made it plain to all that they had struck against their will. Both newspapers and a majority of the business community, indeed, defended Tubb and his stonemasons. Said an Argus editorial: "Better that our high school building should never be erected and that all building operations suspect for the season than yield to force and intimidation."

Major L. W. Eldridge, realizing that the school might not be built if the Croatians were kept from the job, authorized Phil Laux, who was a close friend of Pete Tuss, to stand guard at the building site to protect workmen who elected to return to their jobs. The businessmen supported Major Eldridge by hurriedly organizing the "Citizens’ Alliance of Lewistown, led by Edward Brassey and R. von Tobel, which pledged itself to protect workingmen from strikes, lockouts, and boycotts.

What had happened was unfortunate for the Croatians, but they were not ignorant of their position. It was all too clear, when T. J. Tubb went east during the strike and returned with several stonemasons, that if the Croatians expected to work, they would have to brave the consequences and rely upon the businessmen’s support. By early October, stonemasons and other workers had returned to their jobs despite a union-organized boycott of the majority of Lewistown businesses. The union itself split on the issue, the conservatives looking for compromise and the radicals standing firm. The Argus and the Democrat called the strike leaders "socialistic and anarchistic." But the truth is that the union was beaten by the business community, not by their own divisiveness.

Once the walk-out developed, J. W. Hughes, a conservative union member, and himself a competent stonemason, criticized the role of the Croatians again, when he warned the strike leaders in the October 16 issue of the Democrat: "You had better send to Anaconda again and get another buffaloer to talk to the boys and start them [the Croatians] for South Africa if they don’t stop working on the school house. As long as they had the Austrian stonemasons buffaloed and fighting their battles for them it was all right, but the boys are onto them."

Although Hughes incorrectly charged the stonemasons with collusion with the strikers, it is clear that the Croatians were in the middle of the dispute, while both businessmen and strikers seemed to be maneuvering them about like pawns. In the end, however, it was their skill, not their politics, which made the immigrant stonemasons important to their adopted town.

The strike over, the stonemasons went back to work, and in 1905, when a traditional gift from Andrew Carnegie made possible a public library for the town, their skills were once more utilized by T. J> Tubb, the contractor who had been in the center of the labor storm. A moving force behind procuring the $10,000.00 Carnegie grant was Frank E. Smith, a local attorney who had long deplored the "great dearth of books" in the vicinity. In a letter he wrote in 1938 to Oscar O. Mueller, well known Lewistown lawyer and historian, Smith recalled that although the city advertised for bids, Tubb said he wanted to build the Carnegie Library so much that he underbid all competitors. Again hiring Croatian stonemasons, Tubb added "detail after detail" at his owns expense and lost money through the project. When Smith suggested that the contractor deserved more payment, Tubb replied, "I built that building according to what I thought was best and I will not accept one cent more than the contract price."

Founded as an organization of working stonemasons many centuries earlier, it was fitting that Lewistown’s Masons, Masonic Lodge #37 chose to build its new temple of native stone in 1908. Pete Tuss won the $30,000 contract and set to work building what the Fergus County Argus called on its dedication on July 20, 1909, "the handsomest building in this part of the state."

The building was indeed striking. Constructed of gray sandstone, its incorporated carved Ionic, Doris, and Corinthian columns and capitals. Using special chisels and mallets, the craftsmen painstakingly etched ornate scrollwork on the cut rock. But all the tedious work was forgotten, John F. Plovanic once told his grandson, when the scroll was finally finished and placed in its niche.

Before undertaking the Masonic Temple project, Pete Tuss initiated the first construction phases of St. Joseph’s Hospital, and edifice with, in terms of dedication, sacrifice and time span, is reminiscent of the great cathedral building projects of Europe. The story of its construction, indeed, spans nearly three decades. Sister Philomene of the Order of the Daughters of Jesus arrived in Lewistown in 1903, spending the next three years operating a school to raise money to build a hospital. Tuss won the contract and began laying stone in October, 1906, finishing his part of the job two years later. John F. Plovanic eventually completed the hospital and its magnificent encircling wall, building four additional units from 1913 to 1936.

St. Joseph's Hospital

Of equal importance to their masonry skills in building the hospital was the very nearly sacrificial dedication of the stonemasons. Daisy Monkelin and the late ""Andy" Kalafatic recalled to me that their fathers, and others, contributed a day’s labor per week to the project at no small sacrifice to the family income. John Plovanic remembered that the Mother Superior regularly provided refreshments, sometimes even brandy, late in the afternoon. It was a kind gesture, and while the good Mother’s hospitality could hardly be refused, as a contractor Plovanic was not eager to see his masons drink brandy on a job of that intricacy.

Constructing St. Joseph’s Hospital had, in truth, been a particular challenge. Featuring a quarter circle or compound arch high on the façade, which serves as a dome for a status of St. Joseph, this was a complicate bit of stonework. With little confidence, the architect had contacted special stonemasons in St. Louis. By this time, however, Plovanic had already calculated the mathematical dimensions designed the arch piece by piece, and had it finished. A surprised architect returned to Lewistown duly impressed.

Part 3