Chicago Sun-Times
March 22, 2004
By Andrew Herrmann Staff Reporter
Plan to Name Park after Anarchist Draws Fire
Bad blood between Chicago police and Lucy Parsons continues - 60 years after her death.
Parsons, a feisty mixed-race reformer who described police as "organized bandits" and "minions of the oppressing class," was an anarchist and wife of a man executed in connection with a cop killing in 1886.
The Chicago Park District is proposing to name a ppark for her on the Northwest Side as a recognition of her efforts on behalf of workers, women and African Americans.
The head of the Chicago police union is objecting, dismissing her as "a woman whose historic roots come from the defense of her husband."
In a letter to Park District board members, Mark P. Donohue, president of the local Fraternal Order of Police, said he is "disappointed and disheartened" over the nomination.
"Chicago's long and varied history has provided it with a depth of talent throughout the times," writes Donahue. The Parsons pick "lacks the depth and richness of the Chicago experience."
The proposed Lucy Elia Gonzales Parsons Park, at 4712 W. Belmont, is part of a larger city effort to recognize more women in a system where only 27 of 555 parks are named for females.
Parons' husband, Albert, was hanged Nov. 11, 1887, after being convicted, along with seven other men, in the death of Police Officer Mathias Degnan at the infamous Haymarket Riot in May of 1886. The officer was killed in the explosion of a bomb likely hurled by one of the marchers who had gathered to hear Albert Parsons and others preach workers rights. In all, eight police officers died from riot injuries, and 60 cops were injured.
Prosecutors were unable to link Albert Parsons, who advocated overthrow of the government, directly to the death of Degnan. But jurors were convinced he helped instigate the incident at Des Plaines and Randolph on the Near West Side, said Mindy Spitzer, a Haymarket expert at the Chicago Historical Society.
At his trial, prosecutors offered vitriolic writings by Lucy Parsons, including a newspaper article titled "A Word to Tramps," in which she advised the underclass to "avail yourselves of those little methods of warfare which Science has placed in the hands of the poor man" - dynamite. "Learn the use of explosives," she wrote, and "...you will become a power in this or any other land."
Historians generally conclude Albert Parsons was caught in the furor of the times, when big business and a budding labor movement were at often violent odds, with police officers serving as the army of what Lucy Parsons derided as "the boss class."
Her name was suggested by Chicago Parks historian Julia Bachrach, a parks spokesman said. In the nominating papers, her anarchist past is noted and she is touted for her work as a union organizer.
"She wasn't named because she was Albert Parsons' wife," said parks spokesman Julian Green. "Lucy Parsons promoted women's, labor and civil rights in Chicago. She was highly regarded by Jane Addams and other social reformers."
Spiter said Parsons saw the "capitalist system as a very violent system," Though there is no evidence they called for violence at Haymarket, they had "encouraged people to attack the police," said Spitzer.
