File:Joe Hill (PORTRAITS 46).jpg

Photograph of a painting

Handwritten on verso of image: Joe Hill, IWW organizer, poet, martyr.

The most certain research places the birth of Joe Hill in Gavle, Sweden on October 7, 1879. At birth he was christened Joel Emmanuel Haggland, joining the eight other children of railroad worker Olof Haggland and his wife, Margareta. He immigrated to America with his brother in 1902. At some point between 1906 and 1910 the name Joel Emmanuel Haggland disappeared, to be replaced by the moniker Joseph Hillstrom. The years of drifting through America, working a series of low-paying, thankless jobs, and encountering thousands of immigrants just like himself had a powerful effect on the now thirty-year-old Hillstrom. He apparently grew hard and cynical toward the nation he had adopted, viewing it as a sea of suffering, poor families held captive at the feet of a handful of wealthy and powerful individuals. In 1910, he became involved with the Industrial Workers of the World and became an organizer. He was convicted of murdering John Morrison and his son Arling near downtown Salt Lake City on the night of January 10, 1914. Hill told supporters, "Don't mourn, organize!" shortly before his 1915 execution by a Utah firing squad.

• Subjects (LCTGM): Labor leaders--United States
• Subjects (LCSH): Hill, Joe, 1879-1915; Swedish Americans