August 24, 2023

STRIKE! 120th Anniversary of the Newsboy’s Strike of 1899

Newsies Strike in 1899

Yes, you read that right. Newsies. You may or may not have seen the infamous Disney musical called “Newsies” with a David and Goliath storyline and some pretty sweet costumes and accents. Heck, they even made a Broadway musical out of it.

Well, once upon a (long) time ago, I was very passionate about the real story behind the movie. Who were the newsies? What did they really say and do? Seriously, were there actually kids named “Kid Blink” and “Racetrack”? You bet there was! Believe me, I know, because I did dozens, if not hundreds, of hours of research at the New York Public Library in Manhattan. I scrolled through miles of microfilm to hunt down every. single. article. I believe I may have the most research on this topic than anyone out there. (Okay, there may be one or two other people, but I really think I have more.)

It was always a goal of mine to somehow get all these articles up on the internet for people to read for themselves. The Newsies’ story is a pretty good one, but it’s not really like the way Disney tells it. (Surprise!) It’s about time I set the record straight.

And so begins my project. I have all the links to my posts below. The strike took place over roughly 13 days, so there’s a post for each one with a few extras.

(If you’d like an easy introduction to this story, Don Brown wrote an adorable children’s book about it called Kid Blink Beats the World.)

(I originally wrote these posts in 2019 on my old blog, but have posted them here with updates.)