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The Guardian - US
The Guardian - US
World
Dharna Noor

Texas was once a hotbed of wild west socialism – could it make a comeback?

cowboys on horses at a rodeo
A cowboy holds on to a bucking horse at a Texas rodeo circa 1900. Photograph: Bettmann/Bettmann Archive

Texas is well-known as a Republican-red state, but it has another, largely forgotten red history of the radical shade. Long before it became a rightwing political stronghold, it was defined by cowboys on strike, farmers organizing against the railroads, and one of the largest Socialist party chapters in the country.

“In Texas, the history of our radical politics and labor and working class tradition has been purposefully hidden,” author David Griscom said. “It’s important to go back and correct the record and see that there was an effort to try to make Texans forget the radical roots in the kind of more recent past.”

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