KEIR HARDIE CENTENARY
\ HEN Keir Hardie walked into the House of Commons in 1906, the first Member to be elected as a Labour candidate, he caused a newspaper sensation as "the man in the cloth cap," It was not the only time that controversy stirred about this great Labour pioneer. His support of the Suffragettes and his strictures on militarists and on royalty roused his opponents to fury; and when war came in 1914 even his supporters were divided. Those who knew Hardie best agree that the war killed him as surely. as Af he had been
struck by a bullet. Socialism for him also meant anti-militarism and internationalism, and when he saw the workers of Europe fighting one another and many of his own Labour colleagues supporting the war, it was for him the end, Keir Hardie was born into poverty in a Scottish hamlet just over 100 years ago. He had no schooling, but he taught himself to read. While he worked as a miner he wrote articles for local newspapers, and soon became a journalist and a miners’ leader. He played a great part in a development of British trade unions and particularly in associating them with politics and the Independent Labour Party. On the 100th anniversary of Hardie’s birth last year the BBC broadcast a tribute which is to be heard from 1YC at 10,30 p.m. om Thursday, May 23, and later from other YC stations. The Man They Remember is nies up of the recollections of people who knew him well, gathered by a BBC producer and an interviewer who travelled from Westminster through the Midlands and industrial north to the Lowlands of Scotland. Well-known men who will be heard include Sir Charles Trevelyan, A. Fenner Brockway, M.P., and Emrys Hughes, M.P. But probably no contribution to the programme shows the gentleness of Hardie better than the memory of a man who is now a borough councillor in West Ham, He saw Hardie set out for the House of Commons in a wagonette with a trumpeter on that first day and spoke to him; and the man with the bushy beard and the piercing eyes patted his head and said: "Always be kind. Always be kind." 4
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New Zealand Listener, Volume 36, Issue 927, 17 May 1957, Page 16
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372KEIR HARDIE CENTENARY New Zealand Listener, Volume 36, Issue 927, 17 May 1957, Page 16
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Copyright in the work University Entrance by Janet Frame (credited as J.F., 22 March 1946, page 18), is owned by the Janet Frame Literary Trust. The National Library has been granted permission to digitise this article and make it available online as part of this digitised version of the New Zealand Listener. You can search, browse, and print this article for research and personal study only. Permission must be obtained from the Janet Frame Literary Trust for any other use.
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