The Rights Of The Living & The Dead

Conjoined with the Occupy Philly encampment today, there were two parades: one was when the occupiers marched about ten blocks to the Liberty Bell and back to City Hall, and this second was the Trans March, in which a few hundred transsexuals and sopporters demanded respect and legal protections for persons of that orientation. I saw them pass City Hall and end it at Love Park, which is at the end of the street.

Behind the marchers, in the area behind the concrete fence where the interesting statue "Government of the People" stands, is Thomas Paine Plaza, marked with those words only on the opposite side. Almost no one in the city knows that the place bears that name, as old Tom's legacy is Philadelphia's secret of Free Thought, hidden to the extent possible by Orthodox Christians who have hated him since around 1790.

The shorter building at center-left, above the pink banner, is the newest part of the convention center, which I can rarely afford to enter. It stands on the site of the Odd Fellows Temple, built in the mid-1890s, where many leading radical thinkers, including anarchists such as Peter Kropotkin and Emma Goldman, addressed large audiences. The building was razed about two years ago, but in 1901, 1904, and especially 1909, it was the vortex of Goldman's Free Speech fights, which were successful and were part of the reason there is as much of that freedom as there is today in the US.

The spire two buildings to the right marks the Methodist church where Occupy Philly held its final meeting before settling down at City Hall, and at the far right is the main Masonic Temple of the city, which is a gaudy curiosity that attracts a good many tourists.

Behind the marchers and just out of the picture is the corner where "Mother" Mary Jones held her rally in 1903 to inagurate the famous "March of the Factory Children," which led all the way to President Theodore Roosevelt's house on Long Island (perhaps 130 miles I'd say), where he refused to let them in. The march brought national attention to the horrors of child labor, and the spot is marked with a plaque.

I went away from the demonstration site today with sadness. Yes the revolution may be here, but today I very keenly felt that I am no longer one of the activists. I was once, but no more, and there are awkward moments here and there when I see certain faces. I came home and made pasta with a tomato sauce loaded with periwinkle meat and other good things.