Having had family members involved on both sides of that incident, I became very interested in this case. In 1974 I interviewed several people involved, including Frank Van Gilder, the vet who was leading the soldiers and gave the order to stop in front of the IWW hall. His wife answered the door when I came to call on him, and said, "You're a brave young man!" Mr. Van Gilder, who died shortly after I spoke with him, would not allow me to take notes, so I excused myself to use the bathroom more than once and scribbled away. Mr. Van Gilder was also active during the trial at Montesano and was very proud of his involvement with wiretapping the defense attorney. He seemed proud as well of some of his incredibly abusive behavior to the very troops he was ordering around. I also talked with people who witnessed the capture of Wes Everest. Even in 1974, Nov. 11, 1919 seemed like a long time ago, yet there remained many people who refused to talk to me. And the ones who did probably felt they better unload their story while they still had time to tell it. There are a lot of myths about the Centralia Massacre. I highly recommend John McClelland's book, "Wobbly War : the Centralia Story" (1987) as the most objective research on this topic that continues to polarize.