After working as a ranch hand and smelter worker, he was a deputy sheriff in Mohave County, Arizona.

The latter obviously served as barracks, taverns, and brothels for bargees and smelter workers.

Bridges met Noriko Sawada during a fund-raiser for mine, mill, and smelter workers, and the two became a couple.

In 1916 the union changed its name to the International Union of Mine, Mill, and Smelter Workers.

Many smelter workers and miners were sent away to the front, and their places in the industrial works and mines were filled with mothers, wives, and sisters.

The WFM later changed its name to the International Union of Mine, Mill, and Smelter Workers.

After a riot and fire were started by a rowdy group of smelter workers in a local saloon, a local newspaper editor began agitating for the settlement to be incorporated.

Its efforts to organize both hard rock miners and smelter workers brought it into sharp conflicts - and often pitched battles - with both employers and governmental authorities.