Eugene Victor Debs, 1855-1926, was a socialist leader and labor organizer. He was born in Terre Haute, Indiana, and left home at 14 to work in the railroad industry as a locomotive fireman. He married Kate Metzel on June 9, 1885, and they made their permanent home in Terre Haute. A strong proponent of organized labor, Debs became the president of the American Railway Union in 1893, and his first imprisonment came as a result of his prominent role in the 1894 Pullman Palace Car Company strike. He discovered the works of Karl Marx while in prison and became a Socialist in 1897. He ran for president as the Socialist Party candidate in 1900, 1904, 1908, 1912, and 1920, the latter election occurring, famously, while Debs was in prison again for criticizing the government's enforcement of the 1917 Espionage Act. His time in jail negatively affected his health, and he spent the remaining years of his life at Lindlahr Sanitarium in Elmhurst, Illinois.