Shows
Labor History TodayThe Raging Erie: Life, Labor, and the Canal That Changed AmericaThis week on Labor History Today: author Mark S. Ferrara joins labor educator Linda Donahue to explore the hidden history of the workers who built and lived along the Erie Canal. Based on Ferrara’s book The Raging Erie, the conversation uncovers the stories of Native Americans whose land was taken, immigrant laborers who carved the canal by hand, orphan children who worked as mule drivers, and the canallers who helped shape America’s expansion westward.
As the Erie Canal celebrates its 200th anniversary, this episode shines a light on the hardship, solidarity, and resistance that defined life...2025-07-2735 min
Labor History TodayLife and Times of a Black Wobbly (Encore)Ben Fletcher was one of the most important black labor leaders in American history. Yet he’s almost entirely unknown. In today’s show, from the Working Class History podcast (originally aired here on 7/23/23), we learn about this little-known dock worker and labor organizer, who helped organize thousands of workers on the Philadelphia docks into the most powerful multiracial union in the country.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor History Today, email us at LaborHistoryToday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is produced by Union...2025-07-2044 min
Labor History TodayHouston, We Have a Labor Dispute (Encore)For decades, rumors have circulated about a strike in space. The story goes that in 1973, the three astronauts on the Skylab 4 mission took an unplanned day off to protest ground controls management style, and the job action resulted in improved working conditions. It's a great story, but according to crew member Ed Gibson, that's not exactly what happened. Reporter Meagan Day says the real story is still a testament to the potential of strikes — or even just the threat of strikes — to shift the balance of power in the workplace. She wrote about it in Jacobin and brings us her...2025-07-1318 minLabor History TodayA Weekend With Pete SeegerThis week on Labor History Today, we bring you a special episode celebrating folk legend Pete Seeger. In the first episode of A Weekend With Pete Seeger, recorded in 1999, Seeger sings, plays banjo, and shares stories of a lifetime fighting for labor rights, peace, and the environment. Captured just before his 80th birthday, these intimate conversations—long tucked away—bring Seeger’s voice and spirit vividly to life. Our thanks and appreciation to Jean-Claude Kuner and Claus Vittus, who created the 5-episode Pete Seeger podcast for the Tønder Festival, an annual folk music festival in Tønder, Denmark.
Questions...2025-07-0543 minLabor History TodayThe Battle of Ballantyne PierOn today’s Labor History Today, from our friends at The Docker Podcast, we join ILWU longshore workers James Brophy and Leith Jasinowski-Kahl to mark the 90th anniversary of the 1935 Battle of Ballantyne Pier. From police violence on Vancouver’s waterfront to the songs that keep resistance alive, they share why this history still matters today.
And on Labor History in 2:00: the year was 1936; Jesus Pallares, a Chicano miner and union organizer was deported from the United States.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor Histo...2025-06-3039 minLabor History TodayWe Rise Fighting: Strikes, Struggle, and StrategyThis week on Labor History Today, we bring you a special episode from the We Rise Fighting Labor Podcast, exploring the power and potential of today’s mass protests—from the streets of LA to immigrant rights rallies; where is all this energy going, and what vision can turn protest into real, lasting change?
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor History Today, email us at LaborHistoryToday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is produced by the Labor Heritage Foundation and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor...2025-06-2233 minLabor History TodayTony Mazzocchi, Cowboy Strikes, and the Power of SolidarityOn this week’s Labor History Today: We remember legendary union leader Tony Mazzocchi—his fight for worker safety, his role in founding the Labor Party, and his lasting impact on labor arts.
Plus, Seth Newton Patel’s song about the untold story of the multiracial cowboy strike of 1883, and a look back at the 1937 miners’ solidarity strike.
2025-06-1518 min
Labor History TodaySongs of the Line and StallThis week on Labor History Today: From the Library of Congress’ America Works podcast: Bill Favaro shares the origins of his family’s Louisiana rod & reel shop, and Juan Salcido Sanchez reflects on a lifetime caring for racehorses. Plus, we mark two deadly events in mining labor history—from Butte, Montana (1917) to Cripple Creek, Colorado (1904).
Music: “The Miners” by The Elders.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor History Today, email us at LaborHistoryToday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is produced by the Labor Herit...2025-06-0924 min
Labor History TodayThe ConductorettesOn this week’s Labor History Today: "This drunk came on and he started showing me a bad time, and I up and popped him and knocked him out. The soldier got one arm, I got the other and we put him beside the telephone pole. We got back in, gave a bell, and away we went. Never knew what happened to the guy. He could still be sitting there—I don’t know."
That was Pearl Wattum, one of Vancouver’s legendary “conductorettes”—the women who kept the city’s streetcars running during World War II while the men were awa...2025-06-0133 min
Labor History TodayMongrel Firebugs and Men of Property (Encore)This week’s Labor History Today podcast: Mongrel Firebugs and Men of Property (Encore)
Steve Fraser discusses his book “Mongrel Firebugs and Men of Property: Capitalism and Class Conflict in American History” and political scientist and historian Michael Munk connects 2024 Minneapolis with the general strike that took place there in 1934. Plus, Meany Archivist Ben Blake on how the labor movement has used car caravans, the “En Masse” podcast takes us inside the New England quarries nearly a century ago, and we celebrate the life of Rosie the Riveter. Originally released May 31, 2024.
2025-05-2640 min
Labor History TodayEmma Tenayuca and the Strike that Shook San AntonioOn this week's Labor History Today: Before she turned 20, Emma Tenayuca led thousands of Mexican American pecan shellers into one of the largest strikes of the 1930s. A fearless young organizer from San Antonio, Texas, Tenayuca fought for workers’ rights, racial justice, and dignity—despite arrest, red-baiting, and death threats. Her story, largely left out of mainstream labor history, still resonates in today’s struggles for immigrant and worker justice. This episode features a segment from Solidarity Works, the podcast of the United Steelworkers
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a p...2025-05-1922 min
Labor History TodayFrom PATCO to Trump: Lessons from Labor’s Past for Today’s FightOn this week’s Labor History Today podcast: In a special crossover episode with the Power At Work podcast, historians Joe McCartin and Veronica Martinez-Matsuda join me and Power At Work host Seth Harris to connect the past to labor’s present “perilous moment.” They explore the legacy of the 1981 PATCO strike, today’s threats to federal workers' rights, the farm labor movement’s long exclusion from labor law, and why history doesn’t swing back on its own—people make it.
Subscribe to Labor History Today and listen wherever you get your podcasts.
#LaborRadioPod #History #Working...2025-05-1138 min
Labor History TodayBroken Heads and Unbroken Spirits: 40 Years After the British Miners’ StrikeOn this episode of Labor History Today, we mark the 40th anniversary of the end of one of the most significant labor struggles of the 20th century: the 1984–85 British Miners’ Strike. Former miner and strike veteran John Dunn shares his harrowing personal account of the violence, repression, and community solidarity that defined the year-long battle between the National Union of Mineworkers and Margaret Thatcher’s government. Dunn’s story, told in conversation with Heartland Labor Forum host Tino Scalici, brings to life the cost of resistance, the brutality of the state, and the enduring legacy of working-class struggle.
We also...2025-05-0430 min
Labor History Today50 years of “Strike!” (Encore)Sara Nelson’s inspirational keynote at the April 6, 2021 symposium celebrating the 50th anniversary of Jeremy Brecher’s classic labor history book “Strike!” On today’s Labor History in 2: Our Thing is DRUM!
Originally released May 2, 2021.
To contribute a labor history item, email laborhistorytoday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is produced by the Labor Heritage Foundation and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor.
#LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @ILLaborHistory @RickSmithShow #LaborHistory @PMPressOrg @FlyingWithSara @labornotes @LN4S
Edited/produced by Chris Garlock and Patrick Dixon; social media guru: Harold Phillips
2025-04-2731 min
Labor History TodayUnion Made: The DC Labor FilmFest PreviewThis week on Labor History Today: The 25th annual DC Labor FilmFest kicks off May Day at the AFI Silver! Host Chris Garlock previews the powerful lineup of films about work and workers with AFI programmers Todd Hitchcock, Abbie Algar, Eli Prysant, and Javier Chavez — including LILLY, The Last Showgirl, and more.
Plus: On Labor History in 2:00, we remember the 1914 Ludlow Massacre. And historian Nick Juravich shares a favorite labor song celebrating the radical legacy of the National Maritime Union.
🎟️ Full festival info at laborheritage.org
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find...2025-04-2025 min
Labor History TodayPara PowerOn Labor History Today: Para Power: AFT president Randi Weingarten talks with Nick Juravich, associate director of the Labor Resource Center at UMass Boston, about class, race and education and his book Para Power: How Paraprofessional Labor Changed Education. PLUS: Nick’s almost-favorite labor song, and, on Labor History in 2:00, Florence Reece is born.
Labor History Today is a member of the Labor Radio Podcast Network.
@AFTunion @rweingarten @NickJuravich @AFISilver @LaborHeritage1 @wpfwdc @aflcio #1u #unions #laborradiopod
2025-04-1345 min
Labor History TodayA Chance to HarmonizeOn Labor History Today: In 1934, as part of an effort to boost morale and encourage citizens to find community in their traditions, the Roosevelt administration sent artists to homesteads throughout the country to lead group activities—including listening to and making folk music.
On today’s show, a conversation centered around A Chance to Harmonize: How FDR’s Hidden Music Unit Sought to Save America from the Great Depression—One Song at a Time, a book by award-winning author and music scholar Sheryl Kaskowitz.
The event took place at the Roosevelt House Public Policy Institute at Hunter College...2025-04-0632 min
Labor History TodayTaking a Stand: Union Solidarity Against ApartheidOn Labor History Today: Kings and presidents and CEOs like to think that they make history but real history is actually made by thousands of small actions like this: a handful of grounds workers at a local school district refusing to handle South African chicken wire, multiplied around the globe until, eventually, the entire racist system of apartheid collapses. Today’s episode tells the impressive story of international solidarity by union members in British Columbia – B.C. -- who worked tirelessly in support of those fighting to end apartheid. It comes to us from On The Line: Stories of BC W...2025-03-3022 min
Labor History TodaySam Walton, Harry Bridges & The Great Cowboy Strike (Encore)On Labor History Today: Joe McCartin, Leon Fink and Patrick Dixon discuss the 2002 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that undocumented workers don’t have the same rights as Americans, Sam Walton’s anti-union legacy, and they remember dock union leader Harry Bridges and the Texas cowboys strike. PLUS: Saul Schniderman on Martin Luther King and striking sanitation workers in Memphis. Music this week includes “Glory,” with Common and John Legend, from the motion picture "Selma” and “A Change Is Gonna Come” by Sam Cooke. Originally released March 25, 2018.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a...2025-03-2355 min
Labor History TodayThe St. Mary Nurses Strike of 2020Labor History Today: During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, 800 nurses walked out on strike in Bucks County, Pennsylvania. As concern rises about the return of measles and cuts to healthcare staff and budgets, this edition of the Labor Jawn podcast from February 2022 is especially timely.
And, a double-hit of Labor History in Two: The day The Grapes of Wrath opened in movie theaters, and the day Bruce Springsteen was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of...2025-03-1627 min
Labor History TodayBlack Convicts: How Slavery Shaped AustraliaLabor History Today: This week’s edition of the show takes us to Australia, but the history of slavery and the ongoing failure to come to terms with the resulting racism and discrimination there echo uncomfortably loudly here in the United States as Donald Trump ramps up his campaign to stamp out any effort to acknowledge that such things exist, as though by simply abolishing the words diversity, equity and inclusion we can magically erase generations of oppression.
It cannot do so, but we clearly have a long way to go here at home, and it’s instructive – and a...2025-03-0944 min
Labor History TodayDerry’s Missing Factory GirlsOn Labor History Today: A visit to the Northern Ireland city of Derry and a search for the real Factory Girls.
On this week’s Labor History in Two: Jefferson Outlaws the Slave Trade; Greyhound Bus Drivers Strike
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor History Today, email us at LaborHistoryToday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is produced by the Labor Heritage Foundation and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor.
Sources:
Derry’s Factory Girls Deserve Better?
L...2025-03-0220 min
Labor History TodayThe Brotherhood of Sleeping Car PortersAs Black History Month comes to a close, the On the Line podcast marks the occasion with a fascinating look back at the history of train sleeping car porters, almost all of whom were Black. It's a story that has only recently started to be told, and combines the history of Black employment in Canada, unionization and the fight for dignity and equality. On The Line examines those long-lost days mostly through the voice of Warren Williams, whose Uncle Lee was in the forefront of the drive to organize Sleeping Car Porters in Canada. Warren is the current President o...2025-02-2330 min
Labor History TodayBlack labor in Richmond (Encore)For 150 years, Richmond's place in history has been as "the capital of the Confederacy." But this label hides a much richer and more complex history. On today’s show, originally aired on Feb. 20, 2022, we hear from Peter Rachleff, Co-Executive Director of the East Side Freedom Library, a retired professor of history at Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota, and author of "Black Labor in Richmond, 1865 -1890," as he reveals part of that hidden history, that of Black and White workers in the second half of the 19th century.
Note: Excerpted from Rachleff’s Feb. 2, 2022 talk for The Virginia Work...2025-02-1629 min
Labor History TodayGrit and Working-Class SolidarityOn Labor History Today: Grit and Working-Class Solidarity: B.C. Workers Respond to the 1919 Winnipeg General Strike. The On the Line: Stories of BC Workers podcast reports on “A time of unsurpassed working-class consciousness and resistance, the likes of which Canada had not seen before, nor since.”
On this week’s Labor History in Two: Moral Mondays.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor History Today, email us at LaborHistoryToday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is produced by the Labor Heritage Foundation and the Kal...2025-02-0924 min
Labor History TodayThe 1917 “Bath Riots”On Labor History Today: The 1917 “Bath Riots”. The story of Carmelita Torres, the "Latina Rosa Parks," and the so-called “Bath Riots” on the U.S.-Mexico border in 1917. On Labor History in Two: auto workers sit down and Black students sit in.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor History Today, email us at LaborHistoryToday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is produced by the Labor Heritage Foundation and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor.
#LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @GeorgetownKILWP #LaborHistor...2025-02-0218 min
Labor History TodayMLK in MemphisOn this week's Labor Heritage Power Hour: MLK in Memphis; “We Will Not Be Turned Around”, Part 3 of AFSCME’s I AM STORY podcast about the 1968 sanitation workers’ strike.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor History Today, email us at LaborHistoryToday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is produced by the Labor Heritage Foundation and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor.
#LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @GeorgetownKILWP #LaborHistory @UMDMLA @ILLaborHistory @AFLCIO @StrikeHistory #LaborHistory @wrkclasshistory
2025-01-2640 min
Labor History TodayRemembering Ludlow but Forgetting ColumbineOn this week’s Labor History Today: While historians have written prolifically about the 1914 Ludlow Massacre, there has been a lack of attention to the Columbine Massacre in which police shot and killed six striking coal miners and wounded sixty more protestors during the 1927–1928 Colorado Coal Strike, even though its aftermath exerted far more influence on subsequent national labor policies.
In her 2023 book Remembering Ludlow but Forgetting the Columbine: The 1927–1928 Colorado Coal Strike, Leigh Campbell-Hale reorients understandings of labor history from the 1920s through the 1960s and the construction of public memory—and forgetting—surrounding those events.
Our c...2025-01-1933 min
Labor History TodayBattle of the Eureka StockadeOn this week’s Labor History Today: Battle of the Eureka Stockade. Australia’s history closely tracks American history; the subjugation of indigenous people is the most obvious parallel, and the battles for basic worker rights is another. On today’s show -- which comes to us from Stick Together, Australia's only national radio show focusing on industrial, social and workplace issues -- the Battle of the Eureka Stockade, the first major event of post-colonial Australia, where in 1854, during the Victorian gold rush, the army and police violently attacked miners – killing dozens -- for daring to call for the end of m...2025-01-1234 min
Labor History TodayAt Sword’s PointAmerican labor unions have seen an incredible resurgence in recent years, which, suggests public historian Tom Goldscheider, “begs the question: why were they in decline in the first place?”
In "At Sword’s Point", Tom revisits a pivotal moment in American history, when the furious power of Joseph McCarthy’s Red Scare found its first true target, and when the dismantling of American organized labor began.
But this isn’t a story of workers caving in the face of mass hysteria; this is the story of a rural town where, against all expectations, the workers fought back.
Today’...2025-01-0558 min
Labor History TodayChristmas in MansfieldJoe Jencks is a 25-year veteran of the international folk circuit, an award-winning songwriter, and a celebrated vocalist based in Chicago. Merging conservatory training with his Irish roots and working-class upbringing, Joe delivers engaged musical narratives filled with heart, soul, groove and grit. Pete Seeger said “The spirit of Folk music is people working together. Joe is a fantastic singer who carries on the traditions.”
Today, Joe tells us the story behind his song “Christmas in Mansfield,” where Armco locked out 620 steel workers on September 1, 1999.
A note from LHT host Chris Garlock: Labor History Today is broug...2024-12-2930 min
Labor History TodayThe 1997 UPS Strike“This fight isn't just for the teamsters. This is for all American workers.”
This weekend, Teamsters struck Amazon in New York City, Atlanta, Skokie, Southern California, San Bernardino and San Francisco. The union represents 10,000 Amazon workers at 10 warehouses and delivery stations.
But that quote at the top is not from the Amazon strike; it’s about the Teamsters’ strike against the United Parcel Service in 1997.
Today, our colleagues at the Labor Jawn podcast take us back to that pivotal strike twenty seven years ago when 185,000 workers stood up to one of the largest shipping companie...2024-12-2337 min
Labor History TodayTouring the American Labor MuseumOn this week's Labor History Today: Touring the American Labor Museum
The American Labor Museum in Haledon, New Jersey, is also known as The Botto House, and that’s because for generations that’s what it was: the home of the Botto family. This unassuming house, sitting on an ordinary-looking street in a quiet residential neighborhood, played a key role in American labor history when it became the heart of the 1913 Patterson Silk Strike as tens of thousands of silk workers – most of them immigrants and many of them young children – demanded an eight-hour day and improved working conditio...2024-12-1535 min
Labor History TodayYbor City, Crucible of the Latina SouthOn this week's Labor History Today: Decades before Miami became Havana USA, a wave of leftist, radical, working-class women and men from prerevolutionary Cuba crossed the Florida Straits, made Ybor City the global capital of the Cuban cigar industry, and established the foundation of latinidad in the Sunshine State. Located on the eastern edge of Tampa, Ybor City was a neighborhood of cigar workers and Caribbean revolutionaries who sought refuge against the shifting tides of international political turmoil during the early half of the twentieth century.
Producer Patrick Dixon talks with historian Sarah McNamara about her book Y...2024-12-0848 minLabor History TodayA tale of two Detroit muralsDr. Jay Cephas considers two Depression-era murals in Detroit and their contrasting messaging about workers, labor, and power. Diego Rivera’s famed Detroit Industry murals (top), commissioned by Edsel Ford for the Detroit Institute of Arts in 1932, champions industrial and technological progress and the factory workers who fueled it. In contrast, Walter Speck and Barbara Wilson’s 1937 untitled mural (bottom), which originally hung in the UAW Local 174 union hall and now hangs behind the reference desk at the Reuther Library, champions the progress those industrial workers made laboring for their own welfare via union action.
Dr. Cephas is A...2024-12-0131 minLabor History TodayThe lost labor artistFive stunning paintings depicting labor organizing, pickets and the violence directed at workers in the turbulent 1930s were almost lost to history. The story of Philip Tipperman and how a small group of people saved those paintings.
On this week’s Labor History in Two: Massacre At Bogalusa.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor History Today, email us at LaborHistoryToday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is produced by the Labor Heritage Foundation and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poo...2024-11-2432 minLabor History TodayThe Bootleg Coal RebellionLabor historian Mitch Troutman’s 2022 book, The Bootleg Coal Rebellion: The Pennsylvania Miners Who Seized an Industry, 1925-1942 is a detailed account of coal bootlegging in the anthracite region of Pennsylvania in the Prohibition/Depression decades when unemployed miners took over unused mines,
asserting and defending a right to mine and market the coal to support their families. Excerpted from his June 23, 2022 talk for The Battle of Homestead Foundation.
On this week’s Labor History in Two: the year was 1785. That was the day the General Society of Mechanics and Tradesmen of the City of New York...2024-11-1727 minLabor History TodayTogether We Can Move MountainsBev Grant is a cultural worker from Brooklyn, NY; she’s a social justice feminist, a choral director, an occasional bandleader, a dance artist and a photographer.
She’s also a much beloved singer/songwriter, and on today’s show, she tells us the story behind one of her best-known songs – and one that seems especially meaningful this post-election week, Together We Can Move Mountains.
On this week’s Labor History in Two: The Benevolent Dictator.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor History Tod...2024-11-1022 minLabor History TodayA Wild Woman Sings the Blues“The life and music of Barbara Dane,” from The Harry Bridges Project. The story of America told through its social upheaval, its achievements and, above all, its music. Originally broadcast on WPFW's Labor Heritage Power Hour (10/31/24).
On this week’s Labor History in Two: The year was 1975; that was the day that the National Organization for Women, or NOW, called for a strike by women across the nation.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor History Today, email us at LaborHistoryToday@gmail.com
Labor...2024-11-0355 minLabor History TodayRemembering the West Virginia Mine WarsLHT tours the West Virginia Mine Wars Museum with Executive Director Mackenzie New-Walker.
On this week’s Labor History in Two: The year was 1948. That was the day that a thick yellow fog rolled over the town of Donora, Pennsylvania just south of Pittsburgh.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor History Today, email us at LaborHistoryToday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is produced by the Labor Heritage Foundation and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor.
@WarsWV #LaborRadioPod #Hist...2024-10-2839 minLabor History Today“The Union’s Inspiration”The Pittsburgh Labor Choir’s Tom Hoffman and Kira Yeversky lead a master class in the history of labor songs in their inspirational session at this year’s Reuther-Pollack Labor History Symposium, recorded with a live – and enthusiastically singing – audience.
On this week’s Labor History in Two: The year was 1945; that was the day that Paul Robeson received the Spingarn Medal from the NAACP.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor History Today, email us at LaborHistoryToday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is prod...2024-10-2049 minLabor History TodayBill Pancoast’s Road to MatewanI could not put this away. Once I saw what happened here: the orange Tug River from the strip mines…the strip mining, the desecration, the poverty. I owed it to the world to tell what happened.
William Trent Pancoast has worked as a construction laborer, gas station attendant, railroad section hand and brakeman, factory laborer, commercial laundry foreman, and machinist. He’s been an English teacher and a journeyman die-maker.
In 1986 The Wall Street Journal dubbed Pancoast a "Blue collar writer" and that’s just fine with him, as he told the Journal, "The reason I write a...2024-10-1329 minLabor History TodayWhat Can We Learn From the Great Depression?Chris talks with labor historian Dana Frank; her new book is What Can We Learn From the Great Depression? Stories of Ordinary People and Collective Action in Hard Times. The book takes a new look at working-class activism during the 1930s from the perspective of our own time, examining mutual aid, eviction protests, the expulsion of a million Mexicans, a sit-down strike by African American women working as wet-nurses, and a white supremacist fascist organization in Ohio known as the Black Legion.
Dana will be in conversation with Bill Fletcher Jr. this Tuesday, October 7, at the K Street...2024-10-0633 minLabor History TodayBill Lucy on Black powerWilliam Lucy – an icon of the labor movement -- died this past Wednesday at the age of 90. “Bill Lucy served as a brilliant strategist whose words instantly cut to the heart of an issue,” said AFL-CIO president Liz Shuler, who called Lucy “a bridge across generations of our movement; and a leader in connecting the fights of working people all across the world.”
As Shuler noted, when Lucy was just 34 years old, “he wrote four simple words—'I Am a Man’—that would change the course of history in Memphis, Tennessee,” helping “all Americans see the humanity of Black sanitation wo...2024-09-2937 minLabor History TodayThe Disney Revolt (Encore)The Animation Guild (TAG), Local 839 of the Theatrical Stage Employees (IATSE), resumed negotiations with Hollywood studios this week and are fighting for pay equity for color designers, a job historically staffed by women. Today’s show originally ran on July 6, 2023, when the strike by Hollywood writers was in its’ 10th week. Among those turning out to support that strike were members of the Animation Guild (IATSE Local 839); in March of 2023, the animators staged a “solidarity walk” around Walt Disney Studios in Burbank with dozens of the studio’s animation production workers protesting Disney’s refusal to voluntarily recognize its unionization e...2024-09-2331 minLabor History TodayHamilton Nolan and “The Hammer”Labor journalist Hamilton Nolan on the labor movement past, present and future and his new book “The Hammer: Power, Inequality, and the Struggle for the Soul of Labor.” Recorded live at the eighth annual Reuther-Pollack Labor History Symposium on August 31 in Wheeling, West Virginia. Music by the Pittsburgh Labor Choir.
On this week’s Labor History in Two: The year was 1970; that was the day 350,000 GM workers kicked off a 67-day strike.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor History Today, email us at LaborHis...2024-09-1546 minLabor History TodayShift HappensJ. Albert Mann, author of “Shift Happens: The History of Labor in the United States,” a children’s book that’s unusual not just in its subject matter but in the way it treats kids seriously as the future citizens they are. Recorded live at the Reuther-Pollack Labor History Symposium in Wheeling, West Virginia on August 31, 2024. Recording by Patrick Dixon, produced by Chris Garlock.
On this week’s Labor History in Two: The year was 2011; that was the day hundreds of ILWU strikers blocked railroad tracks near Longview, Washington.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to fin...2024-09-0835 minLabor History TodayA labor walk in WheelingWalter Reuther’s name is forever linked to Detroit, Michigan, where he and his brother Victor built the United Automobile Workers -- the UAW -- into one of the largest and most progressive labor unions in American history. In Wheeling, West Virginia, where he was born on September 1, 1907, Reuther is a hometown boy who made good.
Each year for the last eight years, the Wheeling Academy of Law and Science Foundation (WALS) has organized the Reuther-Pollack Labor History Symposium on Labor Day weekend. The annual event also celebrates the life and work of local stogie maker -- and un...2024-09-0236 minLabor History TodayThrowing a working man's partyLabor action is effectively one of two things: political action, or direct action. This week, from the Solidarity Forever podcast, we learn about political action, in the courts through the landmark Pullis decision, and charting the rise and fall of the Working Man's Parties in the days of Andy Jackson.
On this week’s Labor History in Two: the year was 1925. Five hundred African American sleeping car porters gathered at the Elks Hall at 129th Street in Harlem.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labo...2024-08-2538 minLabor History TodayBlood in the StreetsBlood in the Streets, photographer Chuck Avery’s illustrated history of American labor struggles, and Kurt Stand shares an excerpt from his essay, Peekskill, 1949: What Was Lost, What Remained, What It Means Today.
On this week’s Labor History in Two: the year was 1918; that was the day that 101 leaders of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) or Wobblies were convicted in a Chicago Federal Court.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor History Today, email us at LaborHistoryToday@gmail.com
Labor...2024-08-1829 minLabor History TodayThe 1934 Minneapolis trucker’s strikeLabor historian Peter Rachleff on how a Midwest strike helped shape national labor law plus a preview of his talk on the 1886 takeover of the Richmond (VA) City Council by black and white union activists.
On this week’s Labor History in Two: the birth of the original Rebel Girl, Elizabeth Gurley Flynn.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor History Today, email us at LaborHistoryToday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is produced by the Labor Heritage Foundation and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for...2024-08-1136 minLabor History TodayThe AAUP and the Black Freedom Struggle, 1955–1965Between 1955 and 1965, the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) investigated numerous southern institutions of higher education that had dismissed faculty members for publicly supporting desegregation and racial equality. In today’s episode, from the AAUP Presents podcast, a discussion with Joy Ann Williamson-Lott, dean of the graduate school and professor of social and cultural foundations in the College of Education at the University of Washington, drawing on her recently published article, "The AAUP and the Black Freedom Struggle, 1955–1965.”
On this week’s Labor History in Two: The year was 1821. That was the day Knights of Labor founder Uriah Smi...2024-08-0442 minLabor History TodaySmash FascismFrom the Fragile Juggernaut podcast; the escalating confrontation between fascism and anti-fascism in the 1930’s and ‘40’s; Was there an American fascism? Where did it come from and what did it look like? How did it relate to the labor movement? And what was the meaning of the Popular Front, the broad left coalition against fascism? Questions that still resonate today…
On this week’s Labor History in Two: The year was 1932. That was the day that flames burned in the US Capitol.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part...2024-07-2836 minLabor History TodayA farewell to BJRSweet Honey in the Rock founder Bernice Johnson Reagon, on today’s Labor Heritage Power Hour
Today’s labor history: First US general strike
Today’s labor quote: Bernice Johnson Reagon
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Proud founding member of the Labor Radio Podcast Network
2024-07-2502 minLabor History TodayThe free trade mythThe Labor and Energy podcast takes a look
Today’s labor history: Alliance for Labor Action founded
Today’s labor quote: Thomas Donahue
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Proud founding member of the Labor Radio Podcast Network
2024-07-2402 minLabor History TodayTrump’s actions speak louderA Teamster leader speaks out on The Real News Network
Today’s labor history: Anarchist attacks steel magnate
Today’s labor quote: Alexander Berkman
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Proud founding member of the Labor Radio Podcast Network
2024-07-2302 minLabor History TodayTragedy and Resistance at Port Chicago Naval Magazine (Encore)On July 17, 1944, a group of sailors and civilians were loading ships with ammunition and bombs at Port Chicago, a naval magazine and barracks in the San Francisco Bay Area. Tragically, the ships blew up in a massive explosion that instantly killed 320 workers and injured hundreds more. Most of the dead were African Americans, since racial segregation consigned Black soldiers and sailors to manual labor and service, including the dangerous work of transporting munitions. When the surviving workers were ordered back on the job without any additional safety measures or training, 50 refused to return. The resisters, dubbed the “Port Chicago 50,” were...2024-07-2255 minLabor History TodayA Supreme disaster for workers (Encore)On June 24, 2022, the Supreme Court overturned the historic 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling that legalized abortion in the United States nearly 50 years ago. The decision sent shock waves across the country and through the American labor movement, which recognizes that reproductive rights are a worker issue, affecting millions of working women and their families. Labor historian Joe McCartin argues that “for most of its history, the court's just been a disaster for workers” and on today’s show, McCartin explores that history, warning that “We're not going to see a better Supreme Court…without a movement, without something happening in the streets...2024-07-1526 minLabor History TodayWildcat in BCI’m up in British Columbia this week for the first time since the pandemic; it’s a beautiful place and at least where my friend Phil and I go, it’s very peaceful, the perfect place to unwind and relax. But, as you'll hear, today’s show is anything but peaceful: it’s about a 1966 wildcat strike by 400 mostly women members of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers at Lenkurt Electric in Burnaby, British Columbia, which was a turning point for the province's labor movement. Back then, courts and police routinely jailed and fined union members during labor disputes...2024-07-0733 minLabor History Today“The Port of Missing Men” (Encore)This week, in an encore of a show we first aired on July 10, 2022, labor history takes a deep dive into "True Crime" `. Billy Gohl was called "The Ghoul of Grays Harbor" in the early 20th Century when he was accused of being the murderer who dumped several bodies into the canals around Aberdeen in Washington State. Was he one of America's first serial killers? Or was he just another in a long line of labor activists framed by the bosses? Find out when Working to Live in Southwest Washington podcast hosts Shannon and Harold talk with Aaron Goings, author o...2024-06-3027 minLabor History TodayOrganizing Your Own: The White Fight for Black Power in DetroitContrary to the common belief that white activists were purged from the Black freedom movement in the mid-1960 and 1970s, Black-led organizations in Detroit – including the Northern Student Movement, the City-Wide Citizens Action Committee, and the League of Revolutionary Workers—actually called on white activists to organize within their own white networks to support Black self-determination in education, policing, employment, and labor unions, according to Dr. Say Burgin, author of Organizing Your Own: The White Fight for Black Power in Detroit. Today’s show comes to us from the Tales from the Reuther Library podcast; hear what really happened and wh...2024-06-2338 minLabor History TodayThe People, No (Encore)Kansas City native Thomas Frank talks with the Heartland Labor Forum radio show about his new book about American populism, the long trail of elites who hate it, why pundits called Donald Trump a populist and why he’s nothing of the kind.
Harvey J. Kaye on The Fight for The Four Freedoms: What Made FDR and The Greatest Generation Truly Great, from Empathy Media Lab.
And on Labor History in 2:00, Rick Smith tells us about Arturo Alfonso Schomburg.
Today’s music includes two songs from the great MrBettsClass videos, Populist Party – a parody...2024-06-1643 minLabor History TodayThe house where Kate livedChris visits the restored home of Kate Mullany, one of the least-known – and most interesting -- labor leaders in American history. Learn more here and check out the Don’t Iron While the Strike is Hot! musical here.
On this week’s Labor History in Two: Labor leader Helen Marot was born to a wealthy Quaker family in Philadelphia.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor History Today, email us at LaborHistoryToday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is produced by the Labor Heritage Foundat...2024-06-0926 minLabor History TodayPride on the line (Encore)Today’s show is excerpted from “Pride on the Line: The UAW and Queer-Labor Solidarity after Stonewall” by Jamie McQuaid, part of the Our Daily Work Our Daily Lives Brown Bag series from Michigan State University. The talk took place in September 2022 and this originally aired on LHT on 10/30/22.
On this week’s Labor History in Two: Wall Street Lays an Egg.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor History Today, email us at LaborHistoryToday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is produced by Union...2024-06-0235 minLabor History TodayThe Memorial Day Massacre (Encore)Joe McCartin, Ben Blake and Julie Greene remember the 1937 Memorial Day Massacre, when police opened fire on striking steelworkers at Republic Steel in South Chicago, killing ten and wounding more than 160.
Patrick Dixon interviews Tom Sito on the 1941 strike by animators against Walt Disney. Sito, a well-known American animator (Who Framed Roger Rabbit, The Lion King, Shrek and many more), animation historian and teacher, is the author of “Drawing the Line: The Untold Story of the Animation Unions from Bosko to Bart Simpson.”
And in this week’s Labor History Object of the Week we take a look a...2024-05-2652 minLabor History Today“The Black Wobbly” gets a muralA mural celebrating Ben Fletcher – “The Black Wobbly” – was unveiled in Philadelphia on May 18; check out our audio postcard.
On this week’s Labor History in Two: Remembering C.L.R. James
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor History Today, email us at LaborHistoryToday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is produced by the Labor Heritage Foundation and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor.
@IWW @ProfPeterCole #LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @GeorgetownKILWP #LaborHistory @UMDMLA @ILLaborHistory @AFLCIO @StrikeHistory #LaborHistory @wrkclasshistory
2024-05-2035 minLabor History TodayThe 1938 Crisfield Crab Pickers StrikeBefore last Friday, to know about the 1938 crab pickers strike in Crisfield, Maryland, you had to know about it. This is the story of so many worker struggles in this country; hard-fought fights that unlike other battles – the Civil War, for example – have virtually no monuments or plaques, no visitor centers. But now, on Crisfield Highway, Maryland Route 413, there’s an official state historical marker that commemorates the 1938 strike by 600 crab pickers, mostly Black women. On today’s show we bring you an audio postcard from the marker’s unveiling.
Next Saturday, May 18, there will be another unveiling, this one i...2024-05-1233 minLabor History Today“I'm taking pictures of the history of today”In 1946, as part of a strike-ending agreement negotiated between the Department of the Interior and the United Mine Workers of America, photographer Russell Lee went into coal communities located in remote areas across the United States, documenting miners in 13 states.
Photographs from this federal project have rarely been studied or exhibited—until now. "Power & Light: Russell Lee's Coal Survey" is on view now at the National Archives here in Washington, DC. On Friday, I toured the exhibit with photojournalist Earl Dotter, known as the “American Worker’s Poet Laureate,” and sat down with him afterwards to get his thoughts a...2024-05-0523 minLabor History Today“UAW’s Southern Gamble” pays offTo call the April 19 vote by Volkswagen AG workers in Tennessee to unionize historic may be a bit of an understatement. Not only was it the first foreign-owned auto plant in the South to organize, the vote was a mind-blowing 2,628-985, or 73% in favor. The win by the United Auto Workers came after decades of losses as plant after plant opened across the South.
On today’s show, Dr. Stephen Silvia explains how foreign automotive companies whose workers had strong unions in their home countries followed an American playbook to stifle organizing efforts in the United States.
Si...2024-04-2837 minLabor History TodayThe Return of John BrownAbolitionist John Brown is mistaken for a Black Lives Matter activist in Gene Bruskin’s latest labor musical, and a tour guide keeps Black worker history alive.
Excerpted from the Labor Heritage Power Hour radio show.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor History Today, email us at LaborHistoryToday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is produced by the Labor Heritage Foundation and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor.
#LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @GeorgetownKILWP #LaborHistory @UMDMLA @ILLaborHistory @AFLCIO @Str...2024-04-2135 minLabor History TodayThe ’34 Toledo Auto-Lite strikeThe 1934 Toledo Auto-Lite strike is one of the three most important in U.S. history, yet it’s largely unknown; why?
Plus: CBTU president Terry Melvin on why the AFL-CIO’s Gompers Room was renamed the Solidarity Room.
On this week’s Labor History in Two: Debs goes to prison.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor History Today, email us at LaborHistoryToday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is produced by the Labor Heritage Foundation and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Wor...2024-04-1430 minLabor History TodayTrumka remembers PittstonOn the 35th anniversary of the Pittston Coal strike, we revisit our 2019 interview with Richard Trumka about the historic strike.
On this week’s Labor History in Two: The Upper Big Branch mine disaster.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor History Today, email us at LaborHistoryToday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is produced by the Labor Heritage Foundation and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor.
@MineWorkers @LizShuler #LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @GeorgetownKILWP #LaborHistory @UMDMLA @ILLaborHistory @AFLCIO @Str...2024-04-0734 minLabor History TodayConnecting the ACLU, NRA and IWWLabor historian Joe McCartin on the labor connection to National Rifle Association v. Vullo.
On this week’s Labor History in Two: Remembering ILWU leader Harry Bridges.
Read more: New York's Coercion of Private Companies to Blacklist the NRA Has a Long and Dark History
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor History Today, email us at LaborHistoryToday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is produced by the Labor Heritage Foundation and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor.
@A...2024-03-3121 minLabor History Today“Changing Lives, Changing L.A.”Today’s show comes to us from Re:Work, a woman-led radio show and podcast from the UCLA Labor Center, spotlighting the voices of workers, immigrants, and people of color.
“Changing Lives, Changing L.A.” is a play created from transcripts from the UNITE HERE Local 11 Oral History Project and originally performed before a live audience at Loyola Marymount University and UCLA. Portrayed by professional actors, four members of Local 11 share their stories of becoming leaders in their union,
and fighting for a better life while helping transform Los Angeles.
These are important voices to hear, especi...2024-03-2431 minLabor History TodayB.C.’s Tough and Fearless Truck-Driving WomanFrom On The Line, the story of Diana Kilmury, the bold and fearless truck driver who took on both sexist attitudes on the job and a corrupt union.
On this week’s Labor History in Two: Big Bill Haywood Talks General Strike.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor History Today, email us at LaborHistoryToday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is produced by the Labor Heritage Foundation and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor.
@BC_LHC #LaborRadioPod #Hist...2024-03-1744 minLabor History TodayThe 2024 Labor Oscar winners!The Power at Work podcast’s Joseph Brant reveals the winners of their Labor Oscars, all of which are classics of the genre.
On this week’s Labor History in Two: The Slovak Strike.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor History Today, email us at LaborHistoryToday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is produced by the Labor Heritage Foundation and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor.
@BurnesCenter @MrSethHarris @sagaftra @AndreaLyman10 @haroldPDX @AWFJ @aboutdocsguide @PowerAtWorkBlog #Oscars #LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #Class...2024-03-1031 minLabor History TodayWhen Mother Jones teamed up with a U.S. Senator to battle West Virginia feudalismDavid Corn, Washington D.C. Bureau Chief for Mother Jones, brings us “A Story of Mother Jones (the Labor Organizer) That’s Relevant a Century Later”.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor History Today, email us at LaborHistoryToday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is produced by the Labor Heritage Foundation and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor.
@DavidCornDC @MotherJones #LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @GeorgetownKILWP #LaborHistory @UMDMLA @ILLaborHistory @AFLCIO @StrikeHistory #LaborHistory @wrkclasshistory
2024-03-0844 minLabor History TodayWe Were ThereThe history of Women's History Month, and Women in the U.S. Labor Movement, a special report from the Work Stoppage podcast, plus “We Were There” by Bev Grant and the New York City Labor Chorus, and, on Labor History in Two, the year was 1990; that was the day 9,300 workers walked out at Greyhound bus lines.
NOTE: Bev Grant and the DC Labor Chorus perform “We Were There” on Tuesday, March 12 at the Takoma Busboys and Poets; tickets are free but you must RSVP here.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can...2024-03-0329 minLabor History TodayLife and Times of a Black Wobbly (Encore)Ben Fletcher was one of the most important black labor leaders in American history. Yet he’s almost entirely unknown. In today’s show, from the Working Class History podcast, and in honor of Black History Month, we learn about this little-known dock worker and labor organizer, who helped organize thousands of workers on the Philadelphia docks into the most powerful multiracial union in the country. (Originally released 7/23/23)
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor History Today, email us at LaborHistoryToday@gmail.com
Labor Histo...2024-02-2544 minLabor History TodayMingo, Matewan and the Coal Wars of West VirginiaJeff Barnes was born and raised in Tazewell, Virginia, in the heart of coal country. He lives, writes, and practices law in Richmond. His novel “Mingo”, published in 2021, was inspired by his childhood fascination with the 1919 Matewan Massacre, which occurred during the bitter, brutal Coal Mine Wars and the stories his father told of growing up in Pocahontas, Virginia in the 1920’s with friends who were first generation Americans of Hungarian and Italian descent. Last month Jeff gave a talk on Mingo, Matewan and the Coal Wars of West Virginia to the Virginia chapter of the Labor and Employment Relati...2024-02-1833 minLabor History TodayThe myth of “highly paid” Alabama auto workersThe Valley Labor Report reports.
Today’s labor history: Striking Hollywood writers return to work.
Today’s labor quote: Bill Fletcher Jr.
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Proud founding member of the Labor Radio Podcast Network
2024-02-1302 minLabor History TodayArt Shields: The People’s ScribeArt Shields covered it all, as a reporter for the Daily Worker on the front lines in Spain, as a labor journalist, and organizer himself.
He covered many key events for the left including the defense of Sacco & Vanzetti, the Battle of Blair Mountain, the organizing drives in Harlan County, the sit-down strike in Flint, Michigan, and many more.
Art believed that strong unions were one of the best defenses against fascism, and covered the defense of those trade union leaders under attack during McCarthyism.
Today’s show is an excerpt from a talk last month pre...2024-02-1126 minLabor History TodaySaving "the Diego Rivera of Pittsburgh"David Byrne called him "the Diego Rivera of Pittsburgh." The Steel Workers’Solidarity Works podcast talks with two of their union’s members who are dedicating their time and expertise to saving the historic murals of Croatian painter and immigrant Maxo Vanka, which cover the walls of the St. Nicholas Croatian Church in Pittsburgh, and which depict themes of social justice, immigration and the heartbreak of love, loss and war.
On this week’s Labor History in 2:00: the year was 1908. That was the day the U. S. Supreme Court ruled on the Lowe vs. Lawler case, also known as...2024-02-0424 minLabor History TodayThe lost Matchgirl Strike leaderLast October, Union Dues podcast host Simon Sapper took LHT’s Chris Garlock on a labor history walk in London; our November 5 episode covers our visit to the site of the factory where the 1888 Matchgirls Strike took place. Simon took us to several other nearby sites that illustrated the way workers lived -- and struggled – in those days; most of the actual places are now long gone, but one of them, the grave of striker Eliza Martin, still exists, though as you’ll hear, it's not easy to find. (Check out the Matchgirls Memorial Trust for more information, including their...2024-01-2829 minLabor History TodayMLK at the AFL-CIO in 1961 (Encore)Original airdate January 16, 2022
On December 11, 1961, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. spoke at the AFL-CIO’s Fourth Constitutional Convention at the Americana Hotel in Miami Beach, Florida.
The speech is not long, just 30 minutes, but it’s tremendously historic, both in its content and its timing. In this speech, King connected the civil rights movement and labor movement, calling them “the two most dynamic and cohesive liberal forces in the country.” King encouraged the AFL-CIO to "help erase all vestiges of racial discrimination in American life, including labor unions," as well as to provide financial support to the civi...2024-01-211h 11Labor History TodayWoody’s resolutionsLabor historian Julie Greene on why Woody Guthrie’s 1943 New Year’s resolutions still resonate today.
On this week’s Labor History in Two: the year was 1968; that was the day Johnny Cash played Folsom Prison.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor History Today, email us at LaborHistoryToday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is produced by the Labor Heritage Foundation and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor.
@WoodyGuthrieCtr #LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @GeorgetownKILWP #LaborHistory @UMDMLA @ILLaborHistory @AFLCIO @StrikeHi...2024-01-1423 minLabor History Today”Please Buy My Last Paper, I Want to Go Home”Back in the day of publishers William Randolph Hearst and Joseph Pulitzer, newsboys were essential players in the circulation pipeline, cheap labor that made the highly competitive industry profitable. The newsboy became an America cultural trope or archetype, a focus of rags-to-riches fiction, the target of pity and social welfare activism, a smiling stereotype, an exemplar of hard work, and an incarnation of urban poverty. "Please Buy My Last Paper, I Want to Go Home”: Portrayal of Newsboys and Newsgirls in 19th and 20th Century Music" is a talk given last Fall by Joshua Duchan from Wayne State University’s Music...2024-01-0742 minLabor History TodayBayard Rustin, leader and loverLabor Heritage Power Hour co-host Elise Bryant talks with two young activists --Pride@Work’s Jarel Sanders and the A. Philip Randolph Institute’s Denicia Montford Williams -- about the new film “Rustin”, which tells the story of charismatic gay civil rights activist Bayard Rustin.
On this week’s Labor History in Two: Musicians fight back.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor History Today, email us at LaborHistoryToday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is produced by the Labor Heritage Foundation and the Kalmanovitz...2023-12-3135 minLabor History TodayCapital’s TerroristsFrom the Gilded Age to the 1920s, employers and allies used terrorism to control workplaces and communities. Our colleagues at the Heartland Labor Forum radio show talk to Chad Pearson, author of Capital’s Terrorists: Klansmen, Lawmen & Employers
to find out how terrorism disempowered the working class and its unions.
On this week’s Labor History in Two: AFL leaders jailed for boycotting; Wal-Mart pays up for wage theft.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor History Today, email us at LaborHistoryToday@gmail.com
2023-12-2425 minLabor History TodayWoody’s ”1913 Massacre”In our first segment, Woody Guthrie Center Director Cady Shaw on the story behind Woody Guthrie’s song "1913 Massacre". Check out the video here.
Then, Central Oregonizing, Radical Songbook podcast host Michael Funke’s brief history of unions at sawmills in Bend, Oregon from 1916 to 2000. Check out the video here.
On this week’s Labor History in Two: The year was 1951; that was the day New York City was struck by the Great Bagel Famine.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor Histor...2023-12-1731 minLabor History TodayA People’s History of Alcohol in AustraliaMelbourne’s Solidarity Breakfast podcast talks to Alex Ettling, co-editor ofKnocking The Top Off: A People's History of Alcohol in Australia.
On this week’s Labor History in Two: The Noble and Holy Order of the Knights of Labor.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor History Today, email us at LaborHistoryToday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is produced by the Labor Heritage Foundation and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor.
@3CRsolidarity #LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @GeorgetownKILWP #Labor...2023-12-1021 minLabor History TodayLabor history, justice, and JesuitsAll Who Labor podcast host Anna Nowalk speaks with Georgetown University’s Brother Ken Homan about the distance between what we say we believe and how those values are lived out, particularly as it relates to the Jesuits. The conversation stretches from topics further in the past, such as slavery, to more current labor activism at universities.
On this week’s Labor History in Two: The year was 1833. That was the day that the Oberlin Collegiate Institute was founded in north central Ohio. Today, it's known as Oberlin College. The college was the project of two Presbyterian minis...2023-12-0331 minLabor History TodayThe Leadville Irish Miners’ Memorial"In Ludlow, the workers were killed by bullets and kerosene; here they died from poverty. The names are illuminated at night. People are claiming the memorial. They're leaving items, artifacts, relics, coins, stones, gifts for the dead, telling them that we see them."
The average age of the people in the pine boxes was 23 years old; half of them were children under 12. 70 percent were from Ireland. On today’s show we travel to the Evergreen Cemetery in Leadville, Colorado; where on September 16th a new memorial was unveiled commemorating the 1,100 unmarked graves of Irish workers and their fami...2023-11-2629 minLabor History TodayArt/Work: Women Printmakers of the WPAVirginia Anderson, Curator of American Art at the Baltimore Museum of Art walks us through the BMA’s brand-new exhibit, Art/Work: Women Printmakers of the WPA, which explores the importance of women artists many of whom are unknown today, yet who captured the human faces of industrial and domestic labor and its inherent racial, gendered, and class inequities while they used their art to support important reforms led by the era’s growing communist and socialist movements. From the Labor Heritage Power Hour radio show, which airs Thursdays at 1p ET on WPFW 89.3 FM in Washington, DC.
...2023-11-1955 minLabor History TodayUnder the Iron Heel: Repressing the IWW and free speechYesterday, the IWW -- the Industrial Workers of the World -- hosted a dedication ceremony for a new monument in Centralia, Washington. The Centralia Tragedy, also known as the Centralia Conspiracy and the Armistice Day Riot, was a violent and bloody incident that occurred in Centralia on November 11, 1919, during a parade celebrating the first anniversary of Armistice Day. The conflict between the American Legion and the IWW members resulted in six deaths, others being wounded, multiple prison terms, and an ongoing and especially bitter dispute over the motivations and events that precipitated the conflict. Both Centralia and the neighboring...2023-11-121h 06Labor History TodayHow matchgirls sparked the British labour movementLHT’s Chris Garlock tours the East London site of the 1888 Matchgirls Strike with Union Dues podcast host Simon Sapper.
On this week’s Labor History in 2:00: Birth of populist Will Rogers.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor History Today, email us at LaborHistoryToday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is produced by the Labor Heritage Foundation and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor.
#LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @GeorgetownKILWP #LaborHistory @UMDMLA @ILLaborHistory @AFLCIO @StrikeHistory #LaborHistory @wrkclasshistory @DuesUnion
2023-11-0523 minLabor History TodayWho “Oppenheimer” left outThe summer blockbuster “Oppenheimer” generated a lot of interest in the history of how nuclear weapons were developed in the United States, but the film leaves out an important part of this history: the sacrifice made by tens of thousands of workers in the production of our country’s nuclear weapons arsenal.
Excerpted from the Heartland Labor Forum radio show.
To learn more about eligibility for benefits from the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act or to start a claim, click here or call toll-free 866-888-3322.
On this week’s Labor History in Two: The...2023-10-2930 minLabor History TodayThe Triangle Fire: A new memorial, and ”Scenes from a Prosecution”A talk with the writer, producer and director of Triangle: Scenes from a Prosecution, a new one-act dramatization of the criminal trial of the owners of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory following the 1911 fire that took 146 lives in New York City. Plus, music and poetry by Bev Grant and Joe Glazer.
The new Triangle Fire Memorial was unveiled and dedicated on October 11.
On this week’s Labor History in Two: the year was 1983. That was the day that musician Merle Travis died.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be...2023-10-2239 minLabor History TodayWeapons of the BossIn 1953 the International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU) established a set of ten guiding principles at its’ tenth biennial convention in San Francisco. This manifesto represents a fascinating historical document, a snapshot in time but also a roadmap, a statement of aspiration calling upon union members to look beyond internal conflicts derived from factionalism, prejudice, even tradition.
On today’s show, drawn from The Docker Podcast, Zack Pattin (ILWU Local 23) and Myka Dubay (ILWU Local 5 and ILWU International Executive Board) discuss their workshop at this year’s Young Workers Conference, “Weapons of the Boss: Racism and Anti-Trans Discrimi...2023-10-1541 min