On January 14, 1895, trolley workers in Brooklyn walk off the job. The largest and most violent strike in Brooklyn’s history to that point, it was in many ways a typical story of the Gilded Age
On January 13, 1966, the New York City transit strike ended. This strike was notable both for the public sector unions putting newly elected New York Mayor John Lindsay in his place and in being the e
On January 3, 1931, farmers converged on England, Arkansas to demand poverty relief. This led to Will Rogers’ poverty tour and a greater national conversation about conditions in rural America i
On December 12, 1957, the AFL-CIO evicted four unions from the federation for corruption, most notably the International Brotherhood of Teamsters. This moment to fight the corruption that gave organiz
On December 1, 1868, a young black former Union soldier named John Henry was among a group of convicts sent from Richmond to West Virginia to blast a railroad tunnel, where he would soon die. Everyone
On November 28, 1901, a strike among Cuban cigar workers in Tampa, Florida collapsed after workers inspired by the Cuban revolutionary Jose Martí sought to create a cross-racial organization to resis
On September 29, 1962, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference announced Operation Breadbasket, a boycott campaign against companies that refused to hire African-Americans. This was part of the l
On October 26, 1924, the first of five workers died in less than a week at Standard Oil’s Bayway TEL works from lead exposure in making leaded gasoline. Lead has been part of human economic activity