Labor History Today

The Memphis Fire Fighter Strike of 1978

On July 2, 1978, fire fighters in Memphis went out on strike, one of several groups of fire fighters across the country who struck that year. On today’s show – which originally aired on the IAFF Podcast, from the International Association of Fire Fighters – two Memphis fire fighters tell the story of the conditions that led up to the strike, the obstacles they faced on the job and how fire fighters in Memphis reached their boiling point and walked off the job not once but twice in the summer of 1978.And on this week’s Labor History in 2:00…The year was 1930. That was the day some 1300 labor radicals and Communist Party supporters assembled in Chicago to establish The National Unemployed Council. 
Produced by Chris Garlock. To contribute a labor history item, email laborhistorytoday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is produced by the Metro Washington Council’s Union City Radio and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor at Georgetown University.
#LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @GeorgetownKILWP #LaborHistory @UMDMLA @IAFFNewsDesk @ILLaborHistory

Marvel Cooke, a Journalist for Working People

Marvel Cooke, a groundbreaking Black woman journalist who reported on labor in the 1940s and organized a union with the Newspaper Guild in the 1930s, is one of countless storytellers nearly forgotten by history because they were too radical. Lewis Raven Wallace brings us this report from The View from Somewhere: A Podcast About Journalism With A Purpose, which features stories of marginalized and oppressed people who have shaped journalism in the U.S. The podcast focuses on the troubled history of “objectivity” and how it has been used to gatekeep and exclude people of color, queer and trans people, and people organizing for their labor rights and communities.
Also this week: In June of 1990, hundreds of striking janitors and supporters peacefully demonstrated in Century City, Los Angeles. Police in riot gear attacked, injuring hundreds of people. The violent encounter -- which became known as The Battle of Century City -- would mark a turning point in the janitors' fight for justice. Check out the video here.
On this week’s Labor History in 2:00: Milwaukee transit workers join the ‘34 strike wave.
Produced by Chris Garlock. To contribute a labor history item, email laborhistorytoday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is produced by the Metro Washington Council’s Union City Radio and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor at Georgetown University.
#LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @GeorgetownKILWP #LaborHistory @UMDMLA @LewisPants

LHT Archives: Why America’s most radical union shut down ports on Juneteenth

NOTE: This show was originally released on June 28, 2020“The origin of the word strike goes back to the port of London in 1768, when dock workers and sailors struck. When sailors stop work, they take down the sails of their ship and that's called, nautically, striking your sail. And that term becomes the de facto word for all work stoppages.”Peter Cole, professor of history at Western Illinois University and author of two books on dockworkers, Wobblies on the Waterfront and Dockworker Power: Race and Activism in Durban and the San Francisco Bay Area, talks with Ben Blake and Alan Wierdak about the historic Juneteenth strike by dockworkers this year, and the long history of dockworker activism.
Plus, Arlo Guthrie sings “The Ballad of Harry Bridges” and Elise Bryant reads “Ready To Kill,” Carl Sandburg’s poem about who should be memorialized in our statues.
Produced by Chris Garlock. Alan Wierdak (George Meany Archives) produced the Peter Cole interview. To contribute a labor history item, email laborhistorytoday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is produced by the Metro Washington Council’s Union City Radio and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor at Georgetown University.
Links:The Most Radical Union in the U.S. Is Shutting Down the Ports on Juneteenth (In These Times, June 16, 2020)Your Rights At Work radio show (WPFW 89.3FM)Labor Heritage FoundationArlo Guthrie: The Ballad of Harry Bridges
#LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @GeorgetownKILWP #LaborHistory @UMDMLA

LHT Archives: Debs on capitalism; Dudzic on the Labor Party

NOTE: This show was originally released on June 10, 2018.Union City's Chris Garlock hosts, with Joe McCartin, Julie Greene and Ben Blake.
This week's labor history: Joe, Ben and Julie discuss Eugene Debs, railroad union leader and socialist. He founded the American Railway Union on June 13, 1893, and on June 16, 1918, Debs spoke out on the relationship between capitalism and war; 10 days later he was arrested and eventually sentenced to 10 years in jail.PLUS: Patrick Dixon interviews Mark Dudzic on the founding of the Labor Party in the U.S. and this week’s Labor History Object of the Week is an AFL-CIO letter boycotting Nazi Germany, part of the exhibit “For Liberty, Justice, And Equality: Unions Making History In America” at the George Meany Labor Archives at the University of Maryland College Park campus.
This week’s labor music is “Uncle Sam Goddamn” by Brother Ali.Check out his video here: youtu.be/46l236O7Iv8
Joe McCartin is professor of history at Georgetown University and Executive Director of the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor.Julie Greene is a historian of United States labor, immigration, and empire; she teaches at the University of Maryland. She is the author of The Canal Builders: Making America's Empire at the Panama Canal (Penguin Press, 2009).Ben Blake works at the University of Maryland, where he’s a labor archivist at the George Meany Labor Archives.Chris Garlock, Union Cities Coordinator for the Metro Washington AFL-CIO, hosts Union City Radio on WPFW 89.3FM.
Questions, comments or suggestions welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor History Today, email us at LaborHistoryToday@gmail.comLabor History Today is produced by Union City Radio and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor. Engineered by Chris Garlock.Labor history sources include Today in Labor History, from Union Communication Services unionist.com/
#LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @GeorgetownKILWP #LaborHistory @UMDMLA

LHT Archives: Painters join Black Lives Matter protests; the history of black police in America; Race and Rebellion

NOTE: This show was originally released on June 14, 2020.“We're sick and tired of being left out. We're sick and tired of not being heard. And we're sick and tired of our communities, where we live and work, are not being heard.”That’s Ken Rigmaiden, president of the Painters union. Our Cool Things at the Meany Archive team caught up with him last Monday when the Painters joined the Black Lives Matters protests in downtown Washington, DC…
“I'll be frank with you, I've watched police behavior and reform and policies over time. It's been sort of a surprising, shocking that many of the police departments have sort of reverted to tactics, you know, that mirrored or that represented how police operated before African American mayors and before African-Americans became police chiefs and police commissioners.”W. Marvin Dulaney, emeritus professor of history at the University of Texas Arlington and the author of Black Police in America talks with LHT’s Patrick Dixon about the history of black police in America.            “Just the fact that they've devoted so much space to trying to explain how we got here I think sort of validates the idea that you really need to understand the past to understand what's happening in the present.”Archivist Megan Courtney talks about the 1968 Kerner Commission Report with Dan Golodner and Troy Eller English in their podcast Tales from the Reuther Archive…
That’s all on this week’s Labor History Today, along with a song from the R.J. Phillips Band recorded three years ago for the families who have lost loved ones as a result of police brutality. And, on Labor History in 2, we hear about a miner shot dead trying to organize.
Produced by Chris Garlock. Patrick Dixon produced and edited the W. Marvin Dulaney interview; Alan Wierdak produces Cool Things from the Meany Archives. To contribute a labor history item, email laborhistorytoday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is produced by the Metro Washington Council’s Union City Radio and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor at Georgetown University. We're a proud founding member of the Labor Radio Podcast Network, more than 100 shows focusing on working people’s issues and concerns. 
#LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @ILLaborHistory @RickSmithShow @GeorgetownKILWP #LaborHistory @UMDMLA @GoIUPAT
Links:Tales from the Reuther Archive
Labor History in 2

The 1913 Dublin Lock-out

Irish historian John Dorney discussed the 1913 Dublin Lock-out at a recent meeting of the NoVA Labor Book Club. The Dublin lock-out was a major industrial dispute between approximately 20,000 workers and 300 employers which took place in Ireland's capital city of Dublin. Often viewed as the most significant industrial dispute in Irish history, the dispute lasted from August 26, 1913 to January 18, 1914. The central issue was the workers' right to unionize.Dorney – whose father led the Irish Teachers' Union for 25 years -- is the author of "The Civil War in Dublin" and "Peace After the Final Battle - The Story of the Irish Revolution."Music: 1913 Lockout by musicians Don Baker & Gerry Hendrick On today’s Labor History in 2: The year was 1937. That was the day known as among the darkest days for Labor, the Memorial Day Massacre.To contribute a labor history item, email laborhistorytoday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is produced by the Metro Washington Council’s Union City Radio and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor at Georgetown University. We're a proud founding member of the Labor Radio Podcast Network, more than 100 shows focusing on working people’s issues and concerns. #LaborRadioPod
#LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @ILLaborHistory @RickSmithShow @GeorgetownKILWP #LaborHistory @va_labor Edited/produced by Chris Garlock and Patrick Dixon; social media guru: Harold Phillips

Shootout in Matewan; General strike in KC

On May 19, 1920, a deadly shootout took place in Matewan, West Virginia between striking union miners and coal company agents; Record West Virginia launched their show last year with a retelling of this famous battle. And just two years earlier, a general strike took place in Kansas City, sparked by solidarity between black and white women workers. The Heartland Labor Forum’s Judy Ancel brings us the story of this important but little-known moment in labor history.On today’s Labor History in 2: The year was 1934. That was the day the Lucas County Sheriff ordered an attack on thousands of Electric Auto-Lite strikers and Unemployed League supporters, touching off the six-day Battle of Toledo.To contribute a labor history item, email laborhistorytoday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is produced by the Metro Washington Council’s Union City Radio and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor at Georgetown University. We're a proud founding member of the Labor Radio Podcast Network, more than 100 shows focusing on working people’s issues and concerns. #LaborRadioPod
#LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @ILLaborHistory @RickSmithShow @GeorgetownKILWP #LaborHistory @RecordWV @Heartland_Labor Edited/produced by Chris Garlock and Patrick Dixon; social media guru: Harold Phillips

Passaic textile strike & LAWCHA preview

This year marks the 95th anniversary of the 1926 textile strike in Passaic,  New Jersey, when some 15,000 unskilled wool workers -- mostly immigrants and half of them women -- struck for more than a year for higher wages and better conditions. We talk about the strike and its relevance to today’s struggles with Jacob Zumoff, author of The Red Thread, the first comprehensive study of this historic strike.This Friday, the biennial conference of LAWCHA – The Labor And Working Class History Association – kicks off. It’s being held online, making it available to labor history fans around the world. The theme this year is “Workers on the Front Lines”; LHT’s Patrick Dixon gets a preview from conference co-chair Peter Cole.
On today’s Labor History in 2: The year was 1934. That was the day Minneapolis Teamsters walked off the job.To contribute a labor history item, email laborhistorytoday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is produced by the Metro Washington Council’s Union City Radio and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor at Georgetown University. We're a proud founding member of the Labor Radio Podcast Network, more than 100 shows focusing on working people’s issues and concerns. #LaborRadioPod
#LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @ILLaborHistory @RickSmithShow @GeorgetownKILWP #LaborHistory @LAWCHA_ORG #LAWCHA2021 @LaborOnline @RutgersUPress @ProfPeterColeEdited/produced by Chris Garlock and Patrick Dixon; social media guru: Harold Phillips