Labor History Today

Life 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 History Today is produced by Union City Radio and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor.
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Mingo, Matewan and the Coal Wars of West Virginia

Jeff 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 Relations Association; today’s show features an excerpt from that talk.On this week’s Labor History in Two: the year was 1936. That was the day more rubber workers sat down in Akron, Ohio.  
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.
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The myth of “highly paid” Alabama auto workers

The Valley Labor Report reports.Today’s labor history: Striking Hollywood writers return to work.Today’s labor quote: Bill Fletcher Jr. @LaborReporters @BillFletcherJr @wpfwdc @AFLCIO #1u #UnionStrong #LaborRadioPod
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Art Shields: The People’s Scribe

Art 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 presented by the Abraham Lincoln Brigade Archives; you’ll find the whole talk here.On this week’s Labor History in Two: The year was 1926; on this day, labor leader Benjamin Gold began what became a general strike of all furriers in New York City.
photo: Art Shields, right, interviewing young people for an article in the Daily Worker in 1949. | Daily Worker / People’s World Archives | Tamiment Library
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.
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Saving "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 the Danbury Hatters case.
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.
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The lost Matchgirl Strike leader

Last 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 work to erect a statue for the matchgirls).Plus: Musician, poet, humanitarian and activist Pete Seeger died ten years ago, on January 27, 2014; the R.J. Phillips Band’s Joe DeFilippo sent us a musical tribute.
On this week’s Labor History in Two: the year was 1908. That was the day the United States Supreme Court ruled that bans on “yellow-dog” contracts were unconstitutional.
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.
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MLK at the AFL-CIO in 1961 (Encore)

Original airdate January 16, 2022On 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 civil rights movement.Until recently this speech only existed on a reel of tape in the Meany Labor Archives at the University of Maryland College Park, but for the 2022 AFL-CIO Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Civil and Human Rights Conference the AFL-CIO and the Archives digitized the speech and gave us permission to bring it to you here on Labor History Today. Labor historian Joe McCartin tells us how had King come to be there, the context for his quiet but powerful challenge to the American labor movement, and what that speech says to us now, 61 years later.Our other story today is the perfect follow-up to Dr. King’s speech; it’s about the fight by DC trash collector Marvin Fleming and his union, AFSCME, against job discrimination in the 1960’s.On this week’s Labor History in Two: Give Us Our Daily Bread (1898) and Standing Against Wage Theft (1915).
Questions, comments or suggestions 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 City Radio and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor.
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SEE ALSO:Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Speech to AFL-CIOExploring Dr. King’s Radical LegacyTrumka in Memphis: We’re Reaching for that MountaintopThis week's music: Ain't gonna let nobody turn me round (The Roots); Everybody's Got A Right To Live: Frederick Douglass Kirkpatrick & Jimmy Collier and The Soul Chance; Woke up this morning (The Freedom Singers).

Woody’s resolutions

Labor 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.  
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Labor History Today is produced by the Labor Heritage Foundation and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor.
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