A daily, pocket-sized history of America's working people, brought to you by The Rick Smith Show team.
Episodes
May 11, 2015
May 11, 2015
1 min
On this day in Labor History the year was 1894. It was the first day of the Pullman Strike.
May 10, 2015
May 10, 2015
May 10, 2015
2 min
On this day in Labor History the year was 1869. At 2:47 pm a one-word telegram was sent from Promontory Summit, Utah. The message read simply, “done.”
May 8, 2015
May 8, 2015
1 min
May 8, 2015
May 8, 2015
1 min
If you are a member of a union, how well do you know your union’s history? You might be surprised to find out how far back that history goes. Such is the case with the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen.
May 7, 2015
May 7, 2015
1 min
On this day in Labor History the year was 1937. That was the year that 400 black women who worked as tobacco stemmers walked off the job at I.N. Vaughn and Company in Richmond, VA.
May 7, 2015
May 7, 2015
1 min
On this day in Labor History the year was 1867. That was the day that shoemakers founded the labor union the Knights of St. Crispin, in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. St. Crispin is the patron saint of cobblers.
May 5, 2015
May 5, 2015
1 min
On this day in Labor History the year was 1852. It was the last day of a three-day convention held in Cincinnati, Ohio.
Printers who worked for newspapers and other publications from fourteen cities had converged to decide if they wanted to form a union.
May 4, 2015
May 4, 2015
1 min
On this day in Labor History the year was 1886. This was one of the most significant days in US labor history.
A mass meeting of workers was called for that night in Chicago’s Haymarket Square.
May 3, 2015
May 3, 2015
1 min
On this day in Labor History the year was 1886. A little after three o’clock on that Monday, in Chicago, radical labor activist and newspaper man August Spies climbed onto a box car to give a speech about the fight for the eight hour day.