April 11
Ford Motor Company signs first contract with United Auto Workers - 1941
Jackie Robinson, first Black ballplayer hired by a major league team, plays his first game with the Brooklyn Dodgers at Ebbetts Field - 1947
United Mine Workers President W. A. "Tony" Boyle is found guilty of first-degree murder, for ordering the 1969 assassination of union reformer Joseph A. "Jock" Yablonski. Yablonski, his wife and daughter were murdered on December 30, 1969. Boyle had defeated Yablonski in the UMW election earlier in the year—an election marred by intimidation and vote fraud. That election was set aside and a later vote was won by reformer Arnold Miller - 1974
Some 34,000 New York City Transit Authority workers, eleven days into a strike for higher wages, end their walkout with agreement on a 9-percent increase in the first year and 8 percent in the second, along with cost-of-living protections - 1980
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission issues regulations prohibiting sexual harassment of 
workers by supervisors in the workplace - 1980
Police in Austin, Minn., tear-gas striking Hormel meatpacking workers. Seventeen strikers are arrested on felony riot charges - 1986
Some 25,000 marchers in Watsonville, Calif., show support for United Farm Workers organizing campaign among strawberry workers, others - 1997
(Farmworker’s Friend: The story of Cesar Chavez is a thoughtful and moving book about the inspiring life of the founder and long-time leader of the United Farm Workers of America. This sympathetic portrayal of Chavez and his life’s work begins with his childhood, starting from the time his family’s store in Arizona failed during the Great Depression and his entire family was forced into the fields to harvest vegetables for a few cents an hour.)
More info & ammo for unionists is available
online from Union Communication Services.
New York Times Tech Guild Ends Strike, Continues Contract Fight
ZeniMax Video Game Workers Walk Off the Job in Maryland and Texas
