News

March 6

06 Mar, 2011

The Knights of Labor picket to protest the practices of the Southwestern Railroad system, and the company's chief, high-flying Wall Street financier
Jay Gould. Some 9,000 workers walked off the job, halting service on 5,000 miles of track. The workers held out for two months, many suffering from
hunger, before they finally returned to work - 1886

Joe Hill’s song “There Is Power In A Union” appears in “Little Red Song Book” - 1913

With the Great Depression underway, hundreds of thousands of unemployed workers demonstrated in some 30 cities and towns; close to 100,000 filled
Union Square in New York City and were attacked by mounted police - 1930

International Brotherhood of Paper Makers merges with United Paperworkers of America to become United Papermakers & Paperworkers - 1957

The federal Coal Mine Health and Safety Act is enacted - 1970

Predominantly young workers at a Lordstown, Ohio GM assembly plant stage a wildcat strike, largely in objection to the grueling workpace: at 101.6 cars
per hour, their assembly line was believed to be the fastest in the world - 1972

President Jimmy Carter invoked the Taft-Hartley law to halt the 1977-78 national contract strike by the United Mine Workers of America. The order
was ignored and Carter did little to enforce it. A settlement was reached in late March - 1978

The U.S. Dept. Of Labor reports that the nation’s unemployment rate soared to 8.1 percent in February, the highest since late 1983, as cost-cutting
employers slashed 651,000 jobs amid a deepening recession - 2009