Tag: workers rights
Doctors Said Coal Miners’ Lungs Were Black and Their Wages Too Low to Live On
At the turn of the 20th century, coal mining was not merely dangerous work. For many miners, it was a job that slowly destroyed the…
Chicago Mayor Threatened to Call Out Troops as 1905 Strike Spread
Chicago stood on the edge of a wider labor conflict in the spring of 1905 as striking teamsters, determined employers, imported strikebreakers, and hundreds of…
Kansas Coal Miners Call for Strike When Company Threatens Fines for Failure to Work on Saturdays
It was the summer of 1920, and the coal fields of southeastern Kansas stood on the brink of another labor showdown. Less than a year…
San Francisco Streetcar Strike Remains Deadlocked
San Francisco’s street railroad strike showed no sign of ending in May 1907, despite efforts by a citizens’ committee to bring both sides to the…
Swiss Troops Use Machine Guns on Strikers
In the summer of 1919, Switzerland was caught in the same unrest shaking much of the postwar world. Rising prices, labor anger, and fear of…
Troopers Use Riot Clubs in McKees Rocks Strike
In the summer of 1909, the strike at the Pressed Steel Car Company in McKees Rocks, Pennsylvania, had become a scene of hunger, fear, and…
Midnight Train Carries Soldiers to Coal Strike
In the autumn of 1919, the nation’s coal fields were tense. Across the country, miners were demanding better wages, shorter hours, and safer working conditions….
Police Clubs Fell on Lawrence Textile Strikers
In the fall of 1912, the textile city of Lawrence, Massachusetts, was still raw from one of the most famous labor uprisings in American history:…
