Labor History Today

This week on Labor History Today, we revisit the 1946 Oakland General Strike through the eyes of labor educator and activist Stan Weir — and uncover the surprising role a chart-topping “country” hit played on the picket line. After we hear the day’s events from Labor History in 2:00, host Chris Garlock digs into Weir’s vivid account of the strike’s carnival-like atmosphere, where bars rolled jukeboxes into the streets and “Pistol Packin’ Mama” — the first country song ever to top the Billboard pop chart — echoed off downtown buildings for 54 hours. We trace how an American Federation of Musicians strike helped turn the tune into a national sensation, and why its defiant energy resonated with the mostly women department-store strikers who ignited the Oakland uprising. 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. #LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @GeorgetownKILWP #LaborHistory @ILLaborHistory @AFLCIO @StrikeHistory #LaborHistory @wrkclasshistory  

This week on Labor History Today, we’re marking the 50th anniversary of the Walter P. Reuther Library building at Wayne State University with a special episode from our friends at Tales from the Reuther Library. Hosts Dan Golodner and Troy Eller English revisit the origins of one of the nation’s premier labor archives, sharing stories from its early days and reflecting on why preserving labor history remains vital in a moment of renewed attacks on worker rights. As part of the celebration, they sit down with Sara Nelson, president of the Association of Flight Attendants, whose union recently placed its records with the Reuther. Nelson discusses the history and evolution of the flight attendant profession, the fights that shaped it, and why knowing our past is essential to winning today’s battles. Plus, on Labor History in 2:00: the 2012 walkout by more than 100 New York City fast food workers that helped spark a movement. A NOTE TO OUR LISTENERS: Recently we passed the 100,000-download mark here at Labor History Today. Now, we don’t pay a whole lot of attention to metrics and all that sort of stuff; we don’t have sponsors and we’ve been putting the show together every week since 2017 because – like Sara Nelson – we believe that the key to the future of working people and their unions lies in knowing about our past struggles. Still, it’s nice to know that so many of you are listening out there; so here’s a promise: you keep listening and we’ll keep putting out the show. And if you get a chance, share the show with a colleague, friend or family and what the hell, let’s rack up another hundred thousand downloads even quicker! 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. @ReutherLibrary @FlyingWithSara #LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @GeorgetownKILWP #LaborHistory @UMDMLA @ILLaborHistory @AFLCIO @StrikeHistory #LaborHistory @wrkclasshistory  

On this week’s Labor History Today: We turn up the “today” in Labor History Today with a special edition focused on the historic, open-ended strike now underway at Starbucks. Nearly 2,000 union baristas at 95 stores in more than 65 cities have walked out — the boldest action yet in the Red Cup Rebellion — and we bring you the Labor Radio Podcast Weekly’s roundup of how shows across the network are covering this fast-moving struggle. Hear frontline voices from Working People, Work Stoppage, We Rise Fighting, Labor Notes, and WBAI’s What’s Going On as baristas, organizers, and labor reporters break down understaffing, impossible time standards, corporate cup-writing mandates, community solidarity, and why workers are calling for a nationwide Starbucks boycott. Plus: a brand-new strike song from veteran labor troubadour David Rovics, and — at the end — a little bonus from the Labor Radio Podcast Weekly crew. No contract, no coffee. Tune in. 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. @WorkingPod @WorkStoppagePod @LaborNotes @stucknation#LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @GeorgetownKILWP #LaborHistory @UMDMLA @ILLaborHistory @AFLCIO @StrikeHistory #LaborHistory @wrkclasshistory  

Historian and former UAW organizer Rudi Batzell joins America’s Workforce Union Podcast to explain how the failure of land reform after slavery — and employers’ use of racial division and strikebreaking — shaped the early U.S. labor movement. From “40 acres and a mule” to the CIO, Batzell shows how race and class remain inseparable in American labor history. And on Labor History in 2:00: Justice for Janitors. 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. #LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @GeorgetownKILWP #LaborHistory @UMDMLA @ILLaborHistory @AFLCIO @StrikeHistory #LaborHistory @wrkclasshistory  

On today’s Labor Radio Podcast Daily: Organising for a Change digs into the reform vote and the real fight ahead for labor. In labor history, on this date in 1919, a deadly clash between American Legionnaires and Wobblies erupted during the Armistice Day Parade in Centralia, Washington. Quote of the day: Eugene Victor Debs. @wpfwdc @AFLCIO #1u #UnionStrong #LaborRadioPod Proud founding member of the Labor Radio Podcast Network

On this week’s Labor History Today: U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders accepts the 60th annual Eugene V. Debs Award from the Eugene V. Debs Foundation in Terre Haute, Indiana — and pays tribute to the labor legend not as a figure of the past, but as an inspiration for the struggles of today. From the Pullman Strike to the Atlanta Federal Penitentiary, from Debs’ call for human kinship — “while there is a soul in prison, I am not free” — to Sanders’ warning about today’s billionaire class, this episode connects the struggles of the past to the movements of the present. Plus, music by The Local Honeys, who performed at the Debs dinner, and Labor History in 2:00 remembers Debs. 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. #LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @GeorgetownKILWP #LaborHistory @UMDMLA @ILLaborHistory @AFLCIO @StrikeHistory #LaborHistory @wrkclasshistory  

On this week’s Labor History Today: Our friends at America’s Workforce mark Halloween with a chillingly real tale — the untold story of John Henry and his lasting legacy on labor. Host Ed “Flash” Ferenc talks with historian Scott Nelson of the University of Georgia, author of Steel Drivin’ Man: John Henry, the Untold Story of an American Legend. Nelson uncovers the truth behind the legend of John Henry — a 19-year-old Black convict laborer who died driving steel in a Virginia railroad tunnel — and how his story still echoes through labor history. Plus: Labor History in Two! on the 1835 Philadelphia general strike for the ten-hour day. 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. #LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @GeorgetownKILWP #LaborHistory @UMDMLA @ILLaborHistory @AFLCIO @StrikeHistory #LaborHistory @wrkclasshistory

On Labor History Today: In 2005 the Guinness Brewery at Park Royal, West London closed after seven decades of production. Tim Strangleman spent the last six months of the Brewery’s life working with a photographer to record in words and picture the site before it closed. Subsequent research revealed an incredibly rich story of corporate cultural change and the transformation of work and the workplace. Drawing on material from his 2019 book, Voices of Guinness: An Oral History of the Park Royal Brewery, Strangleman, Professor of Sociology, in the School of Social Policy, Sociology and Social Research, University of Kent, Canterbury, reflects on what that story tells us about work meaning, identity and organizational life in the second decade of the twenty-first century. Our show – which originally aired on October 24, 2021 -- is excerpted from Strangleman’s Zoom presentation at the October 5, 2021 edition of Our Daily Work/Our Daily Lives, the lecture series sponsored by the Michigan Traditional Arts Program and the Labor Education Program at Michigan State University. To get on the ODW/ODL email list email John Beck at mailto:beckj@msu.edu Click here for photos of the Park Royal Guinness Brewery.   And, on Labor History in 2:00, the year was 1940; that was the day that the federally mandated 40-hour work week went into effect for U.S. workers. Produced by Chris Garlock. To contribute a labor history item, email laborhistorytoday@gmail.com Labor History Today is produced by the Labor Heritage Foundation and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor at Georgetown University. #LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @GeorgetownKILWP #LaborHistory @UMDMLA @ILLaborHistory @AFLCIO @MichiganTradArts @MSUSHRLR @DIndustrialKent @SSPSSR @OxUniPress

On this week’s Labor History Today: Justice Denied: David Gariff on “Ben Shahn and the Case of Sacco and Vanzetti.” Saul Schniderman remembers musician activist Elaine Purkey. From the Tales from the Reuther Library podcast, “When It Happened Here: Michigan and the Transnational Development of American Fascism.” And, on Labor History in 2: Paul Robeson, “The Voice of an Era.” Originally aired October 18, 2020; produced and edited by Chris Garlock and Evan Papp. To contribute a labor history item, email laborhistorytoday@gmail.com Labor History Today is produced by the Labor Heritage Foundation and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor at Georgetown University. We're a proud founding member of the Labor Radio Podcast Network; #LaborRadioPod

On this week’s Labor History Today: A visit to the Donora Smog Museum, where a six-day inversion in 1948 trapped toxic fumes over a Pennsylvania mill town and changed how the U.S. thinks about work, health, and accountability. And, on Labor History in 2:00: The Mother Jones Monument is Dedicated. 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. #LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @GeorgetownKILWP #LaborHistory @UMDMLA @ILLaborHistory @AFLCIO @StrikeHistory #LaborHistory @wrkclasshistory  

On this week's Labor History Today: Mary Kenney O’Sullivan, first AFL woman organizer; novelist Jack London’s classic definition of a scab; Southern Tenant Farmers’ Union leads Missouri Highway sit-down; Roosevelt creates National War Labor Board to mediate labor disputes during World War II. Today’s show is an encore of our January 7-13, 2018 and features labor historians Joe McCartin and Leon Fink. 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. #LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @GeorgetownKILWP #LaborHistory @UMDMLA @ILLaborHistory @AFLCIO @StrikeHistory #LaborHistory @wrkclasshistory  

This week on Labor History Today: From the 2025 Camp Solidarity, West Virginia Mine Wars Museum co-founder Wilma Steele unpacks the red bandana—tracing its paisley roots from Persia to Appalachia—and how a scrap of cloth became labor’s emblem of courage, memory, and solidarity. And, on Labor History in 2:00: The Uprising of the 20,000. 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. #MineWars #LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @GeorgetownKILWP #LaborHistory @ILLaborHistory @AFLCIO @StrikeHistory #LaborHistory @wrkclasshistory  

On this week’s Labor History Today: From Camp Solidarity in Matewan, West Virginia—the heart of the legendary Mine Wars—UMWA President Cecil Roberts reflects on the long struggle of coal miners to claim America’s promise that “this land belongs to all of us.” On the eve of his retirement, Roberts’ words connect today’s fights for justice with a century of labor history rooted in the hollers of Appalachia. 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. #LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @GeorgetownKILWP #LaborHistory @UMDMLA @ILLaborHistory @AFLCIO @StrikeHistory #LaborHistory @wrkclasshistory  

This week on Labor History Today, labor historian Joseph McCartin joins Chris Garlock to unpack his recent congressional testimony on unions, antisemitism, and the long fight for solidarity. From the labor movement’s diverse roots to employers’ historic use of antisemitic attacks to weaken unions, McCartin offers critical perspective on the dangers of rewriting history and why today’s struggles echo the past. 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. #LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @GeorgetownKILWP #LaborHistory @UMDMLA @ILLaborHistory @AFLCIO @StrikeHistory #LaborHistory @wrkclasshistory  

On this week’s Labor History Today: Activist and artist Austin Sauerbrei talks about his debut graphic novel Trouble! at Coal Creek, which brings to life the 1890s miners’ uprising in Tennessee, where striking workers and Black prisoners found common cause against exploitation. It’s a moving call for solidarity, told in powerful words and images. Austin talked with our colleague Robert Lindgren, who hosts and produces Labor Exchange, the excellent radio show that airs weekly on KGNU Community Radio in Boulder, Colorado. 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. @aflbobby #LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @GeorgetownKILWP #LaborHistory @UMDMLA @ILLaborHistory @AFLCIO @StrikeHistory #LaborHistory @wrkclasshistory  

On this week’s Labor History Today: Historian Dr. Jeffrey Johnson tells the story of the 1916 San Francisco Preparedness Day bombing and the infamous frame-up of labor leader Tom Mooney, who spent more than two decades behind bars before his eventual release and pardon. Recorded live at the 9th Annual Reuther-Pollock Labor History Symposium, Johnson explores how xenophobia, anti-labor fervor, and miscarriages of justice from a century ago still echo loudly today. Plus, on Labor History in 2:00: The Battle of Blair Mountain. 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. #LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @GeorgetownKILWP #LaborHistory @UMDMLA @ILLaborHistory @AFLCIO @StrikeHistory #LaborHistory @wrkclasshistory  

This week on Labor History Today: the Solidarity Forever podcast explores how enslaved Black laborers resisted and strategized before the Civil War. At a time when the President attacks the Smithsonian for “focusing too much on slavery,” we’re keeping the people’s history—our history—alive. 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. Music: I Be So Glad... When The Sun Goes Down (Ed Lewis) & Oh Freedom! (The Golden Gospel Singers) #LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @GeorgetownKILWP #LaborHistory @UMDMLA @ILLaborHistory @AFLCIO @StrikeHistory #LaborHistory @wrkclasshistory  

On this week’s Labor History Today, scholar and creator Shana L. Redmond sits down with Naomi R Williams, Assistant Professor of Labor Studies and Employment Relations at Rutgers University, to discuss Williams' new book A Blueprint for Worker Solidarity: Class Politics and Community in Wisconsin. Williams takes us into the history of Racine, Wisconsin — a small industrial city where, in the 1970s and 80s, workers built cross-racial, cross-sector alliances that transformed their community. From “total person unionism” to coalitions linking labor, civil rights, and women’s movements, Racine’s story offers a powerful blueprint for building democracy and justice today. NOTE: This conversation is excerpted from a longer version on the Labor Heritage Power Hour, available on all podcast platforms. This episode also features John Lewis Says Freedom, a brand-new song from musical storyteller and political satirist Charlie King. And, on Labor History in Two: A Little Security for Workers. 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. #LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @GeorgetownKILWP #LaborHistory @UMDMLA @ILLaborHistory @AFLCIO @StrikeHistory #LaborHistory @wrkclasshistory  

This week on Labor History Today: From Nixon’s “hard hat” protest to reform battles inside the Steelworkers, from Philly’s once-every-40-years sanitation strikes to the enduring call of the Delano grape boycott — we explore how workers have fought, organized, and reshaped history. Today’s show features excerpts from America’s Workforce Radio, Tales from the Reuther Library, The Labor Jawn, Solidarity Works, and The Rick Smith Show’s Labor History in 2:00. Plus: a 1922 railroad walkout that rattled the steel industry.

On this week’s Labor History Today, we feature the Tales from the Ruther Library podcast, where Dan Golodner talks with historian Dr. Justine Modica about the history of childcare labor in the U.S. and the “Worthy Wage” movement that emerged in Seattle in the 1990s. Plus: in labor history, striking Teamsters in 1934 Minneapolis defy martial law. Hosted by Patrick Dixon. 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. #LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @GeorgetownKILWP #LaborHistory @UMDMLA @ILLaborHistory @AFLCIO @StrikeHistory #LaborHistory @wrkclasshistory