Over the last two years, the City of Fayetteville, Arkansas, working with the University of Arkansas Humanities Center, has erected a historical marker, renamed a major street, and sponsored a public mural to honor Nelson Hackett, an enslaved worker who
This is one of a small number of postings from the LAWCHA 2025 conference panels. If you have a summary from the conference, we’d be glad to add it.The “Workers and the U.S. Civil War” panel explored various experiences of
We have a few brief summaries of panels and papers from the Labor and Working Class History Association conference, June 2025. Mark Kagan sent his presentation in full from the session on Ruptures in Union Politics and Labor Relations in
This is one of a few brief summaries of panels and papers from the Labor and Working Class History Association conference, June 2025. If you have a comment or summary of a panel or event from LAWCHA2025, send it on
The Hollywood Movie Norma Rae defined working class women’s experiences in the wake of neoliberalism. The film launched Sally Field into a cultural icon, but according to Aimee Loiselle’s new book, it warped the labor history that was the base
On June 17, 2025, an official Illinois historical marker that highlights the experiences and activism of Black coal miners in Illinois was dedicated at the Springfield Transportation Hub, on the southwest corner of 11th and Washington streets in Springfield, Illinois.
Back By Robyn MuncyProfessor of History, University of Maryland, College Park Between the 1870s and 1920s, American women increasingly entered the paid laborforce. They did so overwhelmingly because of economic need, and they were able to do so because the US
In his recent executive order on “Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History,” President Donald Trump criticized historians for “replacing objective facts with a distorted narrative driven by ideology rather than truth.” In a subsequent order he called for the elimination
Dana Frank’s What Can We Learn From the Great Depression: Stories of Ordinary People & Collective Action in Hard Times shares four Great Depression episodes that dramatically and poignantly show how ordinary working people responded to the ongoing crisis by
“When the union’s inspiration through the workers’ blood shall run,There can be no power greater anywhere beneath the sun;Yet what force on earth is weaker than the feeble strength of one,But the union makes us strong.Solidarity forever!