The Woman Who Faced Down the Mob and Championed a Union

Min Matheson Brought Her Transformative Vision to an Unlikely Corner of America

Labor leader Min Lurye Matheson made her name facing down the mob. She arrived in Northeast Pennsylvania in 1944, dispatched by the International Ladies Garment Workers Union, or ILGWU, to organize the hard-pressed garment workers of the Wyoming Valley anthracite coal region. Here, in towns with deep mob roots such as Pittston, she soon observed first-hand “the system,” an election day practice in which women signed the polling roster but had their husbands cast their votes—all under the watchful eye of authorities controlled by Russell Bufalino, the gangster depicted in …

by Catherine Rios and David Witwer | October 21, 2020

Will COVID-19 Finally Convince Us to Do Better by Farmworkers?

The Current Crisis, and Longstanding Conditions, Argue for Enforcing Laws and Offering Better Protections—From Face Masks to Retirement Accounts

by Jackie Mansky | April 15, 2020

In California, the COVID-19 shutdown coincided with the lettuce season in the small Fresno County town of Huron. Its mayor, Rey León, has since been struggling to convey shifting safety …

Why Don’t More Americans Remember the 1897 Massacre of Pennsylvania Coal Miners?

The Mostly Eastern European Victims Were Forgotten Because of an Ensuing Backlash Against Immigrant Workers

by Paul A. Shackel | March 14, 2019

At the western entrance of the coal patch town of Lattimer, in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, sits a rough-cut shale boulder, about 8 feet tall, surrounded by neatly trimmed bushes. A …

The 19th Century Labor Movement That Brought Black and White Arkansans Together

In 1888, Small Farmers, Sharecroppers, and Industrial Workers Organized to Fight Inequality

by Matthew Hild | February 28, 2019

Today, when Americans think about the tradition of political protest to protect democracy, they often recall the mid-20th century, when millions of Americans participated in the civil rights movement and …

How the South Made Hubert Humphrey Care About Race

The Minnesota Liberal’s Louisiana School Years Turned His ‘Abstract Commitment’ to Civil Rights Into ‘Flesh and Blood’

by Arnold A. Offner | July 26, 2018

It is one of the great ironies of 20th-century American history: Hubert Humphrey, the foremost proponent of civil rights among American politicians, had little contact with African Americans until age …

labor rights