Going Back to Blair Mountain

The Largest Armed Labor Uprising in American History Is Finally Getting the Remembrance It Deserves

For most people, the memory of the largest armed labor uprising in American history is unknown, buried beneath the dirt of West Virginia’s Blair Mountain alongside bullet casings and relics of coal camp life. In miners’ families, the stories stayed alive, passed down around kitchen tables and on front porches. But until the 21st century, there were no monuments, museums, or markers of the West Virginia mine wars, a seminal American story of how labor unions came to be.

In late August 1921, some 15,000 mineworkers and allies banded together across …

The Valley’s Last Camaro | Zocalo Public Square • Arizona State University • Smithsonian

The Valley’s Last Camaro

In 1992, General Motors Shuttered Its Van Nuys Plant—But Not Before Union Workers Left Their Mark on the Final Car They Produced

Improbably, the best monument to the old General Motors assembly plant in Van Nuys, California, sits in a garage in Jamestown, North Dakota—the final car produced at the facility that …

How Latin America Built L.A.

Excavating the Century of Economic Domination Beneath the 2022 Summit of the Americas

Los Angeles is just the second U.S. city to host the Summit of the Americas, which brings together political leaders, civil society organizations, and business executives from North, South, and …

The 1970s Beer Boycott Inspiring Amazon Organizers Today

Over the Course of a Decade, a Diverse Bay Area Coalition Convinced Coors to Change Its Employment Practices

In 1973, San Francisco beer delivery drivers were at odds with local beer distributors over low wages, union-busting efforts, and employment discrimination. Distributors of the Colorado-based Coors Brewing Company were …

Meet the ‘Mediators’ Who Connect Scientists and the Public | Zocalo Public Square • Arizona State University • Smithsonian

Meet the ‘Mediators’ Who Connect Scientists and the Public

Fossil Preparators Are a Panacea to a Closed-Off Field—And Their Work Offers a New Model for Research

How do colossal Tyrannosaurus rex and Triceratops fossils get from the ground to the natural history museum? And could that process—which involves not just paleontologists but a largely uncredited group …

How ‘Automation’ Made America Work Harder | Zocalo Public Square • Arizona State University • Smithsonian

How ‘Automation’ Made America Work Harder

Computers Were Supposed to Reduce Office Labor. They Accomplished the Opposite

The world confronts “an epochal transition.” Or so the consulting firm McKinsey and Company crowed in 2018, in an article accompanying a glossy 141-page report on the automation revolution. Over …