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Welcome, Labor Notes Folks!
A very warm welcome to everyone who signed up for the LHF newsletter at this year's Labor Notes Conference and Great Labor Arts Exchange in Chicago. Whether you stopped by our table, attended a workshop, joined a singalong, checked out the banners, or simply scanned a QR code on a sticker, we're glad you're here.
The Labor Heritage Foundation celebrates and supports the art and culture of the labor movement—music, poetry, visual arts, theater, film, storytelling, history, and more. Each week, we publish a free newsletter packed with labor arts news, events, opportunities, and resources from around the country.
We invite you to explore our website, check out our labor arts calendar, listen to the Labor Heritage Power Hour radio show, and follow us on social media. And if you're creating labor art, organizing cultural programs, or know about an event we should share, we'd love to hear from you.
Thanks for joining us—and welcome to the community!
In solidarity,
Chris Garlock, Executive Director, Labor Heritage Foundation
| | THIS WEEK'S LABOR HERITAGE POWER HOUR RADIO SHOW
Art Is a Hammer to Shape the World
On this week’s Labor Heritage Power Hour, we bring you highlights from the 2026 Great Labor Arts Exchange at Labor Notes in Chicago. Our featured segment is Art Is a Hammer to Shape the World, a panel moderated by longtime union organizer and author Ken Grossinger (Art Works: How Organizers and Artists Are Creating a Better World Together) and featuring textile artist Tabitha Arnold, Puerto Rican labor organizer Edwin Morales, artist and organizer Josh MacPhee, and Labor Heritage Foundation board member and DC Labor Chorus director Elise Bryant. We also sample two of the new Labor Culture moments introduced at this year’s Great Labor Arts Exchange with Jordan Bridges of the New Orleans Workers Center for Racial Justice and singer-songwriter Joe Jencks, share the latest Labor arts news and more. | | |
LABOR ARTS NEWS BRIEFS
More Than 16,000 Sign SAG-AFTRA Letter Demanding Congress Pass NO FAKES Act: The performers union’s letter warns that deepfakes proliferating online risk putting “victims, performers, creators and consumers at risk and in danger” over unauthorized use cases in “scams, exploitation, false endorsements and the replacement of human performance itself.” Read more.
A+E Factual Studios Workers Win NLRB Election to Unionize with the Writers Guild of America East: With a 84 percent yes vote, the WGAE will officially represent these freelance creative professionals for the purpose of collective bargaining. Read more
Dark Horse Comics Agrees To Recognize Union: The announcement came one week after Local 7901 announced that 59 of the company’s 102 workers had signed a union petition. Read more.
Seattle Times Union Files ULP Over Bad-faith Bargaining: For three months, management has refused to produce an initial management wage proposal until all other economic issues are negotiated. Read more.
Editorial Workers at New York’s Schneps Media Launch Union: The union seeks to secure competitive wages, sustainable working conditions and strengthen the news organization’s mission. Read more.
Catapult Workers Collective Staff Win Union Election: Staff cited concerns around job security, wages and leadership transparency as core motivators for organizing. Read more.
WHAT WE’RE READING:
Labor Notes: From Cell to Cell, Jailed Minnesota Unionists Sang of Freedom
The Nation: The Troublemakers of the Labor Movement Are Still Fighting—and Winning
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LABOR VIDEOS OF THE WEEK
Juneteenth (above) — Written by Steve Jones and featured in Love Songs from the Liberation Wars: The 1940s Tobacco Workers Struggle, this song commemorates Juneteenth, the June 19, 1865 announcement in Galveston, Texas that enslaved people were free. Now a federal holiday, Juneteenth celebrates Black emancipation and honors the continuing struggle for freedom and justice. Concept by Steve Jones and Elise Bryant; video by Saul Schniderman.|
2026 Labor Notes Opening Night Procession (short version, below): Marching band, puppets & labor tapestries. Featuring the Clamor & Lace Noise Brigade, The Sunshine Puppeteers and Tabitha Arnold's working class tapestries, carried by the Labor Heritage Foundation Great Labor Arts Exchange team. Video by Chris Garlock
Got labor video? email us at info@laborheritage.org
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LABOR SONG OF THE WEEK
“Wade in the Water” (performed here by the Fisk Jubilee Singers) is one of the most enduring African American spirituals, rooted in the experiences of enslaved people and later embraced by civil rights and labor movements alike. Its themes of collective struggle, liberation, and perseverance have made it a powerful song for workers and organizers, reflecting a tradition in which music helps build solidarity, sustain courage, and inspire people to fight for a more just world.
Got a Labor song? Email us: info@laborheritage.org
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LABOR LANDMARK OF THE WEEK
The Samuel Gompers Memorial in Washington, D.C. honors the founder of the American Federation of Labor, whose leadership helped grow union membership from 50,000 to 3 million workers. Unveiled in 1933 and funded largely by AFL members, the monument celebrates Gompers' pivotal role in building the modern American labor movement.
Details on the LHF Labor Landmarks Map.
Want Labor landmarks like this one sent to your inbox every week? Sign up for our free newsletter!
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LABOR QUOTE OF THE WEEK
"When I got there I thought the Great War had started over again. Gas was flying all over the place and shots flying and flares going up and it was the first time I had ever seen anything like it in my life..."
— Union organizer who witnessed the Women’s Day Massacre on this date in 1937 (see Today’s Labor History, below); more labor quotes here.
Graphic: From a drawing by William Gropper who was visiting Youngstown in 1937. Illustrating a video on the Little Steel Strike.
Got a favorite Labor quote? Email us: info@laborheritage.org
Want Labor quotes like this one sent to your inbox every week? Sign up for our free newsletter!
| | Forward the LHF newsletter to friends, family, colleagues and help us reach our goal of 10,000 readers! 👉 Subscribe free | | | The Donora Death Fog (Encore)
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.
| | Like this newsletter? Help us spread labor art by passing it along! | | CLICK HERE for our complete labor arts calendar; look for our Labor Arts Calendar edition on Monday | | |
TODAY'S LABOR HISTORY
1917: AFL President Sam Gompers and Secretary of War Newton Baker sign an agreement establishing a board of adjustment to control wages, hours and working conditions for construction workers during World War I.
1934: A pioneering sit-down strike is conducted by workers at a General Tire Co. factory in Akron, Ohio. The United Rubber Workers union was founded a year later.
1937: The Women’s Day Massacre in Youngstown, Ohio, when police use tear gas on the women and children, including at least one infant in his mother's arms, during a strike at Republic Steel.
1938: "Bloody Sunday" Vancouver, BC (photo); police battle unemployed at Post Office.
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| What labor tactic did Akron tire workers pioneer in 1934? | | | | |
LAST WEEK'S QUIZ: Tony Mazzocchi, born June 13, 1926 in Brooklyn, N.Y., was an activist and officer in the Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers union. He was a mentor to Karen Silkwood, a founder of the Labor Party and a prime mover behind the 1970 passage of the Occupational Safety and Health Act. He also co-founded the DC Labor FilmFest.
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SUPPORT LABOR ARTS!
Please CLICK HERE NOW to pledge your financial support to our 2026 program, which includes our annual Solidarity Forever Award, the Great Labor Arts Exchange, the DC Labor FilmFest and much more (check out our website for details!).
Donations are tax-deductible to the extent allowed by law.
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