Labor Arts News & Updates

5,990 Ways to Explore Labor Culture

Nearly 6,000 labor films, quotes, songs and history entries are now searchable in LHF’s new Labor Arts & Culture Database. Explore by person, union, movement, event or theme, discover related culture through On This Day, and suggest new material to help this living resource grow.

Explore the database—and send us your suggestions!

WEEKEND LABOR ARTS CALENDAR


Fri: Film & Talk: Who Were the Wobblies? (CT)

Fri: Rochester Labor Film Series: Baristas Vs Billionaires (NY)

Sat: Book Launch: Fight & Win: Minneapolis Teamsters Strike 1934 (MN)

Sun: We Fought For What We Have: A Union Story (MD & Virtual)

Got a labor arts or history event? Email us: info@laborheritage.org

THIS WEEK’S LABOR HERITAGE POWER HOUR

Dolly, Dystopia and the '34 Teamsters Strike

On this week's Labor Heritage Power Hour: Karen Nussbaum reveals the working-women’s movement behind Dolly Parton’s “9 to 5”; Kathy Newman explores labor, AI and individuality in Pluribus; and John Hanson recounts the rank-and-file solidarity that powered the 1934 Minneapolis Teamsters strike. Plus Labor Arts News Briefs and the story of organizer and songwriter Ella Mae Wiggins.

LABOR ARTS NEWS BRIEFS

No Contract, No Curtain: SF Opera Musicians Strike: Opening-night patrons didn’t learn the performance was canceled until the general director appeared onstage. Read more.

Strike Votes Sweep Three New York Museums: Strike dates at the Whitney, Brooklyn and American Folk Art museums haven’t been set, but the three groups noted that each museum has a major exhibition opening in early October. Read more.

Casa Bonita Workers Rally for Fair Contract: Workers are asking allies to contact other managers at Casa Bonita and their parent company and urge them to settle a fair contract. Read more.

Loft Cinema Workers Unanimously Ratify First Union Contract with IATSE Local 415: The union contract covers 20 workers across floor staff at one of Tucson’s most beloved cultural institutions. Read more.

Forgotten Named MotorCities Award Finalist: The MotorCities Awards of Excellence honor individuals, events and projects that preserve, interpret and promote Michigan’s automotive heritage. Read more.

The Labor Heritage Power Hour Hits Seattle Airwaves: Seattle listeners can now hear the Power Hour twice a week. Read more.

LABOR VIDEO OF THE WEEK: Bulldogs - Emmett Doyle
Got labor video? email us at info@laborheritage.org

PICKET SIGNS OF THE WEEK
Armed with an appropriately hand-painted sign, Atlanta Labcorp workers (above) are voting on whether to join the Painters (IUPAT) after winning more than $750,000 in back pay through a settlement of unfair labor practice charges. Meanwhile, striking San Francisco Opera musicians (below) have forced the cancellation of performances through September 20. Photo (below): Benjamin Fanjoy/San Francisco Chronicle 
Got a creative picket sign to share? email us at info@laborheritage.org

LABOR SONG OF THE WEEK: "Our Hands Are Tied" - Holly Carter

Tells the story of IWW organizer Frank Little, murdered by a vigilante mob in Butte, Montana, after challenging brutal mine conditions and opposing World War I. The song has just been added to LHF’s new Labor Arts & Culture Database. 
Got a Labor song? Email us: info@laborheritage.org

LABOR ART OF THE WEEK: Bella Donna - Georgia O’Keefe

In 1938, the Hawaiian Pineapple Company hired Georgia O’Keeffe to paint for an ad campaign—but refused her request to live among plantation workers. She responded with Bella Donna, a poisonous nightshade, before later painting Pineapple Bud; Bella Donna also appears in Apple TV’s Pluribus, discussed on this week’s Labor Heritage Power Hour.

- Read more in “When Georgia O’Keeffe Went to Hawaii to Paint Pineapples.”

LABOR QUOTE OF THE WEEK

“I wanted to build a movement of working people for justice.”

— Ken Paff, co-founder of Teamsters for a Democratic Union, founded on this date in 1978. Find out more on LHF’s new Labor Arts & Culture Database.

LABOR LANDMARK OF THE WEEK 
The Youngstown Historical Center of Industry & Labor

Youngstown, Ohio

Known locally as the "Steel Museum," YHCIL documents the rise and fall of the steel industry in Youngstown and the Mahoning Valley. Its exhibits combine artifacts, videotaped interviews and full-scale recreations of the places where steelworkers lived and worked, in a tribute to the men and women who forged a way of life from iron and steel for almost two centuries.
Details on the LHF Labor Landmarks Map.

THIS WEEK'S LABOR HISTORY TODAY
Ralph Chaplin’s Legacy, Ybor City’s Radical Past

This week on Labor History Today, union members honor “Solidarity Forever” author Ralph Chaplin at his Tacoma gravesite. Then we uncover the immigrant workers, strikes, socialism and antifascist organizing often missing from the tourist history of Tampa’s Ybor City. Plus, New York City’s Union Square becomes a National Historic Landmark.

TODAY'S LABOR HISTORY
1978: Teamsters for a Democratic Union (TDU) is formally founded at an Ohio convention,  during a period of serious corruption in the union.

1988: Thousands of teachers in the Philippines go on strike to protest unpaid allowances. The government responds by dismissing and suspending 3,000 teachers.

1999: A 20-month illegal lockout of 2,900 Steelworkers members at Kaiser Aluminum plants in three states ends when an arbitrator orders a new contract.

Find more labor history in the LHF Labor Arts & Culture Database.

LAST WEEK’S QUIZ: Eugene V. Debs, labor leader and socialist, was sentenced on September 12, 1918 to 10 years in prison for opposing World War I. While in jail Debs received 1 million votes for president.

RECENT NEWSLETTERS
Stories, Songs and Solidarity (9/11)
Super-Sized Labor Day Weekend Edition (9/4)
Scabby, Dolly and the Art of Solidarity (8/28)
The Little Red Songbook Turns 117 (8/21)
What’s Your Favorite “Little Red Song”? (8/14)