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PODCAST

Labor History in 2:00

The Rick Smith Show

A daily, pocket-sized history of America"s working people, brought to you by The Rick Smith Show team.

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All Episodes

01:59

June 8 - The Silent Skies

Labor History in 2:00 ·

2025/06/08

On this day in Labor History the year was 1966. That was the day that the roaring of the jet age grew quiet across the United States. 35,000 members of the International Association of Mechanics went out on strike.

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01:59

June 7 - Workers Holiday in Michigan

Labor History in 2:00 ·

2025/06/07

On this day in Labor History the year was 1937. The leader of Lansing, Michigan’s United Auto Workers union, Lester Washburn, returned home, in the wee hours of the morning. He had been to Detroit for a meeting. At his home he found a disturbing scene.

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01:59

June 6 - Fighting Apartheid

Labor History in 2:00 ·

2025/06/06

On this day in Labor History the year was 1988. That was the day that between two and three million black workers went on strike in South Africa. The Congress of South African Trade Unions had called for three days of “national peaceful protest.”

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01:59

June 5 - The UFCW is Founded

Labor History in 2:00 ·

2025/06/05

On this day in Labor History the year was 1979. That was the day that leaders from the Retail Clerks and the Amalgamated Meat Cutters unions began two-day special conventions to discuss merging their organizations. The result was the forming of the United Food and Commercial Workers.

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01:59

June 4 - Minimum Wage Through the Years

Labor History in 2:00 ·

2025/06/04

In the past few years you may have seen news stories about efforts to raise the minimum wage. From the “Fight for Fifteen,” to various state-based campaigns, raising the minimum wage has become an important campaign for workers. But do you know where in the United States the minimum wage started?

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01:59

June 3 - Look for the ILGWU Label

Labor History in 2:00 ·

2025/06/03

On this day in Labor History the year was 1900. That was the day that the International Ladies’ Garment Workers Union was formed. Eleven delegates attended the founding meeting. They represented the major garment making cities of the east coast.

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01:59

June 2 - The Nation’s First Strike

Labor History in 2:00 ·

2025/06/02

On this day in Labor History, we are going all the way back to the year 1786. That was the day when what labor historians widely consider “America’s First Strike” occurred in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. A group of the city’s journeymen printers gathered to discuss proposed decreases to their wages.

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01:59

June 1 - Fighting for Equality

Labor History in 2:00 ·

2025/06/01

Would you be willing to risk your job to stand up for the rights that you believe in? For postal worker Henry Gerber, the answer to that question was a resounding yes. And so On this day in Labor History, the year was 2001.

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01:59

May 31 - Families Washed Away in Johnstown Floods

Labor History in 2:00 ·

2025/05/31

On this day in Labor History the year was 1889. Nestled in western Pennsylvania was the community known as Johnstown. The town and surrounding area was home to 23,000 people, families of workers who labored in the regions’ booming steel mills.

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01:59

May 30 - Blood in the Streets on Memorial Day

Labor History in 2:00 ·

2025/05/30

On this day in Labor History the year was 1937. It was a day that would become known as the Memorial Day Massacre. Ten demonstrators were killed by police bullets, while protesting at Republic Steel, on the south east side of Chicago.

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01:59

May 29 - No Dancing Allowed

Labor History in 2:00 ·

2025/05/29

On this day in Labor History the year was 1912. That was the day fifteen women lost their jobs for dancing on their lunch break. The women worked for the Curtis Publishing Company in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

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01:59

May 28 - The 1946 Rochester General Strike

Labor History in 2:00 ·

2025/05/28

On this day in Labor History the year was 1946. That was the day the working people of New York stood up in true labor solidarity. It all started at stroke midnight on May 15th as messengers delivered the following statement to 489 municipal employees:

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01:59

May 27 - Unconstitutional

Labor History in 2:00 ·

2025/05/27

On this day in Labor History the year was 1935. That was the day the United States Supreme Court unanimously declared the National Industrial Relations Act unconstitutional. The act had been passed just two years before, as the centerpiece of President Franklin Roosevelt’s plan to combat the Great Depression.

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01:59

May 26 - Battle of the Overpass

Labor History in 2:00 ·

2025/05/26

Did you know that sometimes photographs have the power to help change the course of a labor struggle? That is what happened on this day in Labor History, the year was 1937. Detroit News photographer James “Scotty” Kilpatrick came with his camera to the River Rouge Ford plant.

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01:59

May 25 - Philip Murray is Born

Labor History in 2:00 ·

2025/05/25

Unions were created to make living conditions just a little better than they were before they were created, and the union that does not manifest that kind of interest in human beings cannot endure.” Those were the words of Philip Murray, born on this day in Labor History, the year was 1886. Philip Murray was born in Blantyre, Scotland, the son of a union coal miner.

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01:59

May 24 - The Eighth Wonder of the World

Labor History in 2:00 ·

2025/05/24

On this day in Labor History the year was 1883. The “eighth wonder of the world, the Brooklyn Bridge opened for traffic. 600 men worked on the project, which took 14 years to complete. Between twenty and thirty men died working on the bridge. This included the bridge’s designer, German-born John. A. Roebling.

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01:59

May 23 - Solidarity in Toledo

Labor History in 2:00 ·

2025/05/23

How can unionized workers and unemployed workers stand together? Perhaps we can look to the past for examples of the power of such solidarity. On this day in Labor History the year was 1934. It was the height of the Great Depression.

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01:59

May 22 - Have You Been to Jail for Justice?

Labor History in 2:00 ·

2025/05/22

On this day Labor History the year was 1895. Labor organizer Eugene V. Debs began a six month prison sentence in Woodstock, Illinois. Debs was the leader of the American Railway Union that had led a nationwide boycott and strike against the Pullman Palace Car Company in 1894.

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01:59

May 21 - The Little Wagner Act

Labor History in 2:00 ·

2025/05/21

On this day Labor History the year was 1945. That was a very important day for workers on the islands of Hawaii. It marked the passage of the federal Hawaii Employment Relations Act, more popular known as the “Little Wagner Act.”

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01:59

May 20 - Rights on the Rail

Labor History in 2:00 ·

2025/05/20

On this day Labor History the year was 1926. That was the day President Calvin Coolidge signed the Railway Labor Act. For decades railroad labor disputes had often become bloody affairs.

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