Today in Labor History

On this date in 1899, what many believe to be the first formal training on first aid in American history took place at the Windsor Hotel in Jermyn, Pennsylvania, when Dr. Matthew J. Shields instructed 25 coal miners on ways to help their fellow miners. Upon completion of the course each of the miners was prepared and able to render first aid. The training led to decreases in serious mining injuries and fatalities.

In 1934, some 25,000 silk dye workers struck in Paterson, New Jersey. 

In 1990, the Tribune Company began a brutal 5-month-long lockout at the New York Daily News, part of an effort to bust the newspaper’s unions.

And in 2011, after a two-year fight, workers at the Bonus Car Wash in Santa Monica, California, won a union contract calling for pay increases, better breaks and other gains.  
- compiled/edited by David Prosten at Union Communication Services ​​

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