The next few days will see a critical mass of exciting labor events, beginning with a symposium on Organizing for Power and Workers' Rights in the 21st Century at the University of Maryland College Park today and the Labor Heritage Foundation’s “We Were There: A Celebration of Women's History Month” tonight at 5:30p at the AFL-CIO followed by the National Organizers Workshop tomorrow and Saturday. The free concert tonight at the AFL-CIO promises to be especially entertaining, led by Bev Grant and featuring an all-star line-up of local musical talent from the labor movement. For full details, including weather-related updates, go to dclabor.org and click on calendar.
Here's today's labor history: On this date in 1770, British soldiers, quartered in the homes of colonists, took the jobs of working people when jobs were scarce. On this date, grievances of rope makers against the soldiers led to a fight. Soldiers shot down Crispus Attucks, a black colonist, then others, in what became known as the Boston Massacre. Attucks is considered the first casualty in the American Revolution. Today's labor quote is by American folksinger Woody Guthrie: I hate a song that makes you think you are not any good. I hate a song that makes you think that you are just born to lose. Bound to lose. No good to nobody. No good for nothing. Because you are too old or too young or too fat or too slim. Too ugly or too this or too that. Songs that run you down or poke fun at you on account of your bad luck or hard traveling. I'm out to fight those songs to my very last breath of air and my last drop of blood. I am out to sing songs that will prove to you that this is your world and that if it has hit you pretty hard and knocked you for a dozen loops, no matter what color, what size you are, how you are built, I am out to sing the songs that make you take pride in yourself and in your work. And the songs that I sing are made up for the most part by all sorts of folks just about like you.
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