Host:  Chris Garlock; JOIN US AT 202-588-0893

Guests (in-studio): 
WPFW General Manager Jerry Paris on the workers who are repairing the station's antenna
Jonathan Williams, UFCW 400 Communications Manager, on wins in 2016 and challenges in 2017. 

Labor Song: Billy Bragg -There Is Power In A Union

For any breaking labor news this holiday week, check dclabor.org, like us on Facebook, or follow us @dclabor on Twitter.

Here’s today's labor history:
On this date in 1899, three dozen railroad clerks gathered in the back room of a cigar shop in Sedalia, Missouri to form Local Lodge Number 1 of a union they named the Order of the Railroad Clerks of America.  
In 1905, Idaho Governor Frank Steunenberg, who had brutally suppressed the state’s miners, was killed by an assassin's bomb. Legendary Western Federation of Miners and IWW leader William "Big Bill" Haywood and two other men were put on trial for the death but were ultimately declared innocent. 
In 1936, a GM sit-down strike spread to Flint, Michigan and would last 44 days before ending in union victory on February 11, 1937, when GM signed a contract with the United Auto Workers, recognizing the union as the sole bargaining agent for the workers in all of its plants.

Today’s labor quote is by William Haywood
"Big Bill" Haywood, who said that the mine owners "did not find the gold, they did not mine the gold, they did not mill the gold, but by some weird alchemy all the gold belonged to them!"

For any breaking labor news this holiday week, check dclabor.org, like us on Facebook, or follow us @dclabor on Twitter.

Here’s today's labor history:
On this date in 1970, after years of intensive lobbying by the labor movement, a comprehensive national safety law was enacted as President Nixon signed the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970 , creating the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, or OSHA. 
Since OSHA opened its doors in 1971, workplace fatalities have been cut in half and occupational injury and illness rates have dropped 40 percent. Even so, too many workers continue to be killed and injured on the job. 

Today’s labor quote is Tony Mazzocchi, the primary force behind enactment of OSHA.
Speaking about the exposure of hundreds of workers to asbestos in Tyler, Texas, during the 1960s, he said:
"I wanted the whole country to know in detail what had happened at that factory, and to understand what had gone on there—the fruitless...lack of enforcement by the Department of Labor, the whole long lousy history of neglect, deceit and stupidity—was happening in dozens of other ways, in hundreds of other factories, to thousands of other men across the land. I wanted people to know that thousands upon thousands of their fellow citizens were being assaulted daily, and that the police—in this case, the federal government—had done nothing to remedy the situation. In short I wanted them to know that murder was being committed in the workplace, and that no one was bothering about it."

For any breaking labor news this holiday week, check dclabor.org, like us on Facebook, or follow us @dclabor on Twitter.

Here’s today's labor history:
On this date in 1865, the coffee percolator was patented by James H. Mason of Franklin, Massachusetts, placing millions of caffeine-dependent working people forever in his debt.
In 1936, auto workers began a sit-down strike for union recognition at GM’s Fisher Body plant in Cleveland, Ohio. Two days later, the strike spread to the plant in Flint, Michigan, and continued until GM recognized the United Auto Workers as the bargaining agent for its employees in February 1937. 
In 1952, country music legend Hank Williams attended what was to be his last musicians’ union meeting, at the Elite (pronounced E-light) Café in Montgomery, Alabama.  He died of heart failure three days later in the back seat of a car driving north.  He was just 29 years old.  

Today’s labor quote is by Hank Williams, from his song "Wealth Won't Save Your Soul"
THE RICH MAN LIKE ALL, WILL BE JUDGED AT THAT TIME,
BUT ALL OF HIS WEALTH, WILL BE LEFT BEHIND.
FOR NO MATTER HOW MUCH EARTHLY WEALTH YOU GET HOLD,
WELL MY FRIEND IT WON'T SAVE, YOUR POOR WICKED SOUL.