Film. Directed and produced by Barbara Kopple. 1976. 103 minutes.
This documentary tells the story of a Kentucky coal miners' strike and the thirteen-month struggle between a community fighting to survive and a corporation dedicated to the bottom line.
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Book — Non-fiction. By Daniel Bullen. 2021. 320 pages.
A history of Shays’ Rebellion, where farmers challenged the state’s authority to seize their farms for flagrantly unjust taxes, told from the protesters’ perspective.
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Book — Non-fiction. Edited by Anthony Arnove and Haley Pessin. 2023. 352 pages.
Speeches, essays, songs, and documents from a range of movements offering hope for those seeking to understand our recent history so they can better understand how to change it.
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More than four thousand Philadelphia longshoremen, organized by African American IWW leader Ben Fletcher, went on strike and shut down one of the busiest ports in the United States.
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A plane crash near Coalinga, California, causing the death of 28 Mexican laborers and others, led to a popular song and belated recognition.
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Book — Non-fiction. By Howard Zinn, Dana Frank, and Robin D. G. Kelley. 2002. 184 pages.
Three renowned historians present stirring tales of labor and the effectiveness of strikes and organized labor.
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The Sierra Club launched the Stop Sugar Field Burning Campaign to bring an end to the practice of sugarcane field burning which is harmful to the environmental and the health of local residents.
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Book — Non-fiction. By Blair L. M. Kelley. 2023. 352 pages.
This book uses personal narratives to highlight the community and networks of resistance that Black laborers built in the face of racism and segregation in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
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Book — Non-fiction. By Howard Zinn, adapted by Rebecca Stefoff with additions by Ed Morales. Translated by Hugo García Manríquez. 2023. 608 pages.
A Spanish translation of the young adult version of the best-selling A People’s History of the United States.
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Led by the International Longshoremen’s and Warehousemen’s Union (ILWU), sugar workers on 33 of Hawai’i’s 34 plantations went on strike, which lasted almost three months and led to substantial improvements in pay, housing, and working conditions.
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Amidst a looming “garbage crisis” in Washington, D.C., on May 1, 1970, 1,700 sanitation workers went on strike to demand an end to racial discrimination, unsafe working conditions, low pay, and unequal pick-up routes.
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Book — Non-fiction. 2024. Edited by Jeanne Theoharis and Joseph Entin. 320 pages.
Firsthand accounts of COVID-19’s devastating effects on working-class communities of color.
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Not wanting Black coworkers to be given the same positions and pay, a contingent of Philadelphia Transit Company (PTC) workers staged a wildcat strike and withheld their labor.
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The Columbia Avenue Riot began in the predominantly African American neighborhoods of North Philadelphia after an altercation with the police and continued for three days.
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More than 100 textile workers died when a mill collapsed due to inadequate construction.
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A coalition of environmental activists, anti-capitalists, and union leaders took to the streets of Seattle to bring the World Trade Organization conference to a halt.
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In solidarity with the Palestinian people, Detroit auto workers led a one-day strike protesting the United Auto Workers’ (UAW) support of Israel.
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Book — Historical fiction. By Jewell Parker Rhodes. 2025. 208 pages.
A chapter book on the experience of a late 19th century era Black family participating in the Oklahoma Land Rush.
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