Since its original publication in 1987, Like a Family has become a classic in the study of American labor history. Basing their research on a series of extraordinary interviews, letters, and articles from the trade press, the authors uncover the voices and experiences of workers in the Southern cotton mill industry during the 1920s and 1930s. Now with a new afterword, this edition stands as an invaluable contribution to American social history. "The genius of Like a Family lies in its effortless integration of the history of the family--particularly women--into the history of the cotton-mill world.--Ira Berlin, New York Times Book Review "Like a Family is history, folklore, and storytelling all rolled into one. It is a living, revelatory chronicle of life rarely observed by the academe. A powerhouse.--Studs Terkel "Here is labor history in intensely human terms. Neither great impersonal forces nor deadening statistics are allowed to get in the way of people. If students of the New South want both the dimensions and the feel of life and labor in the textile industry, this book will be immensely satisfying.--Choice

Baseball. religion. work. death. and the company store-these figured eminently in the lives of Southern cotton mill workers and their families during the early decades of the twentieth century. In this firsthand account of his native Bladenboro, North Carolina, George G. Suggs, Jr., captures in rich detail the world of a thriving cotton mill town where the company was dominant but workers had forged a strong community. Here the focus is on the workers-their interests, personalities, and values-in their best and in their darker moments. Ultimately we see the many dimensions of working-class culture and taste a way of life that has vanished. Drawing upon childhood memories and his father's recollections, Suggs covers events in Bladenboro during the 1930s and 40s. He describes the nature of cottonmill work, the stresses and strains produced by undesirable working conditions, and the various ways in which workers and their families learned to cope. Many characters emerge from this story-from the kind woman who dispensed the company fiat money to the desperate men who would gamble it away. The book explores key topics such as social rankings, medical care, the company store, and workers' responses to death. Above all, we see how faith found expression on the job and in the surrounding evangelical churches. The workers of Bladenboro are gone, and little remains of the mills, but this work pays tribute to lives well lived under the most challenging circumstances.

Includes the proceedings of the annual meeting of the Society.

The old adage says ¿A watched pot never boils¿, but I feel there are also times when ¿An unwatched pot always boils over¿. Such was the case in Carroll County, Virginia at the turn of the twentieth century. By 1900 the water was simmering between the mostly Democratic Allens and the Republican led court system. Cries of illegalities from the Allens against the court officials were met with claims of Allen bullying that led to unfulfilled jail sentences. Heat was turned up in 1911 when nephews of the Allens were involved in a fight that ordinarily would have been interpreted as ¿boys being boys¿. Instead numerous charges were brought against the nephews, while no charges were brought by the parties that initiated the skirmish. The water reached a boiling point when the nephews were extradited in a manner in which the Allens felt was improper. New charges of interfering with the duties of an officer then resulted in numerous charges against the Allen men themselves. Although the Allens, and the court officials, had been in hot water before, it took a March day in 1912 for the pot to boil over and become what will forever be known as ¿The Carroll County Shootout¿. This is the story of the aftermath of that shooting. Follow Jeremiah Haynes, a Richmond journalist, as he comes to the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia to ¿find the truth,¿ a truth that no one wanted told.