On September 10, 1897, a group of 400 striking coal miners--workers of Polish, Slovak, and Lithuanian descent or origin--marched on Lattimer, Pennsylvania. There, law enforcement officers fired without warning into the protesters, killing nineteen miners and wounding thirty-eight others. The bloody day quickly faded into history. Paul A. Shackel confronts the legacies and lessons of the Lattimer event. Beginning with a dramatic retelling of the incident, Shackel traces how the violence, and the acquittal of the deputies who perpetrated it, spurred membership in the United Mine Workers. By blending archival and archaeological research with interviews, he weighs how the people living in the region remember--and forget--what happened. Now in positions of power, the descendants of the slain miners have themselves become rabidly anti-union and anti-immigrant as Dominicans and other Latinos change the community. Shackel shows how the social, economic, and political circumstances surrounding historic Lattimer connect in profound ways to the riven communities of today. Compelling and timely, Remembering Lattimer restores an American tragedy to our public memory.

By the mid-1930s, Pennsylvania’s anthracite coal industry was facing a steady decline. Mining areas such as the Wyoming Valley around the cities of Wilkes-Barre and Pittston were full of willing workers (including women) who proved irresistibly attractive to New York City’s “runaway shops”—ladies’ apparel factories seeking lower labor and other costs. The International Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union (ILGWU) soon followed, and the Valley became a thriving hub of clothing production and union activity. This volume tells the story of the area’s apparel industry through the voices of men and women who lived it. Drawing from an archive of over sixty audio-recorded interviews within the Northeastern Pennsylvania Oral and Life History Collection, Sewn in Coal Country showcases sixteen stories told by workers, shop owners, union leaders, and others. The interview subjects recount the ILGWU-led movement to organize the shops, the conflicts between the district union and the national office in New York, the solidarity unionism approach of leader Min Matheson, the role of organized crime within the business, and the failed efforts to save the industry in the 1980s and 1990s. Robert P. Wolensky places the narratives in the larger context of American clothing manufacturing during the period and highlights their broader implications for the study of labor, gender, the working class, and oral history. Highly readable and thoroughly enlightening, this significant contribution to the study of labor history and women’s history will appeal to anyone interested in the relationships among workers, unions, management, and community; the effects of economic change on an area and its residents; the role of organized crime within the industry; and Pennsylvania history—especially the social history of industrialization and deindustrialization during the twentieth century.

A life touched by tragedy and deprivation--childhood in her native Ireland ending with the potato famine, immigration to Canada and then to the United States, marriage followed by the deaths of her husband and four children from yellow fever, and the destruction of her dressmaking business in the great Chicago fire of 1871--forged the stalwart labor organizer Mary Harris "Mother" Jones into a force to be reckoned with. Radicalized in a brutal era of repeated violence against hard-working men and women, Mother Jones crisscrossed the country to demand higher wages and safer working conditions. Her activism in support of American workers began after the age of sixty. The grandmotherly persona she projected won the hearts, and her stirring rhetoric the minds, of working people. She made herself into a national symbol of resistance to tyranny. Sometimes exaggerating her own experiences, she fought for justice in mines, factories, and workshops across the nation. For her troubles she was condemned as "the most dangerous woman in America." At her death in 1930 at the age of ninety-three, thousands paid tribute at a Washington, D.C., memorial service, and again at her burial in the only union-owned cemetery in America in the small mining town of Mount Olive, Illinois. As noted in The New York Times, the Rev. W. R. McGuire, who conducted her burial, said, "Wealthy coal operators and capitalists throughout the United States are breathing a sigh of relief while toil-worn men and women are weeping tears of bitter grief." The courage of Mother Jones is notorious and admired to this day. Cordery effectively recounts her story in this accessible biography, bringing to life an amazing woman and explaining the dramatic times through which she lived and to which she contributed so much.

Ages ago, elves and dwarves unknowingly migrated between Universes via a Junction. Jenneva and Egam believe they have found a Junction and plan a trip with Alexander to test the theory and investigate the origins of the elves and dwarves. Because they believe that the perennial animosity between the two races is due to misunderstandings about their histories, the mages include the prince of elves and the prince of dwarves in the group. Trouble begins at the very start of the journey as Egam falters going through the Junction, awakening an old nemesis, the evil demon, Alutar. It appears that the excursion will not just clarify history, but also actually change it. As the group discovers they are trapped in the new Universe, the shocking truth of the real history of the races is overshadowed by impending doom as an ancient prophecy begins to unfold. Meanwhile, the evil sorcerer, Sarac, not only gains freedom from his imprisonment, but also gains the blessing of the evil demon, Alutar. With the blessing, Sarac is given new powers and is promised a reign of a thousand years. The race is on to prevent Sarac from unfettered control of the Universes, as our trio stands incapable of altering the prophecy of destruction.

It is a bedrock American belief: the 1950s were a golden age of prosperity for autoworkers. Flush with high wages and enjoying the benefits of generous union contracts, these workers became the backbone of a thriving blue-collar middle class. It is also a myth. Daniel J. Clark began by interviewing dozens of former autoworkers in the Detroit area and found a different story--one of economic insecurity caused by frequent layoffs, unrealized contract provisions, and indispensable second jobs. Disruption in Detroit is a vivid portrait of workers and an industry that experienced anything but stable prosperity. As Clark reveals, the myths--whether of rising incomes or hard-nosed union bargaining success--came later. In the 1950s, ordinary autoworkers, union leaders, and auto company executives recognized that although jobs in their industry paid high wages, they were far from steady and often impossible to find.

Focused on the emergence of US President Donald Trump, the United Kingdom’s departure from the European Union, and the recruitment of Islamic State foreign fighters from Western Muslim communities, this book explores the ways in which the decay and corruption of key social institutions has created a vacuum of intellectual and moral guidance for working people and deprived them of hope and an upward social mobility long considered central to the social contract of Western liberal democracy. Examining the exploitation of this vacuum of leadership and opportunity by new demagogues, the author considers two important yet overlooked dimensions of this new populism: the mobilization of both religion and masculinity. By understanding religion as a dynamic social force that can be mobilized for purposes of social solidarity and by appreciating the sociological arguments that hyper-masculinity is caused by social injury, Roose considers how these key social factors have been particularly important in contributing to the emergence of the new demagogues and their followers. Roose identifies the challenges that this poses for Western liberal democracy and argues that states must look beyond identity politics and exclusively rights-based claims and, instead, consider classical conceptions of citizenship.

As more and more people are recognizing the need for accurately representing the story of the United States in public narratives, especially those told at museums and historic landmarks, heritage studies is emerging as an important program of study in universities across the country. These two collections are timely and valuable resources on the theory and practice of heritage education and its relationship to the discipline of archaeology. History and Approaches to Heritage Studies explores the historical development of cultural heritage theory and practice, as well as current issues in the field. This volume brings together archaeologists who are deeply engaged with a range of stakeholders in heritage management and training. Chapters contain useful reflections on working with descendant communities, local residents, community partners, and students in a variety of settings. With a focus on pedagogy throughout, topics include the importance of critical thinking skills, how technology has transformed education, gender issues in archaeology, minorities in heritage careers, NAGPRA and ethics education, archaeology field schools, and e-learning. Pedagogy and Practice in Heritage Studies presents teaching strategies for helping students think critically about the meanings of the past today. In these case studies, experienced teachers discuss ways to integrate heritage studies values into archaeology curricula, illustrating how the fields enrich each other. They argue that encouraging empathy can lead to awareness of the continuity between past and present, reflection on contemporary cultural norms, and engagement with issues of social and climate justice. These practical examples model ways to introduce diverse perspectives on history in pre-college, undergraduate, and graduate contexts. Emphasizing the importance of heritage studies principles and active learning in archaeological education, these handbooks provide tools to equip archaeologists and heritage professionals with collaborative, community-based, and activist approaches to the past. Volumes in the series Cultural Heritage Studies, edited by Paul A. Shackel