Reading List on Labor Studies


 

Acheson, Sam.35000 Days in Texas. A History of Texas as Seen Through the eyes of the Dallas News. MacMillan, New York, 1938. With historical photos and whimsical writing, Acheson proudly tells what most people would be ashamed to admit: the history of the Dallas Morning News. Galveston news established 1842 as political vehicle for Mirabeau Lamar, genocidal president of the republic of Texas. From then till now, the main Dallas paper has organized and fought for the status quo and big business. See notes.

Allen, Ruth A, East Texas Lumber Workers. An Economic and Social Picture, 1870-1950. Univ of Texas Press, 1961. Dallas Public Library 331.7634 A428e. Allen was an economist and most of the book consists of documenting the poverty in the timber country of East Texas. However, on page 165 there begins a riveting chapter "Labor Unrest in the Pineries". Allen documents efforts of the Knights of Labor, the IWW, American Labor Union, The Brotherhood of Timber Workers, and the Timber Workers of the World to organize and keep contracts with the lumber barons from 1870 on.

Allen, Ruth A, The Southwest Railroad Strike. It's kind of unbelievable in places, but Ms Allen did a great service by writing the only existing history of the strike that ruined the Knights of Labor.
 
American Social History Project, Who Built America, v I & II, New York, Pantheon, 1992
Archie Green, Only a Miner (U of I Press, 1972). On February 21, 1931, about a year before he became one of America's most famous entertainers, Gene Autry recorded "The Death of Mother Jones" 
in New York. Autry was born in Tioga, in Grayson County. Pages 249-252  investigates the ties between Autry and the radical movement of his times. He pretty much draws a blank except 
that Autry recorded the Mother Jones tune after getting it from his agent, R. Calaway
 
Arnon Gutfeld, "The murder of Frank Little; Radical labor agitation in Butte, Montana, 1917.

 

Aronowitz, Stanley, From the Ashes of the Old. American Labor and America's Future. Houghton Mifflin, NY, 1998. Aronowitz is a New York sociologist with some labor background. He begins with history of labor since 1945. He notes changes in the economic situation that called for new thinking among trade unionists, but faults us for not having adapted. He insists that his prescriptions must be followed or doom will follow, and he predicts that we won’t comply! Notes

 
Ashbaugh, Carolyn, Lucy Parsons, American Revolutionary. Charles H Kerr, Chicago, 1976. For review see our history to 1886.
 
Babson, Steve with Ron Alpern, Dave Elsila, and John Revitte, Working Detroit, the Making of a Union Town. Adama Books, New York, 1984. It kind of sluffs over the Reuther role. Especially good on 
women's and civil rights issues. I didn't know there were race riots in downtown Detroit after the Packard strike. Lots of good historical pictures. In the back, there's a map of "Working Detroit Sites" 
that would make a fine walking tour. Excellent bibliography. This is a good way to get into history of UAW, which is big in North Texas.
 
Barr, Alwyn and Robert A Calvert, Editors, Black Leaders, Texans for their Times. Texas State Historical Association, 1981. Covers "Dave, a Rebellious Slave," "William Goyens of Nacogdoches" 
Matt Gains, Reconstruction politician" William M "Gooseneck" McDonald, business and fraternal leader" Mary Branch, educator, WR Banks, Educator, Heman Marion Sweatt, Civil Rights Plaintiff, 
and John Biggers, Artist." I was really impressed with this effort to reveal the lives of Black Texans through a few biographies covering pre-revolutionary to modern times. See notes.

Baum, Dale, The Shattering of Texas Unionism: Politics in the Lone Star State During the Civil War Era. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1999. xvi + 283 pp. 39 tables, 9 maps, bibliography, and index. $37.50 (cloth), ISBN 0-8071-2245-9. See Notes

Beard, Charles and Mary, The Beard's Basic History of the United States. Doubleday, NY, 1944. Excellent source. In the appendixes, they have the Declaration of Independence, important speeches, etc. pg 331: In 1872 elections, "The Reformers' candidate for President, Charles O'Connor, of New York, poplled a vote of less than 30,000 -- more in Texas than in New York, and more in Georgia than in Illinois." Pg 341: "In 1895, when a war with Great Britain seemed impending, Thomas Pascal, a Democratic politician of Texas, wrote privately to President Cleveland's Secretary of State that such a war would knock more pus out of the 'anarchistic, socialistic, and populistic boil' than 'would suffice to inoculate and corrupt our people for the next two centuries.'" Pg 390: President Wilson wrote "The government of the United States at present is a foster child of the special interests. It is not allowed to have a will of its own.... The government of the United States in recent years has not been administered by the common people."   --Woodrow Wilson

 

Bornstein, Andrew and others, “A Rich Man’s War and a Poor Man’s Fight. A handbook for trade unionists on the Vietnam War” first printing Labor Day, 1971. Washington Labor for Peace, 304 Colorado Building, Washington DC 20005. “This handbook is primarily the responsibility of the following: Andrew Bornstein, David Eisen, David Elsila, Tom Gagliardo, Al Lannon, Tony Mazzocchi, Richard Prosten, Marvin Rogoff, Daniel Schulder, Patricia Schulder, Don Spatz, Katherine Stone, Patricia Strandt, Frank Wallick.” It explains the war and talks about what to do about it. Page 69 begins a number of statements from unions against the war, beginning with the UAW Convention Resolution of April, 1970. For notes, click here

 

Boyer, Richard O and Herbert M Morais, Labor's Untold Story.  United Electrical Workers, Pittsburgh, 1965. This is simply the best one-volume summary of American labor history that I have read.

 

Brody, David, Labor in Crisis. The Steel Strike of 1919. JB Lippincott Company, Phila and NY, 1965. The strike lasted 9/22/19 to 1/8/20. Red baiting, terror, lies, immigrant bashing, and racial politics were used against the weakly united craft unions. Significant because a large number of craft unions more or less united behind an organizing committee under leadership of Chicago Federation of Labor leader John Fitzpatrick and Secretary William Z Foster. Both of them had just made history with the packinghouse workers and were trying to repeat the success in steel.  Company leadership was mostly Judge Gary.

Brooks, Thomas R, Toil And Trouble. A History of American Labor. Dell Publishing, NY, 1964. In 300 pages, Mr. Brooks attempts to recapitulate the story of American labor, draw its lessons, and recommend a course of action. See Notes

Bush, Charles G. "The Green Corn Rebellion". University of Oklahoma, 1932. This unpublished master's thesis is apparently the basis for almost all historical references to the Greencorn Rebellion. 
Odd, because it presents few facts and has a decidedly anti-labor bias that distorts the entire history.
 
Cahn, William, Lawrence 1912, the Bread & Roses Strike. Pilgrim Press, New York, 1977. The pictures will break your heart. Half of them are of children, aged 10-14 or so, working long hours
 in textile mills. Many of worked barefoot, so little were they paid!
 
Campbell, Randolph B. Grass-Roots Reconstruction in Texas, 1865-1880. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1997. x + 280 pp. Maps, notes, bibliography, index. $35.00 (cloth),
 ISBN 0-8071-2194-0. Covers 6 Texas counties during Reconstruction. I have a long review from H-net, but I didn't read it yet myself.
 
Cannon, James P compilation, Notebook of an Agitator pg 32-36. Pathfinder Press. Has an account of Frank Little in  Duluth and a lot of praise for him.
 
Carleton, Don E, Red Scare. Right-wing Hysteria Fifties Fanaticism and Their Legacy in Texas. Texas Monthly Press, 1985. Mostly about the "Minute-Women" fascist bunch that dominated
 the Houston School district for a while. Gertrude Barnstone is the hero of the story.

 

Carver, Charles, Brann & the Iconoclast. UT Austin Press, 1957, 1985. William Cowper Brann was as successful and highly controversial editor in Waco. He was shot down by an irate reader April 1, 1898. Brann was an amazingly interesting writer and he irritated many, especially because of his attacks against Baylor University and certain highly regarded Baptists in Waco. He was apparently very brave. On the downside, though, he was as racist, or even more racist, than other southerners of his time. The circumstances of his death are worth the entire book. In 1872, Paul Quinn Negro University was begun in Baylor by the African Methodist Episcopal church. (page 31)

 
Catton, William and Bruce. TWO ROADS TO SUMTER. McGray-Hill paperback, New York, 1963. Biographies of Lincoln and Jefferson Davis, compared and contrasted. They were born near
 one another in Kentucky; one moved North and the other South. It makes it clear in detail that the cause of the Civil War was the insistence of the Slave States on their "right" to expand into new
 territories. Lincoln's party adamantly opposed the extension of slavery and that is entirely and completely what the war was about.
 
Chaplin, Ralph, Wobbly, the Rough and Tumble Story of an American Radical. Union of Chicago Press. 1948. Lots of inside stuff on IWW. Quite an authoritative bit of stuff on Frank Little. For more on Frank Little click here. 
 
Clark, L.D. A Bright Tragic thing. A Tale of Civil War Texas. Cinco Puntos Press, El Paso, Texas. 1992. I borrowed it from Lakewood Library. Fictional account of Great Hangings of Gainesville in 1862.
Clark, LD (Editor) Civil War Recollections of James Lemuel Clark, Texas A&M Univ Press, 1984. More on Gainsville. See Notes
 
Commons, John R, ed. A Documentary History of American Industrial Society. Vol I-X., Cleveland: Arthur H Clark Co., 1910

Cooke County Library Vertical Files, "a letter from U.D. Fox to his daughter." About civil-war era hangings in Cook County. See Notes

Daniels, Patricia, Famous Labor Leaders. Dodd, Mead & co, New York, 1970. Short biographies on Sylvis Powderly Gompers Haywood Green Lewis Murray Hillman APhilip Randolph, Dubinsky,
 Meany & Reuther. Short stuff on Debs, Hoffa, & Harry Bridges. Photo portraits.

Darrow, Clarence, The Story of My Life. Grossett & Dunlap, New York, 1932. Has chapter on capital punishment, on crime, as well as his many important cases.

Davis D Joyce of East Central Univ, Editor, An Oklahoma I had Never Seen Before. Alternative Views of Oklahoma History. OU Press, Norman, 1994.  borrowed this from G Kennedy. Impressive counter-view of the pap they teach as Oklahoma History.  Has biography of Kate Barnard, social worker who played a big part in getting progressive stuff into 1907 constitution. But it's also noted that the racists could not have gotten Jim Crow approved by President T Roosevelt, so they held off until the constitution was passed, then passed Jim Crow right afterwards. “P 318: Only recently, however, on April 13, 1993, did it become illegal to rape your wife." Edith D Barlow in "Violence Against Women in Rural Oklahoma"

 

DeLeon, Arnoldo, They Called Them Greasers. Anglo Attitudes Toward Mexicans in Texas, 1821-1900. UT Austin, 1983. I made a lot of notes.

Dorau, Angela Armendariz, "Of Soldiers, Racism, and Mutiny. The 1917 Camp Logan Riot and Court Martial." Heritage, Spring, 1998. Includes a photo of the trial that was donated by Attorney John H Crooker III

Drew, Gilpin Faust, Editor, The Ideology of Slavery. Proslavery Thought in the Antebellum South, 1830-1860. LSU Press, Baton Rouge, 1981. Leading intellects of their time and period 
rationalize the continuation of slavery between 1836 and 1860. Most of their works were made into pamphlets and disseminated throughout the U.S. It is an amazing collection of high-flown phrases,
 circuitous reasoning, and outright lies. By comparison, the childish nonsense of the Nazi Primer or Mein Kampf stand as better works of literature. A white boy raised in the South, even in contemporary
 times, has already heard most of these sickening excuses, because they are still being repeated.
 
Dubofsky Melvyn and Warren Van Tine, John L Lewis, a Biography. Univ of Illinois. 1986. Abridged Edition. Nearly 400 pages of facts about the man and his times. Lewis was very close to the
 Republicans through  most of his career, especially to Herbert Hoover. Although the book chronicles the man's great achievements, the commentary seems to disparage him.

Dubofsky, Melvin, and Van Tine, Warren, editors. Labor Leaders in America. Univ of Illinois. Urbana and Chicago, 1987. Short bios of William H Sylvis, Terence Powderly, Samuel Gompers, Eugene V Debs, William D 'Big Bill' Haywood, Rose Schneiderman, John L Lewis, Sidney Hillman, Phillip Murray, Walter Reuther, Jimmy Hoffa, George Meany, and Cesar Chavez. See Notes

Dubofsky, Melvyn, We Shall be All. A History of the Industrial Workers of the World. University of Illinois Press, Urbana and Chicago. 1969. This is the definitive history of IWW. Many references to Frank Little.
 I don't have this but I need it: Industrial Democracy (or was it solidarity?) July 28, 1917. Has  3 page article by Frank Little. For interlibrary loan try RLIN CUBG86-53796. Also the 3/24/17 
Solidarity has comparison of war policies of IWW and AFL.

Elliott, Claude, "Union Sentiment in Texas 1861-1865". Southwestern Historical Quarterly 50:449-77.

Fehrenbach, TR, Lone Star, A History of Texas and the Texans. Collier Books, New York, 1968. Reputed to be "the best history of Texas." I borrowed copy from Roy Hudson. It's a history of racism
 and genocide. Since it's true, that's OK. But the problem is that Fehrenbach seems to approve of it, even glory in it to an extent. The Texas Rangers are big heroes in this book. When they gun down innocent 
Native Americans or Mexicans, the author compliments them for their directness! No mention of labor developments nor of Texas Ranger role in labor.
 
Filippelli,Ronald L, Labor in the USA: A History. New York, Alfred A Knopf, 1984

Foley, Neil, The White Scourge. Mexicans, Blacks, and Poor Whites in Texas Cotton Culture. University of California, Berkeley, 1997. See Notes

Foner, Philip S, History of the Labor Movement in the United States (10 volumes). International Publishers, 1994. This is the last of the excellent series because Foner died. It takes us up to 1929.
 
Foner, Philip S., The Workingmen's Party of the United States. A History of the First Marxist Party in the Americas. MEP Publications, Minneapolis, 1984. Dallas Public Library 324.2737 F673W.
 
Foner, Philip S, US Labor and the Vietnam War. International Publishers, New York,1989

 

Foner, Philip S. and Ronald L Lewis, editors. Black Workers. A Documentary History From Colonial Times to the Present. Temple University. Philadelphia. 1989. They collected writings  from all through American history. Up to the CIO period, the labor movement doesn't look so great. Terrific index.

Gainesville library 976-4533 "Cooke County" vertical file under "Great Hanging" Pete A.Y. Gunter, "The Great Gainesville Hanging, October, 1862." Rebel Colonel Bourland's 'Witch Hunt' in North Texas. Blue and Gray (magazine) April-May 1986.

Gomez-Quinones, Juan, Mexican-American Labor. University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque,1994. See Notes

Green, Janet Wells, From Forge to Fast Food: A History of Child Labor in New York State. Troy NY, Council for Citizenship Ed, 1995

Grossman, Johnathan P. William Sylvis, Pioneer of American Labor. A Study of the Labor Movement During the Era of the Civil War. Columbia University Press, 1945, 1973, 1986.

Hall, Covington, Labor Struggles in the Deep South & Other Writings. Edited & Introduced by David Roediger. Charles S Kerr, Chicago, 1999. This is very important, referred to all the time by other historians, so I made a lot of notes.

 
Harrison George, "The IWW Trial. Story of the Greatest Trial in Labor's History by one of the Defendants." Arno Press & The New York Times 1969. Dallas Public Library 343.31 H427i. 
George took notes while he and 112 other defendants were tried for conspiracy by the United States Government. 166 leaders of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) had been indicted,
 but all of them weren't found in time for the trial to start. It is my understanding that the transcripts & other stuff are in some DoL archives in Ft Worth.
 
Hill, Patricia Everidge, Dallas. The Making of a Modern City. UT Austin, 1996. A "Must Read" for anybody who wants to know anything about Dallas history. Dallas was a center of progressivism
 up to about 1930 when the Citizen's Alliance asserted itself. It's still asserting itself now. (Reviewed more fully in the history section up to 1956)
 
Hill, lPatricia Evridge,  "Real Women and True Womanhood. Grassroots Organizing Among Dallas Dressmakers in 1935." is in Labor's Heritage, a slick historical magazine sponsored by the AFL-CIO
. The establishment in Dallas played mean, violent, and underhanded against women organizing for a decent living in 1935. With terrific pictures and 11 pages of text, it documents one of North Texas' most important historical struggles.
 Our side eventually lost the battle but won the war. The International Ladies Garment Workers Union (ILGWU) and the Committee for Industrial Organizing (CIO) both became well established in North Texas by 1941. 
Labor's Heritage costs $19.95/year. Write to Labor's Heritage, Meany Archives, 10000 New Hampshire Av Silver Spring, Md 20903
 
ILWU, "The ILWU Story, Six Decades of Militant Unionism," International Longshoremen's & Warehousemen's Union, 1188 Franklin Street, San Francisco, CA 94109, 1997. 88 pages of pictures and text prepared
 by Eugene Dennis Vrana, who is the archivist at the ILWU building. This pamphlet stands up proud and honest. There's also a swell video available from the same place. We got to talk to Vrana in Spring, 1999, 
and were really impressed with the union and with their commitment to honestly preserving and presenting their history.

Janes, Daryl, editor, NO APOLOGIES. Eakin Press PO Drawer 90159 Austin Tx 78709 0159, 1992. About 15 ex-radical Austin students from the old SDS days. Includes pieces by Susan Olan and by Dick Reavis. Reavis predicts that someday they will all reunite as "seniors for a democratic society". Gives a really good account, though, of the Austin anti-war movement in its earliest days.

Jones, Jon, Early Days in Cooke County. 1848-1873. Reprint by Cooke County Heritage Society, Inc, 1977. Page 64 - 67 has his remembrance of Great Hanging. Also, he moved into Chickasaw territory later & describes it.

Juravich, Tom & Kate Bronfenbrenner, Ravenswood. The Steelworkers' victory and the revival of American Labor. ILR Press, an imprint of Cornell University Press, Ithaca and London, 1999. For notes, see the period before 1995
 
Kelley, Robin D.G., Hammer and Hoe. Alabama Communists During the Great Depression. Univ of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill and London, 1990. See Notes
 
Kraus, Henry, Heroes of Unwritten Story. The UAW, 1934-39. Univ of Chicago Press, 1993. In 1934, he was a writer looking for ties to regular people. Came across Wyndham Mortimer 
and the early auto workers union in Cleveland and became their writer. Edited first UAW newspaper from Cleveland.
 
Kraus, Henry, The Many and the Few. A Chronicle of the Dynamic Auto Workers. University of Illinois Press, 1947.
 
Kreas, Saul,. My Life and Struggle for a Better World. 1977. Great big book proudly explaining this guy's role in Communist Party in Connecticut.

 

Ladino, Robyn Duff with Foreword by Alwyn Barr, Desegregating Texas Schools. Eisenhower, Shivers, and the Crisis at Mansfield High. U T, Austin 1996. With pictures and journalistic reporting, Ladino explains one of the most important events in the modern civil rights movement. But it wasn't a happy event. The three students eventually went to Ft Worth by bus, just as they had for a long time. Notes

 

LaFargue, Paul and Wilhelm Liebknecht, Karl Marx His Life and Work. (remembrances) International Publishers, NY, 1943. Marx's household, his personal work habits are described. Both of these guys were proteges, especially in England

Landrum, Graham and Allan Smith, An Illustrated History of Grayson County, Texas. Historical Publishers. Ft Worth. 1967. Among other things, it tells about repression against suspected Northern sympathizers during Civil War.

Lehman, Ted, Pamphlet in Fresno, California, library dated 25 May 1971 "The Constitution Guarantees Freedom of Speech--Rats! The Fresno Free Speech Fight" I think he was reporter for the 
Fresno Bee or Sacramento Bee. Tells about Fresno Free Speech fight (1913?) Pretty uncomplimentary about Fred Little, Frank's brother. Fred and Emma may have had two sons, and this is where
 the trail of Frank Little's writings and personal effects leaves off.
 
Long, Priscilla, Pamphlet "Mother Jones, Woman Organizer," is published by South End Press in Boston
Lorence, James J, "Controlling the Reserve Army. The United Automobile Workers and Michigan's Unemployed, 1935-1941." In Labor's Heritage
 
Lukas, J. Anthony, Big Trouble. Simon Schuster, NY, 1997. The trial of Haywood, Pettibone and Moyer for dynamiting Idaho Governor Frank Steunenberg to death in 1905. It’s long and hard to read 
because he goes off into historical explanations of every character and event. Lots about Theodore Roosevelt, mostly bad. 
 
Marx, Karl and Frederick Engels, The Civil War in the U.S.. From their writings in the Vienna Presse and the New York Daily Tribune and from their correspondence to one another, 1861 and 1862. 
Copyright 1937, 1961, International Publishers Inc. NY.  Although Engels was not positive, Marx never wavered in his belief that the North would prevail. They played a role in keeping England out of the war.
 
McFeely, William S., Frederick Douglass. Touchstone Book published by Simon & Schuster, New York, 1991. Photos & exhaustive life of Douglass. But a gossipy thing.
McGuckin, Henry E  "Memoirs of a Wobbly" $6.95 Charles H. Kerr Publishing Co 1740 West Greenleaf Av #7, Chicago Il 60626.

Mers, Gilbert, Working the Waterfront. The Ups and Downs of a Rebel Longshoreman. University of Texas Press, Austin, 1988. See Notes

Michener, James, Alaska, Fawcett Crest Book, Ballantine, NY? 1988.

Morris, Richard B (Editor) US Department of Labor, The American Worker. Columbia University. No copyright date, but it's probably around 1976. It has a decent time line in the back. 
Picture book with fine photos, short descriptions, and poetry. I borrowed copy from Dallas CLC.

 

Morton, A.L., The Life and Ideas of Robert Owen. International Publishers. New York, 1978. A great deal of Owen's historical fame comes from his early success at New Lanark mills 1813-1821, but I note on pg 18 that there was a tremendous rise in the industry all through that whole period. It might have been hard to not succeed! Owen is one of the greatest of the Utopian Socialists, so I made some notes.

 
Papanikolas, Zeese, Buried Unsung. Louis Tikas and the Ludlow Massacre. Foreword by Wallace Stegner. University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln and London, 1982. As far as I know, 
this is the only work on Tikas, who was a strike captain in the Ludlow tent colony when he was brutally murdered right at the beginning of the Ludlow Massacre.

Phillips, Michael, "White Violence, Hegemony, and Slave Rebellion in Dallas, Texas, Before the Civil War." East TX Hist Journal. He says that editor Charles R Pryor of the Dallas Herald and other "fire-eaters" whipped up the hysteria against abolitionists that resulted in the whippings and hangings across the state.

Reinhardt, Louis "The Communistic Colony of Bettina 1846-8." Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Vol III, July 1899 to April 1900. See period before 1860.

Renshaw, Patrick, The Wobblies. The story of Syndicalism in the United States. Anchor Books. Doubleday & Company, Garden City, NY 1967.

Richter, William L., Overreached on All Sides. The Freedman's Bureau Administration in Texas 1865-1868. Texas A&M Univ Press, College station, 1991. For a review, see the period before 1886

Roediger, David R & Philip S. Foner OUR OWN TIME. A History of American Labor and the Working Day. Verso Press, London,  New York, 1989. First published by Greenwood Press, 1989. 
This is a finely detailed documentation of American labor's economic and political struggle for shorter working hours. Their thesis is that shorter hours was the goal that unified various workers' groups. See Notes
 

Rogers, Mary Beth, Cold Anger. A story of faith and power politics. Univ of N TX Press, 1990. Based mostly on interviews with Ernesto Cortes and Industrial Areas Foundation organizations like COPS in SA, TPO in Houston, and Dallas Interfaith Alliance here. In the forward she says, "Cold Anger is a story about a new kind of intervention in politics by working poor people who incorporate their religious values into a struggle for power and visibility." Cortes studied under Alinski and that whole Chicago school. Later, he returned to SA and organized on the West Side. Alinski theology and tactics are applied to the idea of a more substantial ongoing organization based on churches. Bishop Patrick Flores of SA helped him get started.

Rogers, Walter and Elizabeth, Big Wheels Rolled in Texas. Box 51294, New Orleans, LA. 70151. 1970. 479 typed pages. A middle-aged heiress marries an IWW organizer and moves to "Universe" Texas in 1940. The frontispiece says this is a "non-fiction novel about working people." It's badly printed and really hard to read. Also, their desire to keep identities of people and geographical areas secret gets confusing. There are long sections of sermonettes on politics and labor history. It's kind of crazy, but I really liked it. It gave me some idea of what kinds of things people were interested in during the critical period of Texas labor history. Before this one, they wrote John Donar: Common Man. For more on Reds, click here.

Rogers, Walter & Elizabeth, John Donar: Common Man. Unlike Big Wheels Rolled in Texas, which I reviewed in the first section of this page, the couple's first collaboration is an easy read. See Notes
 
Roscoe C. Martin, THE PEOPLE'S PARTY IN TEXAS. A Study in Third Party Politics. University of Texas Press, 1933,1970. You can't really understand the progressives in Texas until you read this.

Rutherford, Philip "The Great Gainesville Hanging," Civil War Times Illustrated, April 1978, 12-20. Gainesville library 976 4533

Schor, Juliet B., The Overworked American. The Unexpected Decline of Leisure. Basic Books, Harper Collins Publishers, 1991. Basic book about America's working hours. Everybody else quotes her. 
Put this together with the book by Roedigger and Foner, and you start doing some serious thinking about working hours & days, unemployment, economic problems, social problems….

Schutze, Jim, "Peep Hole Power" in the Dallas Observer11/5/98. He gives a background and viewpoint on the Dallas Citizens Council. "If Dallas really is Oz, then, for better or for worse, the Citizens Council is its wizard." Discusses the origins and the present role of the Dallas Citizens' Council. It is a group of businesspersons who run the city. I think you can still download from http:\\www.dallasobserver.com. I recommend it.

Sellars, Nigel, “With Folded Arms? Or With Squirrel Guns?” in The Chronicles of Oklahoma. Vol LXXVII, Number 2, Summer, 1999. Of the four that I have read, this seems like the most factual account of the Greencorn Rebellion. Dr. Sellars has distinguished himself in recent years as an outstanding historian of Oklahoma. See my section on Greencorn Rebellion.

 
Sinclair,Upton The Flivver King. A Story of Ford-America. 1937 Charles H Kerr. Chicago 
Slater, Mary Ann, "Politics & Art. the Controversial Birth of the Oklahoma Writers Project" pg 72 Chronicles of Oklahoma Vol 68 1990-91.

Smallwood, James "Disaffection in Confederate Texas: The Great Hanging at Gainesville," Civil War History 22:3490 p60.

Smith, James (Editor) Labor History course II volume I Labor Education Program USWA, College of business Administration, U of H, Includes contribution by Dr George Green of Arlington UTA. 
Starts with Agricultural revolution of 11,000 years ago. Ends 1970s. It raises questions well, but doesn't provide very good answers
 
Stein, Leon (Editor), Out of the Sweatshop. The Struggle for Industrial Democracy. Quadrangle/ The NY Times book Co.. 1977. Articles  & essays from the time of the sweatshops to 1970s.
 Lots of original material from  the big names of that period such as Jacob  A Riis, Theodore Dreiser, John R Commons, etc. For some reason it completely skips the period of the CIO. I made a lot of notes

Sugar, Maurice, The Ford Hunger March. Meiklejohn Civil Liberties Institute, Berkeley, California, 1980. 146 pages. Sugar was a famous labor lawyer in the 1930s. He would become the first general counsel for the United Auto Workers and would remain so until fired by Walter Reuther. This is his account of the Ford Hunger March of March 7, 1932, taken from his autobiographical notes and edited. There are lots of statistics and quotes that paint a picture of depression era. Four were killed in the march, probably by police from Detroit or Dearborn, but possibly by gunfire from Ford's "security" force of hoodlums.

Texas AFL-CIO, "The Labor Story" 8 1/2 X 11 pamphlet of 47 pages. Starts with slavery days and goes up to about 1989 in Texas. It's so good that it's unbelievable that nobody takes credit for writing it. 
I think it might have been Hank Rabin of the Steelworkers, but I never found out.
Interesting photos, but the printing process doesn't do them justice. I have some free copies (1/29/99).

The strike call was forced on union leadership by militancy in the ranks, particularly from the low-skilled workers, who were often immigrants. They were the backbone of this great and militant event, but the company propaganda campaign of "un-Americanism" worked well against them and, particularly, against Foster. The author seems to have a lot more information from the companies than from the union, but it's a darned dramatic story from any point of view. At the end, though, the divided steelworkers went back to working 7-12's and company paternalism.

 
Tomlins, Christopher L., The State and the Unions. Labor Relations, Law, and the Organized Labor Movement in America, 1880-1960. Cambridge University Press, 1985-1995. "Industrial pluralism" is predicated on a denial of the proposition that the interests of employers and workers are necessarily incompatible. It is the basis of labor law since the Wagner Act in 1935. Tomlins delves deeply into the formation of law since the last century, much as any historian or legal scholar might. However, his conclusions are rather different as expressed in the last lines:  (Last page, 328) "...a counterfeit liberty is the most that American workers and their organizations have been able to gain through the state. Its reality they must create for themselves." For a lot more notes, see labor law as history

Trexler, H.A. "Episode in Border History" Southwest Review, Winter, 1931 p236. Account of 32 killed in "Battle of the Nueces". For more info, click here

U.S. Dept of Labor, Important Events in Labor History. General Printing Office, DC
UAW Education Department, "The history of organized labor and the UAW" Jan 1992. about 30 pages of short history.
Warnick, Sherry, "Radical Labor in Oklahoma: The Working Class Union" pg 180 of Chronicles of Oklahoma Vol 52, 1974-75
 
Warren, Leslie, Dallas Public and Private; Aspects of an American City. Grossman Publishers, NY, 1964. Description of Dallas life around Kennedy Assasination. See Notes
 
Weisberger, Bernard A, Samuel Gompers (from series on illustrious Americans). Silver Burdett Company, Moristown, New jersey,  1967. Contains pictures, lots of quotes, whole articles, and a bio of Samuel Gompers
 
Werstein, Irving, Pie in the Sky, An American Struggle. The Wobblies and their Times. Delacorte Press, NY,1969. in OU library. 

Williams, John Hoyt, Sam Houston. A Biography of the Father of Texas. Simon & Schuster, New York etc. 1993. Dallas library B H84367W 1993. Why did Sam Houston opposed secession? According to this book, he foresaw the useless bloodshed of the war and was positive the North would prevail. He wanted to protect "his beloved" South. Also, Houston seems to have had an alternate imperialist plan to the one led by Jefferson Davis: he wanted to invade Mexico and establish a "protectorate". But it was never because Houston opposed slavery; he owned a slave or two himself!

Winpisinger, William W RECLAIMING OUR FUTURE; AN AGENDA FOR AMERICAN LABOR. Edited by John Logue; foreword by Senator Edward M Kennedy. Westview Press, Inc, 
5500 Central Avenue, Boulder, Colorado 80301; 1989. "Wimpy" Winpisinger was the President of the International Association of Machinists (IAM). The ideas in the book were apparently 
developed by a series of speeches and papers that  he prepared during 1977-1988
 
Winters, Jr, Donald E, The Soul of the Wobblies. The IWW, Religion, and American Culture in the Progressive Era 1905-1917. Greenwood Press, Westport, Cn 1985.
Womack, John Jr. "Oklahoma's Green corn Rebellion, the Importance of Fools" has no date. typed manuscript in OU library F700 .W64. It has the same viewpoint as the Bush article.
Woodward, C. Vann. The Strange Career of Jim Crow. Second Revised Edition. Oxford University Press. NY. 1966.  Ask almost anybody when Jim Crow segregation began in the South 
and they will tell you it began with the end of the Civil War. But in truth it did not.

WPA Dallas Guide and History. Manuscript finished in 1941, but published in 1993 by Univ North Texas and the Dallas PUblic Library. Available 
on Amazon.com. Probably the most comprehensive and scholarly of all Texas histories. see my notes

It is really worthwhile for history buffs to get on H-Net. You can do it by writing to Seth M. Wigderson at seth.wigderson@gte.net.
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