Every business was shut down. People gathered on street corners and started directing traffic. They made a rule: restaurants were going to close, bars could stay open if they didn't serve hard liquor. They put the jukebox out on the street and people were actually dancing on the streets.
Dancing in the streets during a shutdown? That seems impossible in our current pandemic, but seventy-four years ago, there was indeed a spirit of rejoicing and solidarity in the city of Oakland, California when 100,000 workers walked off their jobs in the last general strike this country has seen.
We’re devoting our entire show this week to remembering the 1946 Oakland General Strike, as Work Week’s Steve Zeltzer interviews labor historian and researcher Gifford Hartford, who talks about how the strike happened and why it’s still relevant today.
On this week’s Labor History in 2:00, Breaking Through the Racial Divide; Rick Smith tells us about the founding of the Colored National Labor Union.
Music: General Strike by Moe Shinola, a musician and former cab driver who lives in Kansas City, Missouri.
Produced and edited by Chris Garlock. To contribute a labor history item, email laborhistorytoday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is produced by the Metro Washington Council’s Union City Radio and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor at Georgetown University. We're a proud founding member of the Labor Radio Podcast Network, nearly 80 shows focusing on working people’s issues and concerns. #LaborRadioPod
LHT Archives: Painters join Black Lives Matter protests; the history of black police in America; Race and Rebellion
The 1913 Dublin Lock-out
Shootout in Matewan; General strike in KC
Passaic textile strike & LAWCHA preview
Sea Shanties and the Pleasure of Work
50 years of “Strike!”
Mourn for the dead, fight like hell for the living!
Ludlow: My name is Louis Tikas
The U.S.-Canadian Labor History Collaborative
Canal workers, gays & miners, Gandhi’s labor quote
The Hardhat Riot
We Were There; Pins and Needles; Dust for Blood
Bootlegged Aliens; UPPER CASE WOMAN
Workers on Arrival: Black Labor in the Making of America
Singing About Food Labor; Bill Lucy on the ’68 Memphis strike
The Life and Times of a Black Wobbly
The Valentine’s Day Strike of 1921
Remembering John Sweeney and Anne Feeney
What’s the matter with labor history?
The People, No
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