On this day in Labor History the year was 1879.
That was the day that Will Rogers was born in Oologah, Indian Territory, in what later became Oklahoma.
Rogers grew up on a ranch, and by 10thgrade had dropped out of school to be a cowboy.
Skilled with a lasso, he became a cowboy entertainer first in vaudeville then in silent film.
Rogers also had a syndicated column and a radio show where he became a popular political commentator.
With quick wit and humor Rogers helped to shape public opinion.
He brought humor to serious issues in a way later echoed by the likes of John Stewart and Stephen Colbert.
Rogers often talked about the plight of the American worker.
In 1931 he was asked to give a radio address for President Herbert Hoover’s Organization on Unemployment.
Rogers expressed the urgency of the unemployment that was sweeping the nation during the Great Depression.
He said, “The only problem that confronts this country today is at least 7,000,000 people are out of work.
That’s our only problem. There is no other one before us at all. It's to see that every man that wants to is able to work, is allowed to find a place to go to work, and also to arrange some way of getting a more equal distribution of the wealth in country…So here we are in a country with more wheat and more corn and more money in the bank, more cotton, more everything in the world—there’s not a product that you can name that we haven't got more of it than any other country ever had on the face of the earth—and yet we’ve got people starving.”
July 22 - The Nation’s First General Strike
July 21 - The Crazy Eights
July 20 - Delivering Respect
July 19 - Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell Announced
July 18 - Chicago Stockyards Workers Kick Off Historic 1919 Strike
July 17 - Growing Teamster Power
July 16 - Ida B. Wells-Barnett is Born
July 15 - Murdered for Standing Up
July 14 - Happy Birthday Woody!
July 13 - The New York City Draft Riots
July 12 - Oscar Neebe is Born
July 11 - A Trail of Broken Treaties
July 10 - Debs Arrested
July 9 - The Deadliest Commute
July 8 - Machinists Walk Out on the Airlines
July 7 - Fighting Privatization in Puerto Rico
July 6 - The Preacher and The Slave
July 5 - The Match Girls Strike
July 4 - The Guiding Light of Transparency
July 3 - Paterson Child Laborers Strike
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