Joe Hill: Labor’s Legendary Troubadour
At sunrise on Nov. 19, 1915, a firing squad at the Utah State Penitentiary executed a labor activist who many people believed had been falsely convicted of murder.
Nearly a century later, the legend of “Joe Hill” is frequently invoked in the ongoing...
Frances Perkins: Trailblazer for Workers’ Rights
In an era when few women had risen to positions of prominence, Frances Perkins in 1933 became the nation’s first female cabinet secretary. During her long tenure as Secretary of the Department of Labor, she was a trailblazer for workers’ rights,...
The Post Office Department and Jim Crow
Although slavery had been outlawed, there were virtually no laws or regulations after the Civil War that provided African-Americans with protection against racial discrimination on the job, unless they worked for the federal government.In 1883, as...
Postal Landscape Includes Art of the New Deal
If the facility you work in was built during the Great Depression, chances are that its public lobby features a unique work of art. Though many post offices have undergone repeated renovations, most of the art has been preserved. Today, about 1,000...
Not Always a Smooth Ride
Mail transportation took the obvious route when the Continental Congress founded our nation’s postal system in 1775. The horse and rider — and maybe the occasional “buggy” — were the main features of the system for decades.