Chapter 1
Setting The Stage
A Historical Perspective Leading Up To The Birth of Our Union
Every union has a beginning, and ours was born out of hardship, determination, and the unbreakable will of workers who refused to stand alone. This page opens the door to the roots of our trade by drawing from Chapter 1 of the Ironworker History Book, “Setting the Stage.” It provides a powerful historical perspective on the economic, social, and industrial conditions that existed before the birth of our union. Here, you will explore labor history leading up to 1896, a period of rapid industrial growth when ironworkers helped build a nation while enduring dangerous conditions, unstable wages, and little protection.
More than a record of dates and events, this chapter shares the stories of struggle, courage, and solidarity that shaped the labor movement in the United States. It highlights the defining moments and collective actions that gave working people a voice and laid the foundation for unionism. As a resource page, this section is meant to educate, inspire and remind us that the rights, standards, and unity we depend on today were earned through sacrifice and resolve.
Historical Video Resources
Title Full Link
Guilds and the Industrial Revolution https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sTN0IXAdx08&list=PLrRiBVo0E4Jr85p6Df2QxT-7UjNSNQXzH&index=1
Workers Fight Back https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6nqXDHTyqIY
The Men Who Built America: How Steel Forged a U.S. Empire https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EI_4QDByiW4&list=PLrRiBVo0E4Jr85p6Df2QxT-7UjNSNQXzH&index=4
Modern Marvels: Building of the Brooklyn Bridge https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9I-JFnbJ19U&list=PLrRiBVo0E4Jr85p6Df2QxT-7UjNSNQXzH&index=7
Star Spangled Banner Story https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NCdwPf46N30&list=PLrRiBVo0E4Jr85p6Df2QxT-7UjNSNQXzH&index=9
Big Bill Haywood: A Life Larger Than Most
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4jJg4Yh5IvQ&list=PLrRiBVo0E4Jr85p6Df2QxT-7UjNSNQXzH&index=11
Homestead Strike of 1892 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f1ZOqiRAIH4&list=PLrRiBVo0E4Jr85p6Df2QxT-7UjNSNQXzH&index=13
The Raising of Chicago https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QWQa2jCNzIc&list=PLrRiBVo0E4Jr85p6Df2QxT-7UjNSNQXzH&index=18
The History of Labor Day https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n2IxchiVdS0&list=PLrRiBVo0E4Jr85p6Df2QxT-7UjNSNQXzH&index=19
The History of Bethlehem Steel https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sEOrGSEG5Ak&list=PLrRiBVo0E4Jr85p6Df2QxT-7UjNSNQXzH&index=25
Haymarket 1886 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GW_a0MQIHt8&list=PLrRiBVo0E4Jr85p6Df2QxT-7UjNSNQXzH&index=29
Allan Pinkerton https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XQ0byzPA8F0&list=PLrRiBVo0E4Jr85p6Df2QxT-7UjNSNQXzH&index=30
J.P. Morgan https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9SaQ_LdnvMs&list=PLrRiBVo0E4Jr85p6Df2QxT-7UjNSNQXzH&index=35
Tribute to Henry Bessemer https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QRSm7F1S7Ug
Eugene V. Debs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qOnyX5kRaJk
The First Iron Bridge – Coalbrookdale (Abraham Darby)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LmAlTOxrF7Y
Engineering the Iron Bridge: Iron Casting from the 1700s
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SHoY0thM8jE
The Difference Between Pig Iron, Wrought Iron, Cast Iron, and Steel https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rp5_Al2JXAg
300 Years of Iron & Steel Making in Pennsylvania – Lecture https://youtu.be/kps1-bIUcnE
James B. Eads: Master of the Mississippi
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oILXfdGb8ug
Eads Bridge https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pwrhept8G_Q
Interactive Pneumatic Caisson – Eads Bridge https://interactive.wttw.com/ten/modern-marvels/eads-bridge
Eiffel Tower Construction (1887–1889) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oOKyJrFRrNo
The Molly Maguires https://vimeo.com/user47609602/review/288350084/3891cbdfe4
How the Erie Canal Transformed America
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aAGYXgzHkeY
The Last Surviving Ironworker https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-PhWqbNuGXY
NAM indoctrination films (93 films, ~14min each)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xn9piuNwNTg&list=PLqqqqZrD37h5Y0N8g9HPqVWP4ondE4Exp
The N.A.M. and visual propaganda https://www.hagley.org/librarynews/research-national-association-manufacturers-and-visual-propaganda
The CCC https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mClKVBixbeI&t=526s
WPA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=To9irNzXOic
Conquest of the Hudson: The Lincoln Tunnel (19:44) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mav9SgzAsfw
National Iron & Steel Heritage Museum (Videos) https://steelmuseum.org/video/iron_steelmaking_videos.cfm
Labor Day: Why We Celebrate It? (4:13) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YqmPE2HtkyU
Recommended Books
Author(s) Book(s)
James C. Reilly Bridging the Gap: A History of Iron Workers Local 1, Chicago, Illinois
J. Robert Beck Ironworkers: The Untold Story
International Association of Bridge, Structural, Ornamental and Reinforcing Iron Workers The Ironworkers’ Journal
Robert E. Hanrahan Writings on Chicago labor and ironwork union development
Jim Rasenberger High Steel: The Daring Men Who Built the World’s Greatest Skyline
Richard O. Boyer & Herbert M. Morais Labor’s Untold Story
Philip Dray There Is Power in a Union: The Epic Story of Labor in America
Jeremy Brecher Strike!
Thomas Geoghegan Which Side Are You On? Trying to Be for Labor When It’s Flat on Its Back
Michael Yates Why Unions Matter; Longer Hours, Fewer Jobs
Steven Greenhouse The Big Squeeze; Beaten Down, Worked Up
David Montgomery The Fall of the House of Labor; Workers’ Control in America
Nelson Lichtenstein State of the Union; Labor’s War at Home
Melvyn Dubofsky We Shall Be All: A History of the IWW
Howard Zinn A People’s History of the United States
Irving Bernstein The Lean Years; The Turbulent Years
Jacqueline Jones A Dreadful Deceit
Bruce Nelson Workers on the Waterfront
Stanley Aronowitz False Promises: The Shaping of American Working Class Consciousness
David Brody Workers in Industrial America
S. Michael Gaddis California Labor History
Arturo Rosales Chicano! The History of the Mexican American Civil Rights Movement
Studs Terkel Working; Hard Times
Archie Green, David Roediger, Franklin Rosemont, Salvatore Salerno (eds.) The Big Red Songbook
Elizabeth Gurley Flynn The Rebel Girl: An Autobiography
Mary Heaton Vorse A Footnote to Folly; Labor’s New Millions
Elizabeth A. Fones-Wolf Selling Free Enterprise: The Business Assault on Labor and Liberalism
Jennifer A. Delton The Industrialists: How the National Association of Manufacturers Shaped American Capitalism
William Cahn A Pictorial History of American Labor
Richard O. Boyer & Herbert M. Morais Labor’s Untold Story
Paul Avrich The Haymarket Tragedy
Martin Jay Levitt Confessions of a Union Buster
Robert Michael Smith From Blackjacks to Briefcases
Julius G. Getman Restoring the Power of Unions
James Green The Devil is Here in These Hills
Jane McAlevey A Collective Bargain: Unions, Organizing, and the Fight for Democracy
Norman H. Finkelstein Union Made
Jane Mayer Dark Money
Chicago Teachers How to Jump-Start Your Union
Louis Schubert, Thomas R. Dye and Harmon Zeigler The Irony of Democracy
Pope Leo XIII
Rerum Novarum
Labor History Sites and Memorials
American Federation of Labor State Historical Marker
https://www.google.com/maps/place/Omni+William+Penn+Hotel/@40.4406252,-79.9974862,146m/data=!3m2!1e3!5s0x8834f159c4135b2f:0x15be6f0bc0a58398!4m9!3m8!1s0x8834f159c36e9765:0x10487e56a2ee9463!5m2!4m1!1i2!8m2!3d40.440716!4d-79.99688!16s%2Fg%2F1jlk0k1n_?entry=ttu&g_ep=EgoyMDI2MDQxNC4wIKXMDSoASAFQAw%3D%3D
Cigar Makers Union Monument
Samuel Gomers Memorial
google.com/maps/place/samuel+gompers+memorial/data=!4m2!3m1!1s0x89b7b7936874635f:0x9698e1dd487ac6d?sa=X&ved=1t:242&ictx=111
Homestead Historical Marker (Pinkerton Landing Site)
https://www.google.com/maps/place/880+E+Waterfront+Dr,+Munhall,+PA+15120/@40.413132,-79.898416,582m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m6!3m5!1s0x8834ee407816efb3:0x6f61902a43d0960b!8m2!3d40.413181!4d-79.8968301!16s%2Fg%2F11bw4ckl57?entry=ttu&g_ep=EgoyMDI2MDQxNC4wIKXMDSoASAFQAw%3D%3D
Jack “Black Jack” Kehoe-Hibernian House
https://www.google.com/maps/place/Hibernian+House/@40.7940427,-76.2845906,579m/data=!3m2!1e3!4b1!4m6!3m5!1s0x89c58d4499097af5:0xd1668daf19c8df91!8m2!3d40.7940427!4d-76.2845906!16s%2Fg%2F11b7dxc0z9?entry=ttu&g_ep=EgoyMDI2MDQxNC4wIKXMDSoASAFQAw%3D%3D
Terence V. Powderly’s Gravesite
https://www.google.com/maps/place/Rock+Creek+Cemetery/@38.944912,-77.0109473,595m/data=!3m2!1e3!4b1!4m6!3m5!1s0x89b7c875ba3ce361:0xcb0a894d051881fe!8m2!3d38.944912!4d-77.0109473!16zL20vMDRycWxt?entry=ttu&g_ep=EgoyMDI2MDQxNC4wIKXMDSoASAFQAw%3D%3D
Railroad Strike of 1877- State Historical Marker
https://www.hmdb.org/map.asp?markers=40906,26112,26111,47037,259789,52129,259962,259831,73628,26110
Cast Iron – SoHo District, New York
https://www.google.com/maps/place/SoHo,+New+York,+NY/@40.7236448,-74.0006793,1159m/data=!3m2!1e3!4b1!4m6!3m5!1s0x89c2598c5e51e2f3:0xce2f3449f490f818!8m2!3d40.7245908!4d-74.0019174!16zL20vMHBuMjA?entry=ttu&g_ep=EgoyMDI2MDQxNC4wIKXMDSoASAFQAw%3D%3D
Haymarket Martyrs’ Monument
google.com/maps/place/haymarket+martyrs+grave/data=!4m2!3m1!1s0x880e351cb0928f03:0x5934c3742cc88cb2?sa=X&ved=1t:155783&ictx=111
Eads Bridge
google.com/maps/place/eads+bridge/data=!4m2!3m1!1s0x87d8b2e635e370f7:0xdbb43a6bf37f779f?sa=X&ved=1t:155783&ictx=111
Brooklyn Bridge
google.com/maps/place/brooklyn+bridge/data=!4m2!3m1!1s0x89c25a2343ce7b2b:0x2526ddba7abd465c?sa=X&ved=1t:155783&ictx=111
