Sister Solidarity: The living history of labor

If there was one thing that had the most impact during this past week at the UALE NE Summer School was the Labor History night. Sisters came forth and told the stories of Sojourner Truth, Mary Harris "Mother" Jones, Sarah Bagley, Pauline Newman, Rose Schneiderman, Harriet Tubman, Clara Lemlich, Lucy Gonzales Parsons, Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, Jessica Govea, Maxine Dugan, Barbara Wertheimer, and many others. Three women came forward and told their own stories of being a woman and struggling against the male dominated workforce (Paulette), learning why her mother struck for a better way (Crystal), and being a young woman coming from a non-union upbringing to learn what it means to have solidarity (Zuleyka).

Sister Bev Grant, the cultural coordinator for the School, not only handled everyone beautifully, but led people in song during a technical glitch with the virtual history show on the screen behind the speakers. She has been doing this for 24 years and her experience shows. She wrote a song called "I am a Sewing Machine" in honor of those who died not only in the Triangle Shirt Waist fire in 1911, but those who perished in Bangladesh in the factory collapse and fire in 2013.

This presentation not only told us the stories of the ladies, but it showed that it doesn't matter how old you are, like Mother Jones who didn't start organizing until she was 50, Ida Torres who is still in the fight at the age of 91 and Dr. Lois Gray who is still teaching us women, or how young you are, like Jessica Govea who was only 19 when she started organizing farmworkers along side of Cesar Chavez. If you have the heart and the will and the strength to stand up, you too can become a labor heroine in your own way.

Here are some of the pictures from rehearsal that night, courtesy of Sister Geeti Borah: