This ACTUAL picture pops up every now and then in pop culture and has done so for decades.. An actual scene of workers eating lunch above a still being built city.. on a beam.. inches from death but not scared of anything, just devouring their food in order to have energy to work more..
Labor Day is something special.. something very important. It is not MAY DAY, America was sure to separate its reflection of workers from the Communist inspired day across the rest of the world. No, here in America, we have long prided ourselves on having workers rights alongside of capitalism. Sometimes it works. Sometimes it does not. Every now and then someone like Teddy Roosevelt or Franklin have to come around and give workers more rights.. or Richard Nixon and give the government more power to protect.
But labor day did not just emerge because someone in power liked labor unions.. Not at all. It was forged with blood and sacrifice. Real blood and real death. The United States Department of Labor offers up a history of Labor Day on its website..
Not spoken about much during Labor Day celebrations: The Molly Maguires .. They battled coal barons in my home location of the dark mines of Eastern Pennsylvania.. They forged fairness for workers and wages for those who often were just slaves to the company towns.. And they were charged with crimes without evidence they committed them and hung–most likely because their actions have weight that forever changed the nation.
And even today, in the Old Jail in Jim Thorpe Pennsylvania, it is said that a handprint of one Molly still exists as a sign for all future generations of their universal power and strength.
Labor Day comes every year with picnics and beach trips.. and just like every other holiday here in the United States, over time it seemingly loses meaning for some people. Labor Day should not at all.. the very fact you have a day off or are able to have a wage and overtime after forty hours is because of the sacrifices often in blood that so many had generations before us..
