Here are the life stories of the men and women who have led the labor movement in America from Reconstruction to recent times, from William H. Sylvis, the first major labor leader, to Cesar Chavez, who organized California's farm workers in the 1960s. All of the chapters have been written expressly for this volume by leading authorities, several of whom are authors of booklength biographies of their subjects. Taken together these readable yet authoritative life studies provide a broad overview of the American labor movement that will appeal to the student and lay reader as well as to the specialist in social history and labor and industrial relations.''An excellent collection that is at once a valuable reference tool and, more important, an original contribution to the expanding field of American labor history.''--John Bodnar, co-author of Lives of Their Own: Blacks, Italians, and Poles in Pittsburgh, 1900-1960
