Help Honor Mother Jones with a Commemorative Stamp
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Mickey Mouse, Mickey Mantle and Mickey Rooney have been honored with commemorative stamps by the U.S. Postal Service. So have obscure diplomats, comic book heroes, authors, architects, motorcycles and love birds.
All occupy a niche of American history and culture. Now labor historians and social activists say its time to honor someone who significantly improved the lives of America’s workers: Mary “Mother” Jones.
Mother Jones was a fearless fighter for workers’ rights:
Once labeled “the most dangerous woman in America” by a U.S. district attorney, Mary Harris “Mother” Jones rose to prominence as a fiery orator and fearless organizer for the Mine Workers during the first two decades of the 20th century.
Nearly anywhere coal miners, textile workers or steelworkers were fighting to organize a union, Mother Jones was there….She was banished from more towns and was held incommunicado in more jails in more states than any other union leader of the time.
Mother Jones Online Museum and More Highlights at AFL-CIO Cool Tools
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The real life working-class hero Mary “Mother” Jones now has her own virtual museum that documents the struggles, victories and history of the woman once dubbed “America’s Most Dangerous Woman.”
The online Mother Jones Museum is the featured item in our newest collection of Cool Tools—the latest selection of books, DVDs, websites and other media with a working-class bent. Cool Tools also highlights three books and a DVD on Latina sweatshop workers’ struggles and victories.
The Mother Jones Museum describes itself as a “virtual museum and curricula about the amazing labor agitator.” It includes links to her entire autobiography and other documents about militant labor history. As the site states:
We believe that she still has something to teach us after all these years.
One page features my favorite Mother Jones quote:
I asked a man in prison once, how he happened to be there, and he said he had stolen loaf of bread. I told him if he had stolen a railroad, he’d be a U.S. senator.
AFT Helps Teach Valuable Lessons in Women’s History Month
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To commemorate March as Women’s History Month, AFT has compiled resources to use in classrooms, union meetings and other venues to discuss the role of women in our nation’s history. The site pulls together a variety of resources that provide a glimpse into the many significant contributions women have made in the fight for both legal and social equality.
Women have taken leadership roles from the onset of the union movement. Today, 44 percent of union members are women. They hold some of the highest posts in the movement, including AFL-CIO Executive Vice President Arlene Holt Baker, 11 members of the AFL-CIO Executive Council and the presidents of several unions such as AFT, AFTRA, California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee, Flight Attendants-CWA, School Administrators and United American Nurses.
The resources compiled by AFT include profiles of some of the women who have fought for workers’ rights, fair wages, dignified working conditions and the freedom to join unions. They range from Lavinia Wright and Louise Mitchell, who formed the first all-women’s labor union in 1825, to the legendary Mother Jones and on to Linda Chavez-Thompson, the first woman to hold the office of AFL-CIO executive vice president and the first person of color to hold one of the top elected offices at the federation.
Click here to see a list and links to all the resources ands here for the profiles of labor heroines.
