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Sunday, September 2, 2012

Labor Day facts - The Answer Sheet - The Washington Post

Labor Day facts - The Answer Sheet - The Washington Post:

Answer Sheet


Labor Day facts

For well over a century Americans have been celebrating Labor Day on the first Monday in September, yet it may be the federal holiday about which kids — and plenty of adults — know the least.

A protest in 2011 in Ohio against a Republican effort to cut public workers’ union bargaining rights. (Melina Mara/THE WASHINGTON POST)
Too many don’t know that it was labor activists who forced employers to stop sending kids into mines, textiles, glass factories, canneries and other places to work back-breaking jobs day and night. Because of the labor movement, child labor ended, and adult workers won better conditions, including the eight-hour work day.
The first Labor Day celebration is believed to have been first observed on Sept. 5, 1882, when Peter J. McGuire, a Carpenters and Joiners Union secretary, organized 10,000 workers to march in New York City, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. Within a decade, more than half