Execution of Tupac Amaru II Today in Labor History May 18, 1781: Tupac Amaru II was drawn and quartered in the Plaza Mayor del Cuzco, Peru. Tupac II had led a large indigenous uprising against the Spanish conquistadors. As a result of his heroic efforts, he became an inspiration to other Latin Americans in the […]
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Coeur d’Alene War. Today in Labor History May 17, 1858: 1,200 Coeur d’Alene, Palouse, Spokane & Skitswich Indians defeated Colonel Steptoe’s forces near Colfax, WA. Colonel George Wright returned with a larger force and defeated the indigenous warriors in early September during the Battle of the Four Lakes. In 1851, Washington Territory Governor Isaac Stevens
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Today in Labor History May 16, 1717: Voltaire was imprisoned in the Bastille for writing subversive satire. Today in Labor History May 16, 1871: The Paris Commune destroyed the Vendôme Column (“monument de barbarie”). Karl Marx predicted the destruction of this monument in 1852, in his political pamphlet Le 18 Brumaire de Louis Bonaparte. “But if the Imperial
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Today in Labor History May 15, 1872: Julia Ward Howe declared the first Mother’s Day as an anti-war holiday. Howe was an abolitionist and a feminist who wrote the lyrics for the Battle Hymn of the Republic. However, despite her disgust with slavery, she never thought black and white people were truly equal. 1890s May 15,
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Today in Labor History May 14, 1771: Utopian-socialist Robert Owen was born on this day in Wales. In the early 1800s, he made a fortune in textiles. However, he tried to run his mills on higher principles than greed. For example, he offered prices at his company store that were only slightly higher than their wholesale
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