A mind always employed is always happy. This is the true secret, the grand recipe, for felicity. 

This month we are honoring International Workers' Day!

Post an iconic historical photo of International Workers' Day from around the world to qualify for the following PRIZES:

1st - $100

2nd - $75

3rd - $60

4th - $50

5th - $45

6th - $40

7th – $30

8th – 10th FREE Video Poker Apps

Rules

• Must be 21 years or older to qualify.
• Must be a member no later than April 9, 2020.
• One post only per day.
• One prize only per member. Once you win, you can no longer take part in the contest and post answers.
• Prize money is in LCB chips and can only be used to purchase merchandise in our store.
• LCB reserves the right to void the contest at any time.
• Contest ends May 31, 2020. 

Good luck!

The Haymarket Affair, the event that spawned the creation of International Workers day.

Uprising of the 20,000. November 23, 1909

One of the most iconic photos of American workers is not what it seems. But “Lunch atop a Skyscraper" has come to represent the country’s resilience, especially on Labor Day.

Eleven pairs of shoes were dangling over the New York City skyline. It was September of 1932, as the Great Depression was reaching its height. Unemployment and uncertainty could be felt throughout the city and the entire country. But on West 49th Street, a pillar of hope was under construction: the art deco skyscraper that would come to be known as 30 Rockefeller Plaza.

The ironworkers constructing its 70 floors were taking a break, sharing boxed lunches and cigarettes.
They appeared to be completely unfazed by the location of this break: a narrow steel beam jutting out into the sky, hundreds of feet above the pavement.

As one coveralled man helped another light his smoke, someone snapped a picture. The resulting photograph became one of the most iconic images in the world, an embodiment of the spirit of the American worker. It still hangs in pubs, classrooms and union offices across the nation. Construction workers frequently re-create the 87-year-old photo.

And every Labor Day, it is shared across social media, in tribute to those whose perspiration and determination built this country.

- From The Washington Post, Democracy Dies in Darkness

The day is used to honour the contribution of working-class men and women across the globe. It is a public holiday in South Africa, which originated with the historical struggles of workers and trade unions. 

May 1 (April 18 Old Style) 1917

Women employees at Tubular Alloy Steel Corp. gathered en masse to listen to wartime pep rally speech by Army Pvt. John Adams of Detroit who was wounded in action in Buna campaign.

Great photo 

may day

labor day in mexico

It is good to remember that this was not always the case. Labor Day is celebrated because before the rights of workers were not recognized, the conditions for workers were deplorable, people (including women and children) were forced to work hours of up to 18 hours, and wages were extremely low.

In the year 1886 thousands of Chicago workers in the United States, tired of being exploited, decided to defend their labor rights and took to the streets to demand: An 8-hour workday, the right to strike, freedom of expression and association, as well as having a job and a fair salary. However, many of them died in the attempt.

It was in 1913 that Labor Day was celebrated for the first time in Mexico, when 20 thousand workers marched and demanded that the government implement the eight-hour work day and in open defiance of Victoriano Huerta, President of Mexico

In 1923, Álvaro Obregón, president of the country, was promulgated on May 1 as Labor Day in Mexico. However, Mexicans had to wait until 1925 for President Plutarco Elías Calles to officially establish the celebration.
In Mexico, it was until the enactment of the Political Constitution that workers' rights were recognized and protected by law. Article 123 establishes some of these guarantees, among which are: the eight-hour workday, one day of rest for every six days of work, fair wages, the right to form associations and unions, among others. A Federal Labor Law was also made to regulate labor relations between workers and employers.

Protest marches in Mexico
On Labor Day there are several parades of workers, some organize protest marches, in which the working class and their unions take advantage of and express their disagreements with the authorities hoping that they will be heard and helped.

International workers day march in New York, 1909! All these people marching for peoples rights for decent income and basic human rights! Awesome! :-) 

Here is one from my home country

May Day group at Rideau Hall, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, May 1898.

a typical demonstration on May 1 in the USSR (in any republic and city) I went to them myself - I know

Eight-hour day banner, Melbourne, 1856

Melbourne’s building workers won the world’s first eight-hour day without a loss in pay in 1856.

The eight-hour day movement or 40-hour week movement, also known as the short-time movement, was a social movement to regulate the length of a working day, preventing excesses and abuses.
The eight-hour day movement forms part of the early history for the celebration of Labour Day, and May Day in many nations and cultures.

Was Melbourne’s really the first eight-hour day?

American workers didn’t begin a serious struggle for an eight-hour day until 1886. European workers only began to achieve an eight-hour day around the period of the 1917 Russian revolution, when European capitalism was under threat of being replaced with socialism.

• Lewis Hine (1874–1940), a New York City schoolteacher and photographer, believed that a picture could tell a powerful story. He felt so strongly about the abuse of children as workers that he quit his teaching job and became an investigative photographer for the National Child Labor Committee. He was careful to document every photograph with precise facts and figures. To obtain captions for his pictures, he interviewed the children on some pretext and then scribbled his notes with his hand hidden inside his pocket.

  Hine believed that if people could see for themselves the abuses and injustice of child labor, they would demand laws to end those evils. By 1916, Congress passed the Keating-Owens Act that established the following child labor standards: a minimum age of 14 for workers in manufacturing and 16 for workers in mining; a maximum workday of 8 hours; prohibition of night work for workers under age 16; and a documentary proof of age. Unfortunately, this law was later ruled unconstitutional on the ground that congressional power to regulate interstate commerce did not extend to the conditions of labor. Effective action against child labor had to await the New Deal. Reformers, however, did succeed in forcing legislation at the state level banning child labor and setting maximum hours. By 1920 the number of child laborers was cut to nearly half of what it had been in 1910

• 

Since we are also looking for international photos, I would like to submit an iconic photo, which is also included in my grandfather's collection from his hometown.

Here is a picture from May 1st, 1979 from Oulu, Finland, where thousands of people gathered together for the common cause of workers' rights. In the upper right corner you can spot the white-and-blue flag of Finland

Not only were they fighting to be racially equal, they were fighting for all workers everywhere!  Thank heavens for their tenaciousness and plain old fashion guts!  We wouldn't be much without these people!  Thank-you!

INTERNATIONAL WORKERS' DAY 125th Anniversary 

Over 500 people march from the  Cathedral to the Minnesota State Capitol for International Workers' Day. The Marchers united from around the world with demands to stop the attacks on Immigrants, Workers and Unions that were coming from the State Legislature.

On May 1, 2011, the date was marked as the 125th Anniversary of the 1886 Workers Movement, demanding an 8 hour workday after the endorsement. Since then, May 1st has been honored Around the World as International Workers' Day.

GOOD LUCK TO ALL AROUND THE WORLD!

Wishing for Good Health and Safety of All!

2Late4Me

Budapest, Hungary, May 1st 1919.

SFRJ 1954

Labor Day meeting in Union Square, in rain, New York, May 1st 1909

Another Workers' Day image from Finland, this time it's from the 1940's and from Tampere:

I detest when people use any type of platform to promote their own agenda's!  This is an example of how a holiday intended to honor all labor workers has taken a back-seat to this groups selfish and completely irrelevant demonstration.  Immigration is not the focus on this day!  This display is shameful to say the very least!  This needs to STOP!

May Day New York 1910

May Day festivities at National Park Seminary in Maryland, 1907.Library of Congress

International Workers' Day 

( Wiesbaden, Germany - May 1, 1995 )

 Speakers and participants at Tag der Arbeit rally (International Workers' Day) in the city center of Wiesbaden - holding up banners and flags. 

Here you go. 

Police face off with Workers Day/May Day protesters in Downtown Montreal (2015)

(Photo Credits: Camil Tang)

Hello, just curios what year this photo was taken?

St.Petersburg Russia, May 1st, 1901, workers chant "down with the monarchy"

The MAYPOLE TRADITION (MAY DAY)

Another popular tradition of May Day involves the maypole. While the exact origins of the maypole remain unknown, the annual traditions surrounding it can be traced back to medieval times, and some are still celebrated today.

Villagers would enter the woods to find a maypole that was set up for the day in small towns (or sometimes permanently in larger cities). The day’s festivities involved merriment, as people would dance around the pole clad with colorful streamers and ribbons.

 
Historians believe the first maypole dance originated as part of a fertility ritual, where the pole symbolized male fertility and baskets and wreaths symbolized female fertility.

The maypole never really took root in America, where May Day celebrations were discouraged by the Puritans. But other forms of celebrations did find their way to the New World.

During the 19th and 20th centuries, May Basket Day was celebrated across the country, where baskets were created with flowers, candies and other treats and hung on the doors of friends, neighbors and loved ones on May 1.

What does May Day have to do with the international distress call, "Mayday, Mayday, Mayday"? Nothing, as it turns out. The code was invented in 1923 by an airport radio officer in London. Challenged to come up with a word that would be easily understood by pilots and ground staff in case of an emergency, Frederick Mockford coined the word "mayday" because it sounded like "m'aider," a shortened version of the French term for " come and help me."

INTERNATIONAL WORKERS' DAY

The connection between May Day and labor rights began in the United States. During the 19th century, at the height of the Industrial Revolution, thousands of men, women and children were dying every year from poor working conditions and long hours.

In an attempt to end these inhumane conditions, the Federation of Organized Trades and Labor Unions (which would later become the American Federation of Labor, or AFL) held a convention in Chicago in 1884. The FOTLU proclaimed “eight hours shall constitute a legal day’s labor from and after May 1, 1886.”

The following year the Knights of Labor—then America’s largest labor organization—backed the proclamation as both groups encouraged workers to strike and demonstrate.

On May 1, 1886, more than 300,000 workers (40,000 in Chicago alone) from 13,000 business walked out of their jobs across the country. In the following days, more workers joined and the number of strikers grew to almost 100,000.

What working life looked like for kids on the first Labor Day
Lewis Hine’s photography helped end child labor“Breaker boys working in Ewen Breaker of Pennsylvania Coal Co. Location: South Pittston, Pennsylvania.”

The American labor movement was in full swing by the time Labor Day became a federal holiday in 1896. Support for the eight-hour workday was growing and unions were gaining political clout. Yet hiring children was still an easy choice for employers. Youngsters worked for a fraction of what their parents earned and were less likely to strike. Between 1890 and 1910, the number of American kids pulling wages jumped from 1.5 to 2 million.

It was around this time that documentary photographer Lewis Hine began investigating the lives of working children. Using a series of disguises—fire inspector and bible salesman among them—Hine photographed working conditions in coal mines, cotton mills, fisheries, and on city streets, where he encountered kids employed as “newsies” and “bootblacks”.

Many then considered work good for kids, provided it developed useful skills, and wasn’t overly exploitative. Immigrant families, in particular, relied on the income earned by children. But Hine’s images and detailed reporting exposed widespread abuse. His work inspired congressional legislation that would begin combatting a system that had little regard for children’s health or safety. By 1920, child labor had begun to decline.

You meant that question for me,  right? Sorry, I'm not 100% sure but if you are asking me the photo i shared of the protest in Montreal was taken in 2015.

Marx, Engels, and Lenin look on in Poland May Day Crowd in Katowice, Poland; May 1, 1960

1909 Norway

MayDay National Rally, May 1st 2016 South Africa

The first recorded celebration of May Day in South Africa is reported by Ray Alexander to have taken place in 1895 which was organised by the Johannesburg District Trades Council. The next occasion was the visit of British labour and socialist leader Tom Mann, who came to South Africa in 1910. Mann, like Kier Hardie before him, criticized the South African Labour Party (SALP) for its neglect of African workers, and urged the white labour movement to begin to think seriously of organising among African workers. His visit inspired a mood of international worker solidarity and culminated in a mass May Day procession in which all sections of the labour movement participated.

The sign for the UAW (United Auto Workers).  

My Great Uncle was one of the UAW sit-down protestors in 1936 and 1937.  My Grandmother told me it was extremely hard for my Uncle and his family during these years.  Their home was not mortgaged but, they did have to live without any utilities, mainly heat.  This was extremely difficult because the winters in Michigan are bitterly wet and cold.  They also sometimes had to depend on others for food; yet they offered their home for shelter for other sit-downer's family members.

This sit-down protest forced the Auto Manufacturers to reach an agreement with the Union and therefore ended the strike.  Decent working conditions and fair hourly wages were finally negotiated for all auto workers.  My Grandmother also told me, due to the agreement that was reached, my Uncle was finally able to take a vacation from work.  An employee vacation was not allowed prior to the agreement and any worker taking extra time off from work was fired. 

Way To Go Uncle Roy! 

You and your fellow workers sacrifices opened the doors for other workers everywhere to protest for change. 

First May Day celebration of the Ottoman period in Skopje, North Macedonia 1909.

Suffragettes, Labor Day, 1913

May Day Mayheim, 1931

THE WORLD'S LARGEST LABOR CELEBRATION UNION RALLY IN 19th CENTURY CHICAGO

May 1 is known as a celebration of spring, May Day, and also Labour Day. It is considered a global holiday that commemorates the working class and organized labor around the world.

May Day is Día del Trabajo in Cuba and the day is used today to celebrate the Socialist government and and the Cuban Revolution.

May Day Parade, Cuba; May 1, 1940

Socialists in Union Square, New York City, May 1st 1912

1 may 1937

 40,000 young athletes from the republics of the USSR, on Red Square in Moscow.

May Day 1959, Moscow.

Workers Marching in the Red Square with political leaders watching from Lenin’s mausoleum.

People gathering for 1st of May celebrations in Helsinki, 2018

May Day Rally, Singapore, 1963

1986 May Day demonstration of workers in Kiev after the accident at the Chernobyl. 
People were not warned of the danger.

The crowd photo depicts "Svátek práce", or May Day in Prague, Czechoslovakia, 1959

While most Americans view Labor Day as the last long weekend of the summer and another day off work, the history behind the holiday was actually a result of one of the most intense and violent struggles for workers’ rights.

In 1894, during a time of severe economic and social unrest, thousands of workers at the Pullman Palace Car Company went on strike to protest the way George Pullman, founder and president of the Pullman Palace Car Company, treated his workers.  Pullman was one of the wealthiest men in the Chicago area, and subjected his workers to high rents and low pay in the company town he had built for them near the factory.  His actions forced many of his workers into debt and poverty.  When his workers rebelled and went on strike with the support of Eugene Debs and the American Railway Union, Pullman gained the support of President Grover Cleveland, who ordered federal troops to intervene—leading to a bloody confrontation and the deaths of more than 30 Pullman workers. 

Soon afterwards and amid growing criticism to the brutal response to the striking workers, President Cleveland established Labor Day as a national holiday in an effort to appease organized labor.