Resources

If you're interested in finding out more, check out the following resources:

Reading suggestions
Black Metropolis: A Study of Negro Life in a Northern City by St. Clair Drake & Horace R. Cayton (University of Chicago, 1993)
Black Workers and the New Unions by Horace R. Cayton & George S. Mitchell (Ayer, 1985)
Black Workers in White Unions by William B. Gould (Cornell, 1977)
Faded Dream: The Politics and Economics of Race in America by Martin Carnoy (Cambridge, 1996)
The Negro in the Steel Industry by Richard L. Rowan (University of Pennsylvania, 1970)
Organized Labor and the Black Worker, 1619-1973 by Philip S. Foner (International Publishers, 1974)
Out of the Crucible: Black Steelworkers in Western Pennsylvania, 1875-1980 by Dennis C. Dickerson (State University of New York, 1986)
Southern Labor and Black Civil Rights: Organizing Memphis Workers by Michael K. Honey (University of Illinois, 1993)
The Promised Land: The Great Black Migration by Nicholas Lemann (Knopf, 1991)
The Right to Challenge: People and Power in the Steelworkers Union by John Herling. (Harper and Row, 1972)
Out of This Furnace by Thomas Bell (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press 1976)
Lives of Their Own: Black, Italians and Poles in Pittsburgh 1900-1960 by John Bodnar, Roger Simon and Michael P. Weber (Urbana, University of Illinois Press 1982)
Steel People-Survival and Resilience in Pittsburgh's Mon Valley Published by River Communities Project, School of Social Work, University of Pittsburgh 1986
Aliquippa Update-A Pittsburgh Milltown Struggles to Comeback, 1984-86 and Trouble in Electric Valley, Local Leaders Assess the Difficult Future of Their Communities Published by River Communities Project, School of Social Work, University of Pittsburgh 1986
Dreams Gone to Rust-The Mon Valley Mourns for Steel by David Corn (Harper's September 1986)
Oral History as a Teaching Approach by John A. Neuenshwander (Washington, D.C. National Education Association, 1976)
Films/videos
A. Philip Randolph: For Jobs and Freedom, about the crusading human rights activist and founder of the country's first African-American trade union. California Newsreel, (800) 621-6196 tel / (415) 621-6522 fax.
At the River I Stand, on the 1968 Memphis sanitation workers' strike culminating in the assassination of Martin Luther King; winner of the Organization of American Historians Barnouw Award. California Newsreel.
Eyes on the Prize, groundbreaking multi-part series about the Civil Rights Movement. PBS Home Video, (800) 344-3337 (educational) / (800) 531-4727 (home video).
The Braddock Chronicles 1 & 2, a series of short films documenting the people of Braddock, Pennsylvania.
Voices from a Steeltown, an open ended documentary dealing with the decline of Braddock, a steeltown in Western Pennsylvania.
Organizations
Americans United for Affirmative Action
(404) 870-9090
Educates the public on the importance of maintaining affirmative action programs and the principles of equal opportunity in employment and education.
Black Workers for Justice
(919) 977-8162 / bwfj@igc.org
Focused in North Carolina and Georgia, BWFJ works with low-income workers around issues of worker empowerment, work place fairness, health and organizing issues.
Leadership Conference on Civil Rights
(202) 466-3311
A coalition of more than 185 national organizations united in their support for equal justice, equal opportunity and mutual respect.
National Association for the Advancement of Colored People
(410) 633-7400
The NAACP is the oldest and largest civil rights organization in the U.S., with the principal objective of ensuring the political, educational, social and economic equality of minority group citizens of the U.S.
Coalition of Black Trade Unionists
An important resource for African-American workers.