Word came from Wisconsin in time (or close enough anyway) for the international workers’ holiday that Cream City Review will be publishing my “Labor Day Ironies” in a forthcoming special “Labor” issue. My essay surveys the origins of May Day and Labor Day and some attendant peculiarities, not the least of which is that Labor Day became a holiday only after a disastrous failure of a strike. The president who signed off on it did so only to mollify workers anger by the harsh tactics used to squash the labor action. A Pyrrhic victory if there ever was one, if you ask me, but some fascinating history all the same.
