Birth of Richard Trevellick, a ship carpenter, founder of American National Labor Union and later head of the National Labor Congress, America’s first national labor organization - 1830

Mary Harris “Mother” Jones born in County Cork, Ireland - 1830

The term “rat,” referring to a worker who betrays fellow workers, first appears in print in the New York Daily Sentinel. The newspaper was quoting a typesetter while reporting on replacement workers who had agreed to work for two-thirds of the going rate - 1830

First daily labor newspaper, "N.Y. Daily Sentinel", begins publication - 1830

George Henry Evans publishes the first issue of the Working Man’s Advocate, “edited by a Mechanic” for the “useful and industrious classes” in New York City. He focused on the inequities between the “portion of society living in luxury and idleness” and those “groaning under the oppressions and miseries imposed on them.” - 1829

William Sylvis, founder of the National Labor Union, born - 1828

The Mechanics Gazette, believed to be the first U.S. labor newspaper, is published in Philadelphia, the outgrowth of a strike by Carpenters demanding a shorter, 10-hour day. The strike lost but labor journalism blossomed: within five years there were 68 labor newspapers across the country, many of them dailies - 1827

Indian field hands at San Juan Capistrano mission refused to work, engaging in what was probably the first farm worker strike in California - 1826

After eight years and at least 1,000 worker deaths – mostly Irish immigrants – the 350-mile Erie Canal opens, linking the Great Lakes and the Atlantic Ocean. Father John Raho wrote to his bishop that "so many die that there is hardly any time to give Extreme Unction to everybody. We run night and day to assist the sick" - 1825

First strike for 10 hour day, by Boston carpenters - 1825

Men and women weavers in Pawtucket, R.I. stage nation's first "co-ed" strike - 1824

Uriah Smith Stephens born in Cape May, NJ. A tailor by trade, in 1869 he led nine Philadelphia garment workers to found the Knights of Labor - 1821