Today in Labor History

October 28 - Union Communications Services, Inc.

Union organizer and anarchist Luisa Capetillo is born in Ariecibo, Puerto Rico.  She organized tobacco and other agricultural workers in Puerto Rico and later in New York and Florida. In 1916 she led a successful sugar cane strike of more than 40,000 workers on the island.  She demanded that her union endorse voting rights for women.  In 1919, three years before her death, she was arrested for wearing pants in public, the first woman in Puerto Rico to do so.  The charges were dropped – 1879

The Gateway Arch, a 630-foot high parabola of stainless steel marking the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial on the waterfront of St. Louis, Mo., is completed after two and one-half years. Although it was predicted 13 lives would be lost in construction, not a single Ironworker died - 1965