In 1887, President Grover Cleveland declared the first Monday in September as the first official Labor Day, saluting the social and economic achievements of U.S. workers.

Two young ladies take a break from the paper mill

where they work, Appleton, Wisconsin, 1890

Labor Day parade, Buffalo, NY, 1900

1900 Census - Average Annual Salary: $449.80

Coal miners near Hazelton, PA, 1905

Copper miners, Calumet, MI, 1905

The Biloxi Bakery, Biloxi, Mississippi, 1913

Fred Klein, Sr., center with folded arms, was the founder of the Biloxi Bakery.  He and his sons ran the family business until 1973 when the plant was shut down to make room for an urban renewal project.  The project subsequently failed.  The bakery never reopened.

1920 Census - Average Annual Salary: $1,407

The staff of People's Drug Store located at the

corner of 11th & G St., Washington, DC, 1924

Office workers at the American Nature Association, Washington, DC, 1925

Mary Ramsey, an assembly line worker at the

Atwater Kent Radio Factory, Philadelphia, 1925

Construction workers, Washington, DC, 1929

RCA Victor five-tube radio chassis assembly line, Camden, NJ, 1937

Consolidated Vultee plant, Nashville, TN, 1943

Chicago Sanitation employees, 1948

Source

Worker in the blast furnace at Bethlehem Steel, 1951

Behind-the-scene photo of the filming of an episode of The Honeymooners.  Shown, left to right, are Joyce Randolph, Art Carney, Jackie Gleason, and Audrey Meadows, April, 1955.  Notice the cameraman is wearing a suit?

A training session for Helena Rubinstein
cosmetic sales associates, NY, 1961

Super Giant grocery store, Rockville, MD, 1964

Thank you to the manual laborers and blue collar
workers who made this country great.