The National Historic Landmarks Program is pleased to announce the release of a new theme study, Labor History in the United States, which highlights the many stories of Americans at work through current scholarship on labor history and nationally significant places. Prepared by Dr. Rachel Donaldson (College of Charleston) as a National Conference of State Historic Preservation Officers (NCSHPO) consultant, the study is organized into chapters focusing on workers in agriculture, extraction industries (like mining or lumbering), manufacturing, transportation, and the service sector.
While labor organizing is a theme throughout, the focus on occupational groups highlights up-to-date research on a wide variety of working people. Beyond discussion of existing and potential labor history National Historic Landmarks, the context here, and in other NHL theme studies, can also inform National Register of Historic Places nominations. The complete accessible PDF is available for download on the National Historic Landmarks Program website – Recent Theme Studies.