Greetings...this is the first post for a blog that will discuss two upcoming books dealing with Finnish American labor and social history. I would also like to use this blog as a chance to open a forum into not only Finnish American labor and social history, but also working class issues, which as many of you know, receive little to no attention in public school curriculum or the current mass media.
I currently have two books coming out through Michigan State University Press. The first is The Finns in Michigan. It is another title in the excellent "Discovering the Peoples of Michigan" series. It is due out Spring 2009. If you enjoy labor history, then I believe you will enjoy this book and I truly hope it will be the starting point or a catalyst for a resurgence in honoring the history of those that struggled for industrial democracy and at the same time helped to build America. This book is a pretty raw interpretation of the Finnish American working class and also contains historical elements that are common to the overall American working class.
In upcoming posts I will give an overview of the next book that deals with Finnish American socialist-unionist history in the copper district of Michigan's Upper Peninsula. This book also has two chapters on the 1913-14 Copper Strike led by the Western Federation of Miners.
