The Unmaking and the Making

“As a work of history, [Stayin’ Alive] might be the most groundbreaking and original national history of a working class since E.P. Thompson’s Making of the English Working Class....for its humanity, its memory, its reminder that political agency can change outcomes, and most of all for reminding us that 'those steel mills and their surrounding communities may be gone, but the workers are still out there — part of the new Wal-Mart working class' this book is required reading for anyone looking to revive working class hopes and alternatives to America’s disastrous love story with capitalism.”


Steven Colatrella, “Is a Dream a Lie if it Doesn’t Come True  (or is it something worse)?,” New Politics Winter 2011. 

Lovely Letter of a Dying Age

I often get nice letters from readers, but this one really moved me. It's posted with permission:

Mr. Cowie,

My father worked at the Ford Motor Company Casting Plant in Brookpark OH.  My mother was a stay-at-home mom until she and Dad built their own home in 1950-51 in an out-lying suburb south of Cleveland.  She went to work at the local grocery chain to make ends meet and to finish