Samuel Gompers (1850–1924) played a bigger role in shaping the U.S. labor movement than any other individual. Gompers was born in London and came to America with his family in 1863. He went...

Henry Clay Frick (1849–1919) became wealthy in the coal and coke business around Pittsburgh during the 1870s. He formed a partnership with steel magnate Andrew Carnegie in 1881 and served as chai...

George Meany (1894–1980), the son of a plumber, started as a plumber himself, but quickly became a union bureaucrat. He was named secretary-treasurer of the AFL in 1939 and succeeded to the...

Walter Reuther (1907–1970) was discharged from the Ford Motor Co. in 1931 for union activism. He began to organize for the United Auto Workers and led a sit-down strike in Detroit in 1936, e...

John L. Lewis (1880–1969) served as president of the United Mine Workers Union for more than 40 years. He was one of the founders of the CIO and pursued the aggressive organization of worker...

César E. Chávez (1927–1993) was one of the most effective labor organizers of the modern era. Born in Yuma, Arizona, Chávez became active with the National Agricultural Workers as early a...

Eugene Debs (1855–1926) was the president of the American Railway Union and a founding member of the Social Democratic Party of America. Born in Indiana, he dropped out of high school and we...