Overview

Skilled Hands, Strong Spirits follows the history of the Building and Construction Trades Department from the emergence of building trades councils in the age of the skyscraper; through treacherous fights over jurisdiction as new building materials and methods of work evolved; and through numerous Department campaigns to improve safety standards, work with contractors to promote unionized construction, and forge a sense of industrial unity among its fifteen (and at times nineteen) autonomous and highly diverse affiliates. Arranged chronologically, Skilled Hands, Strong Spirits is based on archival research in Department, AFL-CIO, and U.S. government records as well as numerous union journals, the local and national press, and interviews with former Department officers. Grace Palladino makes the history of the building trades come alive. By investigating the sources of conflict and unity within the Building and Construction Trades Department over time, and demonstrating how building trades unions dealt with problems and opportunities in the past, she provides a historical context for the current generation of workers and leaders as they devise new strategies to suit their current situation.

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9780801474149

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Reviews

Grace Palladino's sweeping narrative is the best history ever written about the venerable cornerstone of American unionism. It is deeply informative, wisely balancing criticism and praise for the building trades while pointing the way to a better future. This is a landmark book in labor studies. Michael Kazin, Georgetown University, author of Barons of Labor: The San Francisco Building Trades and Union Power in the Progressive Era and The Populist Persuasion: An American History

Skilled Hands, Strong Spirits gives us a valuable institutional look at the strengths and limitations of craft union autonomy. From a contemporary perspective it is a look at the real problems inherent in 'changing to organize,' a slogan clearly identified with the current debate over labor's future. For this reason it is an important book. -Marcus Widenor, Labor Studies Journal (Winter 2006) Skilled Hands, Strong Spirits is a significant contribution that encourages wide-ranging reflections and comparisons. This important institutional history illuminates its specific subject matter while encouraging broader reflections on the character of the bifurcated U.S. labor movement more generally. -Robert H. Zieger, Labor History (November 2005) Throughout its history, various unions have left the BCTD [Building & Construction Trades Department] over jurisdictional and other disputes... Institutional histories are difficult to write; it's easy to get caught up in personalities or the spider web of intrigue and behind the scenes details. Pallidino, however, handles this with grace and an over-arching view of the story. Anyone who has spent time on a construction site or a newly elected local trades officer would learn much from this very readable volume. -Mike Matejka, Grand Prairie Union News Grace Palladino's Skilled Hands, Strong Spirits is a comprehensive institutional history of the national building trades unions. She describes the unchanging conflicts-the debates over centralized authority vs. local autonomy, inter-union rivalries, and jurisdictional disputes-that have served to divide more often than unite this wing of the labor movement. In today's challenging environment, new strategies and approaches are more important than ever if construction workers are to be justly rewarded for their difficult and dangerous labor. -Mark Erlich, New England Regional Council of Carpenters, author of With Our Hands and Labor at the Ballot Box There have been few serious studies of national construction unions since the era when labor history was a branch of labor economics. Moreover, there has been virtually no good history of construction unionism at the national level since then. Skilled Hands, Strong Spirits fills that gap admirably. -Richard Schneirov, Indiana State University Grace Palladino's Skilled Hands, Strong Spirits: A Century of Building Trades History is a well-written, well- researched narrative history of one of the most important sectors of the trade union movement in the United States. It is traditional history of the best sort, its focus centered on institutions, events, leaders, labor markets, and the meaning and acquisition of skill. -Melvyn Dubofsky, Binghamton University, SUNY Grace Palladino's sweeping narrative is the best history ever written about the venerable cornerstone of American unionism. It is deeply informative, wisely balancing criticism and praise for the building trades while pointing the way to a better future. This is a landmark book in labor studies. -Michael Kazin, Georgetown University, author of Barons of Labor: The San Francisco Building Trades and Union Power in the Progressive Era and The Populist Persuasion: An American History

Grace Palladino's sweeping narrative is the best history ever written about the venerable cornerstone of American unionism. It is deeply informative, wisely balancing criticism and praise for the building trades while pointing the way to a better future. This is a landmark book in labor studies. -Michael Kazin, Georgetown University, author of Barons of Labor: The San Francisco Building Trades and Union Power in the Progressive Era and The Populist Persuasion: An American History

Author Information

Grace Palladino is the Codirector of The Samuel Gompers Papers at the University of Maryland, College Park. She is also the author of Teenagers: An American History; Dreams of Dignity, Workers of Vision: A History of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers; and Another Civil War: Labor, Capital, and the State in the Anthracite Regions of Pennsylvania.

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