The First Labor Day
Labor Day parade,
Main St., Buffalo, N.Y., ca. 1900.
1880-1920
On September 5, 1882, some 10,000 workers assembled in New York City to participate in
America's first Labor Day parade. After marching from City Hall, past reviewing stands in Union
Square, and then uptown to 42nd Street, the workers and their families gathered in Wendel's Elm
Park for a picnic, concert, and speeches. This first Labor Day celebration was eagerly organized and
executed by New York's Central Labor Union, an umbrella group made up of representatives from
many local unions. Debate continues to this day as to who originated the idea of a workers' holiday,
but it definitely emerged from the ranks of organized labor at a time when they wanted to
demonstrate the strength of their burgeoning movement and inspire improvements in their working
conditions.
Miners with Their Children, at the Labor Day Celebration, Silverton, Colorado,
Russell Lee, photographer, September 1940.
America from the Great Depression to World War II: Photographs from the FSA and OWI, ca.
1933-1945
The FSA/OWI collection has more than 60 photographs documenting Silverton, Colorado's 1940 Labor Day
celebration. To see this mining community's parade and other festivities, search on Silverton.
New York's Labor Day celebrations inspired similar events across the country. Oregon became the
first state to grant legal status to the holiday in 1887; other states soon followed. In 1894, Congress
passed legislation making Labor Day a national holiday.
For many decades, Labor Day was viewed by workers not only as a means to celebrate their
accomplishments, but also as a day to air their grievances and discuss strategies for securing better
working conditions and salaries. Nowadays, Labor Day is associated less with union activities and
protest marches and more with leisure. For many, the holiday is a time for family picnics, sporting
events, and summer's last hurrah.
• Read about other significant days in the history of labor. Search the Today in History Archive
on labor to find features such as the history of the eight-hour workday.
• For images and documents pertaining to labor unions, search across the American Memory
collections on the term labor union.
• American Memory contains an extensive array of materials related to parades and processions.
Search the collections of photographs and prints using the keyword parades, or the name of a
specific parade. The collections of motion pictures also document many different kinds of parades
including a small Massachusetts town's celebration of Labor Day.
