On May 4, 1886, a bomb exploded at a Chicago labor rally, wounding dozens of policemen, seven of whom eventually died. A wave of mass hysteria swept the country, leading to a sensational trial, that culminated in four controversial executions, and dealt a blow to the labor movement from which it would take decades to recover. Historian James Green recounts the rise of the first great labor movement in the wake of the Civil War and brings to life an epic twenty-year struggle for the eight-hour workday. Blending a gripping narrative, outsized characters and a panoramic portrait of a major social movement, Death in the Haymarket is an important addition to the history of American capitalism and a moving story about the class tensions at the heart of Gilded Age America.

This is the first paperback edition of a moving appraisal of the infamous Haymarket bombing (May 1886) and the trial that followed it--a trial that was a cause célèbre in the 1880s and that has since been recognized as one of the most unjust in the annals of American jurisprudence. Paul Avrich shows how eight anarchists who were blamed for the bombing at a workers' meeting near Chicago's Haymarket Square became the focus of a variety of passionately waged struggles.

Cover -- Title Page -- Copyright Page -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- Introduction -- 1. The Conspiracy -- 2. From Red to Black -- 3. The Black International -- 4. Dynamite -- 5. Anarchists, Trade Unions, and the Eight-Hour Workday -- 6. From Eight Hours to Revolution -- Epilogue -- Notes -- Index.

The Trial of the Haymarket Anarchists is the culmination of seven years of research into the 1886 Haymarket bombing and subsequent trial. It not only overturns the prevailing consensus on this event, it documents in detail how the basic facts, as far as they can be determined, have been distorted, obscured, or suppressed for seventy years.

The harsh realities of Civil War life as seen through the eyes of the hard-fighting upstate New York regiment (the 121st New York State Volunteer Infantry Regiment). Combs letters, diaries, and memoirs to let the soldiers recount the war in their own words, following them from enlistment through combat, and back to civilian life.

Details the 1886 tragedy near Chicago's Haymarket Square, where many people were killed and injured as labor disputes between workers and business owners became violent.

A biography of the actor who starred in the popular television series, Family Ties, as well as in a number of motion pictures and who recently announced that he has Parkinson's disease.