Books on the topic 'Construction Workers' Strike'

This chapter examines the saga of George M. Pullman's “model town,” which he originally envisioned as a way to reform the senses of the working classes and achieve a peaceful and sustainable solution to the labor problem. With his construction of a model town, Pullman believed he could tame the sensory values of his workers by promoting “self-restraint” and the refinement of “coarse tastes.” In the end, however, Pullman's effort to regulate workers' sensory lives yielded resentment that culminated in a railroad strike in 1894. This chapter first discusses the Great Railroad Strike of 1877 and how it raised concerns about a radical mob bent on stifling—even reversing—Chicago's economic modernization. It then considers Pullman's ambitious plan to build a corporate town south of the city that would retrain workers' senses to ease the conflict between labor and capital without sacrificing the bottomline of his Palace Car Company. The chapter concludes with an analysis of the Pullman Strike of 1894 sparked by suffering and discontent in the model town.

This chapter details several key eight-hour campaign successes and losses in the 1890s and their impact on the religious framing among workers and clergy. As the 1880s gave way to the 1890s, arbitration was heard much more frequently as a solution to impasses between employers and organized labor. Prominent businessmen such as Cyrus McCormick and Marshall Field rejected the notion of bargaining with their employees on what they considered to be their right to conduct their business affairs free from interference. Nevertheless, finding ways to minimize class hostilities and prevent the production losses that inevitably accompanied drawn-out strikes and lockouts was becoming a priority for more and more employers. In 1893, Illinois enacted the “Sweatshop Act” that limited the workdays of women and children to eight hours. Moreover, the 1890s is significant as the period in which eight-hour support among Protestant clergy was strengthened as the result of a new social consciousness regarding labor reform.

The History of Russian Literature provides a comprehensive account of Russian writing from its earliest origins in the monastic works of Kiev up to the present day, still rife with the creative experiments of post-Soviet literary life. Five chronological parts by design unfold in diachronic histories; they can be read individually but are presented as inseparable across the span of a national literature. Throughout its course, this History follows literary processes as they worked in respective periods and places, whether in monasteries, at court, in publishing houses, in the literary marketplace, or the Writers’ Union. Evolving institutional practices used to organize literature are themselves a part of the story of literature told in poetry, drama, and prose including diaries and essays. Equally prominent is the idea of writers’ agency in responding to tradition and reacting to larger forces such as church and state that shape the literary field. Coverage strikes a balance between extensive overview and in-depth thematic discussion, addressing trans-historical questions through case studies detailing the importance of texts, figures, and notions. The book does not follow the decline model often used in accounts of the nineteenth century as a change-over between ages of prose and poetry. We trace in the evolution of literature two interrelated processes: changes in subjectivities and the construction of national narratives. It is through categories of nationhood, literary politics, and literary life, forms of selfhood, and forms of expression that the intense influence of literature on a culture as a whole occurs.

The main milestones of the formation and development of astronomical science in Kharkiv during 1883–1945 are reconstructed on the example of the activities of the astronomical observatory of Kharkiv University. During this period, the outstanding worldview science in Kharkiv has achieved significant success: the works of Kharkiv astronomers have received world recognition; a well-known scientific planetary school has been established at the Observatory; the scientific community highly appreciated the research on the physics and chemistry of the Moon, the giant and small planets of the Solar System. The primary goal of the research is to inscribe the history of the university Observatory into the European and world context. Its purpose is to summarize the results of a comprehensive historical ad scientific study of the development of astronomical research in Kharkiv at the end of the 19th century – the first half of the 20th century and identification of ways of further scientific research. The completed research, which continues the problems of works devoted to the study of the history of astronomical science in Ukraine, focuses on expanding the well-known source base by attracting new retro-information resources. In particular, the monograph used a significant array of archival primary sources from almost twenty archival and library institutions of different countries. Most of them were introduced into scientific circulation for the first time, which allowed to determine and specify the sequence of stages of development of astronomical science in Kharkiv during the research period, to clarify and identify the little-known circumstances of the observatory life. The methodological basis of the study is the principles of historism, objectivity and a systematic approach to studying the problem. To solve specific problematic tasks in the monograph, general scientific and specially historical methods were used which allowed to study, analyze and summarize the presented factual material in a complex manner. The main sections of the monograph represent the dynamics of replenishment of the instrumental base of the university observatory, the chronology of the construction of the observatory complex of buildings at the location of the modern Scientific Research Institute of Astronomy of the V. N. Karazin Kharkiv National University. According to the author’s periodization, the stages of formation of subjects and directions of scientific work of university astronomers have been analyzed, including: seismic observations with the help of horizontal Rebeur-Paschwitz pendulums, research of the activity of the Sun, astrometric observations on the Repsold meridian circle of for the purpose of compiling a catalog of zodiac stars, studying lunar eclipses and meteor showers. The participation of university astronomers in the creation of the plan of the city of Kharkiv and its connection with the general network of precise geometric leveling of the Military Topographic Department of the General Staff; the organization of observations by an expedition of Kharkiv astronomers of the total Solar eclipse of 1914 in Henichesk; the creation of the School-workshop of precision mechanics at the Faculty of Physics and Mathematics of Kharkiv University were considered; information on the participation of Kharkiv astronomers in the events of the civil war during the Ukrainian Revolution was documented. The scientific research activity of Kharkiv astronomers during 1920-1930-s which was devoted to carrying out important astrometric works on meridian observations of star declinations by absolute methods and observations of Kopf-Rentz stars according to the programs of the International Astronomical Union; the initiation of the creation of the Catalog of faint stars; research in astrophysics aimed at studying the physical conditions on the Moon and the Sun, planets and the interstellar environment; performing long series of spectrophotometric observations of the Moon, Jupiter, Mars and Saturn under different conditions of observation; study of the kinematics of stellar systems of different order, the physical parameters and evolution of stars, the morphology of the Galaxy, the nature of the stellar subsurfaces and atmospheres, dust and gas nebulae, new stars and the variability of stars have been considered; the directions of solid works carried out in the field of celestial mechanics, devoted to the dynamics of the minor planets of the Jupiter group, the definition and improvement of the orbits of minor planets have been clarified. The development of amateur astronomy in Kharkiv, in particular, the functioning of circles and societies that directed their activities to the dissemination of astronomical knowledge, was highlighted; the participation of their representatives in astronomical observations at the Kharkiv Astronomical Observatory was emphasized. Reconstructed the development of historical events in the 1930s related to the involvement of Soviet and Western astronomers in the processes of political confrontation between the USSR and the Western world; investigated the course of circumstances that prevented the implementation of the project of creating a new modern astronomical center of national importance – the central Ukrainian observatory in Kharkiv; the participation of an expedition of Kharkiv astronomers in the observation of the «great Soviet eclipse» – the total solar eclipse of 1936 – in the North Caucasus is highlighted; established the facts of political «purges» and repressions by the People’s Commissariat for Internal Affairs ( the NKVD) in the Kharkiv Astronomical Observatory. The activity of the Kharkiv Astronomical Observatory has been documented and authentic biographical information about its representatives during the Nazi occupation of 1941–1943, the period of the German-Soviet war, has been presented; the unpopular facts of the forced collaboration of some scientists are highlighted; the process of recovery and reconstruction of the Kharkiv Astronomical Observatory after the liberation of the city is characterized. With the aim of researching the personal history of Kharkiv astronomy of the studied period, the monograph presents the results of a historical and biographical study of facts of life and scientific heritage of scientists who fully devoted themselves to Science, laid the foundations for the future development of many directions of modern astronomical research, made a significant contribution to the treasury of the national and European astronomical science, whose activities were connected with the Kharkiv Astronomical Observatory, in particular: Grigory Levytsky, Ludwig Struve, Mykola Evdokymov, Otto Struve, Mykola Barabashov, Boris Gerasimovich, Vasil Fesenkov, Oleksiy Razdolsky, Boris Ostashchenko-Kudryavtsev, Nicholas Bobrovnikov, Paraskovia Parkhomenko, Mstislav Savron, Boris Semeykin, Kostyantyn Savchenko and others (25 biographical essays are presented). A significant part of the mentioned factual material was also introduced into scientific circulation for the first time. A separate section of the monograph provides chronologically structured information that reflects the sequence of research work of the Kharkiv Astronomical Observatory employees during the period under study: from astrometric observations of stars and seismic research to spectrohelioscopic and spectroheliographic observations of the Sun and the initiation of the Kharkiv school of planetary science. It is assumed that the materials of the monograph will be used in research work devoted to the study of the process of institutionalization of astronomical research in Kharkiv at the end of the 19th century – the first half of the 20th century.