“Part of what keeps the one-percent in power is controlling the historical narrative and convincing people that only by their own individual effort can they succeed,” says labor historian Toni Gilpin. “What labor history teaches us is that progress for working people comes through collective effort, through mutuality and cooperation, and that’s how progress is achieved. But you can only know that for sure when you know the real history of working people.”

Today on the show, Allen spends the hour with Toni Gilpin to discuss her award-winning new book, The Long Deep Grudge, which tells the story of the rise and fall of the radical Farm and Equipment Workers of America (FE).

Toni Gilpin is a labor historian and activist. She is the author of The Long Deep Grudge: A Story of Big Capital, Radical Labor, and Class War in the American Heartland (Haymarket, 2020) and a frequent contributor to Labor Notes.