Sunshine Was Never Enough: Los Angeles Workers, 1880–2010

John H. M. Laslett

Published by University of California Press 2012

Sunshine Was Never Enough

Los Angeles Workers, 1880–2010

John H. M. Laslett

https://doi.org/10.1525/9780520953871

About this book

Delving beneath Southern California’s popular image as a sunny frontier of leisure and ease, this book tells the dynamic story of the life and labor of Los Angeles’s large working class. In a sweeping narrative that takes into account more than a century of labor history, John H. M. Laslett acknowledges the advantages Southern California’s climate, open spaces, and bucolic character offered to generations of newcomers. At the same time, he demonstrates that—in terms of wages, hours, and conditions of work—L.A. differed very little from America’s other industrial cities. Both fast-paced and sophisticated, Sunshine Was Never Enough shows how labor in all its guises—blue and white collar, industrial, agricultural, and high tech—shaped the neighborhoods, economic policies, racial attitudes, and class perceptions of the City of Angels.

Laslett explains how, until the 1930s, many of L.A.’s workers were under the thumb of the Merchants and Manufacturers Association. This conservative organization kept wages low, suppressed trade unions, and made L.A. into the open shop capital of America. By contrast now, at a time when the AFL-CIO is at its lowest ebb—a young generation of Mexican and African American organizers has infused the L.A. movement with renewed strength. These stories of the men and women who pumped oil, loaded ships in San Pedro harbor, built movie sets, assembled aircraft, and in more recent times cleaned hotels and washed cars is a little-known but vital part of Los Angeles history.

Author / Editor information

Laslett John H. M. :

John Laslett is Professor Emeritus of History at the University of California, Los Angeles. He is the author or co-author of many books including Labor and the Left, Failure of a Dream?, Colliers Across the Sea, and History of the ILGWU in Los Angeles.

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
CONTENTS Publicly Available Download PDF	vii
List of Illustrations Publicly Available Download PDF	ix
Preface and Acknowledgments Publicly Available Download PDF	xi
Introduction: Scope and Purpose Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
Part One: Under the Thumb of the Open Shop Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	11
Part Two: Organized Labor comes into its own Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	105
Part Three: Cultural Change and the Emergence of a new Industrial Order Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	207
Conclusion: Comparative Reflections Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	321
Notes Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	331
Primary Sources Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	413
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	417