Blogs

In the summer of 2013, Dallas Pillen was chosen as the first recipient of the Ronald Raven Annual Award. This scholarship includes a stipend and a semester internship with the Wayne State University Archives; it is awarded to a student with an interest in university archives and records management. Upon completion of the intership, Dallas wrote this summary of his experience.

As a student in the Wayne State University School of Library and Information Science, pursuing an MLIS and a Certificate in Archival Administration, and a graduate of Wayne State University’s undergraduate History program, I was intrigued to receive the call for applicants for the Ronald Raven Annual Award, which awards the successful applicant with an internship at the Reuther.  read more »

This is the first in a series of four blog posts annotating Jerry Peacock's 1939 cartoon map of the Wayne University campus. View the entire map here.

In 1939, Wayne University undergraduate and newspaper cartoonist Jerome R. Peacock drew ("with artistic license") a large-scale, heavily-detailed cartoon map of his school's campus. Peacock might have planned to include it in that year's yearbook, but the 1939 Wayne yearbook was cancelled before publication. By the time the map appeared in the 1942 yearbook, it was already somewhat out of date.  read more »

Work speed-ups on the line helped to initiate the 1972 strike at a General Motors assembly plant in Lordstown, Ohio. Although the strike’s impact was initially felt at GM, its influence quickly grew, informing the nation about the struggles of its young workforce, and influencing the content of congressional hearings and national studies.  read more »

Metro Detroiters recognize radio station WDET 101.9 FM as Wayne State University’s local voice for National Public Radio. Prior to 1952, however, WDET served as the local voice for labor. Unhappy with the critical representation of the labor movement in newspapers and on the radio, in 1944 the United Automobile Workers filed applications with the Federal Communications Commission to run independent radio stations in six markets with strong labor ties: the UAW’s hometown of Detroit; Flint, Michigan; Cleveland, Ohio; Los Angeles; Chicago; and Newark, New Jersey.  read more »