Today, the US celebrates American workers. Happy Labor Day!

In the late 1800s, American workers were obliged to work 12-hour days, seven days a week, under very difficult conditions. Unions finally had enough, and on May 1st, 1886, hundreds of thousands of people went on strike across the country to demand eight-hour workdays. Three days later, a bomb exploded in Chicago's Haymarket Square – the city at the center of the unrest – as tension mounted between strikers and scabs, killing seven police officers and four civilians. This event only added to the pressure for workers' rights, but it was not until nearly a decade later that President Grover Cleveland signed the Labor Day Act into law in 1894.

May Day continued to be recognized as Labor Day in the rest of the world, as the holiday was eventually adopted internationally. In the United States, the holiday was set for the first Monday in September. This was an attempt to distance any association with the Haymarket riots for fear that they would fuel support for communism and other radical ideas. May Day eventually became a major holiday in the former Soviet Union, marked by large military parades.

Labor Day celebrates the American worker. It is also the unofficial end of the summer vacation and recreation season. In most American school districts, summer ends right after Labor Day. The celebrations are informal, and the main purpose of this holiday is to give people a day off and to recognize the contributions of working men and women to the nation.

On any given Labor Day in the United States, you can smell the barbecues lighting up and see many people gathering informally in parks and in their own backyards. In addition to celebrating workers, this day indicates that summer is coming to an end. In tourist towns, you can start to see cars leaving and people going home. Parades are sometimes held to celebrate the day as well.

Labor Day is also important to professional sports because it marks the official start of the professional football season in the United States. On the Thursday immediately following Labor Day, sports fans watch the very first professional football game of the year. For college students, the start of the academic year occurs right after the holiday, and college football is in full swing shortly after the holiday.

“No white after Labor Day”!

According to historians, the phrase "no white after Labor Day" comes from the time when the upper class returned from their summer vacations and put away their light, white summer clothes to return to school and work. Wearing white shoes after Labor Day and before Memorial Day is considered a faux pas by some fashion-conscious Americans. However, this is a custom that is no longer practiced today.

Unfortunately, this year, once again, with the surge in cases of Covid-19 with the Delta variant across the country, despite eased restrictions, the US Government encourages American people not to commute too much to help stop the spread of the virus. Happy Labor Day, American people!

Sources: History, Britannica, Do Something, The United States Embassy in Georgia