Iowa Labor History Oral Project
From its beginnings as a project of the Iowa labor movement to its current form as a dynamic collaboration led by the University of Iowa Labor Center, ILHOP has documented over a century of Iowa and Midwestern history through the lens of workers and their unions in dozens of industries from meatpacking and farm equipment manufacturing to mining, construction, transportation, retail, service, and the public sector.
With over 1,500 interviews, ILHOP records the extraordinary stories of generations of everyday Iowans across lines of race, class, gender, religion, sexuality, language, birthplace, and nationality. In so doing, it reveals the ways in which the story of Iowa workers reflects, deepens, and, at times, even challenges our understanding of a range of histories stretching far beyond a single state or region.
Join us in making ILHOP a hub for students, teachers, librarians, artists, union members, and historians from Iowa and beyond. To get started, you can either follow the links below, or use the menu icon in the top righthand corner of your screen.
