Dr Charles McCollester is the Retired Director of the Indiana University of Pennsylvania Labor Center, and he is a founding member and past President of the Battle of Homestead Foundation.
In this video he is describing the life and contributions of Crystal Eastman (1881-1928), a pioneer in Worker Health and Safety Studies and author of Worker Compensation laws. Crystal Eastman was also a pioneer in Women’s rights and Suffrage.
Eastman’s investigation of industrial accidents in Pittsburgh, published as “Work Accidents and the Law” (1910), seemed to be a legal and political breakthrough. She radically revised inherited common law standards, advocating a re-distribution of risk and loss to reconcile common law with common justice. Her formula seemed simple enough. “As I see it,” she explained in 1910, “the risks of trade, borne through all these years by the workmen alone, should in all wisdom and justice be shared by the employer.”
In recognition of her research her Pa History and Museum Commission marker is located in Market Square, Pittsburgh, Pa.
“Charlie’s Monday Marker” is a new history video series from the Battle of Homestead Foundation with Dr. Charles McCollester guiding you on a video walking tour of Pittsburgh’s most famous Labor History Sites, as highlighted in the book “Labor History Sites in the Pittsburgh Region” by Charles McCollester & Howard Scott.
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