The Negro at Work in WWI and Reconstruction is a factual study of African American workers in wartime industry and beyond, based on government data from 1918–1919.
It presents how Negro wage earners fit into key industries, how their hours and pay compared with white workers, and what employers thought about their performance and prospects.
This official bulletin from the U.S. Department of Labor’s Division of Negro Economics examines patterns across multiple sectors, including meat packing, steel, shipyards, and other war industries. It also highlights the ways state and local programs supported fair employment, mobility, and improved labor relations during and after the war. The text blends tables, charts, and narrative to show the actual experiences of workers and the policies intended to widen opportunities. While grounded in the figures, it also discusses the broader social and organizational context of racial adjustment in the workplace.
- Learn how the distribution of white and Negro workers looked across major industries in 1918–1919.
- See how occupations were classified (skilled, semiskilled, unskilled) and how earnings and hours matched up.
- Review employers’ opinions about Negro labor, promotions, and workplace behavior.
- Explore focused chapters on shipyards, meat-packing, and other large industries, plus state-level programs and advisory committees.
Ideal for students, historians, and readers interested in labor history, race relations in the workplace, and early 20th‑century public policy.