In honor of Women’s History Month, author/historian Dr. Simon Cordery will present his new book, Raising Cain and Consciousness, the story of legendary labor organizer Mary Harris ‘Mother’ Jones.

The free event will be held on March 4 from 7 to 9 p.m. at the Buffalo & Erie Country Historical Society.  It is being hosted by the Monroe Fordham Regional History Center at Buffalo State College. 

Cordery has written extensively about labor relations.  His biography of Mother Jones recounts a life touched by tragedy and deprivation, the events and the era that radicalized her as a stalwart labor organizer and a national symbol of resistance to tyranny.

Mother Jones began life in Ireland during the potato famine.  From there she immigrated to Canada and then to the United States, during which time she lost her husband and four children to yellow fever and saw the destruction of her dressmaking business in the great Chicago fire of 1871. 

Because of what she experienced and what she saw, Mother Jones traveled the country, demanding higher wages and safer working conditions.  She fought in mines, factories and workshops.  Her activism in support of American workers condemned her as ‘the most dangerous woman in America.’  At her death in 1930 at the age of 93, thousands paid tribute at a Washington, D.C., memorial service.

For more information about the event, contact Felix Armfield, professor of history and social studies, at (716) 878-5103.